"Never Kill On A First Date" - Sacrifice and Vocation

GILES: I was ten years old when my father told me I was destined to be a Watcher. He was one, and his, uh, mother before him, and I was to be next.

BUFFY: Were you thrilled beyond all measure?

GILES: No, I had very definite plans about my future. I was going to be a fighter pilot. Or possibly a grocer. Well, uh... My father gave me a very tiresome speech about, uh, responsibility and sacrifice.

BUFFY: Sacrifice, huh?

GILES: (looks toward Owen) Seems like a nice lad.

BUFFY: Yeah. But he wants to be danger man. You, Xander, Willow, you guys... you guys know the score, you're careful. Two days in my world and Owen really *would* get himself killed. Or I'd get him killed. Or someone else.

(Scene from, Never Kill on a First Date Season 1:5)

As one reads through the biblical text and the stories/writings of historical (and 'common') Christian people, the themes of vocation and sacrifice quickly rise to the surface. All of this begins in the life and death of Jesus. In living into his being - his vocation - he offered himself up for the sins of the world, dying the most humiliating and painful death imaginable. Jesus sacrificed his life to live into his calling as Savior of the world.

Living into our vocation and calling will require sacrifice. It may be a sacrifice of relationship (like Buffy in the scene above), a sacrifice of financial stability, a sacrifice of time, a sacrifice of love... the list goes on and on. Indeed, living into our vocations will require a sacrifice, but this full living into our vocation is not without gain. In the Gospel of Matthew we read, "For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it." (Matthew 16:25)


Who are some biblical figures that face sacrifice as they lived out their vocational calling?

What might you have to sacrifice in order to live out your vocational calling?