An account in Exodus 32 highlights a great spiritual lesson regarding consecration. In that chapter, Moses was distressed because he had just discovered that the Children of Israel had sinned by making a golden calf and worshipping it. Moses asked those who were still on the Lord’s side to come to him, and when the tribe of Levi came, he told them: “Consecrate yourselves to day to the Lord, even every man upon his son, and upon his brother; that he may bestow upon you a blessing this day” (verse 29). The word consecrate means “to make or declare something as sacred; to dedicate formally to a divine purpose.” In other words, Moses was telling the Levites, “Dedicate yourselves and your families entirely to God, set yourselves apart for Him, and then He will bestow upon you blessings.”

With God, consecration is a gateway to blessing. If we want His blessing, consecration is required. And if we consecrate ourselves to God, we are assured of His blessing. At times, we may have doubts or fears about what will happen if we yield a specific area of our lives to God. When we understand that consecration opens the door for His blessing, we realize that we have nothing to be afraid of! We never lose by offering ourselves to God.

In Romans 12:1, the Apostle Paul gave a description of what our consecration to God should look like. He said, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.” Each of our lives is meant to be a “living sacrifice.” That indicates a complete surrender—nothing held back. When we meet God’s standard for consecration, His blessing is sure to follow. Let’s consider some specifics about what this means in a practical sense.

No limits

At times, people try to set boundaries for God, as if to tell Him, “You can go this far, but not that far.” I was once guilty of doing that myself. When I was first saved, I had reservations about consecrating my life fully to God so I tried to set limits on what He could call me to do.

In 1978, I went to Portland camp meeting with the sole purpose of being filled with the Holy Spirit. At that time, I was preoccupied with many things—working fulltime, serving as mayor of my town, being active in church work, and so on. I felt that if I could just get to the tabernacle and set myself to seek God there, I could receive the baptism. However, one day as I was praying at the altars, God showed me a vision of an empty pulpit. It was the pulpit at my home church, and on either side of it were people from my community who were unsaved. God’s message to me was: “If you want to be filled with the Holy Spirit, you have to be willing to help those people.”

God was calling me to the ministry, but I was very shy. I could not imagine myself standing at the pulpit, leading public prayer, or making a visit to a hospital or to someone’s home to pray for the sick. So, I attempted to set some limitations for God. I told Him, “I will do this, and this, and this . . .,” and then ended: “But I will not be a pastor.” Of course, I went home from camp meeting disappointed, having not received the baptism because I was not willing to say yes to God.

For two years, I struggled with making that consecration. I spent many hours in prayer, trying to get around God’s will—trying to find an alternate route to receive the blessing without making the consecration he required. Instead, I found out that I could not change God’s will. His gifts and callings are without repentance (Romans 11:29). In August of 1980, the same vision came to me again, and that day I told God yes but not with my whole heart. Still, my blessing did not come. It was not until October 12 when I finally said it from my heart: Yes, I will do whatever You call me to do! The Holy Spirit came in and filled me to overflowing.

Though I had not told anyone about God’s call on my life, two days later I received a call from my district superintendent, Sister Dolly Walker. I preached my first sermon the next Sunday. I soon found out that when God calls us to do something, He gives us power to do it. His commands are His enablings. We cannot count on our own strength, wisdom, or understanding to answer God’s call, but we can count on God. He will supply all we need.

We must not attempt to tie God’s hands. God knows better than we do what He is doing in our lives. When we offer ourselves to Him with no limits, He can work through us in any way He wants.

All-inclusive

Another common misunderstanding is that we can give God some areas of our lives but not others. The prayer of our hearts should be, “Not just myself, but my time, my plans, my possessions, my family . . . I give You everything.” It must be all-inclusive. If our plans and ambitions are not what God wants for us, then we need to allow Him to change them.

We read about this in Matthew 10:37-38 where Jesus said, “He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.” Jesus wants us to love God more than we love anything else, even our families. Our love for Him must surpass even what we count as most precious in this life. That is what a consecrated life looks like.

Over the years, there were times when I had to choose to put the Lord before what I wanted for my family. Once, nearly forty years ago, our family made plans for the Labor Day weekend, which is the last weekend of summer recess for school children. My youngest son was about five years old at the time. The four of us decided to spend the day berry-picking and then have a picnic.

Just as we were getting ready to leave the house, there was a knock at the door. It was a man I knew, and he had a reputation as an alcoholic. Whenever he got into trouble, he would try to pray and ask God for help, but it was never long before he was back to his old habit again. And there he was at our door, saying he wanted to get saved right when we were about to leave for a family picnic.

I really didn’t want to disappoint my children. It was tempting to tell the man, “Could you come back later? We’re on the way out the door.” However, I reminded myself that there would be other opportunities for a family picnic. I told the kids we needed to wait and invited the man into my office. We talked and prayed together. After a time, he said he felt he was saved, and then he left.

Today, that man is in his eighties and he is still saved! And what happened to our family? We still went berry-picking; our outing was just a little delayed. We still had our picnic lunch. When we came home that day, I was a happy dad, a happy husband, and a happy pastor knowing that a soul had been won for Christ! When we put God before every other priority, He will come through with the blessing.

Consider Abraham, who gave us one of the most profound examples of putting God first. Genesis 22:2 says, “And he [God] said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.” How must Abraham have felt when he received that instruction? In all the years I’ve served the Lord, I never faced a consecration that difficult. Isaac was Abraham’s long-awaited, promised son. Yet, verse 3 says, “And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son.” Abraham did not lose any time at all in obeying what God told him to do, and he followed God’s instructions all the way. He took Isaac to the mount, built the altar, bound Isaac to it, and took the knife in his hand. At the last moment, God let him know that was enough. Abraham’s consecration and commitment to God were such that he trusted God with what was most precious to him. Because of that, He was able to receive a blessing from God that reached to all nations of the earth.

Our consecration is to be all-inclusive, and there is no need to be afraid of that type of commitment because God’s intention is to bless.

Ongoing

As a living sacrifice, our consecration is not a one-time event. It must be ongoing. Once we have laid our consecration on the altar, we need to keep it there, continuing to offer ourselves on a daily basis.

In Genesis 15, we read about a time when Abraham prepared an animal sacrifice for God. Verse 11 tells that before God accepted the sacrifice, fowls of the air tried to eat it. What did Abraham do in response? He drove them away! He was not going to allow the fowls to defile or steal away what he had prepared for God.

We have to do that too, in a sense. The enemy of our souls wants to diminish what we have given to God. He will tell us, “You need to lighten up a little. You don’t need to go to church so often. You don’t need to read your Bible every day—you need more rest. It’s ok if you don’t pray today; you are busy.” He can go on and on. He is like a fowl of the air pecking away at our offering to God. He may also try to plant doubts in our minds about whether or not God will even bless our consecration. He will say we won’t miss out on anything by offering God a bit less. We have to actively resist the enemy’s lies.

Abraham guarded his offering until the end of the day. As the sun went down, he was still keeping a vigil, and his effort was not in vain. God honored his sacrifice, and just as surely, God will honor ours as we continue to keep it before Him.

The blessing

Mark 10:28-30 records a conversation between Peter and Jesus about the reward for making sacrifices for the Gospel. It says, “Then Peter began to say unto him, Lo, we have left all, and have followed thee. And Jesus answered and said, Verily I say unto you, There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake, and the gospel’s, But he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life.”

From this we understand that whatever we may give to God, it will be very small compared to what He gives us. In Peter’s case, we know that the disciples were exceptionally blessed. They witnessed many miracles by Jesus—blind eyes opened, lame feet walking, lepers cleansed, food multiplied, storms calmed, demons cast out. Then, at the end of their journeys, the reward of eternal life awaited.

We cannot out-love God and we cannot out-give God. I’ll share an example of what I mean. As pastors, one of our responsibilities is to pray for the sick, and requests for prayer sometimes come at inconvenient times. Once, I got a call at 3:00 in the morning in the midst of a snowstorm. My natural inclination was that I did not want to get out of bed at that hour, especially not to venture into a storm. However, it was a brother saying that his mom was sick to the point of death. When we arrived, his dad was there weeping. His mom was not responding. We anointed her with oil and prayed over her, and within a half hour, she was sitting up, talking, and praising the Lord! What a blessing I received that day. I went home rejoicing; I had seen the handiwork of God with my own eyes.

There is nothing better than praying alongside someone who receives a needed answer from Heaven. Yet, the greatest blessing is still to come: when we stand before God and hear, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.” Truly, nothing we offer God could compare to what He gives us.

Moses’ words from Exodus still resonate today: “Consecrate yourselves to day to the Lord . . . that he may bestow upon you a blessing this day.” We want to consecrate all we have to God so we can receive all He has for us. We have everything to gain and nothing to lose, and the blessings are out of this world!