A Fragrant Offering and Sacrifice to God

Ephesians 5:1,2 Be imitators of God.  This is the high calling of our Christian life.  But what do these words mean, that we are to be imitators of God? 

They certainly can’t mean that we are to mimic God’s omniscience or omnipotence or omnipresence for we do not and cannot possess those divine attributes. 

Neither can these words mean that we are to demand of others that they put us at the center of their own lives and love and worship us as god for that would be blasphemy.  And so what do those words mean that we are to be imitators of God?

They mean that our heart and mind and life are to be shaped and guided and formed by God.  They mean that the world around us will be able to see in us something true and real about God because of how we live our lives- and what we value- and how we treat others.  They mean that we are to be “chips off the old block” as the saying goes.

When Caroline and I lived in Ft. Worth, one of our next door neighbors was a lady named LaVerne.  And when she saw Jacob and I outside together, with me mowing the lawn and him following along with his Fisher Price toy mower, she would say “there goes Pete and Repeat.” 

One of us was tall and one short.  One of us was older and the other younger.  But there was something familiar between the two of us.  You could see the family connection.

That is what these words mean, “Be imitators of God as beloved children.”  This relationship of a father to his children is the key to our high calling as Christians, that the way we live our lives and treat others reveals the truth about God in a meaningful way because there is a family resemblance between us and God—a family resemblance that is readily seen in us by others because God is our Father and we are his children.  The Bible says: 

See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!

This high calling of our Christians life, that we are to be imitators of God, comes from God’s love for us in Jesus Christ.  The law cannot produce that family resemblance in us.  Force cannot extract the image of God from us.  Coercion cannot make us children.  Let me give you an example:

Most of us have seen the video of British hostage John Cantlie reading propaganda produced by his Muslim captors.  We know that these are not his views but he is forced to do it with a sword at his neck.  The words that he is speaking and the action he is taking is completely different than what is in his heart.

In the same way the Law of God and the threats of his punishment can make us outwardly obedient but they cannot make us new people like our heavenly Father.  They cannot produce in us a new heart and a new mind and a new spirit.  They cannot cause us to be born again into God’s family as his sons and daughters.

Only the Father’s love can do that—the love that he has shown to the world in his Son Jesus Christ.  The Bible says that: 

God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, who whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.  For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

This is what the Apostle Paul is talking about when he says that Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

The sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross is what it took to bring us back into God’s family.  The offering of his body and blood crucified on Calvary is the costthat came with making us God’s children so that we can imitate God and reflect his love to the world.   Now…

None of us are by nature children of God.  In fact, by nature, we are his enemies.  And yet the Bible says:  God showed us love for us in this, that while were still sinners, Christ died for us.  Before we could do anything to please God earn his favor, when we no longer resembled what God created us and intended us to be because his image was lost to us, when we were his enemies rather children, God loved us and sent his Son Jesus to live and die for us so that we could be restored to God’s family and imitate him and reflect his love to all we meet.

This restoration is the mission of God in the world and our mission is to make sure that his love and saving purpose extends to every person in the world.  God takes no pleasure in the death of anyone and so he sent his Son Jesus to give us life.

But the way to life for us went through the way of death for God’s own Son.  Sin had to be punished.  Atonement had to be made.  Holiness had to be fulfilled.  And so God sent his Son into the world on this mission of mercy and love and forgiveness and reconciliation, a mission that he had planned for from the beginning. 

From the beginning, God himself established the principle that without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.  That is how seriously God takes sin and he always has! 

When Adam and Even sinned in the garden an animal was sacrificed so that their sin and shame could be covered and from that moment on the shedding of blood was the central act of worship for God’s people so that they could understand sin’s cost and rejoice in the cleansing of God-given forgiveness. 

In the Old Testament Moses described how animals were brought to the place of worship and the priest placed it on the altar as a burnt sacrifice, an offering made by fire, a sweet aroma to the Lord".

Now this doesn’t mean that God is especially pleased with the small of steaks cooking on the grill.  What it does mean is that God is pleased with the sacrifices of his people- and the faith with which they are offered- and the opportunity to forgive their sins and be reconciled to them through the shedding of blood.

That is exactly the kind of sacrifice that Jesus made on the cross.  The Bible says that the sacrifice of Jesus was a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.  It pleased God because it was perfect and holy and complete and given in love for a world full of sinners.

Every sacrifice ever made before that moment was a sign pointing to that “once for all” sacrifice that Jesus made of his own life to reconcile us to God.  The Bible says that Jesus is the atoning sacrifice for our sins but not just for ours, but also for the sin of the world. 

It is because of that sacrifice that we are reconciled to God and have a place in his family and a mission to imitate him in the world.  The Bible says that

we who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, Jesus has now reconciled in his body of flesh by death, in order to present us holy and blameless and above reproach before God. 

It is through faith in that sacrifice that once again the image of God has been restored in us so that we can truly be imitators of God and walk in love just as Christ loved us.

You see, God does not leave us to our own devices to figure out how to love one another.  He gives us a model to imitate and that is the example of his own Son. The Bible says that Jesus is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, that in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell” and so when we walk in love as Christ loved us, sacrificing ourselves for others, offering our resources for his service, we become imitators of God.

            And so let’s look again at the example of Christ as the model for our imitation of God.  Paul says that Christ loved us.  That is where our life with God begins and that is where our life for others begins—with love.  Jesus says that:  the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

To love others as Christ loved us means that first of all, and above all, we are concerned about our neighbor’s eternal salvation—that we have the Father’s love and Jesus’ heart for the lost.

Now, it is important to care for our neighbor’s physical needs.  We can’t honestly say we love someone if we see someone cold and hungry without providing for those needs. 

But above those physical needs (which only affect their life here on earth) is our neighbor’s spiritual need for salvation.  Jesus fed the hungry and healed the sick but his real mission was to see God’s children return to their Father. 

So it must be for the child of God who walks in love and imitates their heavenly Father that our first concern is for the salvation of all people.  That mission of love and salvation is what drives our life as a church and as individual Christians. 

But how is that love for souls shown?  The Bible says that Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.  And so God’s love is shown by us as we give of ourselves and our offerings just as Christ gave his life for us and offered himself for our salvation.

We give of ourselves when we leave our comfort zones and witness to others.  We give of ourselves when we go out of our way to be kind and merciful to those in need.  We give of ourselves when we make sure that our children’s eternal welfare is our first concern so that they come to know and love the Lord.

We give our offerings for missions so that God’s love can be shown to others in places where we cannot go. 

As we give of ourselves and our offerings, as we imitate God’s love for others, as we take our place in his mission, this high calling of our Christian life becomes our own fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.  To that end may God grant us his grace!  Amen.