Tonight on Facebook my buddy Evan posted a status that cut straight to my heart. Not in a mean way, but in that it convicted me. He said: “This is a messed up world we’re living in”. That is the honest and raw truth about the state of this earth if i’ve ever heard it. As soon as I read that I thought: “I know and see everyday how messed up this world is, how badly it needs Jesus, But what am I doing about it?”

Jesus, make me like you.
teach me and show me how to be approachable.
teach me and show me how to respond in love when I am attacked with cutting words.
teach me and show me how to love like you.
help me to see people as you see them.
break me, cleanse me of myself and challenge me in my walk with You
take this hard heart and give me a heart for the lost.
may the cry of Your heart be my heart’s cry.
Father, take me to the foot of the cross, take me into the very place where your Glory dwells.

Just sit and think for a second about what love and sacrifice mean. What is it to truly love someone and to lay down everything that you have for another. Love: unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for the good of another…I know that this is probably the most well known Bible verse in the world, but just bear with me for a second, John 3:16 says that “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” God loves the world, us, humanity so much that He would ask his one and only Son to come here and live a perfect life, to be a lamb without blemish, and then be beaten, carry his own cross up a hill, be nailed to it and die, why would He do this you ask? God loves us, its that simple, He cares about our well being, about restoring a relationship with us to the point that He would sacrifice himself for us. Who am I that the God of the universe, the God that spoke everything into existence would send his son, Himself to die for me? That is the kind of love that I seek to have, to unselfishly love others, and to truly care about their well being.

To sacrifice, “an act of giving up something valued for the sake of something else regarded as more important or worthy” God considers a relationship with us, restoring us, and providing a way for us to be with him of such importance that he would give his life, would edure the cross, and give his only son for us. How worthy is He of our praise. How worthy for us to give 110% in serving him. Our God is truly an Awesome God. He loves me beyond anything I can possibly fathom, and He sacrificed his son for me, if He didn’t do another thing for me from this day on He is still worthy of so much more than I can offer Him.

I want to love selflessly, with the same agape love that He has for me I want to love him back with that same love. I also want to have the same love that He has for the world, to have a heart broken for the same things His heart is broken for. I want to worship Him in every moment without a care for who is around, who can see me, who can hear me. I want to give everything I have for the cause of His Kingdom, the one cause that is worthy. I want to pick up my cross daily and have the faith to know that he will provide and that he will care for me, that he will open doors and make a way. I want to love with the same love He has, and sacrifice my wants and desires for Him.