We know the depth of the Lord’s sacrifice that He paid for our redemption. His sacrifice cost Him everything. Nothing we offer can equal His sacrifice, but we have been called to live a sacrificial life. Our sacrifice for the sake of expressing God’s love and our devotion to Him should carry the evidence of a sacrifice. Those sacrifices have marked the lives of God’s saints across the centuries. Some even sacrificed their lives to express their love for Jesus.

When David wrongly took a census of the nation, he realized he had made a grave mistake. As a result, a plague came upon the land. When David realized his mistake, he asked for forgiveness. David then had to offer a sacrifice to the Lord to bring about the end of the plague.

David approached a man named Araunah and said, “I have come to buy your threshing floor and to build an altar to the Lord there, so that he will stop the plague” (I Samuel 24:21). Araunah said he would give David the threshing floor. “But the king replied to Araunah, “No, I insist on buying it, for I will not present burnt offerings to the Lord my God that have cost me nothing” (vs. 24).

Each act of love and devotion we offer to the Lord requires a sacrifice of our will. If what we offer to the Lord costs us nothing, it will not be a worthy sacrifice. It will remain within the protected boundaries of maintaining our comfort and control. It’s when our will overcomes our desire to maintain comfort and control that we will see the kind of sacrifices that will make the most Kingdom impact because those sacrifices cost us something.