Chardon United Methodist Church

The word was to be courage, but by combining our March and April newsletters, I’ve chosen SACRIFICE. We’ve been hearing this word a lot lately. The dictionary defines sacrifice as: 1) an act of offering to do a deity something precious. 2) something offered in sacrifice. 3) a destruction or surrender of something for the sake of something else. Wow! This describes much of what is happening in our world today. Men and women are sacrificing their lives to fight in the war in Iraq. Many are sacrificing due to loss of job and income. Many are giving to others through service at soup kitchens, homeless shelters, etc. Sacrifice. It is a powerful thing. We see it everyday. Yet, it is a hard thing to do.

Could we give up our time, jobs, families, even our lives, for others? Many times we’re asked to help do someone’s yard, or help fix up the church or prepare a meal. How often are we willing to give the time to do those simple things? ASP—many of us choose to attend. But how often do we say, “I can’t miss work for a week”, or “I can’t be away from my friends”, or “It’s too dirty and hot”, etc., etc., etc? We may be willing to sacrifice but only on OUR terms, not God’s. What about God? What sacrifices did He make? Look again at the description  of sacrifice. He offered something precious—His own son. He surrendered Him to death for the sake of our salvation. He gave Him up so that we could have life. Pretty awesome, but then again,. He IS an awesome God! In Isaiah 53, called the chapter of the “suffering servant” , we read of Christ’s sacrifice. “He was despised and rejected, a man of suffering and acquainted with infirmity...Surely he has borne our infirmities and carried our diseases...But he was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the punishment that made us whole, and by his bruises we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have all turned to our own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” For us, because He loved and still loves us, God through His son Jesus sacrificed all. Let us never forget it, let us truly accept it, let us fully live it by sacrificing our time and needs to help others, and let us go out and share it, the gospel of salvation in Jesus, throughout the world.