In a typical day, I would say that I waste a good 2-4 hours either doing nothing or doing something that is not necessarily bad but my time could be much better spent. Sometimes just giving up a little time watching TV or sitting on Facebook would allow me to spend more time with God rather than just saying I am bored. I figure that if I want to start to mature in Christ, I have to find meaning in scriptures that tell the story of someone else's experience instead of just finding passages that tell me what to do and all I have to do to get something out of it is think of a way to apply it to my life. With that in mind, I prayed that God would speak to me in a different way today and that led me to 2 Samuel 18-25. Here we find King David who has just been told to build an altar and make a sacrifice to God. The Israelites have had a plague upon them because of their wickedness and it is David's job to make the sacrifice to God in order to ask forgiveness and to make the atonement for their wickedness. David knows his duty and goes up to buy a threshing floor as well as some oxen. When he arrives, the salesman Araunah offers these gifts to David so that he should not have to pay in order to make the sacrifice. However, David declines and states, "I will not sacrifice to the Lord my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing." After David paid, he built the altar and made the sacrifice and then God answered his the prayer and the plague was stopped.
What I gather from this is not just that I need to make some sacrifices to God, but they have to show value to me. It is easy for me to give the extra hamburger that I bought and could not eat to a homeless person on the street but what if i were to fast a meal and buy that homeless person a meal and address their needs. Sure we need to eat so that may be a little extreme, but the point I am trying to make is that sacrifices are not supposed to be easy to make, that is why they are sacrifices. God does not want just the spare time we have in our day, he wants the time when we can give as much of ourselves to him as possible and when he can invest in our lives. It does not necessarily just mean sacrificing time either, I could sacrifice my reputation, money, or even my friendship with those that are trying to drag me down. Now in the case of the latter, I should be trying to help those that are trying to drag me down and spread God's word with them. This seems like such a simple thing to do, but in reality it is very tough. I always complain that I am bored and I will sit around and waste many hours in a week because I feel like I am just useless at the time. I have recently given up non-christian music for the most part because I feel like it drags me down. I still have it in my itunes library and on my ipod but I have not really listened to it in the last 3 weeks because I enjoy listening to the christian music more. It has really changed my attitude and when I walk around campus I just sing those songs in my head and smile (sometimes even at people... gasp!). Nobody ever knows what I am doing, but i feel that I am glowing and people are seeing something different about me because I am glorifying God as I walk around campus. What could you be doing to glorify God by making just a little sacrifice?
I feel that as I begin this last week, I still have a long way to go and the homestretch is not going to be easy. I know that God is with me though and he is guiding me along the way and soon enough it will be Thanksgiving and i will be at home with my friends and family. Continue to seek God and think about what you can do to make some changes or sacrifices that will encourage your own walk with Christ. Comments are still open and phone is still on so do not hesitate to ask a question or call/text whenever you feel like it. Have a blessed day and enjoy the rest of the weekend!
Joseph Robinson
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