Three Acceptable Sacrifices
Every believer in the Lord Jesus is a priest (1 Peter 2:5,9; Rev. 1:6) and is called to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Him. Let’s consider three.
1. There is the sacrifice of the believer’s body, according to Romans 12:1—a living sacrifice in contrast to dead works and dead beasts offered under the Old Testament covenant of law (Heb. 6:1; 9:14).
2. In Hebrews 13:15 there is the sacrifice of praise. This is offered to God through the Lord Jesus Christ. All praises and prayers go through Him to the Father. As our great High Priest, the One who presents the sacrifice, He takes away any imperfection and presents all according to His own excellency and virtue. The sacrifice of praise, the fruit of our lips confessing His name, is acceptable to God in the measure in which it comes from the heart. From this same source, the lips of His redeemed offer praise.
3. There is the sacrifice of our substance—our physical resources (Heb. 13:16; Phil. 4:18). Scripture teaches us to use our physical and material possessions to do good and to share with those who are in need. God is pleased with such sacrifices that are a practical expression of love. This is the very opposite of accumulating for self.
All that is offered—our bodies, our praise and our goods—must be offered by the Spirit, in a spirit of thanksgiving and appreciation for the one sacrifice offered once for all by the Father and the Son, for “they went both of them together” (Gen. 22:6,8).
Three Unacceptable Sacrifices
1. Cain’s offering was unacceptable because of the nature of his offering. Abel had offered of his flock; he had shed blood. His offering showed that it is by the death of an innocent substitute that we draw near to God. We are accepted in the value of the offering. Hebrews 10:10,14 shows that this offering is Christ.
The fruit of a cursed earth (Gen. 3:17) offered by Cain well represents man’s efforts and good deeds, offered in opposition to the precious blood of Christ, shed at the cross. God cannot accept such.
2. The offering of Nadab and Abihu (Lev. 10) was not acceptable because of the manner in which it was offered. Through natural energy, strange fire was brought to burn incense. This reminds us that the worshippers God desires must not only worship in truth but also in the power and energy of the Spirit (John 4:23). The energy of the flesh is never acceptable to Him.
3. Uzziah’s offering (2 Chron. 26:16) was not acceptable because of who offered it. The king was not a priest—that was presumption on his part. Only the Lord Jesus Christ assumes in His person the two offices of king and priest (Heb. 7).
God looks at what is offered, how it is offered and who offers. The acceptable offering is centered on Christ and offered through the Spirit by a true believer, now a priest (1 Peter 2:5). By one offering we have been perfected forever—Christ offered Himself without spot to God by the eternal Spirit (Heb. 10:14; 9:14).
M. Payette (adapted)