Thought of the week: The ultimate Sacrifice
Written by Murray McCandless
When the pastor introduced the visiting speaker, an elderly preacher walked to the pulpit and told this story: ‘A father, his son, and his son’s friend were sailing off the Pacific coast when a storm overturned their boat sweeping all of them into the ocean.
Grabbing a rescue line, in a split second the father had to make the most excruciating decision of his life – which boy to throw the other end to and which one to sacrifice. He knew his son had accepted Christ and his friend hadn’t. Anguished, the father yelled, ‘I love you my son,’ and threw the rope to his son’s friend. By the time he’d pulled the boy back to the capsized boat his son had disappeared beneath the waves. His body was never recovered.
The father knew his son would step into eternity with Jesus and couldn’t bear the thought of his friend facing eternity without Christ.’ At the end of the service a teenage boy approached the old man and said, ‘That’s a nice story, but what father in his right mind would sacrifice his son’s life in hopes that the other boy would become a Christian?’
‘You’ve got the point,’ the old preacher replied, ‘It’s not realistic. But I’m standing here today to tell you that story gives me a glimpse into what it must have been like for God to sacrifice His only Son for us. You see…I was that father, and your pastor here, was my son’s friend.’
In order for anyone to be saved, some one had to be sacrificed. God sacrificed his son, so we could be saved. We tend to think of this truth, as universal, when it is personal. It is true the provision is for all mankind, but the possession of eternal life is personal.
None one could love their son, as God loved his son, for the simple reason, our sons as much as we love them, are not perfect, neither is our love. God’s love is absolutely perfect. His love is linked with his character, therefore it is never partial or preferential. God loves without a cause, and without attraction, something that we can not even understand.
Fredrick Lehman gave us that beautiful song about the love of God, when he wrote these words. ‘The love of God is greater far than tongue or pen can ever tell; It goes beyond the highest star, and reaches to the lowest hell; The guilty pair, bowed down with care, God gave His Son to win; His erring child He reconciled, And pardoned from his sin.
He continued to write, ‘Could we with ink the ocean fill, And were the skies of parchment made, were every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade; To write the love of God above would drain the ocean dry; nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky. Oh, love of God, how rich and pure! How measureless and strong! It shall forevermore endure—The saints’ and angels’ song.
Another has written ‘I was sinking deep in sin, far from the peaceful shore.’ Through the message of the gospel, a life line is thrown to us who really were strangers to God, we are not his child, until born into His family.
The lesson of Divine love is taught unmistakably at the cross when I see God not sparing His own Son to redeem me. The lesson of life through the death of another is graphically displayed. I begin to “know” only at Calvary. All other knowledge whether of ritual or religion, dogma or doctrine, theory or tradition is as nothing if I have not first responded to God’s love. John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
Murray A. McCandless 2070 Route 121 Norton NB E5T 1E9 mmccand@nbnet.nb.ca