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If you could pick anyone in the world to spend one day with, who would that be?

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Likely it would be someone that you greatly admire or someone you love.

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It could be someone famous.

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It may be somebody obscure.

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Perhaps it would be a politically powerful individual or someone who's influential in

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the history of the world.

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Or perhaps someone near life's end who is in weakness.

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What if I could offer to you the opportunity this morning to spend a day with the most

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powerful, yet incredibly kind and wise and loving person who has ever lived.

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Would you like to do that?

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Of course, all of us would.

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And the fact is that every child of God does live in the presence of that very person.

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Not just for one day, but for every day of his life.

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It's wonderful to know that we're not merely tolerated by him, but that we are indeed embraced

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by him, desired by him.

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We are requested to come to him.

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I'm talking about someone who knows the real you and who loves you and who is with you

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in every moment of every day.

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I received a letter recently from a man in the Twin Cities who has become a believer

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and who is dying of AIDS.

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He writes, last night I spent an hour in the cold evening air shoveling my sidewalks clear

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of snow.

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It was so peaceful.

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The air was clear and brisk.

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The moon shadowed my every movement with brilliant constancy, a silvery angel guarding my way.

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It was a singular event.

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The starry moonlit sky, the crispness of the air and the snow all combined to flood my

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heart with the glorious joy of being alive.

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How my heart is enlarged by such moments, exhilarated.

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For an instant I glimpse the reality that truly pulses beneath my seemingly ordinary

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days.

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God's love and mercy thrum a powerful counterpoint beneath and around my insignificant life,

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imparting meaning, power, and hope to an otherwise mundane and ordinary world.

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God is so good.

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Only God knows who I am in truth.

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Only God can reveal myself to me.

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The world tells me a million times of my failures and my lack, yet God tells me who I am in

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Him and who I am to be.

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He is not troubled by vision that cannot see the not yet.

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He looks with unclouded eye upon the good and the bad.

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Nothing escapes Him.

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I am but a vapor before the unblinking eye of eternity.

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But God loves me, and He has put His name upon me.

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God knows everything about me.

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If you are one who has placed your faith in Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, like this

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man whose words we have just read, you too are a new creation, a new person with purpose

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and meaning in life.

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If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation.

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The old has all passed away, and all has become new.

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But the new you, who you are in Christ, needs definition, needs description, so that you

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can understand the true significance of who you are now in Him.

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So we've been talking about that for the last several months.

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The new you, who are you?

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God knows, and God wants to show you who you are, and He does in His Word.

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The new you is a part of an ordained priesthood.

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I invite you to open your Bible to 1 Peter chapter 2 as we look again at some verses

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we began with last week.

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1 Peter 2 verse 4, And coming to him, to Christ, as to a living stone rejected by a man, but

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choice and precious in the sight of God, you also, as living stones, are being built up

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as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable

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to God through Jesus Christ.

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Last week we talked about the background of the priesthood in the Old Testament, and the

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fact that you and I serve in a new priesthood, and what that means in the New Testament sense.

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And we had time just to mention the privilege of the priesthood, and that is that we live

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every day in the very presence of God, whereas the priest under the Old Covenant could go

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but into the Holy Place, and the high priest into the Holy of Holies, but once a year we

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have the privilege of coming into the very presence of God boldly, as we sang this morning.

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And to do that any time that we wish, let us come boldly to the throne of grace.

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We as a priesthood, a holy priesthood, have sacrifices to offer to God, just as did the

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Old Testament priests.

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Their sacrifices were all prescribed.

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Their duty is laid out for us in books like Leviticus, which is really a manual for the

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Levitical priesthood, thus its name Leviticus.

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But we also have sacrifices to offer.

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They entered the presence of God with offerings and sacrifices that were appropriate for their

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time.

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And in a somewhat similar way, but then again in an entirely different way, we also have

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appropriate sacrifices to offer to God in our time.

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Peter refers to these in verse 5 as spiritual sacrifices.

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Sacrifices that cannot be defined in terms of animals and grain, but sacrifices that

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can be defined generally, spiritual sacrifices.

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And so the question I want to address as we begin this morning is what are these spiritual

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sacrifices?

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The first is found in the book of Romans, chapter 12, verses 1 and 2, familiar verses

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to many of us, where the apostle Paul, after describing the mercies of God, says to all

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of us who know that mercy, I urge you, brethren, present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice,

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acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.

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And the NIV puts it this way, offer yourselves a living sacrifice to God.

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That's really the idea in offering the body, because you see the body is understood as

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a vehicle or a vessel for all that we are.

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All of our powers, our capacities, our potential, our abilities, our gifts, our decisions, our

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choices, focus upon the body in which we live.

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And so he says, present your bodies, which represents the total you, all that you are

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to God.

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It might be helpful to remind ourselves that although our bodies are still indwelt by the

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principle of sin, the body itself is not sinful.

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It is capable of either performing sinful actions or righteous actions, depending upon

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our choice.

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And of course, it is the latter that pleases God.

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When we choose to do what is righteous, a living sacrifice.

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In the Old Testament, animals were killed and their blood was shed.

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And then the body was disposed of in some sort of way.

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Sometimes it was burned, sometimes it was thrown outside the camp, other times it was

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butchered and eaten.

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Whatever, it was a sacrifice of death, not life.

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The Lord Jesus has fulfilled all of those pictures of a sacrifice of death by the offering

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of himself on the cross for our sin.

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Once and for all, he has paid the penalty for our sin.

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Thus he has made all of those sacrifices of death obsolete.

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They're meaningless now.

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They have no longer any significance to God because the sacrifice has been offered forever

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in Christ.

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And so he tells us not to offer sacrifices of death, but a living sacrifice, which is

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ourselves.

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The word sacrifice in this verse is from a verb that means literally to go up in smoke.

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You may remember about a month ago we talked about the burnt offering sacrifice described

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in the book of Leviticus.

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In that sacrifice everything went up in smoke.

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And so often the word in the New Testament that is translated sacrifice comes from that

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concept.

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It's that which is totally consumed.

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The point of the apostle is that the living sacrifice we are to make is to be complete

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and irrevocable.

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Just as much as was the burnt offering sacrifice of the Old Testament.

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We are to present ourselves.

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It's our responsibility to do that.

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We cannot present others, but we can present ourselves.

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We can bring ourselves to the altar.

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The word that he uses here is the technical term for presenting to God a sacrifice.

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It means to place beside the altar the sacrifice.

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You and I are urged by the apostle to do that.

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It means to put ourselves at the disposal of God.

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That's what it means.

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So the first sacrifice that we are to offer is the sacrifice of ourselves.

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He says it is a reasonable thing that we should do this.

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He calls it, you notice, a spiritual service of worship.

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The word spiritual there is sometimes translated reasonable because the Greek word is logikon.

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And you hear in there, don't you, our word logic.

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The point of the word is that it is the conscious, intelligent, logical, mindful, deliberate

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act of worship to God.

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It is reasonable, quite in contrast to those animals of the Old Testament that really had

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no choice.

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They were selected and they were brought to the altar and there they were bound and they

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gave their lives not because they chose to either, but the living sacrifice is one of

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choice.

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So he says in light of all that God has done for you, it's fine to sing and can it be

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that I should gain, but get beyond that point to say therefore I will sacrifice all that

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I am to this Savior.

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What does it mean to do that?

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It seems to me verse 2 goes on to elaborate because he says and do not be conformed to

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this world.

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Do not be conformed to the world.

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Don't let the world system out there squeeze you into its mold for you.

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But on the other hand he says be inwardly transformed by the renewing of your mind that

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you may test and prove the will of God, what it is, and find that it is good, acceptable

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and perfect.

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The offering of ourselves to God means that we say Lord your will for my life.

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Lord I put myself at your disposal.

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It may not be what I would choose, but work in me to make me willing.

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Philippians says that.

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Paul says it is God who works in you both the willing and the doing.

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If we will simply say God I am at your disposal, he will cause our minds to be transformed

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and renewed so that we are willing to do the will of God and that is the most blessed experience

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that we can have in this world.

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Some of us have bought the idea that the will of God must surely be what will make me unhappy

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and miserable all of my life.

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God will make me do that to test me, to make sure I am sincere.

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What a lie.

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Sometimes the will of God is difficult and involves pain, but the will of God is always

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good ultimately and acceptable and it is perfect always.

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We need not fear the will of God.

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Indeed the thing to fear is to miss the will of God.

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Present myself as a living sacrifice means to commit myself irrevocably to whatever the

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will of God is for me.

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Have you come to that place fellow priest?

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Where you have given yourself to God in this complete sense as though you were a burnt

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offering that yet lives in this world to experience the will of the Lord.

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Both of our spiritual sacrifices can be found in the book of Hebrews the 13th chapter.

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And indeed here the apostle is going to mention a couple to us.

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Verse 15 he says, through him, through Jesus then let us continually offer up a sacrifice

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of praise to God always.

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That is, he says, the fruit of our lips continually confessing his name, giving thanks to his

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name.

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Let us offer up sacrifices to God.

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We do that when we come together for worship.

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As a body of believers this is why we come together, to offer unto God a sacrifice.

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We are not here to be entertained.

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I love the music, don't you?

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But we can't come to be entertained.

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We come to participate in the music.

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We come to offer from our lips praise to the Lord confessing his name.

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That's a spiritual sacrifice fellow priest.

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And so when we come to worship let's come with our hearts prepared.

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If there is any time in the week when you are guaranteed a spiritual battle it's before

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you get to church to worship.

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Satan will do everything he can to make sure we are not prepared to offer to God this sacrifice.

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So how diligently we must be prepared to come.

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And then he says in verse 16, and do not neglect doing good and sharing for with such sacrifices

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God is pleased.

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And so now we have something more tangible under this heading of spiritual sacrifice.

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Doing good is used only here in the New Testament.

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It means doing deeds of love and charity to others.

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He perhaps elaborates upon it by saying sharing.

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The word here is fellowship.

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Coenoneus.

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Fellowshipping.

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And obviously he is talking about material things.

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Money.

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Things that we have to give and share.

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But we can also apply it to our time sharing that.

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Giving of our influence on behalf of others.

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Paul wrote to the Philippians several times in the book, thanks God for their fellowship

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with him in the gospel.

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What is he talking about?

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The monetary gift they had sent to aid him in his ministry.

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And in chapter four of the book he calls it in fact a sacrifice to God.

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This which they have given to him.

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Dr. George Truitt who was for nearly half a century the pastor of the First Baptist

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Church in Dallas, Texas.

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He's out preaching one day in a struggling congregation helping them to raise finances

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for their church building.

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They still needed $6500 which in that day was a great deal of money for a whole congregation.

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Truitt in his typically bombastic and eloquent way talked to them about how important it

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was to give to this goal of the church together.

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And as he did so they took some sort of a promise among them and it totaled $3000.

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And so he got up to them and says what do you expect?

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He says you are $3500 short of your goal.

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And then someone in the back, a lady stood and looking at her husband who was seated

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on the platform and recording the pledges she said to him with a quivering voice, Charlie

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I wonder if you would be willing for us to give our little home.

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We were offered $3500 cash for it yesterday.

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She said if the Savior gave his life for us wouldn't he be pleased if we made this sacrifice

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for him.

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Truitt as he told the story said that the fine fellow behind him responded with equal

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generosity and said yes Jenny I was thinking the same thing.

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Truitt says turning to me with tears in his eyes he said brother Truitt if it's needed

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we'll raise our pledge by $3500.

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Silence reigned in the congregation for a few seconds and then there was a breaking

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and someone and then some several began to cry.

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Those who had 15 minutes before refused to give anymore to do anything additional.

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Now we're either offering their names to the list for the first time or increasing their

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donations so that according to Truitt's testimony by the time they were finished Charlie and

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Jenny didn't have to give their home.

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The sacrifice of doing good, of sharing, of giving of what God has given to us.

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But our spiritual sacrifices don't stop there.

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I invite you to turn to Romans chapter 15 and notice with me another of these sacrifices.

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In the 16th verse the apostle Paul is writing about his ministry and God's calling in his

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life.

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God's call me says be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles ministering as a priest.

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Notice that ministering as a priest doing priestly service with the gospel of God that

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my offering of the Gentiles might be acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit.

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It seems to me the apostle Paul is saying here that converts the people that we win

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to faith in Jesus Christ become a sacrifice on our part to God.

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He is saying I am offering to God as a priest the Gentiles that I have led to faith in Christ.

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He says it is pleasing and acceptable to God being cleansed and sanctified by the Holy

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Spirit.

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Have you ever looked upon your witness that way?

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All the importance of our being a holy priesthood offering to God our testimony to others, praying,

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working diligently that others may come to faith in Christ, though as it were then we

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may offer them to God as a spiritual sacrifice.

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One final sacrifice mentioned in 2 Timothy chapter 4.

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For now the apostle is near death and he says verse 6, I am already being poured out as

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a drink offering.

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Very interesting picture here because some of the Old Testament sacrifices involved the

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pouring of wine over what was laid on the altar.

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It was a libation offering, a drink offering.

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That was a way of further giving to God in this sacrifice.

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The apostle Paul says I look upon my death as my last offering to God.

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He says what I am going through right now is like being poured out.

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The cup has not been emptied yet, but I, my life is being poured out upon the altar of

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God.

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His death.

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Have you ever thought about your death that way?

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To see that as your final act of sacrifice to God.

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In Paul's case it was a martyr death.

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I think it need not always be a martyr's death to be a sacrifice.

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Sometimes it is.

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We as a priesthood are offered to God spiritual sacrifices and to do our work of intercession.

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The apostle pleads the Colossians pray for me.

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Earlier in the chapter he says devote yourselves to prayer.

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What does he mean?

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He means that you and I are to follow the example of our great high priest whom the

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scripture says ever lives to make intercession for us.

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Robert Murray McShane, great saint of God in Scotland in the last century said if I

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could hear Christ praying for me in the next room I would not fear a million enemies.

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Can you agree with that?

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But he goes on to say yet the distance makes no difference.

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He is praying for me.

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He is praying for us today and we are to follow his example as a holy priesthood and to offer

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to God prayers of intercession.

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Let me just give you a simple way to do that.

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It is not original with me.

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A Sunday school teacher taught it to her children years and years ago.

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She held up her left hand and she said here is my prayer list.

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She said I start with my thumb because it is the digit that is closest to me and it

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reminds me to pray for those who are near me, my family, my friends, my neighbors.

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Moving on she went to her index finger.

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She says when I was in school my teacher often pointed that finger at me and sometimes the

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preacher does too.

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So she says when I come to that finger on my hand I pray for those who are teachers

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and preachers who have pointed others to Christ.

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The children were listening to see what she would say.

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She said my middle finger is the largest one and it stands above all of the rest and so

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it reminds me to pray for rulers and for those who are in authority over others.

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She said then this finger is the weakest one.

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She said it reminds me to pray for the helpless, the sick and the poor.

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And then my little finger is the last one.

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Because it is little I see it standing for me and so I finish my praying by asking for

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those things that I believe I need.

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The children never forgot the prayer list on her hand.

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Beloved you and I are to be a praying people.

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God's called us to that.

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To be a people of prayer.

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Oh what a holy calling God has given us.

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The priests of the Old Testament were brought before Moses.

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Sacrifices were made and then according to God's word blood from the sacrifice was placed

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upon the earlobe of the right ear.

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And then upon the thumb of the right hand.

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And then upon the large toe of the right foot.

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Signifying here obedience.

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Works.

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Walk.

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All of it cleansed by the blood and set apart as holy unto God.

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The blood of the Lord Jesus Christ has been shed for us to set us apart also as a priesthood.

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That our lives may be lived in obedience as redeemed people.

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That our hands may be involved in works as redeemed people, a holy priesthood.

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That our walk may be as a redeemed people, a sanctified people.

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Remember who you are.

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And as you go out to your duties for the rest of this day and through this week, remember

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that God has laid his hand upon you child of God to be a priest.

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To be a part of a holy priesthood set apart for service to him.

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Let's pray.

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Sing with me this chorus.

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I think most of you know the words.

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I'll live for him who died for me.

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I'll live for him who died for me.

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How happy then my life shall be.

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I'll live for him who died for me.

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My Savior and my God.

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Would you stand with me please?

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Before we go, let's give ourselves to the Lord to be as priests.

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If we have not been offering unto God the sacrifices appropriate for our priesthood,

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we have not been interceding according to God's plan for us, then let's commit ourselves

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at this moment.

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To begin performing the duty of the priesthood that he calls holy.

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Lord today, we recognize that we are redeemed by precious blood.

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That blood has cleansed us from our sinfulness and sanctified us unto holy work.

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And so in the energy that you give us by the Holy Spirit, enable us this week to be your

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priests and offer unto you the sacrifices and prayers appropriate for those who are

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set apart to this holy purpose.

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In Jesus' name, amen.