Giving Up That Which Costs - Leviticus 1:1-2

Leviticus 1:1-2
1) And the LORD called unto Moses, and spake unto him out of the tabernacle of the congregation, saying,
2) Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, If any man of you bring an offering unto the LORD, ye shall bring your offering of the cattle, even of the herd, and of the flock.

You may have at some point heard a saying along these lines: “A thing is worth only as much as you are willing to pay for it.” It is generally true that most people take better care of the things that they purchased for themselves than they do those things which are given to them. When a person counts the cost and then makes a decision to part with his money, he is demonstrating that he believes the money he is giving up is of equal or lesser value than the product he is purchasing.

This leads me to ask myself: What is my relationship to the Lord worth? What am I willing to give up for the sake of my Lord? In Leviticus 1:2, the children of Israel are commanded to bring an animal sacrifice to the Lord, but it could not be just any animal sacrifice. They were to bring an “offering of the cattle, even of the herd, and of the flock.” This statement indicates that they were limited to sacrificing their own domesticated livestock (The Reformation Study Bible, p. 156), not just a wild animal or someone else’s animals. They had to decide whether or not it was worth it to give up that animal they had raised and poured so much of their resources into. It was a significant monetary sacrifice to obey the Lord. It cost them something.

So, what is my relationship to the Lord worth? What am I willing to sacrifice for Him? At this point, it is easy for me (and maybe you too) to think of all the things that I have “sacrificed” for the Lord (though it is not really a sacrifice to give up something for God because there is nobody or nothing that has more real value than He does). Even this past Sunday, Pastor Schaal mentioned how tempting it can be to think highly of ourselves for sacrificing something in our lives that may be a more difficult for someone else to give up theirs. We think critically of them in order to think better of ourselves. For example, if you look at my user profile on this blog, you will see that I am not really into watching movies. It is not that I despise them or think they are inherently wrong. There are just many other things that I would rather do. Now, it would be easy for me to look down on another Christian who cannot control his movie-watching habits, maybe even to the point that he is watching that which clearly does not please the Lord. I could think that I am something special because I do not have the same struggle. But does that make me more spiritual? Hardly. Where that believer may be struggling in one particular area, there are areas in my life that I have the same difficulty surrendering in order to prioritize my relationship to the Lord. It does not have to be something that is inherently wrong; just something that I have allowed to become a god in my life. Am I willing to give up whatever it is in order to be completely obedient to God? Am I willing to sacrifice something that has value to me so I may be more submissive to Christ? Am I willing to give up that which costs me something?

Oh, that we who know Christ would quit giving Christ lip-service in our sacrifice, and instead, give Him preeminence (Col. 1:18)!