Sacrifice

Sacrifice is invoked here not in the ritual sense but as a moral indictment — Saul is willing to sacrifice his best soldier and own son to preserve the binding force of his ill-conceived oath.

Sacrifice is the religious justification Saul offers for keeping the livestock — he reframes self-interested disobedience as a generous act of worship, using sacred language to cover a selfish choice.

The sacrifice here is the communal worship act being corrupted — Eli's sons intercept the offering process with threats and force, turning a sacred transaction into extortion.

Sacrifices are offered here in the wheat field as an immediate response to the ark's return — the whole community worshipping God on the spot with what they had available.

The sacrifice here is the pivot point of the entire chapter — offered in desperation, it marks the moment Israel's renewed faith is met with God's direct, thunderous response.

Sacrifice appears here in its most disturbing form — child sacrifice — as the explicit reason God demands total demolition of Canaanite worship sites rather than any accommodation or gradual replacement.

Sacrifice is referenced here as part of the religious framework Moses has been constructing — proper sacrificial practice being one of the pillars now threatened by internal false teaching.

Sacrifice here is not merely a ritual act but a theological statement — the quality of the animal brought before God communicates whether the worshiper considers him worthy of their best.

Sacrifice appears here in its most horrifying form — child sacrifice by fire — the first and most severe item on Moses's list of forbidden Canaanite practices Israel must never adopt.

Sacrifice appears here in its darkest form — child sacrifice is cited as evidence of Canaanite religious practice so severe that God orders its complete removal from the land.

Sacrifice is invoked here by its absence — those who knowingly walk away from Christ find no sacrifice left to cover them, because the one sacrifice that could have done so is the very thing they've rejected.

Sacrifice is the central concept here as the author bridges the old and new systems — the old animal sacrifices burned outside the camp are the type that Jesus fulfilled by suffering outside the city gate as the ultimate offering.

Sacrifice is referenced here to expose the limitation of the old system — Levitical priests had to offer sacrifices for themselves first, revealing the imperfect, repetitive nature of that covenant's mediation.

Sacrifice is used here to mark the contrast between the endless daily offerings of the old priesthood and Jesus's single, sufficient self-offering — one act that closed the loop permanently.

Sacrifice appears here as the perpetual, never-completed task of earthly priests — always another offering to make, another day to cover — contrasting with the finished work that allowed Jesus to sit down.

Sacrifices are offered here by Jethro alongside Aaron and Israel's elders — a shared sacred meal that marks this Midianite priest as a genuine worshiper of Israel's God based solely on what he heard.

Sacrifice is the altar's entire purpose — the text explains that burnt offerings, sin offerings, and peace offerings all happened here, establishing that drawing near to God required a death before it allowed an approach.

The sacrifice here transitions from the sin offering to the burnt offering — the first ram dealt with guilt, and now a second animal will be completely consumed to represent total surrender.

Sacrifice is explicitly excluded here — God's instruction makes clear this incense altar has one purpose only, and mixing it with animal sacrifices would violate its dedicated function.

Sacrifice is the Burnt Offering Altar's entire function — every design detail, from the bronze grating to the carrying poles, was engineered to facilitate the ongoing ritual offering that maintained Israel's covenant relationship with God.

Sacrifice is mentioned here as the priestly function that had been suspended during the entire exile — these 4,000+ priests carried a calling they couldn't fully exercise for seventy years, yet they kept it alive.

Sacrifice is being offered here on an altar surrounded by rubble — the physical incongruity of worship amid ruins is precisely the point, illustrating that faithful practice doesn't wait for ideal conditions.

Sacrifice is what Artaxerxes explicitly funds in his letter — bulls, rams, lambs, grain offerings, and drink offerings — underwriting the full resumption of Israel's covenant worship at the Jerusalem altar.

Sacrifice here is the chapter's closing act of worship — after the roll call, the crisis, the fast, the long road, and the completed accounting, the community responds to God's faithfulness by giving everything to the fire.

The evening sacrifice marks the ritual moment that finally breaks Ezra's paralyzed silence — he had been sitting in shock since hearing the report, and this sacred hour of worship becomes the catalyst for his prayer.

Sacrifice is noted by contrast — Abram made none before being declared righteous, underscoring that the ground of his standing before God was trust alone, not any act of religious devotion.

Sacrifice is the concept Isaac himself raises, demonstrating he understood the ritual requirements — making his question about the missing lamb not naive curiosity but an alert observation that something was wrong.

The first sacrifice in Scripture occurs here — God killing an animal to make garments for Adam and Eve, establishing the pattern that shame requires a covering that costs something, and that God provides it.

The sacrifice Jacob offers on the hillside seals the covenant and marks the transition — a ritual act of worship that consecrates the moment and invites God's presence over the new chapter ahead.

Jacob's sacrifices at Beersheba are acts of worship and petition before a life-altering decision — a deliberate pause to consecrate the journey rather than barrel ahead on his own momentum.

Sacrifice is implicitly present in both founding stories here — Jacob's years of labor and Israel's deliverance through Moses both required cost and dependence, the opposite of Ephraim's self-congratulation.

Sacrifice appears here in its absence — Israel will lose the entire sacrificial system along with its king and sacred objects, a total stripping of the religious infrastructure they had relied on.

Sacrifice is shown here as a system being exploited rather than honored — the more sacrifices the people brought, the more the priests ate, creating a perverse incentive to manage sin rather than address it.

Sacrifice represents the formal religious system Israel faithfully maintains — but God says he'd trade every burnt offering for steadfast love that doesn't evaporate before breakfast.

Sacrifice is shown here as ritual without relationship — Israel is offering meat and eating it, but God refuses to accept any of it because the acts of devotion are disconnected from genuine covenant faithfulness.

The sacrifices here are the religious offerings being made by the Galilean worshippers when Pilate's soldiers killed them — their blood literally mingled with the blood of their temple offerings.

Sacrifice here refers to what the disciples have already done — leaving homes and families — and Jesus treats it as real cost while promising that the kingdom return is wildly disproportionate to the loss.

The sacrifice Mary and Joseph offer is the poverty-level substitution — two birds instead of a lamb — a small but telling detail that places the family of the world's Savior firmly among those with the least.

Sacrifice is at the center of this moment — it is the day designated for slaughtering the Passover lamb, which the text deliberately frames against Jesus walking toward the cross as the ultimate sacrificial offering.

Sacrifice is one of the recurring Old Testament patterns Jesus highlights — every animal offering pointing forward to himself as the ultimate and final sacrifice for sin.

Sacrifice appears here in its darkest form — the text notes that Molech worship, which Solomon enabled by building shrines, involved child sacrifice, the very practice that had disqualified the Canaanites from the land.

Sacrifice captures what David's army has just given — their lives and safety — and why his public mourning is so devastating: it signals their sacrifice meant nothing to the king they bled for.

Sacrifice is the lens through which David interprets the water his warriors risked their lives to bring — he refuses to drink it because it has become a sacred offering, something only God is worthy to receive.

Sacrifice is affirmed here as inherently costly — David explicitly rejects the idea of a no-cost sacrifice, insisting that an offering with nothing at stake is merely performance, not genuine devotion.

Sacrifice here is the rhythmic heartbeat of the second procession — every six steps, David stops and offers an animal, turning the journey itself into an act of costly, repeated worship.

Sacrifice appears here as a summary of what Jephthah's life actually cost — his outcast years, his daughter, the civil war — a life of painful giving with only a brief epitaph to show for it.

Sacrifice is offered here to Dagon, the Philistine deity, as an act of triumphant worship — the lords are attributing Samson's capture to their god's power, setting up the fatal theological confrontation that follows.

The sacrifices at Bochim follow the people's weeping in response to the angel's rebuke — a moment of genuine grief and worship, though it comes too late to reverse the announced consequences.

Sacrifice is what distinguishes the honored tribes from the shamed ones here — Zebulun and Naphtali gave everything, while Reuben and Dan calculated the cost and decided not to pay it.

Sacrifice appears here in its most perverted form — children offered to demons rather than to God — listed as one of the grievances God fully witnessed before choosing to hear Israel's cry anyway, making his mercy all the more stunning by contrast.

Sacrifice is referenced here as the central religious act David is contrasting with genuine obedience — God's desire, David argues, was never the sacrifice itself but the surrendered heart behind it.

Sacrifice is the central surprise of this section — God rejects the notion that ritual offerings carry any weight with him, since he already owns everything the worshiper could bring.

Sacrifice is explicitly subordinated here — David declares that a broken person choosing to sing pleases God more than any elaborate ritual offering, making gratitude the higher form of devotion.

Sacrifice is invoked at the chapter's close as the redemptive alternative — the rider who removes evil completely is the same one who once offered himself so that no one would have to stand on the wrong side of this moment.

Sacrifice is named here as one of the key stages in the long arc of redemption, representing the entire Old Testament sacrificial system that foreshadowed and pointed toward Christ's death.

Sacrifice is the explicit basis of the Lamb's worthiness in the new song — he earned the right to open the scroll not through power but through being slain, making his death the qualifying act of all history.

Sacrifice is acknowledged here as God clothes the martyrs in white robes — their deaths are recognized and honored, their ultimate offering seen and not forgotten.

Sacrifice here describes what the three warriors risked by breaking through the Philistine camp — David's refusal to drink the water is his recognition that their lives were the real cost behind this cup, and that must be honored.

Sacrifice is reframed here as something that must genuinely cost the giver — David's insistence on paying full price rather than accepting a free offering captures the true meaning of giving something up to God.

Sacrifice here describes the massive burnt offerings brought the day after the assembly — a thousand each of bulls, rams, and lambs — consecrating the transition of power through formal worship.

Sacrifices are part of the system Paul has in mind when he says the Law couldn't fully free anyone — the sacrificial system pointed toward something it could never itself complete, which is why the one definitive sacrifice of Jesus was necessary.

Sacrifice here takes a jarring form — pagan worshipers preparing to offer animals to Paul and Barnabas, a grotesque inversion of the truth that the healing was done in the name of Jesus, not Greek deities.

Sacrifice here takes a personal, non-ritual form — Timothy voluntarily undergoes circumcision not for atonement but to make himself a more effective messenger in Jewish contexts.

Sacrifice is referenced here as part of Israel's religious practice that God rejects — they were performing the rituals while funding them through the oppression of the vulnerable, making their offerings an offense rather than worship.

Sacrifices are cited here sarcastically — God is not praising Israel's religious diligence but exposing how frequent, public offerings can coexist with — and even mask — systematic oppression of the vulnerable.

Sacrifice is dismissed here by God himself — he reminds Israel that even in the wilderness their offerings were hollow, meaning a long history of ritual could not substitute for the justice and faithfulness he actually required.

Sacrifice appears here in its most horrifying inversion — not the offering of animals to God, but the burning of children to Baal, which God explicitly declares he never commanded or even conceived of.

Sacrifice here describes God's devastating reframing of the Battle of Carchemish — Egypt's army isn't merely defeated in war but treated as a ritual sacrifice, slaughtered at God's own appointed site.

Sacrifice here is being challenged at its very foundation — God tells the people to eat their burnt offerings themselves, because ritual without obedience is meaningless, and that was never what he asked for first.

Sacrifices are the specific religious practice that has gone corrupt — the offerings keep coming, but the animals brought are blind, lame, and sick, exposing the hollowness beneath the routine.

Sacrifice is invoked here in the most visceral terms — God threatens to smear the waste from the priests' own offerings across their faces, turning their religious performance into a symbol of its own corruption.

Sacrifices here represent the religious machinery the people restarted after exile — the outward acts of worship that continued even as genuine devotion quietly drained away.

Great sacrifices are offered here at the convergence of the two choirs at the Temple — the culminating act of the wall dedication, tying the musical celebration to formal covenant worship.

Sacrifice here is entirely practical and unannounced — Nehemiah's daily funding of 150 guests, forfeited salary, and manual labor on the wall, offered without fanfare and acknowledged only in a quiet word to God.

Sacrifice is invoked here to illustrate that worship leadership requires specific, trained people — the census exists in part to ensure someone is officially responsible for leading the sacrificial rites at the restored Temple.

The sacrifice being performed by Baal's worshipers becomes the trigger for their own deaths — Jehu times the attack to begin once the ritual sacrifice is underway and every target is accounted for.

Sacrifice of children is what Topheth had been used for — and Josiah is permanently desecrating that site so that no one can ever again offer children to Molech in the Valley of Hinnom.

Sacrifice is referenced to clarify that Paul's suffering does not supplement Christ's finished atoning work — the cross stands complete, while Paul's hardships belong to the ongoing cost of delivering that message.

Sacrifice is listed here among the outward markers of apparent spiritual seriousness — Paul concedes these practices carry the appearance of wisdom while insisting they cannot address the real problem of inner corruption.

The regular sacrifice is abolished by the contemptible king's forces, removing the daily covenant ritual that structured Israel's worship life and signaling the depth of the defilement.

The daily sacrifice is what the little horn abolishes — its removal signals not just religious disruption but the deliberate severing of the regular rhythm of Israel's worship life.

Sacrifice is referenced here as Christ's blood — the specific act that closed the gap between far-off Gentiles and God, framing the crucifixion as the ultimate distance-eliminating offering.

Sacrifice is the defining characteristic of the husband's role here — Paul holds up Christ giving himself up for the church as the precise standard, making self-giving love the measure of faithful husbanding.

Sacrifice is the act Job performs after every family celebration — rising before dawn to offer burnt offerings for each child, revealing a faith that is proactive and protective, not merely reactive.

Sacrifice is what God requires of the three friends as the concrete act of accountability — seven bulls and seven rams offered to signal their acknowledgment that they spoke wrongly about God.

Sacrifice is the religious requirement driving the Temple marketplace — pilgrims needed approved animals to fulfill their offerings, and merchants had built a profitable system around that need.

Sacrifice is implicit here in Jesus' description of giving his flesh for the life of the world — pointing ahead to his death as the ultimate sacrificial act that gives the Eucharistic language its meaning.

Sacrifice appears here not as reluctant duty but as joyful trade — the man sells everything not with a grimace but with overflowing gladness, reframing what it means to give something up for the kingdom.

Sacrifice is the religious need that the marketplace had commercialized — travelers genuinely needed approved animals to offer, but the system had become predatory rather than facilitating worship.

Sacrifice is invoked here as the practical test of resurrection belief — Paul argues that the costly, dangerous lives Christians are living (including baptism for the dead, daily peril) only make sense if resurrection is genuinely true.

Sacrifice appears here to describe Paul's team's conduct among the Thessalonians — their self-giving example served as living evidence that the gospel they preached was real and worth following.

Paul references his personal sacrifices — suffering, hardship, and service — as the evidence of his apostolic legitimacy, in contrast to the flashy credentials his rivals are flaunting.

Sacrifice is invoked here not in its ritual sense but in the experiential one — Solomon describes pouring years of wisdom, skill, and effort into work, only to hand it over to someone who contributed nothing.

Sacrifice is the act the converted sailors offer to the Lord immediately after the sea goes calm — a spontaneous, reverent response from men who boarded the ship worshipping other gods.

Sacrifice here refers to the personal cost of the eastern tribes' service — years away from families and their already-secured land, fighting battles for territory that would never belong to them.

Sacrifice is the religious need being exploited by the merchants — pilgrims required approved animals to offer, and the sellers had turned that requirement into a profit system Jesus calls robbery.

Sacrifice is what the panicked people first offer as a fix — a standard burnt offering that quickly escalates as they try to calculate the transaction cost of restoring their relationship with God.

Sacrifice is used here not ritually but metaphorically — Solomon observes that people routinely give up peace in pursuit of more, treating it as expendable when it is actually the point.

Sacrifice appears here in its ultimate, final form — Jesus as the atoning offering that fulfills and supersedes the entire Old Testament sacrificial system, dealing with sin once and for all through his blood.

Sacrifice is referenced here as the priestly task Joshua should be performing, making his appearance as a defendant — rather than an officiant — all the more theologically charged.

Sacrifice is used here with a chilling twist — God employs sacrificial language not for worship but for judgment, framing the coming day as a deliberate, planned act rather than impulsive destruction.