Sacrifice! Are You Talking To Me?

Bobby Gums 07.15.2024

Speaking of our sacrifices as children of God, there are three I have been made aware of that I would like to share that certainly deserve our utmost attention. With the focus on our spiritual growth in the grace and knowledge

of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ (2 Pet 3:18) and in response to His making us accepted in the beloved (Eph 1:6), let us consider the following passages as they relate to the intimate nature of our relationship with our Lord and to His glory:

 

1) Heb 13:15, By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name.

Are we not compelled by the love of God and a grateful heart to engage in the act of offering our thanksgiving and commendation for His worthiness and excellence?  1 Peter 2:4 speaks of the “living stone” (our Lord Jesus), who was disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God, and precious and in verse 5, of us as “lively stones” (as alive to God by faith in the sacrifice and atonement of the Living Stone), are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. The apostle Paul, having received gifts from the Philippians, expresses his sentiments in chapter 4 verse 18: But I have all, and abound: I am full, having received of Epaphroditus the things which were sent from you, an odour of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable, wellpleasing to God.  Is this not an indication of how our Lord receives our offering of praise, as we seek not only to satisfy His needs as our faith requires, but in the continual sacrifice of our praise to Him? Surely, God’s heart is “full” in the same way as we willingly and lovingly offer our sacrifices of praise to Him!

 

2) Heb 13:16:  But to do good and to communicate [Fellowship] forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.

To offer fellowship, partnership, participation, contribution, and communion to the community of believers, wherever we may find them, is another sacrifice of ours in which the Lord is well pleased! If we always keep to ourselves rather than offering this sacrifice of communication with each other, the whole body suffers loss. However, when we no longer treat each other as strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God… Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone [of our foundation], we will find ourselves as a building fitly framed together [that] groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord (Eph 2:19-21), and in these things our God is highly exalted and glorified and is well pleased!

 

3) Rom 12:1: I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.

A willful yielding our lives, as alive from the dead, being ‘other’ because of likeness of nature with our Lord, with a strong desire to be accepted and well-pleasing to our Lord at all times in our thoughts, our words, and our deeds.

 

The more we consider Him in every aspect of our lives, the less these seem like sacrifices!

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For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ (Eph 4:12)

Bobby Gums

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