Altar: Sacrifice of Praise

One of the responsibilities we have as parents is to teach our kids proper manners. Good manners don’t seem to come naturally to children, primarily due to the fact that they tend to be selfish and often oblivious to those around them. This is why we teach them to say “excuse me” when they walk in front of someone, “no, thank you” when they don’t want something and “please” when making a request—and kids make so many request.

In our many attempts to train our children to be polite, most of our efforts are spent in the area of gratitude. It seems like we have a never-ending amount of parent prompts that we use to help remind our kids to be grateful. Things like: “now what do you say?” or “what’s the magic word?” or “where are you manners?” As parents we spend so much time reminding our kids to express their gratitude, so when they utter those two simple words, “Thank you” on their own, we stand back in utter shock. We’re instantly filled with pride and assurance that our constant prompting is working. The truth is, all of us need help remembering to be grateful and to show gratitude in all situations. One of the ways people did this in the Bible was to build an altar and bring a sacrifice.

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Sacrifice of Praise
Altars were important because they signified the place where both the divine and human worlds connected. It was a place of worship and sacrifice. People built altars as a way to remember the things God had done. Genesis 8:20 is the first mention of anyone building an altar. In this verse, we see Noah building an altar of gratitude to the Lord. There he offered a sacrifice of praise. In our lives, we too need to build an altar of gratitude and offer sacrifices of praise to God.

The words “sacrifice” and “praise” don’t seem to go together. A sacrifice is something hard that we give up, while praise is a warm expression of admiration. Therefore a “sacrifice of praise” is giving praise when it’s hard to do so.

There are times in our lives when what we believe doesn’t seem to line up with what we see. It is in those moments that we have to bring God a sacrifice of praise. Our praise cannot be based on our external circumstances, nor be given only when situations have turned around in our favor. We must learn how to praise God at all times. We bring a sacrifice of praise, when our praise is immediate, voluntary and intentional.

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Immediate
The word “Then” in Genesis 8:20 denotes that the very first thing he did after leaving the ark was to build an altar to the Lord. You would think that the first thing Noah would have done after exiting the ark was build a house for his family. After being on a boat for over a year, I’m sure he was eager to put down roots and build a safe place for his family to dwell. This however, is not what he did. Before he moved on from the ark and all it represented, he built an altar of gratitude to the Lord. He was grateful for the grace God had shown him and his family. His immediate response to the new life God had given him was to build an altar and bring a sacrifice of praise.

Our first response reveals the inward condition of our heart. The things we say and do first are indicators of what we focus on. Immediately bringing a sacrifice of praise in the midst of trying times is how we keep our focus on God’s goodness and grace.

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Voluntary
When it says, “Noah built an altar to the Lord” this was a voluntary act, not a command from God. Noah was used to following God’s instructions. He built the ark the way God told him to. He gathered the animals like he was instructed and entered and exited the ark at God’s command. God ordered Noah to gather pairs of all of the animals onto the ark in order to repopulate the earth after the flood. He didn’t however, command Noah to build and altar or sacrifice any of the animals. Noah made that decision of his own free will. God did not need to command Noah to build an altar because he was internally motivated, not externally mandated.

Our gratitude must always be voluntary and come from a willing heart. There are times when praising God is a sacrifice. When what we’re facing doesn’t line up with what we believe, we need to build an altar and bring a sacrifice of praise; knowing that our God is always good and always working on our behalf.

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Intentional
What Noah sacrificed displayed his intentional focus on God. Noah’s small amount of livestock meant that it was important to keep the animals alive. Sacrificing even one could have major impact on the Earth’s repopulation. It would have made more sense for Noah to wait until he had enough animals to spare, before bringing a sacrifice. But Noah knew that the clean animals belonged to God. They were set apart for the purpose of honoring God. Noah showed his sincere faith in God by sacrificing one of the clean animals. His intentional faithfulness to honor God came from knowing everything he had first belonged to God. Matthew Henry, in his commentary on Noah’s altar said, “Serving God with our little is the way to make it more."

Setting our focus on the right things is the key to praising God in everything. A sacrifice of praise comes for intentionally choosing to keep our focus on God and not our circumstances.

The altar that Noah built, along with his sacrifice of praise, caused God to say “I will never again curse the ground for man’s sake." God was moved by Noah’s immediate, voluntary and intentional sacrifice of praise. Noah’s sacrifice was a picture the sacrifice that Jesus gave so that we could be with God forever. Hebrews 13:15 declares that It is because of what Jesus has done that we can “continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God”.

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Altar Challenge
What is your immediate response in hard times? Is it gratitude and praise or cursing and complaining? Is your praise voluntary or based on God’s command? Is what you’re intentionally focusing on causing you to praise God?

This week focus on building an altar of gratitude by being quick, enthusiastic and intentional with your praise.

Genesis 8:15-22 - Then God spoke to Noah, saying, 16 “Go out of the ark, you and your wife, and your sons and your sons’ wives with you. 17 Bring out with you every living thing of all flesh that is with you: birds and cattle and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, so that they may abound on the earth, and be fruitful and multiply on the earth.” 18 So Noah went out, and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives with him. 19 Every animal, every creeping thing, every bird, and whatever creeps on the earth, according to their families, went out of the ark. 20 Then Noah built an altar to the Lord, and took of every clean animal and of every clean bird, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. 21 And the Lord smelled a soothing aroma. Then the Lord said in His heart, “I will never again curse the ground for man’s sake, although the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; nor will I again destroy every living thing as I have done.

Hebrews 13:15 - Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name.