Sacrifice

SACRIFICE
Psalm 50:5

My intercom rang.
I picked up.
"Sir, you have a visitor."
It was the receptionist.
I asked her to let him in.
I was the in-house architect in a 
construction company.
My friend, an architect colleague 
Timothy came visiting.
We'd been friends for a decade...
He came in, we talked, shared 
scriptures and prayed.
About an hour later, Timothy 
took his leave.
I saw him off to the car park.

"Tim, where's your car?" I asked.
"I came with a cab", he replied.
"Ah! Car issues! I guess it's at the 
mechanic's...."
Timothy's response stunned me:
"Naaa. I gave it away."
You WHAT??
"I gave it away. We invited a pastor 
to come preach in church last week.
The Holy Spirit asked me to give 
him the car."
It was a BMW.
Tim left in a cab.

I went back to my office, my 
mind in shock.
It took a while to process what 
I just heard...
We were both single young 
architects, just starting out life.
I wondered if the Holy Spirit 
asked me to give away my car, 
I would.

It would be very inconvenient 
not to be mobile in Lagos!
Imagine you have a date?
Which lady would want to date 
you if you ride cabs & buses about?
These were my concerns.
But my friend, Tim gave out his 
one and only car- just because 
the Holy Spirit told him to!
I knew inside me I wasn't broken 
to that level.
But I was challenged & provoked!
That day, my spirit shifted.

I later read a book by Dr Mike 
Murdock where he wrote:
"Whatever you can walk away 
from, you have mastered for life."
Timothy walked away from his car.
That area of his life was 
permanently settled.

This happened over 20 years ago.
Timothy and his family are in 
Canada now.
We spoke last nights & I brought up 
that incident with him...
The irony is, in these 20 years 
Timothy had given out loads of cars.
It became a tradition for him to 
be giving out a few cars every year:

He'd buy cars in Canada, freight 
them to Nigeria and give them away 
to people as led by the Spirit.
He has become a free car-giver...
This morning, I read Psalms 41-50.
Verse 5 of chapter 50 struck me: 
"Gather my saints together unto me; 
those that have made a covenant 
with me by sacrifice."

Here, God spoke of His SAINTS.
Then He went ahead to give a detailed 
description of those He identified as 
SAINTS:
Those who have made a covenant 
with Him by SACRIFICE!

Not those who mount the pulpit to 
preach.

Not those who wear religious robes 
and carry religious titles.

Not church workers.

Those who have made a covenant with 
God by SACRIFICE.

Let me ask: what can YOU walk 
away from...?
Do you have possessions, or possessions 
have you?
Can you walk away from them?

Jesus once asked a rich guy to go sell 
all he had & come follow him.
Scripture records the guy went away, sad.

He was possessed by his possessions.
(Matthew 19:16-22)

Many of us are like this guy...
I learned very significant lessons from 
Timothy that day:
Don't hold on to anything tightly.
See everything you possess as temporary.
Be willing to give away anything- my life 
is not dependent on them.
A man's life does not consist of the 
abundance of his possessions.
Today, there's nothing I hold so dear 
I cannot walk away from.
I don't place much value on any of 
the material things I possess.

A Job submitted, "Naked I came out 
of my mother's womb, naked I depart."

May our possessions not possess us 
in Jesus' Name.
Amen.

Shalom.