“Offer right sacrifices, and put your trust in the LORD.” Psalm 4:5
Devotion:
Psalm 4 teaches us how to pray, how to be angry, and how to worship the Lord. We need to remember the context of this Psalm: the world had turned upside down around David, and people were out to get him. We saw David turn to God in prayer, which is always a great first step. Then we saw David respond in holy anger—the kind of anger that responds to the right things in the right ways. But something more is needed when we find ourselves in difficult situations. We need to continue believing that God is God—the sovereign and glorious One.
When David talks about right sacrifices, it alerts us to the fact that there is such a thing as a wrong sacrifice. A wrong sacrifice could be one that is made to a false god. Or it could be one that is made toward the true God in the wrong way. But for us to understand this, we have to think beyond the blood of animals and the burning of grain.
A sacrifice is anything we offer up which we could have kept for ourselves. And sacrifices are being made all around us. The reason this is important is because when we find ourselves in trouble we typically start looking for a helper. And if we are not careful, we will make sacrifices to false gods who we hope will save us. But these are wrong sacrifices. A right sacrifice is one that is made to God Himself. And the fundamental right sacrifice we make is that of our whole lives. We put our whole hearts and lives upon the altar.
And why would anyone do that? Because the God we are making sacrifices to has already promised to save us. When we offer our whole selves up to Him, it is out of gratitude, not for atonement. So the temptation in life is to turn to idols, but David teaches us to keep worshiping the one true God. He is the only one we can ultimately trust. We pray, we get angry, but ultimately we place our lives and our souls in His hands.
Prayer:
Lord, we look to the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross and learn so much. We learn that all atonement sacrifices are finished once and for all. Whatever sacrifices we make for You are not in order that You would love us in return. We know that You already love us and have forgiven us.
But Lord, we also learn from Jesus how to offer our whole selves up to You in worship. We want to be consumed on the altar with Jesus. We want to be taken up in service to You.
So when life is hard and the world is turned upside down, lead us to trust You. We know that all idols are worthless and vain, but our hearts are prone to wander. Draw us away from our false saviors and lead us to Jesus. Show us how to make sacrifices that are a sweet smell of honor to You. In Jesus’ name, we worship and pray.
Amen.
