Day 7 - What are you willing to sacrifice?

GENESIS 21:8-23:20; GENESIS 11:32; GENESIS 24:1-67

God calls Abraham to sacrifice his only son! After waiting for so long to be able to have a child, could you imagine being asked to offer your child up as a sacrifice? Issac was everything to Abraham and Abraham was giving everything to him. Abraham had to forget his dreams and do what God was asking of him. God tested Abraham's belief in the impossible. Do you think on the journey to the place God had planned, Abraham was angry? sad? full of guilt? full of questions? was he asking God why his only son? Was he concerned with the future or what would be coming next? After becoming a mother, I simply could not imagine! Just the thought of the journey to sacrifice my child makes my heart break. Isaac seems to be a strong teenager that was willing to give up his life. There doesn't seem to be any physical struggle to have Isaac lie on the altar. By carrying the wood, we know Isaac was at least a young man. Isaac, it seems, willingly gave up his life at his father’s request just as Jesus did. What fear would your child have? As parents our children trust us. They trust their lives in our hands. We are called to love and respect God above any one else! Abraham demonstrates this in the same way that God gave us His son!

God made us love our children, treasure them, and to ask us to give them to Him... Wow, what a struggle. After almost loosing a person that is SO dear to me during child birth, I look at the sweet face today and I am in awe that she is still with us!! In the same since that I am in awe of this child, there is another that I am saddened for the family! In 2 days tomorrow a son was lost to SIDS 2 years ago. Seeing a mom and dad, grandparents, family, and friends go through the unexpected loss of a child. This child is with God now and we do not understand why. If God is calling you to give something in your life to Him are you willing to do follow Him? What if He asked you to not do something that you wanted to do for so long and now you think you have a chance to do it? What about an item, is there something that you hold so dear you wouldn't give it to anyone? What about something that you love to do... or something that you know you should give up and won't? Why? Why is it so hard to give up ANYTHING in life when we know it is what God is calling us to do?

Abraham is our example, we are to take his actions and his faith and not just learn from it, but do it! What are you willing to sacrifice? What are you willing to lay down for God? What is God calling you to do in your life that you aren't ready to do? What are you doing that God is calling you to stop? I hope these questions are affecting you like they are me... God has called me to be a wife, a mother, a child, and a friend... He has and is asking me to lay down the wrong in life, to start doing right, to live by His grace, to live by His word!


Very Respectfully,
Leslie

I am redeemed and forgiven by the grace of Christ. - Ephesians 1:7