I have learned the true meaning of the word "sacrifice".

We don't like to think about sacrifice. Giving up something is never easy. However, I don't mean giving up television in order to pray, or giving up some money to help a friend. The sacrifice of which I speak is the sacrifice for sin. The biblical equivalent of payment for our transgressions. The sacrifice I talk about is the reason mercy is possible.

We all know Adam and Eve sinned. We also know they passed their sinful nature to their descendants -- us. So, we also sin. And sin distances us from God. Those are the facts of life. God cannot tolerate sin. "The wages of sin is death." Mercy allows us a way out. The sacrificial offering. What I just learned is that the wages of sin are still death. Someone or something has to die.

The first death spoken of in the Bible is not a person. The first death was an animal -- the animals that provided the skins used to clothe Adam and Eve before the left Eden. And after those first animals died, animals continued to die. Not only did they die to feed people, they died to free people. These animals were as a sacrifice to God to cover the sins that were committed with daily regularity.

For without blood, there is no remission of sins.

I have never seen an animal slaughtered. I can't even imagine what it would be like. But, if I had to make my closest approximation, I'd say it couldn't have been a pretty sight. In my mind's eye, I can see a lamb struggling as its throat is slashed. Its eyes grow dull and glossy as bright red blood pours down into whatever clay basin is there to catch it, its struggles suddenly ceasing as life drains out of it. A lamb without spot or blemish, killed to atone for the wrong I cannot seem to stop doing. In more melodramatic moments, I can see blood spilling to the ground, covering once white wool with scarlet stains that will not wash away . . .

Worthy is the Lamb that was slain . . .

How many times do you have to see the blood spilled for you before you become desensetized to it? Because that's what happened. Israel must have sacrificed millions upon millions of animals each year. Still, they sinned. Could they have felt distant from it? There were priests to do all of that "killing" now. Besides, there are enough sheep in the world, what's one more? Pity it had to be my best sheep, but oh well.

And the priests. How many animals could they slaughter before it became nothing more than a tedious job in preparation for a barbecue? Tie legs, cut throat, wait until blood drains, place wood on altar, burn sacrifice, sprinkle blood, save some meat for later, move on to the next one . . . How many hundreds of animals before the sight of another death didn't bother them?

No one said this was pretty.

Animals weren't enough. The blood of lambs and goats and doves could never really pay the debt. There wasn't a person on earth who could pay the price. A lamb without spot or blemish could not be found among the sinful sheep of this world.

God provided his own. And, like every other sacrifice, he was slain.

Worthy is the Lamb that was slain for the sins of the world . . .

Jesus died for our sins. We say it like a mantra. But, Jesus DIED for our sins. Jesus was not just a figure on a cross. He actually DIED. We see people get shot on the street, we cringe. However, we cannot seem to make the connection between the fact that Jesus died and the fact that it actually was a sacrifice.

Without blood there is no remission of sins. Jesus shed his blood. Actual blood, the type that everyone has running through their veins. Blood was spilled -- from his back after he was beaten 39 times with a whip designed to draw blood, from his head as they pierced it with a crown of thorns, from his hands and feet where they drove nails into his flesh, from his side lanced with a spear. Its a wonder he didn't bleed to death. Blood, the same blood we sing about never losing its power, had to be shed from a man who had to endure human pain. Worthy is the Lamb that was slain . . . He was killed. He died, a gruesome, painful death that not very many of us want to acknowledge. Just as every blemish-free lamb before him, the Lamb of God had to die. Not get hurt, not suffer some minor injury, not go through a little discomfort. The Lamb was slain.

Mercy enabled us to have a way out, a path to righteousness through blood from the one perfect sacrifice. Grace allows us to continue to be washed in the reservoir of blood that sacrifice entails. Unfortunately, I have too many times taken advantage of that grace. I run and jump in the mud and wallow in it before I run back to that fountain of blood that never runs dry to get clean, only to go wallow in the mud again. I never think that blood is more precious than water -- in order to have a fountain of blood, someone has to go through some pain.

I never think my sins had so great a price. I never thought anyone could love me enough to pay it. Lord, help me to never take advantage of your pain and sacrifice again.

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