serve… sacrificially

Sacrifice: the surrender or destruction of something prized or desirable for the sake of something considered as having a higher or more pressing claim. – Random House Dictionary 2010.

I love this definition. It says so much. Just like the concept of love, sacrifice involves a battle, in a sense, that challenges and stretches you. Sacrifice calls us out of the shadows and makes us take a stand for something. The challenge to sacrifice reveals who we are at the core.

Unfortunately, if there is a word that has been all but banished from our language these days it is “sacrifice.” Sacrifice? Why? I mean why would we be asked to do that? For the most part, this generation (and more so the one after it) has had everything it has wanted, when it wanted it and not a second late. Our idea of sacrifice is watching the game on DVR instead of live, letting someone merge in front of you (but ONLY one ; ) ), or giving up lattes for a day. I’m trying to demean simple acts of sacrifice because they are meaningful and important but I do believe that the idea of serving and sacrificing we see in the Bible comes with a much greater price. Jesus told us that He came to serve and ultimately to sacrifice His life for ours. There has never been a more beautiful or pure act of love, service and sacrifice.

For all these reasons, we tied the words serve and sacrifice together when we began thinking about the core values of day|twelve. I pray that day|twelve will be a place where people serve sacrificially.  Honestly, I don’t think one can truly serve without sacrificing because the concept of Biblical service includes sacrifice. I hope that day|twelve will consist of people who serve others who don’t think of their own personal needs but rather pouring out their time and talent for someone else. Imagine a place where people are concerned about the needs of others and serving without any other motive than honoring God and following the example that Christ set. That sounds like a place that I’d want to belong to…

Serve. Sacrificially.