I don’t have a biological father anymore. He went on to glory a few years ago. I thank God though for my heavenly father who fills the role of my biological father very well; giving me good and perfect gifts often. So, I think about Him and His role in my life a whole lot.
I think about the love we share, the pain, the joy, the experiences etc and I just love Him more but sometimes I also wonder – Doesn’t He ask for too much? Sometimes it is so bad that I think – does He want to kill me? I have found that the answer is yes, He does. He wants me 'dead' though living. Just like Jesus (God’s ultimate sacrifice) you & I have been called primarily to be a sacrifice to God – living sacrifice.
Romans 12: 1 NLT says ‘And so dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all He has done for you. Let them be a living and Holy Sacrifice – the kind He will find acceptable’.
Sacrifices usually die either physically or to themselves depending on what
personality or cause they have been sacrificed to. God demands that we die.
Mathew 10: 39 NLT says ‘if you cling to your life, you will lose; but if you give up your life for me, you will find it’.
In dying (being sacrificed), we give up our own lives that we may receive the true life – Jesus, the way the truth and the life. The manifestation in the physical of this lose of life can be anything from loss of friends, money, material possessions, position and/or social status. God is in the business of making a demand for the very core of our lives that He may exchange it for better. He is God that does not withhold any good thing from those that give Him their lives so that the pain that follows dying to Him last only for a short while.
Since the flesh is so strong, we have the tendency to take back our lives even after exchanging it: so God says we must take up our cross daily which implies that we must die daily because whenever we carry the cross, we get to Calvary (the place of death) and from there to a position in Christ Jesus. No wonder Paul says ‘I die daily’. We must die daily for God’s purpose to be achieved in and through us.
The experience that comes with being a sacrifice to God makes it very undesirable and man hates pain but loves pleasure. That is why though we all want to get to heaven, we don’t want to die. Instead of yielding to situations that God has allowed to ‘kill us’ so that we may enjoy the abundant life He alone gives, we go round them. We must be reminded that Jesus has taken the sting out of death so the pain is less to you & me. Moreover, He goes through the valley of the shadow of death with us so that we have an assurance that He will bring us out.
1 Corinthians 15: 36 NLT says ‘…when you put a seed into the ground, it doesn’t grow into a plant unless it dies first’’.
Are you a living sacrifice? Are you dead? Do you die daily? Do you feel this pain I feel from time to time? Do you run your life by your intellect, making choices and decisions that are not aligned to the will & word of God? You & I must die that we may become trees of righteousness, plantings of the Lord.
Please ponder on this and share your thoughts with us.
This is profound! He wants me DEAD though LIVING!!!! Going through life, I think I understand why... a DEAD man, doesn’t consider offense, betrayal, disloyalty, unfaithfulness, treachery, infidelity, perfidy; the list is endless and it literally hurts thinking about this list- No wonder we have to die daily cause when we “die” today, something happens tomorrow to acquaint us with the fact that we are alive! Haaaahhh!!! It never ends and it will continue till Jesus comes, but I guess the beauty of it all and what keeps us going, is the anticipation of Victory that comes from dying; life that comes from death... it is a paradox, but its true oh so true.
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