Sacrifice

You are not here for you.
A few weeks ago, I wrote about how those words came to echo through my brain and are etched in my mind like a permanent fixture. Throughout the day and even in the night, each time I think somethings not fair or am tempted to have hurt feelings or want recognition or need validation, the words come back to me. Not in a demeaning, demoralizing way...but in a gentle, reminding sort of way.
This morning, quite frankly like many mornings, I felt like I needed yet another reassurance of God's love for me. Opening my Bible, I read the words from I John 3:16: "This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers."
Do I really need any more assurances (even though I often feel as if I do)? He laid down His life for me and now asks me to daily lay down my life for others. He loves me because He's allowing me and convicting me and helping me realize the truth of the words "you are not here for you."
The hardest part of this, for me, is that truly laying down my life means anonymity.
Anonymity, according to the dictionary means: the quality or state of being unknown or unacknowledged. We don't like to be unknown. In fact, we all have a deep longing to be truly, deeply known. Yet, when we know we're known by God, the Creator of the universe, being known for what we do seems somehow superfluous.
When we're laying down our lives there's no attention getting, no recognition, sometimes even misunderstanding of what you did or didn't do. Being willing to be ok with all of that often trips me up. Yet the call "you are not here for you" means giving up me.


**After thinking about and rereading the above post, I can't help but notice the dischord between talking about anonymity and publishing a very public blog. Weird.