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God is able to turn bad situations into good for our lives. Psalm 60:5 promises us that God is able to save those He loves, Save us and help us with your right hand, that those you love may be delivered. It is not always the way we want delivery, but He knows what is best for us. We must have faith and trust in Him to know what is best for us.
Daily Devotion 
In a sermon stan preached a few weeks ago, he specifically addressed the issue of sacrifice. One stumbling block for many non-believers (heck many believers) is the barbaric practice of animal sacrifice. I’ve never really understood it. While I understand the concept of blood washing away sins I still never understood why God set up the whole animal sacrifice thing, until stan clarified. Up until the whole Isaac sacrifice thing, the only sacrifice known at that time in the world was human sacrifice. Mainly virgins and children. This was obviously not the heart of God. So he had to teach his people this. So when he asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, while it might have been a test of Abraham’s faith, it was also a teaching moment from God. At the last minute he stops Abraham and provides a ram….the beginning of animal sacrifice. Definitely a step up from human sacrifice. But was it his ultimate plan? Apparently not. David writes over and over that it is not the blood of animals that God is after but a thankful and faithful heart. Chapter 50 reiterates this point over and over. David was way before his time on the sacrifice thing. His comments about animal sacrifice were blasphemous. But he understood that that’s not what God was really after. He was and is and always will be after our hearts. I think this is one of the big factors in God saying that david was a man after his heart. He had an understanding of God’s heart that most did not. Somehow in all my reading of the psalms I never made that connection but now I see it all over the place. God had to meet humankind where they were and take them on a journey in a way that they could understand and respond to him. Another beautiful picture of how God does not force himself on us but continues to reveal aspects of himself as we are able to handle it.
Which then suddenly makes me wonder….Jesus came at a time when sacrifice was still the norm. His initial revelation was to the Jews who still practiced animal sacrifice, so he spoke to them in a paradigm they could understand….telling them he was the ultimate sacrifice, the sacrificial lamb. If that hadn’t been the norm I wonder how different his coming would have been? Its hard to explain this sacrifice thing to modern day folks because it is so foreign to us. But when I speak with my Jewish friends who are practicing, the sacrifice thing makes total sense. Perhaps if we told the story of Jesus within the cultural context of his time, the cross wouldn’t seem so abstract and esoteric. Hmmmmm….new thoughts for the day.
Any thoughts from any of you? (If you happen to be reading this 3 days after the fact :))
This is great information, Sarah! The truth is we don’t take the time to place a lot of things from the Bible in their historical and cultural context. It always makes more sense when we take the time to understand the heart behind the scriptures. Leave it to Stan Mitchell to take us there!