“He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all…” Romans 8:32
God the greatest lover and giver of all, that great, merciful, awesome and gracious God demonstrated his love for sinners by giving of himself, sending Jesus the beloved in whom “dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily” (Col 2:9) to die and give of himself and all he was (even his glory and deity) that we may have life and be reconciled back to God. God by his unfathomable amazing grace did not withhold anything, but gave his best, his all for us! How he loves us. God is love!
God set the example by his love and expects the same from us in reciprocation of what he has done and continues to do for us. He desires and longs for all of us too! He wants us to give to him all we are! Our very lives! With that he is well pleased. He has bought us from this world with his son’s blood to be his very own possession. We are no longer our own but belong to him!
Jesus said it all when he said “you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength: this is the first commandment.”(Mark 12:30). He said this was the first and greatest commandment, no other work; no other command was greater than this. To love God with heart, soul, mind, strength, is to love him with all we are, our very being!
The life he has called us to, bought us into is a life of being given wholly to him. It is no longer we who live but Christ lives in us. The cross changed everything, we no longer belong to ourselves, nor have rights over ourselves. We are his possession, created in Christ Jesus to Love the father and glorify him. We have died to who we ever were and now we live to and for God.
To die costs everything. It’s easy to try to hold on to who we are, what we want, what we desire, what we know and give God only what is convenient or easy, but he is not satisfied with less than our very lives. Jesus said “whosoever would save his life/ seek to save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake, the same shall save/preserve it.”(Luke 9:24; Luke 17:33). The dead have no rights, neither are they concerned with self preservation, they are after all dead. And this is the life we are called to live. A life of dying to who we are and say as Paul “for me to live is Christ”, “But God forbid that I should glory (boast), except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified to me, and I to the world.” (Galatians 6:14)
If we try to save our lives we will lose them. If we try to keep part of who we are for ourselves, we will lose our lives (be separated from God).
It’s easy to give God what cost nothing, what is comfortable and politically correct and easy, but keep away from God that which we want to keep for ourselves, but God says, ‘Lose your life for my sake and you will keep it. Deny yourself, take up your cross daily (die daily) and follow me’. We must die to our own dreams, ambitions, interests, reputations, desires, importance and surrender all we are to God that he may do as he will with us and live through us. What do we love more than God or second to God or equal to God, what defines us and identifies us that we would not give up for him? He says he alone must be first and Great and God in our lives. “You shall have no other gods before me”. Jesus said is we even love our children, spouses, parents or our own lives more than him we are not worthy of him. Yes he must be first even above family. He is a jealous God; he will share his place, his glory with no other.
Abraham, ready to kill his very own beloved long awaited son for the love of God, he pleased God and it was accounted to him as righteousness. He was a friend of God, he pleased God. God gave his testimony after he tested his heart “for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son from me.” (Genesis 22:12)
David said “neither will I offer burnt offerings to the LORD my God of that which does cost me nothing” (2 Samuel 24:24)
O sacrifice costs something, it costs everything, but the sacrifices of God are a broken and contrite heart, the sacrifices of God are not in works and doings, but in giving all we are “I beseech you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies (your entire being, your all) a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service” (Romans 12:1)
Such a heart, wholly given to him, desires him alone and would do anything for the lover of its soul. The cry of such a heart is described in David’s hearts cry to the Lord in Psalms 63 :“O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory. Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you.”
David’s throne, his kingship, his wealth meant nothing to him, they were but a worship unto the Lord, his soul cry was always “ more of you God” and God saw this longing and soul thirst and desperation and granted it. David was a man after his own heart. A broken heart he will never despise or deny. He has said “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.”Matthew 5:6
He shall fill the heart that hunger and thirsts after who he is: his righteousness. He shall satisfy such a heart with no less that more of him and his righteousness and glory. He longs for such worshippers; he is pleased with the sacrificial giving of all we are to him. When we break open the alabaster boxes of our lives to him he memorializes that worship and giving and satisfies such a heart. He longs to be chased and sought and he has promises “YOU shall seek me, and find me, when you shall search for me with all your heart” Jeremiah 29:13
In his love,
Mwendwa
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Amen.