Life-Changing love demands sacrifice

CARL JOHNSON

By CARL JOHNSON
PBF Elder

In addition to reading the daily devotionals in A Place at the Table, I have also been reading a wonderful commentary on the Gospel of Mark, King's Cross, by Timothy Keller.  In the chapter entitled "The Ransom", Pastor Keller makes this observation:

Jesus Christ came not to be served but to die, to give his life.  ... Why? ... Jesus didn't have to die despite God's love; He had to die because of God's love.  And it had to be this way because all life-changing love is substitutionary sacrifice. 

In a very real sense, our participation in this "40-days of Solidarity with the Poor" is an opportunity to identify with, and become engaged in "life-changing love" that is willing to sacrifice some of our comforts and materialistic blessings in order to experience (in a small way, and for a short time) what the vast majority of the world's population experience every day.

Think about it.  If we love a person whose life is all put together and has no major needs, it costs us nothing.   But ... if we ever try to love somebody who has needs, someone who is in trouble or who is persecuted or emotionally wounded, it's going to cost us.  We can't love them without taking a hit ourselves.

That's what it means to love sacrificially ... to give of ourselves for others ... to enter into solidarity with those in need.

As Timothy Keller puts it:

God created the world in an instant, and it was a beautiful process.  He re-created the world on the cross - and it was a horrible process.  That's how it works.  Love that really changes things and redeems things is always a substitutionary sacrifice.

TODAY PLEASE PRAY FOR:
Our Dominican Republic Children today are Yohandry Reyes and Dauri Corneal. Please pray for them and all children who are supported by COTN's I Love Baseball mission.