Sacrifice - Not Really!

This week I was feeling a little bit sorry for myself. On Sunday we will miss the dedication of our godson, Joshua. Knowing that many of our friends will be joined together and we should really be there, I feel I am missing out again. Just as I have missed out on my sisters 30th birthday, my dad's 60th birthday, Cindy and Martin's wedding, birth's of friends children, St. Mirren's promotion to the SPL and we could go and on and on. I was also sad that our family have missed out on so much of this special time with Heidie's pregnancy. I was upset. I admit I started thinking about some of the sacrifies I have made and asking whether it was worth it and then I read the words of David Livingstone;

"People talk of the sacrifice I have made in spending so much of my life in Africa. Can that be called a sacrifice which is simply acknowledging a great debt we owe to our God, which we can never repay? Is that a sacrifice which brings its own reward in healthful activity, the consciousness of doing good, peace of mind, and a bright hope of a glorious destiny? It is emphatically no sacrifice. Rather it is a privilege.

Anxiety, sickness, suffering, danger, foregoing the common conveniences of this life--these may make us pause, and cause the spirit to waver, and the soul to sink; but let this only be for a moment. All these are nothing compared with the glory which shall later be revealed in and through us. I never made a sacrifice. Of this we ought not to talk, when we remember the great sacrifice which He made who left His Father's throne on high to give Himself for us."

So that was me put in my place and reminded that the debt we owe is far greater than the sacrifices we make. And besides, me mate Dave (Livingstone) was able to speak these words after enduring and living through great hardships that we can't even begin to imagine. I was reminded that our calling to seek justice and mercy with those in poverty and in greatest need, while at the same time tell them about Christ is a real privilige that has been afforded to us. And indeed it is!