Sacrificial Love
written by Chris Baker
I am privileged to have such an extraordinary example of sacrificial love from such a young age! My grandmother (Oma), of whom I was extremely close to as a child, was in the hospital dying of cancer on my birthday. She refused to have her death associated with my birthday so, in an act of sacrificial love, she held on for one more agonizing day. I was only seven at the time.
It was even more amazing when I learned of the sacrificial love of my Savior! Jesus not only died sacrificially, but He died for me. In fact, He died for the entire world! 1 John 3:16 says, “We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us” (NRSV). Unbeknownst to me, I stood as a condemned man before God as a result of my sin. My sin had to be paid for. You may be wondering, how could such a price for sin be paid for? The Bible says the wages of sin are death Romans 6:23. What is one to do then? Thanks be to God for Christ Jesus our Lord.
His perfect, innocent, sinless life paid the price for my sin. Jesus willingly took on my punishment for sin. He took the wrath of God, intended for me, onto Himself! Through His death and resurrection my relationship with God was restored. I can now enjoy sweet fellowship with the loving God who created me. I now possess a very personal and authentic relationship with God Himself – God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
How can one begin such a relationship with this personal loving God? Can we earn it by working for it? Can it be purchased? Scripture provides the answer in Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— 9 not the result of works, so that no one may boast” (NRSV). You mean this gift is free? What will it cost then? Everything!
In order to receive this gift, we must be willing to lay down our lives for Jesus. We must surrender our entire selves to Him. What does this look like? The Christian must be willing to allow God full lordship of our lives. In the Savior’s great providence, He has given us His promised Holy Spirit John 14:15-26. The very Spirit of God Himself can now live and dwell within us. This means the believer will be able to submit to and obey the commands of God – through the power of the Holy Spirit within us. The Bible says that God writes His very laws upon our hearts so that we will know His will and how to obey it Hebrews 10:15-18. Notice this work is done by the Spirit of God, not by our own strength.
Salvation is available to any person that has breath in their lungs. If they will simply humble themselves before a Holy God, acknowledge their sinful lifestyles, repent of this sin, seek forgiveness for this sin, acknowledge Jesus as God’s only Son and confess that God Himself rose Jesus from the grave – then we can freely receive the gift of Salvation. The gift that is only available to us because of the sacrificial love of our Savior – Christ Jesus our Lord!
And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. 24 The one who keeps God’s commands lives in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us.
1 John 3:23-24
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The Barnabas Corner 