Today is one of those body-aching from living-full-out giving all I’ve got to give, kind of days. It was a really great day, but my physical exhaustion is revealing a need for a Spirit infilling.

Tuesday is the day our Classical Conversations homeschool community meets. We are celebrating the great accomplishments of the school year, and for it, there is a slideshow I am creating. As I scurried about in-and-out of classrooms, all over campus, capturing beautiful moments of precious children, their parents and tutors, what I would write tonight was not far from my thoughts. Would I have anything to give that could be worthy of a post about SACRIFICE? 

Tonight, while my hands are wet warm with suds, emptying the sink, I find myself empty, again. I offer myself to the Lord, knowing He knows full well I have not had a moment at His feet, and standing on my own that ache. I decide, I will just take a break from writing tonight, but I inquire of the Lord first, because all of this, here at my place, is an offering to Him. For Him.

As the hot water runs over my hands, scrubbing and rinsing, my soul is longing to be bathed in His Presence. My heart goes heavy as I realize, I do not know what it is to REALLY sacrifice. With this thought, I am not self-condemning. This realization becomes a prayer.

Lord, I desire more than anything for my heart to beat as Yours… For my heart to break for the things that Yours does… For me to know the kind of love, the kind that none is greater, the kind that compelled You to lay down Your own life. The kind that SACRIFICES.

Of course, for my own children and loved ones, if I ever found myself in that place, I have to believe I would not hesitate in laying down my own life. But Jesus did not lay down His life just for those that loved Him. I forget sometimes, but remember again. His way is so different from my own.

While in agony of pain I will never have to know, He choked on death to choke death–for me. He offered intercessions for those whose sin caused His pain, “Forgive them, for they know not what they do.” On the cross while gasping for breath, He exhaled grace.

While having no sin of His own, Jesus bore mine. His love compelled Him to wear the stench of sinners, and touch the filthy with His holiness. His tender mercy compelled Him to exchange streets of gold, for the Way of Suffering down the dusty Via Dolorosa. The same Way of Grief led Him to the Skull Place, where His life poured bloody. The same LOVE that brought Him to bear the cross and my shame, compelled Him to draw my blackened soul out of the miry clay.

As I am finishing up the last of the dirty dishes, seeing this post first written on the tablet of my heart, meditating upon His SACRIFICE finds me lost in the mystery and wonder that is God. I pray.

May I be able to comprehend with all the saints

what is the breadth and length and height and depth,

and know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge.