offering

living in community
did i ever say this is easy?
i had an idea coming in that i was taking a chance of God wrecking my comfortable world
the Westside itself is nothing compared to what i have learned living with a new family
people who are amazing,
but yet not like me
they don’t think like me
or see things the way i see them
or prioritize what i prioritize
and there shouldn’t be anything wrong with this
but it has been a difficult couple of days (if not weeks)
and the problem is probably my heart
i'm learning to understand myself and where i have come from
in order to understand why i can become so frustrated at times
and the more i spend time at home with my family (my biological family)
the more i realize how i love and how i feel loved
my mom and dad have loved me well
and they have loved my brothers and sisters well
and i have learned that love looks like acts of service
and words of affirmation
some time, an occasional gift,
but mostly the awareness to see a need and meet it without it being asked
i have had life so good
parents who work hard
and would do anything for their children
and i see how much they did expecting nothing in return
simply pouring out in selfless service
so that we will learn by example
and this is what Paul models too,
declaring his life to be a drink offering (Philippians 2:17)
given completely in love
and then his disciple, Timothy, says the exact same of his life,
learned from Paul’s example (2 Timothy 4:6)
the Old Testament describes a drink offering as something that is poured out on a sacrifice for God (Exodus 29:40-1, Numbers 28:7)
[so maybe pouring myself out on behalf of someone else is a way of interceding for that person’s life to become a sacrifice to the glory of God]
and this is the sacrifice that Paul demands of us in Romans 12, “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God – this is your spiritual act of worship.”
and the OT passages talk about an offering and a sacrifice as something that is “pleasing to God,” but Romans says, “holy and pleasing to God.” What changed? Why holy? Jesus.
because He changed everything.
and it is because of Him that i can love and i can pour out and i can learn to love with the humility of Jesus.
Andrew Murray says, and Jenn often reminds me, that the type of obedience that Jesus had is possible.
he wouldn’t call us to it if it weren’t.
1 Peter says that we were have been chosen by God for obedience to Jesus
and Jesus says that we will do the things He did and greater, but He only did the things that He did through obedience to God’s will
and this by the most sacrificial love