Sacrifice and Reward

The dictionary defines sacrifice as the giving up of something important or valuable in other to gain something more important or valuable. Sacrifice entails giving up things worthwhile such as money, treasures, materials, ideas, time, reputation or life for a particular purpose. Jesus gave His life as sacrifice for the salvation of mankind. Jesus in Math. 13:45-46 told the story of a merchant seeking goodly pearls, who when he had found one pearl of great price went and sold all that he had and bought it. Here the merchant sacrificed everything that he had for the one pearl he sought.

Sacrifices is something you do without coercion or compulsion, it is not something you do for personal gain. Paying your child’s school fees rather than buying a shirt for yourself for example is meeting a family obligation and not a sacrifice. Living a holy life is not a sacrifice. A life of sin is wrong and regrettable and has an eternal consequence of spending the rest of our lives in hell. You not indulging in sin therefore is to avoid the consequence for sin and not a sacrifice.

But when you are out of your ways to contribute meaningfully to the improvement of lives of others, the society or to a Christian, the church at a material cost or physical cost to yourself without the expectation of any reward or appreciation is what sacrifice entails. It is something you do when you are not under any obligation to do so.

THE PRICE OF SACRIFICE One of the major places of sacrifice in life goals is that sacrifice determines your attainment. Who you are, what you will be, how you will be regarded by others is generally governed by the principle of sowing and reaping. If you are non challant or miserly in sowing you will be rewarded with a paucity of harvest. We all have equal opportunities and graces before God, but sacrifices and commitments that you put into such opportunities and graces will determine your position on the ladder of life. Prov. 22:29,

A lot of Christians are wrongly led believing that God should do everything for them without their having to give something back. REWARD OF SACRIFICE

As reaping is determined by what you sowed, similarly is reward determined by what is sacrificed. The honour, respect, wealth, fame and accolades that you get is determined by how much sacrifice you are ready to make. Of the twelve apostles John, Peter, and Paul are celebrated. Notably too Esther, Mary, Ruth and Mary Magdalene are honoured. The difference between them and others are in the sacrifice they made, the principle of input and output.