Tag: offering

Living Sacrifice Day 22 – A Fresh Start

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by reading Hebrews 12:1-13

Being in the IT field, I’ve had people bring their PCs loaded with their problems to me for help. However, the problem I hate dealing with the most is a computer infected with a virus. Having similar experiences myself (before I converted to Mac), it can be the most annoying and difficult problem. Why? Well, depending on the virus, it can really affect the machine. It can cause it to do things involuntarily, keep it from connecting online to prevent you from solving the problem, it can slow down your computer to a crawl, and in general, it just makes your life miserable. Because viruses come out all the time, the anti-virus programs struggle to keep up with them. So, to solve the problem, you first have to find the virus and then hope the anti-virus is up-to-date enough to kill the problem. But depending on the virus, it can be tricky and could take hours to try to figure out if you’ve gotten everything. So, what’s the best solution? The best solution is to reinstall Windows and give your computer a fresh start. As annoying is it is to back up everything, reinstall the operating system, and reload all the programs, it’s amazing at how quickly the computer will run. I’ve had people tell me, “it’s like you gave me a brand new computer.”

This is a good analogy for our lives as Christians. Even in our redeemed state, we are always susceptible to the virus of sin. It can so easily creep into our hearts and cause our whole selves to malfunction. Once sin is in our hearts, our actions can follow suit. What’s inside eventually comes out. No matter how hard you try, sin just doesn’t stay bottled up.

In Romans 12:2, Paul tells us to be different, to renew our minds. Sometimes, we need a fresh start. If we’re really struggling with a particular sin, sometimes we need to get away. That getting away may be in the form of repentance; prayer, meditation, or fasting; encouragement from other believers; or perhaps counseling. We, in a sense, need to be rebooted. When God redeems us, He makes us a new creation. But until we reach heaven, we’re always going to be struggling with the temptations of sin.

In my job, I’m constantly telling people how viruses and spyware work and how to avoid them. “Be careful with what sites online you visit,” I explain. “And when something pops-up, don’t just click on it. In fact sometimes the button that says ‘close’ is a button that will deploy the spyware.” A lot of times, this helps the user from making the same mistake again.

Similarly, Paul tells us to rethink about ourselves. Because when we see ourselves as God’s redeemed, we begin to recognize the traps that Satan uses. We start seeing the places where we are susceptible to his snarls and start to avoid them. I think we will be shocked at what God can do through a creature who is committed to being a living sacrifice. When we’re not slowed down by the viruses of sin, we can run the race marked out for us.

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Living Sacrifice Day 21 – Free Your Mind

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by reading Philippians 2:1-16

The Matrix, one of my all-time favorite movies, is about a world within a world known as the Matrix. While the Matrix exists, few people know about it and are simply satisfied with living in the outer world in ignorance. The movie is about a man named Neo, who is invited to see and live inside the Matrix. The rules of the Matrix are different, but he struggles with being confined by the rules of the world he was so used to. Neo’s trainer Morpheus challenges him to stop thinking like a human being and instead tells him to “free your mind.” As the movie progresses, we are dazzled by Neo’s ability, combined with neat special effects, to defy laws of gravity, run up walls, and do all sorts of super-human moves that defy the limits of a human being.

The Matrix has a number of obvious parallels to Christianity, and Neo’s transformation into a new creature inside the Matrix is one of them. Paul tells us, Do not be conformed any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” Why does the transformation happen by the renewing of your mind?

Here’s why. We’re used to acting a certain way because we’re used to thinking a certain way. When we were an unbeliever we didn’t give credence to God, His divinity, and our place in the Kingdom. If you recall, the first challenge was on getting to know God, and the second challenge was to know our place in His Kingdom. Like Neo, we have to relearn how to act based on our new identity.

There’s a non-smoking commercial campaign airing that depicts people struggling with quitting to smoke. They are so used to lighting up when getting in the car or drinking a cup of coffee, that they struggle to do those activities without a smoke. The point of the commercial is to relearn how to do the other activities like driving and drinking coffee without the crutch of a cigarette.

Being a Believer is similar. We may be used to using bad language, losing our temper, or thinking lustful thoughts. These can be difficult habits to break. Paul is telling us that in order to break these habits we must renew our minds – rethink about who we are and why we exist. This is not easy. If we have lived years losing our temper when things don’t go our way, we have to stop and think about the Lord and who we are as soon as we’re faced with something troubling. If we’re used to thinking a lustful thought every time we see a coworker, then we need to retrain ourselves to honor God with our thoughts.

However, if we can at every moment say, “I exist to glorify God,” then when the temptation arises to revert back to sinful habits, we are more likely to fight it. This isn’t a self-help regiment. This is living up to a standard, up to an identity – we are emulating our Lord Jesus.

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Living Sacrifice Day 20 – I Don’t Fit In

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by reading John 15:18-27

Have you ever been around coworkers when the conversation turns raunchy? I can think of a time that happened to me not too long ago at a social get-together. It was awkward to say the least, and it didn’t take me long to realize that I didn’t fit in.

I think if we were all honest with ourselves, we fear that we won’t fit in. We hate being the odd ball standing out. We hate the feeling of standing in the cafeteria with a tray in our hand, looking for a place to sit. We want to be accepted. We don’t like it if people talk about us behind our backs.

There is always a balance between relevance and conformity. When Jesus told us that we would be in the world, He is challenging us to be relevant. I’ve heard it said that a good preacher preaches with the Bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other. We don’t want to be so heavenly minded that we do no earthly good. However, the other extreme is worse. If all we want to do is be like everyone else, than we have no identity with Christ.

The temptation to conform to this world happens when we don’t know or we lose sight of our identity with Christ. When we forget about our heavenly citizenship, holding on to our earthly one becomes more prevalent. In John 15:18-19, Jesus told His disciples, “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.”

The truth is we should stand out. We may not need to tell anyone that we are a Christian, but the difference between us and everyone else should be obvious. Whereas the native tongue of the world may be sarcasm and criticism, our language should be encouragement and sincerity. If we are doing just that much, it won’t take long for people to notice a real difference. Consider it a great complement when someone says, “You seem a lot different than everyone else. What’s that about?”

Jesus tells us in Matthew 5 that we are both the light of the world and the salt of the earth. We ought to stick out. We ought to feel like we don’t belong. Because if the world loves us and we love being a part of the world, well then it would seem like we belonged to the world.

You may be someone who is struggling with trying to fit in. You want to fit in so bad, that you have found yourself conforming. If that’s the case, let me challenge you to not be afraid of not fitting in. You fit in. It’s just that you don’t fit in to this world. You’re not supposed to, because you fit in to God’s Kingdom.

If you’re one who stands out and may feel lonely, let me encourage you. If you maintain a positive and encouraging attitude, people will flock to you. This world is so abrasive that people are constantly looking for something uplifting. You will quickly become trustworthy – not only on a personal level but on a professional level as well.

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Living Sacrifice Day 19 – Patterns of this World

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by reading Psalm 23

Throughout Scripture, us people are often referred to as sheep. Why? Well, sheep tend to follow. In fact, sheep have been known to follow other sheep around trees, creating a non-stopping cycling circle. Or sheep have also been known to follow another sheep right off the side of a cliff. Suddenly being referred to as sheep doesn’t seem very flattering.

The truth is we can be like sheep. The adage “monkey see, monkey do” can sometimes apply to our lives. However, in Romans 12:2, Paul tells us to break the pattern – to stop the endless, mindless cycle of following someone around the tree.

You’ve no doubt heard someone say, “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.” Well, we as Christians should not follow this motto. There are patterns in this world; we can see them. There’s patterns of greed, lust, gluttony, self-pity, and the list goes on and on. We see the person who overworks, doesn’t spend time with his family, goes into debt by buying more than he can afford. When that keeps happening around us, that’s called a pattern. That’s sheep following sheep, and Paul says, “don’t follow what they’re doing.”

Sometimes it can be difficult to identify patterns that happen right in our own culture. The other day someone shared with me that often times people drown their lives with all sorts of activities like soccer practice and so forth and neglect spending time with other believers. The difficult thing about this is that it seems so common in our culture to run kids from one practice to another and swamp our lives with all sorts of activities, that it’s difficult for us to identify this as a possible pattern to avoid.

This is why it’s so important to be focused on the Lord. When we live lives of worship, we quickly begin to see the mind of Christ. Having the Spirit give us that insight helps us to identify harmful patterns that we should avoid. It may mean that we aren’t like other people or families. That’s okay. We’re not supposed to be. Those sheep don’t know who their following or where that path will lead. Our eyes are on our shepherd, and He gives us abundant life.

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Living Sacrifice Day 18 – A Lifestyle of Worship

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by reading John 4:1-26

Being involved in music and worship teams and in traditional and contemporary churches, I’ve heard every possible criticism about music that you could possibly hear. I can still picture the older gentleman, wearing a suit to church, making a serious face as he bellows the words from the hymnal he holds in his hand. He praises the old hymns as great doctrines of theology, while criticizing songs like “Holy is the Lord,” because he’s repeating the same thing over, and over, and over again.

In the other corner, I see the young person, hands raised, signing out the refrain of the contemporary praise song. He criticizes those who sing about the Lord without emotion and says that the hymns of old seem to lack emotion themselves. He rolls his eyes at “We are One in the Bond of Love,” as he mocks the song by singing with a dramatic southern twang.

These are often the arguments in churches that try to appease the traditional and contemporary crowds, and for the first twenty-something years of my life, this was something I constantly heard. But to be honest, arguments about worship styles are nothing new. In the passage we just read, we saw a Samaritan woman who tried to argue with Jesus about worship styles. We even see this earlier in the Bible, as David’s wife Michal rebuked him for being so expressive in public worship.

Yesterday, we redefined the common understanding of worship by analyzing Romans 12:1. We said that “worship is a voluntary activity in response to God’s goodness, predetermined to glorify God – a personal expression of gratitude at any time, at any day that is pleasing to the Lord.”

In the case of Michal and the Samaritan woman, the worship they were referring to were moments of worship, whether they be a physical expression of praise or a sacrifice at the Temple. However, Jesus explains what true worship is – a seeking of the Father in spirit and truth. This is similar to what Paul writes in Romans 12:1 when he uses the phrase – “a spiritual act of worship.”

What Paul is saying is that if we are committed to being living sacrifices, then every moment, of every day is an opportunity for worship. It doesn’t matter what the activity is, as long as its predetermined to glorify God and is something that actually pleases Him. In other words, what Paul and Jesus are saying is that becoming a living sacrifice doesn’t mean merely having moments of worship but rather adopting a lifestyle of worship.

We’re so used to thinking of worship as those moments involving music. That’s what’s been ingrained in our heads. But it’s time to grow out of that thinking and adopt a Romans 12:1 understanding of worship. So, let me challenge you today to make your activities worshipful. What are some things you’re going to do today with an attitude of worship? And how will you begin or continue adopting a lifestyle of worship that will permeate every corner of your life? Those practical things you offer to the Lord are indeed spiritual and acts of worship.

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Living Sacrifice Day 17 – The Definition of Worship

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by memorizing Romans 12:1

This is our 17th day of our 40 day challenge of being a living sacrifice. We have meticulously broken down Romans 12:1 in an attempt to understand what it is Paul is teaching us about worship. So, let’s recap.

The words “in light of God’s mercy,” tell us that we should worship God not because we feel like it but because of what He has done for us.

The word “offer” is a keyword that tells us that our attitude in worship should be to give freely rather than feel like it’s an obligation or requirement.

“Your bodies” explains that God wants all of us – not merely our money, our time, or our talent. He wants us to be personally, wholly invested in serving Him.

“Living” is a word that tells us that as long as we are alive, every moment of our life should be dedicated to worshipping the Lord.

“Sacrifice” means that it will cost us. The life of a Believer is a gift that is offered to the Lord – a gift of obedience.

“Holy” means set apart. The discipline of being a living sacrifice, means we set apart the activity and predetermine it to be an act of worship. It means putting God first and foremost in our lives instead of giving Him the leftovers.

“Pleasing to God” compels us that the activity that we are to give to the Lord must please Him, and if we are to offer every activity as worship, then every activity must be something that agrees with His standard of quality and with His taste.

When we put those thoughts together, we come up with this interpretation of Romans 12:1, which may serve as a definition of worship.

“Worship is a voluntary activity in response to God’s goodness, predetermined to glorify God – a personal expression of gratitude at any time, at any day that is pleasing to the Lord.”

Ask yourself – is this my understanding of worship? Is this something that’s incorporated in my life? If we begin to live out a Romans 12:1 understanding of worship, you can bet our lives will be more and more transformed as a living sacrifice to the Lord.

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Living Sacrifice Day 16 – What’s In It for Me?

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by reading Revelation 7:9-17

Have you ever been to a worship service and walked out with an amazing spiritual high? I can remember one worship service in particular where afterwards people were crying and hugging each other. It was so moving and profound.

When you think of mountain top experiences in the Bible, what events do you think about? Do you think about Moses’ encounter with God on Mt. Sinai, Elijah hearing the voice of the Lord, David dancing before the Ark of the Covenant, the disciples at the transfiguration? The one I think about as the most profound encounter is the account from today’s reading in Revelation 7.

The other day as I was reading this, I got chills. I think for first time it dawned on me that what John is describing here in Revelation 7 is a worship service that I, a future inhabitant of heaven, am participating in. In a sense, I’m reading about myself in the future. For some reason, I never realized the profundity of it, as I did the other day.

But notice the focus of this passage. There’s a sea of people, all wearing white, all transformed, all bowing before the throne. But every one’s attention is on the Lord. I think if John were to have interviewed one of these redeemed souls, they would not have responded by saying, “this is such a spiritual high for me,” but rather, “worthy is the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world.” It says that day and night they don’t stop worshipping God. It’s like even after a million times of saying the same refrain, they can’t get over how Holy and Awesome God is.

Sometimes when we encounter God, there is an immediate profound effect on our life. However, at other times, we may not immediately sense some emotional or spiritual high. If we think about worship in the Old Testament, we think about those intense moments of worship, but how many times did people like Moses, Elijah, or David spend time worshiping the Lord that isn’t recorded in Scripture.

While we ought to be anxious for God to change us, the temptation can be that we worship God, only when we are looking for that mountaintop experience. And when that mountaintop experience doesn’t happen, we may feel like God didn’t show up. At that point, we are not looking at the Throne of God, we are looking inwardly at ourselves. And when we are focusing on ourselves, we will never be at the place God desires.

As Believers, we must not come to God with the attitude of “what will I get out of it?” we must put ourselves wholly into worshiping God, forgetting about what’s in it for us. Our only concern must be that God is getting all the glory. When we do that every day, every hour, every minute of our lives, we will not be anxious over emotional effects. God will have changed us little by little. We will have traveled baby steps down a long road, but at some point, we will look back and see that God has brought us a long way, and we will have no desire to go back.

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Living Sacrifice Day 15 – Soli Deo Gloria

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by reading Genesis 4:1-16

The great composer Johann Sabastian Bach wrote over 1100 compositions in his 65 years of life. It’s quite remarkable. These aren’t just simple three minute songs that we’re used to hearing on the radio; some are quite lengthy cantatas, chorales, and some are written for a number of instruments. Bach didn’t have Garage Band, recording devices, or some of the other fancy programs we might use to record and make musical notation. Living in the 1700s, he did this all by hand. Bach was commissioned by a number of various courts and churches to practice his art. However, no matter who he worked for, at the end of many of Bach’s compositions, he wrote three initials – S.D.G. They stand for the Latin words Soli Deo Gloria – To God alone be the glory.

As we’ve been talking about worship and Romans 12:1, we are now at the place where we are discussing what constitutes something as worship. Paul gives us two criteria. We discussed the first one yesterday – that the activity must be set apart. Today, we are talking about the second criteria – that the activity must be pleasing to God.

If you will recall, in the very first challenge I gave, I said that the beginning point to becoming a living sacrifice is to know God. If you don’t know God, you don’t know what pleases Him. This is extremely important. Today’s reading about Cain and Abel’s sacrifice gives us insight into this lesson. Abel knew what type of sacrifice God wanted and offered the first of his flock. Cain, a worker in the field, offered God some of his fruits and vegetables. God looked with favor on Abel’s offering but rejected Cain’s.

Let’s step back for a moment and ask, “why did God reject Cain’s offering?” In a sense, Cain’s offering was personal. He worked the field, so naturally he offered something that he worked to produce. While that seems reasonable, that isn’t how God saw it. God wanted them to bring an animal sacrifice – most likely to begin the understanding of what it meant to sacrifice and the cleansing of sin through the shedding of blood. Instead of rising up to give what God wanted, Cain offered what he wanted.

While we have said that we can offer any activity at any time to be worship, the truth is, not every activity can be worshipful. The criteria that Paul states is that it must be pleasing to the Lord. Let me issue a strong warning here. There is a lot of teaching and activity mulling around the church today – teaching that it’s okay to divulge in the carnal, sinful pleasures, and those that teach these heresies are framing it as something that’s pleasing to God. People are cheating on their spouses, engaging in promiscuous and shameful behavior, ignoring their families, and mistreating others and labeling it as pleasing to the Lord. This is nonsense. Do not confuse what’s pleasing to yourself as pleasing to God. In the same sense that we can’t rob a bank and legitimately call that worship, not everything is pleasing to the Lord.

At the beginning of each day, each activity, each thought, the discipline of being a living sacrifice compels us to determine to set it apart to the Lord. At the end of the day, we should look over our day, our activities, and our thoughts and give the stamp that says, “Soli Deo Gloria – to God alone be all the glory.” If we can’t, in good conscience, put that stamp of approval on something we did, then we should work hard to eliminate that thought or activity from our day tomorrow. The purpose of everything we do is to glorify and honor the Lord. That’s what it means to be a living sacrifice.

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Living Sacrifice Day 14 – Set Apart

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by reading Colossians 3

About four years ago, my wife and I took a five week trip to Europe and Morocco. For the year leading up to the trip, we put away money each month that would be designated for this vacation. Even though there were times money was tight, we determined to do everything but dip into the trip savings.

Since we began, we have been talking about what worship is, based on Romans 12:1. It is a voluntary expression of love to God that can take on any form at any time. It’s not limited to a church building on Sunday morning or limited to singing and music. It’s not motivated by our emotions, rather it is a response to who God is and what He has done for us. Now, we are going to talk about the criteria that determines if an activity is worship or not. Paul gives us two of them. He tells us that in order for something to be worship it must be holy and pleasing to God. Let’s start with the first criteria – holy.

When we think of the word holy, we may think of majesty, splendor, other-worldly, or perfect. But that’s not what the word holy means. The word holy means “set apart.” In other words, Paul explains that worship must be an activity that is set aside or set apart to be worshipful.

This doesn’t mean that you have to set it apart days or weeks in advance. It may be that you decide at that moment that you are choosing to give the activity to the Lord. Sometimes even in a worship service, our minds start wandering, and we forget what it is we’re supposed to do. The moment you realize this and say, “God I’m going to give this activity to you,” you are setting apart the activity as worship. It’s as we talked about yesterday in the story of the widow giving her last two coins. Part of offering ourselves to God is setting apart the very thing He wants us to give and not holding back.

So what does it mean to be set apart? I think it can be summed up in two words – priority and purpose. First, it’s about giving God your first and best. It’s, as we talked about yesterday, refusing to give leftovers. It might be saying, “God I’m not going to take a job that offers me the most money and gives me little time to spend with my family; I’m going to take a job that maximizes the priority of my calling as a parent.” It’s as Jesus said in Matthew 6:33, “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness.”

Secondly, setting something apart is doing it with a purpose. Just as the purpose of that savings account was for our trip, Paul tells us that the purpose of our lives is to glorify God. Every action, activity, thought should be conformed to that purpose.

I remember getting an email from an older woman, asking me, “Why must I be a Christian? Why isn’t being good enough?” She was certainly a good person, involved in the community, giving to charity. But the answer to her question is purpose. She is doing those things for some reason – maybe to better herself, to better society, to follow instructions that her parents’ once gave her. But for a Believer, the purpose is much different. We set ourselves apart as a worship service to the Lord. We are no longer doing a job for money, or to please our boss, or to get a promotion, we are doing it as unto the Lord. This was Paul’s point in Colossians 3. Whatever you do, do it all as unto the Lord.

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Living Sacrifice Day 13 – The Last Penny

Justin Hibbard


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Begin by reading Mark 12:41-44

Every year around Christmas, we hear the bells ringing outside the grocery stores and the occasional clang of coins dropping into the red can. It’s the campaign that the Salvation Army does every year to raise money for their cause. Have you ever been in a situation where there’s an opportunity to give, and you look in your wallet only to find you have one bill left, and so you choose not to give?

What is it about that last bill? Why not give it away? Is it really about the money, or is it about something else? Is it about security – the safety of knowing that at least there’s some cash in your wallet if you get into a bind?

Today’s reading was about the widow who gave her last two coins. There’s debate about how much those coins were worth, and some argue that it could have been worth as much as $1.20. Amazingly, she gave it all. While we don’t know the exact worth, we know that they could have at least provided her with the security of knowing that she had something for herself. There are three lessons that we should take away from this story.

The first lesson here is not about how much money you should put in the offering plate, the lesson is about trust. Whenever we give to the Lord, we are trusting Him. God required an offering, not just to maintain the Temple, but to teach His people about trusting Him. It’s as Malachi 3:10 says, “‘Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, so that there may be food in My house, and test Me now in this,’ says the Lord of hosts, ‘if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows.’”

The second lesson is about giving without holding back. We don’t pass an offering plate often in our church, but I have to admit that when we do, I have at times felt the temptation to hold back. I dig through my wallet and see what I’ve got. If I only have one large bill, I feel the temptation to hold on to it. I have plenty of money in the bank, so it’s not like I’m dirt poor and that’s all I have to live on. It’s a security issue. Something about that $20 bill brings me security for whatever reason. However, when I give that money; I don’t miss it. I don’t get to the end of the month and say, “Man, I shouldn’t have given that $20! It’s more like, “Man, I didn’t really need to stop at Starbucks 10 times this month.”

The third lesson is about priorities. Jesus says in Matthew 6:21, “where your treasure is, there your heart will also be.” In 1 Corinthians 16, Paul instructed the Church at Corinth to set apart their offerings on the first day of the week. Why? Because then, it would be their priority and they wouldn’t spend it on other things. I think we as Christians often fall into the temptation of giving leftovers – our leftover time, energy, and finances, instead of giving our firstfruit and best to the Lord. Sometimes our possessions become our security, and we essentially say, “Let me make sure I have what I need first, and the rest is the Lord’s.” In fact, I wonder if this widow had money at the beginning of the week and had chosen to set apart these two coins. If such was the case, she came through on her promise and gave to the Lord what she had set apart, even though it was all that she had left.

In our quest to be living sacrifices, ask God what He wants you to give of yourself. Then set that thing apart – whether it’s time, energy, money, talent or something else. When it comes time to give. Do not hold that thing back. Bring forth your offering joyfully, focused on how Jesus poured all of Himself out for you.

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