Now it shall be, if you diligently obey the Lord your God, being careful to do all His commandments which I command you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. (Deuteronomy 28:1)
I like the story of the chicken and the pig. Both are walking down the street one day when they come to a grocery store with a sign in the window which reads, “Bacon and Eggs Desperately Needed.” The chicken looks at the pig and says, “I’ll give them the eggs if you’ll give them the bacon.”
The pig stares back at the chicken and replies, “No way.”
The chicken asks, “Why not?”
To which the pig states, “Because for you it’s a contribution, but for me it’s my life.”
Unfortunately today we have too many Christians who are only willing to give God an egg here or there, and after they do so they think they’ve given enough. They wonder why God isn’t showing up miraculously in their lives. The reason He is not is that God has asked us as kingdom followers to climb up on His altar and give Him our all. Or another thing that believers will do is climb up on the altar and then climb back off.
Our King has asked each of us to live our lives as a “living sacrifice.” Quite literally, a sacrifice is a dead thing. So the truest interpretation of this term is that we are to be a “living dead thing.” We are to be alive to God and His desires and will while simultaneously being dead to our sinful nature and our own will.
We are to surrender to Him. The way that you surrender to an almighty God is by placing His priorities first in your life and making them your priorities as well.