Sunday Worship Service: Topic: The Secrets of Service

By Pastor Kola Oyekale

The book of Exodus shares how the Israelites left Egypt and their journey to the Promised Land.
When working with God, don’t give him a second class service. Give him an excellent service. When you excellently serve God, he will showcase his glory in your life.
When you give God your best, he gives you his best.

Leviticus 1:1
The book of Leviticus focuses on different kinds of offerings and sacrifices to be offered to God.
You can’t see God if there is no sacrifice in what you are doing.
Sacrifices and offerings are instruments used for God to showcase his glory in our lives.

Sacrifice is offering your body, time, resources, skills and talents to God.

The Secret of Prayer
Prayer offers a covering for you, it also gives you direction and guidance.

There are pillars of advantage for believers. It is important that we engage those pillars with prayers.
One of such pillars is the Pillar of Sacrifice.

Jesus made the kingdom available to us not on a platter of gold but on the pillar of the sacrifice of himself on the cross.

There is no great person in the Bible whose life did not involve some sort of sacrifice or the other.

Genesis 4:3-5 NLT
[3] When it was time for the harvest, Cain presented some of his crops as a gift to the Lord. [4] Abel also brought a gift—the best portions of the firstborn lambs from his flock. The Lord accepted Abel and his gift, [5] but he did not accept Cain and his gift. This made Cain very angry, and he looked dejected.

Hebrews 11:4 NLT
[4] It was by faith that Abel brought a more acceptable offering to God than Cain did. Abel’s offering gave evidence that he was a righteous man, and God showed his approval of his gifts. Although Abel is long dead, he still speaks to us by his example of faith.

There are some kinds of sacrifice that still speaks even when the person has died.

Genesis 8:21 NLT
[21] And the Lord was pleased with the aroma of the sacrifice and said to himself, “I will never again curse the ground because of the human race, even though everything they think or imagine is bent toward evil from childhood. I will never again destroy all living things.

Your sacrifice can make God change his mind over a matter.
Sacrifice can make you draw God’s attention.

The blessing of living a life of sacrifice is great. The result cannot be equated with anything.

Genesis 22:15-19 NLT
[15] Then the angel of the Lord called again to Abraham from heaven. [16] “This is what the Lord says: Because you have obeyed me and have not withheld even your son, your only son, I swear by my own name that [17] I will certainly bless you. I will multiply your descendants beyond number, like the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will conquer the cities of their enemies. [18] And through your descendants all the nations of the earth will be blessed—all because you have obeyed me.” [19] Then they returned to the servants and traveled back to Beersheba, where Abraham continued to live.

God swore by himself to bless Abraham and his descendants because of the sacrifice he made.

Why is Sacrifice a System of Advantage?
The level of your sacrifice determines your relationship with God.
1. By sacrice, you provoke God’s attention.
1 Kings 3:3 NLT
[3] Solomon loved the Lord and followed all the decrees of his father, David, except that Solomon, too, offered sacrifices and burned incense at the local places of worship.

2. Sacrifices make God to overrule in our favour. God breaks protocol for the person who consistently offers sacrifices to him.
If you have God’s attention, nothing will overpower you.
If God breaks protocol for you, you will be ahead of your generation.

3. Sacrifice attracts the fire of God. People who are burning for God continually is as a result of sacrifice in their lives. When there is a sacrifice, the fire never burns out.

4. Sacrifice enforces victory in warfare.
2 Kings 3:26-27 NLT
[26] When the king of Moab saw that he was losing the battle, he led 700 of his swordsmen in a desperate attempt to break through the enemy lines near the king of Edom, but they failed. [27] Then the king of Moab took his oldest son, who would have been the next king, and sacrificed him as a burnt offering on the wall. So there was great anger against Israel, and the Israelites withdrew and returned to their own land.

You can’t be all out for God and he won’t show himself mighty on your behalf. You will command his response.

You need sacrifice to live above the harassment of the devil and a life of limitation.

If there are issues that are so serious, give a sacrifice for it.

There are 7 dimensions of sacrifice:
1. Sacrifice of your body
Romans 12:1 NLT
[1] And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him.

You cannot have God’s attention if your life is not offered as a living sacrifice.
You must always present your body in purity.
Without a life of holiness, nobody will experience God.
You must be ready to die to the flesh.

1 Peter 4:1 NLT
[1] So then, since Christ suffered physical pain, you must arm yourselves with the same attitude he had, and be ready to suffer, too. For if you have suffered physically for Christ, you have finished with sin.

You can’t please the world and still please God.

You must create time to study the word of God and devote yourself to prayers. These things oppose the desires of the flesh. The flesh wants pleasure, you must discipline it.
If you can’t discipline the flesh then you can’t maintain purity.

Prayer: Lord give me enabling grace to live a life of sacrifice in Jesus name.
I Corinthians 9:27 Lord help me present my body in purity as a sacrifice in Jesus name.