Ready Or Knot? By Scott KedershaSample

Day Seven: What Does Sacrificial Love Look Like?

Scripture: Proverbs 3:3, Ephesians 5:25, Colossians 3:13

As we wrap our week together, I want to leave you with an image of sacrificial love found within marriage. This story was displayed during my stepdad’s funeral and illustrates one of the most beautiful pictures of marriage I’ve ever seen. My biological father passed away from heart disease when I was six years old. My brother was three and a half at the time, and he and I grew up in a single-parent home with our mom. A few years later, our mom remarried, and we became a stepfamily. 

Toward the end of my stepdad’s life, however, he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. It was horrible for him and heart-breaking for our family. During those years, we watched my stepdad progressively decline in verbal and cognitive function. The disease process became a huge challenge to my mom, and she made many willing sacrifices to care for him. 

She couldn’t travel or even leave the house without bringing my stepdad. He needed around-the-clock care and supervision. My mom cooked every meal, drove everywhere they went together, made sure he took his pills, and kept him clean as even personal hygiene was affected by this disease. Even though she grew weary at times, she cared for and supported him. 

Their marriage was far from perfect, but they loved each other until the end. My stepdad’s funeral was a powerful testimony to my mom’s love for him. As I reflect on how my mom showed selfless and sacrificial love, I can’t help but think of how God loves us: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved,” (Ephesians 2:4-5). We can never repay God, nor does He ask us to. His love is not contingent upon our proper or worthy response. 

Similarly in marriage, we are permitted the opportunity to love one another wholly and with sacrifice. I was given the extraordinary privilege of seeing sacrificial love lived out first hand by my mother toward my stepdad. Marriage allows a man and woman to display the gospel message of unity through love.

What does sacrifice mean to you? Is it hard for you to imagine demonstrating sacrificial love—like we looked at today—or does it give you joy to think of serving one another in this way? Why or why not?