All of Me
“Season all your grain offerings with salt. Do not leave the salt of the covenant of your God out of your grain offerings; add salt to all your offerings.” Lev. 2:11-13 (AMP)
God is a covenant making and covenant keeping God. He is a God of promises made and kept. He is a God of contractual obligations fulfilled. He will never be unfaithful to His covenant, promise, or Word. If God says something then it is done, by the creative force of His Word, it is so.
The covenants He makes are with us, His people. Both the Old Covenant and the New Covenant were made with people, and both for the same purpose: to have a people unto Himself. We were created by Him and for Him (Rev. 4:11). He desires relationship with us. It goes beyond logic that a perfect God would desire a relationship with a hopelessly flawed human, but He does. He not only desires us, He is jealous for us. He will not share us or our affection. He will not accept a divided heart. He is not a God of leftovers. He is God of the first place, and every place, the Alpha and the Omega, the one who was, and is, and is to come. All the places are for Him to fill and He reigns over them all.
What does this have to do with an Old Testament verse about salt? I must say that God does not often speak to me through the verses of Leviticus. But when I read this verse I could hear Jesus’ voice saying, “You are the salt of the earth” (Matt. 5:13). When I read God’s instruction to the nation of Israel to include salt in their offerings and admonition to not leave it out, this New Covenant Christian hears,
“Do not leave yourself out of the offering you are bringing to Me. When you bring your offerings, your worship, your sacrifices, make sure you bring yourself to me also. The offering of you is what makes your offering acceptable.”
The covenant relationship was not meant to be with the grain or the specially made bread, not with the offering itself, but with the offeror. Offerings of money, time, resources, and talents are hollow and empty if they do not also come with our hearts. He desires us. Our hearts, our affection, all the places of priority and love in our lives, should be present in our offerings. In our giving, in our sacrifices, we present ourselves as part of the gift. In fact, we are the offering:
“Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.” Rom. 12:1 (NIV)
I know there has been more than one occasion when I had the opportunity to give of myself to the Lord, and I merely went through the motions. I fulfilled my obligation, but did not offer any part of myself in it. Instead I relied on my own strength, intelligence, creativity. Funny how those times also coincided with my least successful and fulfilling efforts. In contrast, I can remember specific times when I gave of myself as worship to the Lord even while fulfilling the most mundane of obligations. Sometimes it was just serving my monthly rotation in the church nursery when I truly shared the love of Christ with the 25 three-year-olds through a simple but Spirit-led lesson. I left fatigued, yes, but also filled with a sense of satisfaction and closeness to the Father that came from my sacrifice that was pointed toward those children, but was actually an offering to Him.
In April of 1948 Frank Sinatra released the song, “All of Me.” He sings of his heartbreak since his girl has gone, and the uselessness of his lips and arms since she already had his heart. “You took the part that once was my heart so why not take all of me?” We can assume that if she did not have his heart, his lips and arms would be useful to him, but once she had his heart he was a goner and all of him was forever hers.
Is it sacrilege to compare God’s longing toward us to a crooner’s love song? Maybe, but the same principle applies. If God does not have our heart, then He does not have all of us. If we show up on time, sign up when help is needed, write the check, go on the mission trip, pack food for the hungry, do all the things, and just use our arms, legs, talent and time, we have failed to include the salt in our offering. If we show up for these same things with a heart of worship, with hands and feet ready to share the love of Christ, and with an attitude that is ready to serve the least in Christ’s name (Matt. 25:40), that is us bringing a heart that God wants.
What God wants more than anything is our hearts. My heart is what God desires, not the grain, the salt, or the act of serving. God does not want just the good works, the volunteering, our busyness. God wants our heart above any “thing” we can give to Him. So in all our serving, worshipping, sacrificing, let us do more than go through the motions.
Are there areas of your life that you are holding back? Have you been just going through the motions, doing the tasks but not offering the gift of your heart? There is no better time than today to bring all of yourself to God as a sacrifice of worship. He is waiting for you with love and longing to be wholly His.
