My family was not a wealthy one. Both my parents worked and their income was at the lower end of the middle class and there was never much to spend on luxuries after the mortgage was paid. They made an interesting choice though: I had shown some musical ability so they took the decision to send me to a choir school. Whilst I received a partial scholarship, there was still considerable sacrifice: each term my mother would have to give up a fortnight’s wages to pay the fees. My siblings also showed considerable graciousness with this decision and I never heard a grumble of indignation, rather I think any successes I had were ones they shared in.
I remember my mother again sacrificing to purchase a trumpet for me in Year 7 and my 80 year-old piano teacher in the 1970s also doing so when she took payment of $1 an hour for my tuition, every cent of which she gave to Baptist missionaries.
There is a quality of giving where the person who does so hopes that the sacrifice they make will be of benefit – but they often never know. I don’t know if I’ve ever really mentioned to my mother the many instances where I have played the Last Post on trumpet for various community memorial ceremonies though it has been a regular practice multiple times each year over the last 40 years. She is probably completely unaware of the many times I have played trumpet in church services. My piano teacher passed shortly after teaching me and never saw the significance of her work. However, she did practice 6 hours a day when she was young on piano and violin. I would hazard a guess that she was very much praying that her time had not been wasted on this young boy who was inclined to turn up each week with another excuse for not having practised. I’d like to think her sacrifice and that of my mother reaped reward though they never saw the outcome.
How many times have people given and sacrificed through History, never to find out whether any good came from it?
This is the thing about sacrifice: if there is no God, then any sacrifice for the gospel would be a foolish waste of money, particularly because there is no certainty of this ‘investment’ paying off. However, we proclaim that there is a God and at the very centre of His planning is self-sacrifice for the benefit of others – even though many never take this up and even though we ourselves may never live to see the outcome. The great man of answered prayer, George Mueller, famously sacrificed time to pray for 5 people throughout his life. All became Christians – although 2 were after his death so he never saw the answer – although I have no doubt he was certain it would happen.
Some of these sacrifices involve a lot more than music lessons or educational tuition and can be huge. The man who preached at my wedding had been educated at one of Sydney’s top private schools. When he left, he intended to study at Oxford University but became a Christian on reaching England’s shores and immediately set off for the mission field instead. He started out with a great inheritance but devoted every cent of it to God’s service along the way, burying two of his children and his wife (also a very godly woman.) I first met him in our house church and when he spoke, we all listened intensely: it was as if we had one of the apostles speaking to us such was the depth of his insight and the depth of his Christian experience. He was a man who had given everything to God. Today, 40 years later I can still remember parts of his sermons. This is surely a pattern of the Christian experience: the more we give over to God, the more God gives to us and the closer we come to Him.
This is in complete antithesis to the ways of the world: moments ago in the media I saw one of Australia’s greatest sporting heroes pushing gambling at children (supported by a few other sporting luminaries.) He will be well paid for this but I guarantee out there will be a child who will become hooked and enter a life time of destruction. What a comparison! In revelation 21, the apostle, John, makes a list of what (and who) we won’t encounter in heaven. I have the suspicion that there won’t be gambling and I’d be surprised if there was any money involved – and the streets of gold are there for aesthetic reasons, not capitalist ones. The heaven that has been prepared for us is one where we willingly give and the Spirit that drives sacrifice will see complete fulfillment. We won’t be storing up riches for ourselves but we will be building and doing wonderful things that enrich others.
The brings me to this song, “Jesus, Redeemer.” Who is the original author of the idea of sacrifice? Who plants it in the heart of a parent to give up so much for their children? Or for a person to give up all of their worldly riches for complete strangers? Or to be prepared to even give over their children and loved ones to God, as Abraham did, in complete obedience? Or for God who spent so much time and effort to make our cosmos? This song speaks of the greatest of all sacrifices in the light of which every other human sacrifice pales by comparison: the sacrifice of God of His only son, Jesus, to obtain for us redemption to that very same heaven in the presence of God Himself.