THREE GOOD SACRIFICES
Hebrews 13:15-16 NKJV
15 Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name. 16 But do not forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
Sacrifice is not a word we hear much about in our culture today. We hear about building our brand or finding our passion. But we rarely hear about sacrifices that are pleasing to God. So today, here are three sacrifices. All good. All doable. All pleasing to God.
The sacrifice of praise to God. I looked up the word sacrifice in a couple of different dictionaries. One focused on the loss involved with sacrifice. The other had a better definition: "The act of giving up something highly valued for the sake of something else considered to have a greater value or claim." So, in the case where we are offering the sacrifice of praise, we are giving up our feelings for the sake of praising God, which has greater value. Praising God is more valuable than our feelings. And another element involved in the sacrifice of praise is the word "continually." I can not speak for everyone, so I will use myself. The "continually" part is an area that I have to improve. And yet the admonishment of the Scriptures is that we are to be praising and thanking God all the time. Paul wrote to the Philippians to rejoice in the Lord always. And then he doubled down with, again, I say rejoice, just in case they missed the directive the first time. And Paul wrote to the Thessalonians to rejoice always and give thanks in all things. To do something on a continual basis, we are doing it regardless of feelings. Sometimes we feel like praising, but many times we don't. But when we do, we are offering a sacrifice of praise and thanks which are pleasing to the Lord.
And here are two more sacrifices that we can all get excited about. Right in the middle of us continually praising and thanking God, we are to do good and share. This would involve helping others and giving. Sharing involves using our financial resources to help people and also advance God's kingdom. So that would have us giving up something of value for the sake of something else of higher value. God's people and God's Kingdom would be the higher value proposition here. And don't forget doing good. I don't believe it's a stretch that doing good is sacrificing our time for the purpose of advancing God's kingdom. Many, if not all, of the people who volunteer at The Ark are sacrificing their time to help. They are doing good, and with their sacrifice, God is well pleased.
We don't talk much about sacrifice today, but if we are going to talk about pleasing God with our lifestyle, then we need to add sacrifice to the narrative. I do believe that as The Church exhibits a sacrificial lifestyle, it will stand out more and more to a self-absorbed, unhappy culture. God has always known what the best way is for man to be satisfied, and these three sacrifices are a big step in the right direction.