September 2: The Sacrament of Sacrifice

Do you remember those low-budget horror films where an explosion or construction site causes a chasm to open up and dreadful vermin spill out and terrorize the town? Well, I have friends and family in Baton Rouge who are emailing me similar stories, but the creeping menace comes from human vermin who have been displaced from the evil pit known as New Orleans. The Baton Rouge people are carrying guns, living in fear of their lives, as hundreds of homeless people flood the town raping, stealing, murdering, high-jacking, and intimidating the residents. We are suppose to go there for my neice's wedding in two weeks, but the wild-west atmosphere is hindering food and gas resupply, so we aren't sure what will happen.

Now imagine how this scenario would play out if the displaced people were children of God who practiced Chambers' message of the sacrament of sacrifice. Instead of the self-centered, panic-inspired barbaric attitude that cries "Every man for himself," each person would be willing to let the blessings, limited as they may be, flow through his possesion to become a blessing for the next person who needs it.

In these times of our plenty, it is easy to intellectually recognize the spiritual lesson of the Dead Sea. Although it is filled with some of the richest elements of any body of water in the world, the Dead Sea can support no life because it has no outlet. It hoards all the treasures that it's tributaries supply, but has become deathly stagnant because it cannot share the wealth with lands further down the road. However, if we were in the position of the homeless of South Louisiana, would we be willing to share the limited food and water we could find, and give it with God's agape love? Would we be able to ignore our own thirst and hunger to fulfill the Lord's teaching of anti-self-realization? With great shame, I have to answer that I just don't know what I would do.

Almighty God, I stand before you so ashamed. Please strengthen my love for mankind, so that it becomes as natural as breathing to alleviate pain, even if I must sacrifice to do so. Especially, I pray for a supernatural love that will enable me to love the unlovely, to show compassion to the selfish, to sacrifice for the ruthless, and to quietly listen to the beligerant, so that by these actions I can show the world Your Love.