Reading 1 Peter this morning.<\/p>\n
These verses leapt off the page:<\/span><\/p>\n ”\u00a0As you come to him, the living Stone\u2014rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him\u2014 you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.<\/strong>\u00a0(1 Peter 2:4, 5 NIV)<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n What have I offered as spiritual sacrifices? Does it depend on what I consider a spiritual sacrifice or what He views as a sacrifice?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n I don’t know that it’s ever crossed my mind. How can that be?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n I’ve seen things as sacrifice: relationships, jobs, living situations, time,\u00a0desires, stuff.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n It occurs to me that everything in that list is of this world. Somehow I’ve missed it- spiritual sacrifice- I don’t even begin to know what that looks like in my spirit.<\/span><\/p>\n Or do I?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Fast forward\u2026.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0I wrote those notes above in my phone while I was drinking my vente non-fat latte outside of a STBX in downtown Phoenix last week.\u00a0 Little did I know, God was preparing me for a momentous demonstration of spiritual sacrifice.<\/span><\/p>\n In. My. Life.<\/span><\/p>\n I\u2019m still processing and trying to understand why and what motivates me towards or away from spiritual sacrifice. This, I have discovered, is a struggle and will be a struggle for a while because I\u2019m trying to come to terms with it. Sometimes, I just want my own way. {alright-most of the time}<\/span><\/p>\n I I finished my coffee and started walking back to the hotel. I had noticed that there were more than just one or two homeless folk around the neighborhood. Some walked with purpose, some aimless, some conversed with themselves, and some just sat-as if waiting. For someone. Something.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n I passed by the metro station where a woman and two men and a small dog were sitting. She looked up and called out, \u201cMa\u2019am, could you spare 50 cents?\u201d I said, \u201cI\u2019m sorry.\u201d Shrugged my shoulders and picked up the pace. She said, \u201cthank you.\u201d {I\u2019m thinking: for what?}<\/span><\/p>\n And then, God got right down into the middle of that thought fast and furious.<\/span><\/p>\n This was what His world was all about- \u201cIf you love me, feed my sheep<\/strong>.\u201d \u201cSometimes it\u2019s not about feeding them scripture, it\u2019s just about providing for a need<\/strong>.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n I got to the corner. Still arguing with myself and Him. I get frustrated with the duplicitous way my brain works sometimes. I see things from both sides of an argument and am rendered inoperable. This was one of those moments and in the brief crack of time of my next breath, He said, \u201cGo back. Now.<\/strong>\u201d And I\u2019m saying, \u201cHow can I do this?\u201d All the while thinking about the subject of my being an enabler. {oh the mind and its workings} He said, \u201copen that wallet and take out a $5 and go back and give it to her.<\/strong>\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n I crossed the street to the opposite corner.<\/span><\/p>\n I stopped.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n I looked down at my wallet.<\/span><\/p>\n It was true that I didn\u2019t have 50 cents. But, I had so much more in my life than she. I opened my wallet and took out a folded $5.\u00a0 Thoughts were flying through my head:\u00a0yes, no, but, what if, why, why me?<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Then: \u201cYes<\/em><\/strong>.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n I walked back across the street, down the block to where she sat, now arguing with one of the guys.\u00a0 I stopped, she looked up. I said \u201cI don\u2019t have 50 cents, but here\u2019s a five.\u201d I pressed it into her hand and said something like \u201chave a blessed day\u201d and turned away before she could see the tears welling up in my eyes. But not before I saw the disbelief, gratitude and fear cross her face in that instant when she said \u201cthank you\u201d. Again.<\/span><\/p>\n Who was I kidding?<\/em>\u00a0\u201cHave a blessed day.\u201d\u00a0Really?<\/strong>\u00a0That was all you could think to say??<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Now the reality is this: I didn\u2019t tell you this story to have you verbally pat me on the back in the comments. This isn\u2019t a \u2018congratulations, you finally did something outside your comfort zone\u2019 moment.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n This is what I want you to know: I struggled all the way back to the hotel with God. Because I did what He asked of me and I didn’t want to.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n And I felt helpless.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Over the past few days the realization came to me that this was my spiritual sacrifice. Obedience when I didn\u2019t want to be obedient. Obedience when it grated. Obedience when I actually listened and did what He asked.\u00a0well, duh<\/em>\u00a0Obedience when all the arguments about panhandlers are running amok in my head and I just did not want to do this. {dumb-I know}<\/span><\/p>\n The act of submitting my will to His even when I\u2019m not willing.\u00a0Ohh, that sounds awful now.<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0To come to understand deep in my gut that He really does mean it when he says \u201cwhen you do it unto the least of these\u2026\u201d<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Please try to understand I have never had a problem saying \u201cYes\u201d to God when it was actually what I wanted anyway. Do any of us? Of course not. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Youth camp? I\u2019m there. Teach Sunday school? Sure. Work the nursery? Yep. Donate funds? Absolutely.<\/span><\/p>\n It was that pushing and nudging and pleading of the Holy Spirit to my spirit that made my heart skip beats, my skin flush with heat, the arguing with myself and coming to terms with the fact that I\u2019m trying to say \u201cno\u201d to God.\u00a0 I don\u2019t like myself very much when I\u2019m this way. I\u2019m sure He is saddened by my thoughts as well. He didn\u2019t make me turn around and go back. But, He did make me see it would be impossible for me to live with myself if I hadn\u2019t. This was a crisis moment for me- to subjugate my will to His. And it wasn\u2019t the first.<\/span><\/p>\n This was not the go to Haiti as a group to help or send money\/clothes\/things to missionaries in Africa or support a friend who was going on a mission trip to spread the Gospel.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0This was up close and personal: \u201cMake a choice. Do you love Me? Feed my sheep. This sheep.<\/strong>\u201d It was what He wanted me to do.<\/span><\/p>\n I know the five didn’t go far in the world we live in. But maybe, just maybe a seed was planted or a seed already planted was watered. And definitely, I found, hard as it was, it was meant for me. To learn again- spiritual sacrifice = obedience. Peter knew what he was talking about.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Reading 1 Peter this morning. These verses leapt off the page: ”\u00a0As you come to him, the living Stone\u2014rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him\u2014 you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.\u00a0(1 … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[107,10,106],"class_list":["post-136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","tag-not-my-will","tag-obedience","tag-sacrifice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":138,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136\/revisions\/138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsfromthehomefront.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}