A Sacrifice of Praise

What does it mean to sacrifice and how willing are we to offer up a sacrifice to our God? We read about sacrifice all throughout scripture. From Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice Isaac, to Jesus, the perfect Lamb of God, who sacrificed Himself for our sins. In God’s eyes, sacrifice is an expected part of life. It is a giving up of something very precious. A humbling of ourselves before God. An acknowledgement that His will is more important to us than our own wants and desires. 

Yet, there are those verses throughout scripture that speak of a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. How often have our times of praising God or giving thanks for all that He has done really been a sacrifice?

It is easy to rejoice in our thanksgiving to God and to praise Him when things are going well. Yet Psalm 50:23 tells us, “The one who offers thanksgiving as his sacrifice glorifies me; to one who orders his way rightly I will show the salvation of God!” Perhaps all of those times when work is getting us down, or life suddenly becomes a series of speed bumps, instead of grumbling or feeling sorry for ourselves, we should sacrifice our doubts and frustrations and offer our God words of thanksgiving and praise.

We all have had our share of trials and frustrations while at work. But here is an interesting thought. What if we all considered our work place as a place of worship. What if we looked at every trial and every frustration as an opportunity to praise God and give Him thanks? Surely there is always something that we can find to praise God about.

We read in Hebrews 13:15-16 where the writer says, “Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name. Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.” 

The truth is that there are so many different ways that we can do good at our workplace or when we are engaged with others. God understands that all of us can do good and share what we have when everything is going well. What touches the heart of our Lord is when times are not going well for us, yet we still let Jesus rise up within us and show the love of Christ for the sake of someone else. Those are the times when we are offering God a true sacrifice of praise, worship, and thanksgiving.

Pray that Jesus rises up within us during those times when kindness, understanding, patience and forbearance becomes a sacrifice. 

Pray that the Holy Spirit rises up within us and fills our heart and mind with thoughts of praise and thanksgiving, especially when life becomes difficult. 

Pray that we will never neglect doing good for others and that the love of Jesus is what they will see and not our frustration or disappointment.

Whenever we are in a difficult or stressful situation, we should always be thinking about the words of Jesus spoken in Matthew 5:13,14 where our Lord reminds us that “You are the salt of the earth.” and “You are the light of the world.” Let us be that salt and light at our place of work, at home with our family and wherever we may be. Let all that we do be an offering to God, realizing that at times, it may also be a sacrifice of thanksgiving, worship, and praise.