Love = Sacrifice

A while back, while I was contemplating the costs of adoption, I mentioned to the Lord that this was going to be costly.   I had been thinking about the grants, and even with grants- this adoption was going to cost us.   It was a very clear realization for me, and honestly it troubled me.

A short time later, a Pastor came on the radio, and he said "Love is sacrifice."  Then he said something like there is no love where there is no sacrifice, because love means sacrifice.   

I hadn't thought of this before, but it is true.   Love means sacrifice.    There is no relationship that makes it, without some sacrifice to it.   Marriages often fail because someone doesn't want to sacrifice.

If God told me that He spent $5 trillion to procure my salvation- I would think, yes, but God can make all that money, what does that mean to me?   

If God said that He made a whole other universe, with multiple worlds, to procure my salvation- I would think that is wonderful, but isn't that rather easy for Him to do?

What can God do- that costs Him?    The only thing that would cost God-is something of Himself....somehow to make Himself personally pay.

Luke 22:44 talks about how Jesus, knowing He would soon be crucified, was praying in the Garden of Gethsemane. "And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly.   Then His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground"  (Luke 22:44).   

Jesus was in agony.   Agony means "Extreme physical or mental suffering."

The clinical term of what is seems that happened with Jesus in the garden is called “hematohidrosis.”   “Around the sweat glands, there are multiple blood vessels in a net-like form. Under the pressure of great stress the vessels constrict. Then as the anxiety passes 'the blood vessels dilate to the point of rupture. The blood goes into the sweat glands.' As the sweat glands are producing a lot of sweat, it pushes the blood to the surface - coming out as droplets of blood mixed with sweat."
http://christiananswers.net/q-eden/edn-t018.html

Jesus was praying in a garden because He had to pay a price for sin.  Sin which entered the world in a garden.

After being beaten, whipped, mocked, and nailed to a cross to die.   Jesus, enduring their mockeries, did not revile them in return, but said "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do"  (Luke 23:24).

As Jesus paid the price for all our sins on the cross, He cried out to God, a cry of overwhelming heartache of separation from His Father.  "Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, 'Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?'; which is translated, 'My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?"  (Mark 15:34).

Jesus was paying of Himself for our sins.   All the way to death.

And as the first person to sin, in a garden, was a woman named Eve.  The first person to see Jesus resurrected, in a garden, was a woman named Mary. 

And as Eve sinned first and then told Adam to sin.   Mary was commissioned by Jesus, to go and tell His disciples the good news that He was alive.

As a woman, I feel that God has given this special place of grace- to show us His forgiveness and love.   Jesus fixed our first mistake, and gave a woman the job of carrying that news.    God was using woman's exceptional communication skills for something good.  :)

He truly can turn anything around for good, and God does so love His daughters.

Angels were placed at the garden of Eden (Genesis 3:24) as a result of punishment.   And angels were placed at Jesus' tomb to announce His resurrection (Luke 24:4-7).

Interesting the parallels between mankind's fall into sin, and Jesus' later redemption of mankind from sin. 

Since God is outside of time, I wonder if He could see those scenes playing simultaneously.

God understands love better than us.  And He showed us this love through how He paid of Himself, through His Son Jesus.   He paid something that truly cost Him- in order to adopt us.

It sure made my concern over our adoption costing us money...seem so very  small.