Salvation and Sacrifice
“I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.”
Romans 12:1, NRSV
When I was a missionary in Northern Africa, I often purchased meat from the market. I had to point out to the butcher a live chicken, which he would then proceed to slaughter, clean it and cut it up and package it for me. In the United States, for most of us (if not all), our meat comes washed, cleaned and prepackaged. We are far removed from the realities of a butcher in a slaughterhouse that I wonder if this disconnect makes us understandably feel icky about the Old Testament concept of animal sacrifices.
Yet, there was a greater purpose to the animal sacrifices in the Old Testament. Apart from the sacrifice of the Passover lamb, which reminded the Israelites of their redemption from Egyptian slavery and the sacrifices of Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement), whose purpose was to make annual sin offerings to God, there were numerous other animal sacrifices illustrated in the Old Testament. These sacrifices reminded the Israelites that they were to offer their lives as a living sacrifice to God in response to His great salvation for them.
As Christians, this connection between salvation and sacrifice is even more profound. Just as Christ, our Passover lamb who was sacrificed to take away our sins, we are called to respond by becoming living sacrifices to God and to “offer and present unto thee, O Lord, our selves, our souls and bodies,” as our Eucharistic prayer teaches us every Sunday (“The Book of Common Prayer,” pg. 342).
The prayer quotes Paul in Romans 12:1, where he urges us — because of all that God has done for us in the death and resurrection of Christ, to present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship. Salvation through Christ’s sacrifice elicits our responses of sacrifice back to Him and to the world around us.
In what ways can we become living sacrifices to God and each other? It begins by laying down our pride and ego, our impatience and irritability and instead, pursuing humility. Becoming a living sacrifice looks like asking, “How do I treat this person created in the image of God greater than how I want to be treated?” Becoming a living sacrifice entails not allowing our sense of entitlement to rob us of opportunities to become like Jesus.
Becoming a living sacrifice bears and endures all things for the greater glory of pursuing Christlikeness. For this is Christ’s desire for us — He sacrificed for us so that when we imitate Him, by the power of His Spirit, we become like Him.
