That Sweet Smelling Sacrifice………
It is been so many days since I had an insightful study from the Bible, I was so busy in traveling and pending work. My prayer life was also very much sinking, A day without 1 hour prayer like a shit for me. I can’t function properly. So today morning I decided in the bus itself that I will have a deep Bible study and share a lesson for my readers.
Ephesians 5:2 2 And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and has given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling smell.
(If you are a Bible lover, I suggest you follow NIV version, which is very easy to understand and they use very meaningful words which touches our soul and transcends our lower understanding.)
The Book of Ephesians was supposed to write by Paul the self-proclaimed disciple of Jesus. Now there are so many arguments against Paul’s authorship, well, who wrote it should not be an issue. We should only look for the content.
So many times I have read the Book of Ephesians; again I started reading from Chapter 1.
Ephesus was the city in present Turkey and it was an industrial area. Greek gods were popular there so, Paul went to preach and started a congregation of Christians there. Of course any group, religious or non-religious will go through many issues like external attack and internal politics, so, Book of Ephesians is a call from Paul to keep his congregation strong. In this entire book, he is asking the members of the congregation to think about the base of their congregation and get back to that base.
I donno for other theologians, when we go through Paul’s writing somewhere we will get a doubt that is he promoting himself of God? So, whenever I read Paul’s articles I purposefully skip his self promotion based claims like he went through suffering, he taught others, he is that and he is this ………….he did that, he did this…….. , so that I can fix my eyes more on God and his graciousness. To be frank, Paul sometimes create a mental block to readers his by self promoting lines . Lekin ye sab hota hey, when we live a hatke lifestyle we are in a threshold to show the world……….” Hey world look at me , I am this and learn from me” Well, that is a call from the universe and You can nowhere block it.
It is like being humbly prideful In my theology life time, I was known as a humbly prideful person. I used to put statements in such a way that I promote myself a lot, but it had a coating of humility, but when you unwrap…..it is all pride, pride, and pride. Kindly blame my Guru Chandal dosh….Jupiter and Rahu conjunction…….
Ephesians 4:14- Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming.
In chapter 4:14 Paul says :we should not act like infants once when are enlightened by the true love of god. God showed his true love by sending his son and thus saving us. Even if we set Christ apart, when we have that enlightenment, and when we live in the brightness of that enlightenment, we should not be immature in handling our lives.
See, you should see this as an enlightening call. We all are always humans while our stay on earth and we are programmed for some or other kind of inequities. Here the scripture says, we should be mature enough to understand our temptations to fall into the same kind of inequity again and again. That doesn’t mean we move from one sin to another, its all about conquering ourselves.
Ha….conquering ourselves hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. I just read the news about recent BRICS summit held in Goa. Today’s Times of India comes up with coverage about Russia’s silence over India’s need to Ban Jaysh E Mohammad and Lashkae E Tayyaba. Terrorism in the name of any religion should be banned because we all are different from each other and the universe has programmed us in different ways. Our parents are different; our Karma is different so there is no point in forcefully making a second person accepting your ideologies. What we can do is to just respect their religious views unless it contradicts or violate the basic human needs or rights. China and Russia, the two biggies in BRICS need more mutual interaction. Especially China, which is a closed economy and country, they are not keen about India’s love. Why we follow soft methods. So much of mild moves and time we Indian’s believe that our country doesn’t have the power to strike back unless someone fire from the LOC. When India conducted those surgical strikes, I was in Delhi, the capital of India. Out of 50 Indians, I spoke only 3 believed that India has done those attacks. Rest of the 47 people felt that is a lie promoted by the government and India doesn’t have the guts to strike back. One guy even told, “ye India be soldiers or army chiefs nothing but darpoks.” This guy can say that because he is a free man and maybe he doesn’t have any risk in his life. If India is in an issue, will he ever go for a war? NO.
Well, any country or person is respected when they show an immense amount of internal and external resistance against the evil. Are we Indians showing a good level of resistance? Look at our infrastructure and bureaucracy; it has to improve a lot. Why blame it on government? We, citizens of India, are the basic problem. Just show some benefits, we will adjust of personal space for any evil. Likewise
Ephesians 4:14- Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming
Let’s put it in plain and laymen language. See, when we get an insight that we were either or wrong or right in deciding on some issues in our life, that is called minor enlightenment. Now when we are enlightened we take a decision to stick to not following the earlier pattern no matter how deep the temptations are. It’s like making our base solid and not getting overwhelmed by the temptations. Fixing our roots, laying a strong foundation.
How to lay this foundation?
Ephesians 5:2 and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.
It is all about presenting ourselves as a fragrant offering and sacrifice.
In ancient Rome, after the war captives were taken to a parade and after that parade, they will be executed in a most brutal way. During the parade, right after these soldiers, there will be ladies holding fuming incense, then music instruments and all. For winners, it is a gala and time for celebrations. For losers……………….I don’t want to explain.
So here the scripture is compelling us to see ourselves as just an object of sacrifice in front the lord. We are just his creations and we are here to promote lord despite the religion. One day we will leave everything here and travel back to the source. We dunno that time, infarct no one knows that exact time.
AS an astrologer people ask for predictions, to be frank, I don’t like the prediction part of astrology. It’s all because we should leave that fixing the time part to God. No astrologer should focus on predictions but look more into explaining how the person is programmed and what the best is for him. So that people can understand themselves more.
How can we present ourselves as fragrance sacrifice? Sacrificing is definitely a tough task and pleasing god is not an easy task. That’s why people looking for easy methods like remedies. If you have a problem, then get a gemstones or rudraksha……….The challenges are here to show how much we trust in the lord. These challenges are inbuilt and it will come up to us on the time which is fixed by the Lord. Dasa systems give a lot of idea about those timings, but the intensity of the event can only by decided by the lord. The way out from the issue also is shown by the Lord. Certain issues are given to us and we are destined to live with that. We should not block it, instead accept it and live with it. Even if it is a tough situation, decide to live according to the standards set by the lord leaving all our ego on one side………..So, it’s all about sacrificing ourselves.
It was my deep desire from my childhood to submit myself in the service of my Lord. I remember during my school days itself I was fed up with the way world works and just wanted to run away from the crowd and be alone in the nature. I used to wonder if the universe which we can see is so attractive and mesmerizing, how the realm which God receives our soul could be . All my life I deeply, crazily and madly searched for my Lord than searching for any wealth or comfort or love from a man. I never felt any of these things are more valid than God’s love. If as a sacrifice with a great fragrance, I was ready to leave my life of material comforts to be with my lord. I was not afraid of being starved or killed or persecuted for my trust in my Lord. …….but…… As I grow up………I started losing that grip from the zeal for my Lord Allmighty…….. The pressure to be in the main stream world is so nasty……….I have seen people falling down to the lowest morals , even I myself at sometimes to stand infront of the world………slowly ,slowly I started going down in my faith.
The innate zeal or desire was to get back to the lord at any cost……..and I am going back to that old love and commitment. Me and my Lord alone……..holding hands and spending time till eternity………He is my love, he is my everything…. not the money, my family or fame or name……..Never desired any of things truly……..But cant run away from the worldly commitments too…….
Life is different when the love and zeal for the Lord consumes us…… The pleasure of that life is just limited to few people………and I think I am privileged to know that like that few….My LORD………..pls hold me safe and secure…….and I dont want to get detached from you for anything in the world……Thats my prayer……..
In order to feel the need to sacrifice, we should set our eyes or fix our eyes in the lord no matter however harsh the situation we go through. We should always be grateful for the good things and keep on remembering it. I ,so many times forget the value of good things like my parents, my family, my education, my talents, my health , wealth and so many other things jump into the worldly desires. Then I lose that focus and fall into traumas……..Then I cry out Lord to pull me out if this dungeon. The truth is that Lord is truthful and not forgetful; he always has come to my rescue, even if I am a shit.
Then again me making a promise to sacrifice myself for the love of my lord. Again me falling into some other crisis, again crying out to the lord. Well, the limitations of three dimensions are so powerful, yet life is all about trying to break the chains and get united with that force which created the entire universe. For that, every human being is created and everyday life is just a sign of reminding us that we are just nothing but dust…..And we don’t have an existence without a soul, which solely belongs to God. We just own it on an agreement that we should sacrifice ourselves and set the soul free and entrust it with Lord again……..