His sacrifice...our privilege

                               A little food for weekend thought--

       "I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.  Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." (Rom.12:1-2)
       Such powerful, convicting, counter-cultural words.  To offer ourselves--our hands, feet, legs, arms, hearts, heads--as living sacrifices to the One who sacrificed everything for us.  How quickly and easily we claim our rights, insist on our desires, demand our prerogatives.  And how reluctantly we (or should I say, I) sacrifice our time, our possessions, our very bodies on the altar of worship.
       Oh forgive us, forgive me, Father.
       Such a sacrifice always ultimately results in joyful worship and glorious praise to our God.  As Hebrews 13:15 puts it, "Through Him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is the fruit of lips that acknowledge His name."  Oh might we daily, constantly offer up that sacrifice of thanksgiving and praise to the Lord with our lips, our attitudes, and our actions.
       But here's the thing--we simply can never ever out-give Almighty God!  What is any sacrifice on our part, really, in comparison with the sacrifice Christ made for us?  It's like comparing a a microscopic molecule of water with the vast ocean.  No comparison!
        David Livingstone wrote: "People talk about the sacrifice I have made in spending so much of my life in Africa.  Can that be called a sacrifice which is simply paid back as a small part of a great debt owing to our God, which we can never repay?  Is that a sacrifice which brings its own best reward in healthful activity, the consciousness of doing good, peace of mind, and bright hope of a glorious destiny hereafter?  Away with the word in such a view and thought!  It was emphatically no sacrifice.  Say rather it is a privilege...I never made a sacrifice.  Of this we ought not to talk when we remember the great sacrifice which He made who left His Father's throne on high to give Himself for us."
       Nate Saint was one of the five missionaries killed by the Auca Indians while attempting to bring them the Good News of God's salvation through Jesus Christ.  Nate Saint, Jim Elliott, and the others offered the ultimate sacrifice of their bodies and their very lives in their service to and love for their Savior.  Yet Saint once wrote, "If we could only grasp the significance of the Incarnation, the word 'sacrifice' would disappear from our vocabulary."
       Today, consider it a high and holy privilege when God allows and accepts any kind of "sacrifice" on your part.  Men and women across this globe are literally sacrificing their very lives for their belief in the Lord Jesus.  If they can die for Him, how can we not willingly, joyfully, offer Him our time, our bodies, our priorities, our possessions, our sleep, our reputation, our words, our desires, and our thoughts?
       Lord, every single bit of it is Yours.  All yours.  We place it all at Your nail-scarred feet.
      Thank You for the privilege of sacrificially worshipping and serving You.  Thank You, thank You, thank You, Jesus,  for paying the greatest cost and making the ultimate sacrifice for us.
      Worthy is the Lamb who was slain.
      To God be the glory.