Sacrifice

Sacrifice is something that we hear about nonstop. Even in a nonreligious context, we hear about it all the time. "Do the right thing." "You need to sacrifice this for that." "You need to make a decision." The thing with all of those is, they're only a material or temporary deference in life. What happens when God asks for all of you. It's kind of a scary thought. At the same time, it's definitely something that is comforting. If God has all of me, then what do I need to worry about, right?

Not so much. Even when we know that God has us held close to Him, why do we pull away? Why is it that when we know we need to give something up, we fight it off? Well, I say we--usually I mean me. There are so many things that we're "supposed" to let go of when we begin a walk with Christ. I think that some people are under the impression that they'll just magically stop being part of our lives when Jesus takes over. It's definitely not that. I was one of the people who thought that would be the case--but in reality it's just conviction setting in so that we know it's wrong, but God leaves it up to us to decide what to do about it. Gotta love that wonderful thing called free will. I just can't imagine being Abraham and having God tell me to sacrifice my son. Something that is part of me. Something that I wouldn't imagine letting go of or hurting. Abraham could have very easily said "no, he's my son and I'm going to leave him be."

Did he? No. The scripture doesn't say what might have been going through Abraham's mind at the time, but I can imagine it wasn't pretty. When God speaks to you in a way that says "it's either Me, or this obstacle," it's such a shocking wakeup call. At the same time, we need to be willing and ready to trust in Christ when we know that there's something standing in the way of our relationship with Him. The Father only wants what's best for his child, right? I've heard Abraham and Isaac mentioned a million times in various contexts in sermons, but my challenge to anyone who reads this is to be able to go deeper into what happened that day--and how God moved through Abraham. The faith and devotion to the Lord is so admirable; the strength and willingness to follow in faith even when he couldn't see is something that everybody should strive to be. Will it be perfect? No. But God wants faithfulness, not perfection. That in itself is such a reassurance from a wonderful, merciful, Father who gave the ultimate sacrifice so we could know eternal peace.