Not What Is Left Over

[2Sa 24:24, ESV] But the king said to Araunah, "No, but I will buy it from you for a price. I will not offer burnt offerings to the LORD my God that cost me nothing." So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.

Set apart a specific time for God, make that commitment, and give that time to Him. That is your offering.

Just as we do not come to Sunday worship only when we feel like it, but instead set apart Sunday as the Lord's Day and come before God to worship Him, and just as our giving is not what is left over after we have spent everything else, but is set apart first for God — in the same way, our daily time must also be set apart and given to God. That means having a time each day to meet with the Lord, a time that is kept without fail.

We must not be satisfied with reading the Word or praying only when we happen to have spare time, or when it is convenient. Instead, set aside a specific time each day and deliberately give that time to God. That time becomes your sacrifice of praise, your offering before Him.

When we deliberately set something apart and offer it to God, our heart is in it. And because we have already been made clean through the blood of Christ shed on the cross, God receives the wholehearted devotion offered within that as a pure offering.

But worship that only comes when we feel like it, and giving that only happens when it is convenient, are not yet fully set apart. Of course, even coming that way, even giving that way, is already precious. It is far better than giving nothing at all. But God does not want us to stop there. He calls us further, deeper. He invites us to move from giving what is left over, to setting things apart and giving first.

The same is true of our daily time. A brief prayer or a quick reading of the Word, squeezed in at the end of the day when we are already tired — that, too, is grace. How precious it is that we still seek the Lord, even in that way. But the Lord wants something even better for us. He is calling us not to give Him our leftover time, but to set apart our very best time and offer it to Him.

Knowing this grace, we set things apart not out of duty, but wholeheartedly. God's presence and holiness rest upon what is offered in that way, set apart and pure. The time, the offerings, the days that I offer set apart become the holy life, the holy offering, that God receives.

And it is precisely through that place of full and complete setting-apart that God does astonishing things. When the five loaves and two fish were placed fully into the Lord's hands, the miracle of feeding five thousand people took place. It was not we who multiplied that little into much — it was the Lord. But the Lord was pleased to work through the small act of obedience of a child who gave without holding back. It is the same with our time, our offerings, and our lives. When we set things apart first, and give without holding back, it is through that very place that the Lord does things beyond what we could ever manage on our own.

"But the king said to Araunah, 'No, I will not do that. I will pay you the full price, for I will not offer to the LORD my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing'" (2 Samuel 24:24). David refused to offer a sacrifice that cost him nothing, because devotion that costs us nothing is not true devotion at all.

Therefore, I pray that you will not give God merely the days, the time, the finances, or the effort that remain after everything else has already been taken care of. Instead, may you first set apart your days, your time, and all your resources, and offer them to God — that they may become a sacrifice and an offering that is pleasing and acceptable in His sight. In the name of the Lord, I pray this blessing over you.