Immolative Maneuver
We are supposed to be living sacrifices. That term doesn’t make sense. How can you be a sacrifice, one that is supposed to be slaughtered and burned on the altar, and yet be alive?
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The word “immolation” means self-sacrifice by burning. As I was studying for this article, I searched through some scientific posts regarding polymers and how they can be engineered to break down over time for a variety of purposes. One of them is for a drug delivery system.
“Self-immolative polymers are an emerging class of macromolecules with distinct disassembly profiles that set them apart from other general degradable materials. These polymers are programmed to disassemble spontaneously from head to tail, through a domino-like fragmentation, upon response to extremal stimuli.
…
Self-immolative polymers are now widely recognized as an important class of stimuli-responsive materials for a wide range of applications such as signal amplification, biosensing, drug delivery, and materials science.”1
I know a little less than nothing about molecular science, so I can’t comment on the above except to say that it is very interesting to me…
…that something can be made to last forever, like a PVC pipe (made out of polymers), and ingestible polymers like naturally occurring cellulose. When a substance is self-immolative, it dissolves on a molecular level and whatever is inside of it is dispersed. To wrap my head around this, in drug-related delivery systems, it offers timed release of the medication encapsulated in the pill. This is my rudimentary understanding. I am just reading papers. I encourage you to read more about this if you are interested.2 3
Why did I even bring this up? Because I was thinking about the nature of a sacrifice, especially a burnt offering. David had sinned by numbering the people in 1 Chronicles 21. In another chapter, possibly another time or describing the same things, it says that Satan moved David to number the people ( 1 Chronicles 21:1–2 ). And yet another passage says that it was God who moved David to number the people ( 2 Samuel 24:1 ). To be fair, it says that God was already upset with Israel and moved David to number them so he could mete out judgment upon them. I have heard it explained, and it makes sense to me, that David had only one reason for numbering the people. He wanted to ascertain his military might. He was thinking of himself and not the greatness of God or the welfare of his people.
For this sin, David was given three options for punishment. He could have three years of famine, three months of being defeated by his enemies, or three days of the plague (seen as the hand of God.) He chooses to fall into the hands of God because “His mercies are very great; but do not let me fall into the hand of man.” (1 Chronicles 21:13b, NKJV) The Angel of the LORD, sometimes seen as a Christophany, begins to send sickness and death upon Israel, and before long, 70,000 people die from the epidemic. ”As he was destroying, the Lord looked and relented of the disaster, and said to the angel who was destroying, “It is enough; now restrain your hand.” We see exactly what David thought. God was merciful. He could have easily destroyed everything, but instead, relented and had mercy upon Israel, David, and David’s family. The Angel stopped at the threshing floor of Ornan, also referred to as Araunah. David goes to meet him and wants to purchase the field to build an altar to the Lord and ease the punishment of God.
But Ornan said to David, “Take it to yourself, and let my lord the king do what is good in his eyes. Look, I also give you the oxen for burnt offerings, the threshing implements for wood, and the wheat for the grain offering; I give it all.” (1 Chronicles 21:23, NKJV)
This is a gracious offer, one that may be seen as a special blessing.
David could have easily said, “Praise God! Look how good he is that we don’t even have to pay for anything! God provided it all.” Conventional wisdom today would be to take it and use it for the glory of God. But David is discerning here. He can see that Ornan is a businessman and a salesman. He was also a Jebusite, not a son of Abraham nor part of the family of God. When the Angel is destroying everything in his path with disease out in the open for everyone to see, his sons run and hide, but Ornan keeps on threshing his wheat. He keeps on doing business. This was a business transaction, even if the initial offer was genuine. David then says something amazing.
“No, but I will surely buy it for the full price, for I will not take what is yours for the Lord, nor offer burnt offerings with that which costs me nothing.” (1 Chronicles 21:24, NKJV)
The ancient Hebrew word for “burnt offering” is עֹלָה, and is similar to the word I entitled this article with: immolate. The definition of that word is: “kill or offer as a sacrifice, especially by burning,” which is what David was going to do. However,
can a sacrifice that costs nothing be called a sacrifice?
The very definition of sacrifice is to “offer, giving up, surrender, abandonment, renouncing…” If it is not mine, I can’t do this.
We can become very lackadaisical with our offerings. I am not sure about you, but sometimes I am glad when I can worship God without much of a cost. I guess it is human nature, but I just don’t want to give up my things. In the past, I might have complained to my wife, “I am too tired to go to church; I had a hard time at work this week and nobody likes me there anyway.”
And my wife would say, “But you’re the pastor!”
In reality, I loved going to church and being a pastor. I loved and love the people that I had the privilege of serving for many years. But today it is so different. I can watch the service on YouTube, so it costs me nothing in gas, the car ride, and leaving the convenience of home. For some of us, we live by the tithe rule of 10% (which is what tithe means) and yet we know we could give much more and it wouldn’t change our lifestyle one bit. Is it a sacrifice if it costs us nothing?
Think about how many people around the world are suffering because of their faith in Christ. There are thousands of pastors of small churches across America and the world who daily get up and speak to a handful of people, faithfully giving them the word of God, loving them, and disciplining them. They get no thanks; they get no recognition; nor would they want it. They do not do it so their name would be known, but so that their God would be glorified and his people blessed. There are many modern-day missionary martyrs who gave up the ultimate sacrifice because it was worth it to love God and serve him and his people. These all understand the nature of sacrifice. Do you?
David refused to offer anything that wouldn’t cost him something and that made what he offered that much more valuable.
What would you offer to God in worship? Your time? Service in the Children’s Ministry? Becoming an usher? Cleaning the church building? What about volunteering to be a mentor to someone? Yes, it is inconvenient. That’s the point. Sacrifice is inconvenient.
I had a conversation with someone the other day as they asked about my cancer journey and how I was doing. I told them, “For me to live, is Christ, and to die, is gain.” echoing the words of Paul the Apostle in Philippians 1:21. I told them that we sometimes forget that last part of the verse, that to die is gain. We have a great hope in heaven. We will experience the joy of seeing Jesus face-to-face! It will be the preeminent encounter of our existence! After saying all that, I paused for a moment and told her that sometimes dying for Christ is much easier than living for him. Why? Because truly living a life dedicated to Jesus Christ day in and day out is one sacrifice after another.
“I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” (Romans 12:1–2, NKJV)
We are supposed to be living sacrifices. That term doesn’t make sense. How can you be a sacrifice, one that is supposed to be slaughtered and burned on the altar, and yet be alive? The only way to do so is to imagine yourself, no, reckon yourself, to be on that altar every day. You are not your own.
“For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.” (1 Corinthians 6:20, NKJV)
There is a great blessing in sacrificing to God in worship and helping someone else.
We belong to God, who sent his Son Jesus to die for us in the greatest of all sacrifices. So what is going too far in our worship? What can we give up to measure that sacrifice? Nothing. That’s right. Nothing can measure up, but also, God wants us to enjoy our relationship with him here and now. That is why he calls us to give. There is a great blessing in sacrificing to God in worship and helping someone else. Your sacrifice might be that you loved eating out every day. But you noticed that there are people who have gathered at the local mission needing food. You want to do something so instead of eating out for one week, you give that money to the mission and take the time to spend one day a month handing out lunches to those who need it so much. Is that a sacrifice? Yes. Because it cost you something, you will reap such great benefits.
“And remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’” (Acts 20:35, NKJV)
Now, we don’t do this for the blessing. We do it because God loves us and we see his example and want to follow him. However, it brings us great joy to see others helped.
Immolative maneuvering means to burn as a sacrifice in a way that sparks action. Let us burn with passion as living sacrifices desiring to see God pleased and others blessed. As hard as it is for me, it is in my heart to do all these things. We can be like self-immolative polymers… we stick together and be willing sacrifices, and bring the medicine that so many need, the Gospel of Jesus Christ, applied to the wounds of those hurt by the world. It will indeed take a sacrifice.
Let’s do this together, in Jesus’ name.
χ.ε.ε.
What are polymers? https://www.snexplores.org/article/explainer-what-are-polymers
Drug delivery from the NIH: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3438887/
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