Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Daily Offering

In my Bible, the following section is titled The Daily Offering

Exodus 29:38-46 Now this is what you shall offer on the altar: two lambs a year old regularly each day. One lamb you shall offer in the morning, and the other lamb you shall offer in the evening; and with the first lamb one-tenth of a measure of choice flour mixed with one-fourth of a hin of beaten oil, and one-fourth of a hin of wine for a drink offering. And the other lamb you shall offer in the evening, and shall offer with it a grain offering and its drink offering, as in the morning, for a pleasing odor, an offering by fire to the LORD. It shall be a regular burnt offering throughout your generations at the entrance of the tent of meeting before the LORD, where I will meet with you, to speak to you there. I will meet with the Israelites there, and it shall be sanctified by my glory; I will consecrate the tent of meeting and the altar; Aaron also and his sons I will consecrate, to serve me as priests. I will dwell among the Israelites, and I will be their God. And they shall know that I am the LORD their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them; I am the LORD their God.

Here's what spoke to me from this passage today. First, the Israelites are to set aside time to meet with God twice a day. They are to bring the stuff of their daily lives (lamb, grain, oil, wine) as offering to God. What would it look like for us to bring the stuff of our lives to God twice a day? Our watches, calendars, wallets, Blackberries, cell phones, lap tops? If we did, what would happen?

God makes some promises in this passage. "I will meet you and speak to you" at this place where you come with your offering. "I will dwell among" you. "I will be their God." "They shall know that I am the LORD their God," because they will remember what I have done for them.

In this time of waiting, I have gotten lazy about many things. One of them was offering the stuff of my life to God. When it was hospital work, it was easy to offer that to God. But what about all this unstructured time?

Lord God I give you my time, my mental and physical energy today. Show me how you would have me use it. Amen.

2 comments:

Rev.Dulce said...

Cherish this time because it will be swallowed up soon and you will need the memories.

Theresa Coleman said...

It's the season ... soon enough you won't have unstructured time.

I'm dwelling in unstructured time right now and enjoying it while I can!