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Didomi: Given Unto Death

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Dropping Dead

Dropping Dead

By Rev. George Borghardt

Didomi. It’s a little Greek verb that means “to give.” It’s a simple little word. One person presents something to someone else without requiring any repayment. Freely, a gift is given. Freely, a gift is received by the one to whom the gift is given.

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We withhold giving ourselves and our things to others and put ourselves first instead. Yet we expect others to give, to sacrifice what they want, for us. Putting our needs and desires before anyone else’s: that’s sin, isn’t it? You give yourself for me.If it helps me, I’ll give myself for you, but only if it also serves my interests, my needs, my plans.

We push ourselves forward at the expense of everything including God Himself. So He gives us what we want; His judgment is life without Him. And we receive what we earn with our selfishness, an eternity separated from the God who gave us life.

How will we make up for what we’ve done? How will we fix this? Hell isn’t what we wanted! Well, it is, but it isn’t. We need to be rescued. We need to pay for what we have done.

But we can’t. We can’t pay what our sins owe, and we can’t make up for what we’ve done. If we can’t repay, what do we do? We do nothing. He rescues us. He saves us. He gives it all to us.

Didomi: that little Greek verb. Jesus gives Himself for us as a ransom. He is given for you, given to suffer for all the times when you don’t give to others, when you withhold, when you insist on getting for yourself and won’t be given to by God. Jesus bears it all on the cross and dies, giving His own life for yours.

Strangely enough, this is precisely how the Father loves His creation! He would not sit back and see His creation damned, separated from Him for eternity. No, He gives up His own Son as a ransom, as payment, for our sins. And He did this not only for your sins but for the sins of the whole world too!

Didomi. Giving begins with God who gives us life in His Son’s death. The suffering, the pain, the mocking, the hell that you deserve for your sin is all given to Jesus. He is given over by Judas, betrayed into the hands of sinners, rejected by the chief priests and teachers of the Law, condemned and crucified as a criminal for you, for me, for all. He is given to die so that each one of us would have life in His Name.

We are given to die too...in Him.We are given to die to our sins, die to our selfishness, die to our way of doing things, and to be given to solely by Him. Being on the receiving end of Jesus’ giving up His life for us on the Cross...that’s faith! In Baptism, faith receives our death to sin and our burial with Him, and even fallen sinners like us are saved.

And living that new life in Christ, we are given to give as He has, by giving our lives for others, serving them, putting their needs before our own, their wants before ours.We die daily to ourselves and live in His love for them. It is that love that suffered all, even death itself, to rescue His creation.

Didomi. Jesus does the giving; we do the receiving (being given to). “For the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and didomi—to give—His life as a random for many” (Mark 10:45). Jesus gives His life as a ransom for many. He is given for our sins. He is raised for our justification. And we are given for others as He was given for us, freely, without cost or desire for repayment, always mindful that what is given was first given by Him. Jesus for us. We for others. That’s the way of Jesus who was given to die for us.

Rev. George Borghardt III is the Associate/ Youth Pastor at St. Mark Lutheran Church in Conroe,Texas. He also serves as the Deputy Executive for Higher Things and can be reached at revborghardt@higherthings.org

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