The cost in the altar

“And the king said unto Araunah, Nay; but I will surely buy it of thee at a price: neither will I offer burnt offerings unto the Lord my God of that which doth cost me nothing. So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.” - 2 Samuel 24:24

There is a cost in the altar, and at the altar.  There is no cheap grace.  It is a grace freely offered, but not freely obtained.  The consumer driven world would have us believe that we can have something for nothing, and that same world would influence the church to preach something for nothing salvation.  However, there is a cost in the altar, and at the altar.

Sacrifice is one of those words that is a lot like responsibility.  If you’re trying to draw a crowd or win a vote; it’s best to avoid it.  That said, you cannot avoid it.  King David knew this.  He was going to God to sacrifice for the good of his people and himself.  When he went to make an altar and offer on the threshing floor of Araunah, Araunah gave the floor willing; but David refused.  He knew that there had be a cost in the altar and a sacrifice made for atonement.  The grace of God is mighty and wonderful, but so is the righteousness of God; the judgment of God.  The sin of man separates us from the righteousness of God and there must be a sacrifice for us to be redeemed.  Jesus Christ was the sacrifice for us.  He paid the debt that we could not.  However, it was not a blank check, but a “costly grace” (to quote Bonhoeffer).  Jesus himself, along with the writers of the New Testament teach us that in order to obtain the merits won on the cross; we must be conformed to the same sacrifice that Christ himself made.  We must die the death, and become acquainted with the cost.  This is not a physical sacrifice, but a spiritual one.  It is the giving over of yourself to the will of God.  This is your offering.  All that you are, all that you want, and all that you ever hope to be is offered on the altar to God.  You then find yourself in the “likeness of his death.”  If you are “in the likeness of his death than you will be also in the likeness of his resurrection.”(Romans 6:5)  Jesus said: “except a corn of wheat falleth into the ground and die, it abidith alone: but if it die, it brings forth much fruit.”(John 12:24)  Salvation does not come to those who are living for themselves, but to those who have died to themselves and are living for Jesus.  This is the cost at the altar.  

Without Jesus, there would be no hope, no fruit, and no resurrection.  He paid the cost that is forever embedded in the altar.  He built the bridge that brought full salvation back to mankind.  He made it all possible.  “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”(Romans 5:8)  This is the “costly grace.”  This is why we sing “in my hands no price I bring but simply to thy cross I cling.”  There was no sacrifice we could give, no price we could pay, and no altar we could bring it to; that would suffice for the debt that was owed.  So, the Son of man, the Son of God, came down and did for us what only he could do; and now we have access to the tree of life, to a “heaven to go to heaven in;” full salvation through sanctification.  Praise God!  To the Holy Ghost within.