November 29, 2009

A Sacrifice of Thanksgiving

Psalm 50:14 – “Sacrifice thank offerings to God, fulfill your vows to the Most High”

Sacrifice and thanksgiving in the same sentence . . . how can you make sense of that? Sacrificing sounds painful and requires giving up something while thanksgiving conveys delight and joy for an abundance of blessing. But in Psalm 50:14 – the psalmists calls us to “sacrifice a thank offering to God.”

We usually express thanksgiving verbally by showing gratitude for a gift or for showing satisfaction for a blessed life. We do this every Sunday – we sing songs of praise and gratitude for God’s grace, His mercy, His forgiveness, His unconditional love and His provisions for our daily living. But it does it feel like we’re sacrificing something? If we’re honest about it – expressing songs of praise and prayers of thanksgiving doesn’t seem like sacrificing at all.

Let’s do this – think of a costly way you can give thanks to the Lord. See, words alone can be cheap but offering God your life by submitting to His will – now that can be costly. So what is of value to you that you can offer to God? Your life? Your time? Your possessions? Have you surrendered all of these to God? Jesus prayed, “Your kingdom come, your will be done.” Have we really done that? It’s those who live this selfless, surrendered life to God that really offer a genuine gratitude that brings praise to our God.

Giving is another expression of gratitude that is costly. God is the source of all our that we have – “the earth is the Lord’s and everything in it.” So when we learn to give of our time, our financial resources for God’s Kingdom work, for those in need then we have truly offered a sacrifice of thanksgiving. Giving is a reflection that God is in our lives. Why? John 3:16 reminds us that God loved the world that he gave . . . “Giving is a good gauge of our godlikeness.

Sure offering thanks involves words but as we grow and mature in Christ it should express itself in offering the things we value to God and allow Him to take control and carry out His plans in our lives. Now, you can never out give God but do all you can to offer to Him daily a sacrifice of thanks – amazing things will happen as you do so.

Dino Miciano