Sometimes I think people get nervous when they hear this word. The altar in the church can bring different connotations. Maybe some think of it as a place for scolding or that you go there when you’re convicted of you sin and have to be shamed in front of everyone. I can understand that feeling, but that hasn’t been my response, at least lately when I think of the altar. For me, the altar is a beautiful sacred place where change happens. I grew up in a denomination where “altar calls” were common. The altar has significance being a place of pruning and awareness, repentance and forgiveness, call and confession and correction. People sometimes think of the altar as a place of shame, guilt and remorse. However, when I think of the altar, I actually look at the altar so fondly. It has been a place of needed connection with God. It is a place where everything else is stripped away and all the we can use around us to interrupt our relationship in reconciliation with our God is gone. You are before God, in all of your brokenness standing or kneeling in need of Him, seeking Him and you know what? He is there. He meets us there. The altar isn’t a place to get dressed up for; it is a place to drop and unload the mess of your life into the arms of someone who can carry it, who is big enough to hold the doubts, anger and questions. A God who can handle your disappoint and tears. Of all the places to come, the altar is the representation of where God meets us and changes us.
I have seen chains broken at the altar, lives changed, brokenness reconciled.
A lot of times when I was at the altar, I was not there alone. People came up and prayed with me, prayed for me. Not only did I meet God, but others also met me there, where I was, not for what I was or could be, but where I was. They prayed for me, they encouraged me, they helped disciple me.
The altar can be described differently, defined in many ways, some I found were:
“a memorial of the places where God meets us”
“a significant symbol representing sacrifice, worship and divine encounter”
“the altar foreshadows the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross “
We read in the Bible, especially in the Old Testament of people building an altar in representation or marking of where God did something and it needed to be remembered.
Altars were places where people experienced God’s presence and entered into covenants with Him.
The altar does not need to be a stiff, stoic place of fear and shame. I think we often put spiritual, holy things in boxes of how they have to be which makes us consciously create formality around it, which, sometimes makes it scary. But when we meet Jesus when we encounter Him, the space is sacred, yes, but the sacredness doesn’t have to make it stoic.
The altar is the place to offer ourselves, our whole selves, stripped away of all that holds us back from full engagement with the everlasting God.
I have been listening to a song to help keep me reminded of my need for the altar. My frailty, my brokenness, my weakness to continually keep me in a place of reckless dependance on Jesus.
There are a couple of lines that have really spoken to me with one being, “there’s no waste at the altar.” Offering isn’t always equal in our human brains. We think offering our child as Abraham did was such a large sacrifice, and of course it is. But in the offering is obedience and in that obedience of offering, I believe God is pleased. There were times for me when I was at the altar where I was struggling with something small, like guidance in a high school friendship, other times it was offering myself to full-time ministry. Our brains in the human sense would say that isn’t equal right? But offering isn’t wasted. Whether a high school problem or a life call, God uses it and it isn’t wasted. Even when life looks different than we imagined when we said YES to the offering, it isn’t wasted.
Another line is “where the tears of the desperate, reach the feet of the Savior,” (GASP EMOJI)…oh the beauty of these words. In the nothing of our tears, we bring everything, because we know who we are bringing nothing to. And if nothing is wasted, then those tears, those desperate tears never fall unseen. They aren’t nothing, they are an offering, sometimes when we have nothing else to give.
“Where the heart of surrender, meets the hands of the Maker.” In our offering, no matter how big or small, there is likely a cost. Surrender, giving something up, allowing it not to be yours anymore is a cost, but what better place to put something we think it costly into the hands of the Maker? Our offering is not wasted.
At the Altar
I’m removingAll of the things that would move me further from YouA thank you could not be enoughIt’s not lost on me what You saved me fromI’m runningStumbling, I know but I’m comingTo give You this offeringMy worship, I’ll never withholdBroken, but You call it beautiful
Where the tears of the desperateReach the feet of the SaviorNothing I wouldn’t offerThere’s no waste at the altarWhere the heart of surrenderMeets the hands of the MakerNothing I wouldn’t offerThere’s no waste at the altarYou can bring everything, everything
Things I’ve treasuredOh, couldn’t come close to Your presenceGrace upon grace, who could measure?No, nothing could measureAnd I’m returningOh, back to the One, I am runningTo give Him my love‘Cause He took a sinner like meWashed me with grace and then set me free, oh
Where the tears of the desperateReach the feet of the SaviorNothing I wouldn’t offerThere’s no waste at the altarWhere the heart of surrenderMeets the hands of the makerNothing I wouldn’t offerThere’s no waste at the altarThere’s no waste at theYour arms are open wide (there’s no waste at the altar)Oh, just bring it all to the Father
Use it all, You can use it allOpen invitation
Come lay your broken dreams at the altarAnd every victory at the altarFear and anxiety cannot live hereThere’s no waste at the altarLet your heart sing out and tell Him you love Him (love You, Lord)Don’t make it perfect, just let it be honest (we love You, Lord)He can use anything, sit back and watch HimThere’s no waste at the altar
Come lay your broken dreams at the altarAnd every victory at the altarFear and anxiety cannot live hereThere’s no waste at the altarLet your heart sing out and tell Him you love Him (you love Him)Don’t make it perfect, just let it be honestHe can use anything, sit back and watch HimThere’s no waste at the altar
There’s no waste at the altarThere’s no waste at the altarThere’s no waste at the altar, ohThere’s no waste at the altarThere’s no waste at the altarThere’s no waste at the altar
Lay it all down, lay it all downLay it all down, lay it all downLay it all down, lay it all downLay it all down, lay it all downLay it all down, lay it all downLay it all down, lay it all downThere’s no waste at the altar
Lay it all down, lay it all downLay it all down, lay it all downLay it all down, lay it all downThere’s no waste at the altar
Lay it all down, lay it all downLay it all down, lay it all downLay it all down, lay it all downThere’s no waste at the altar
Oh, He can use anything (He can use anything)Yes, He can use anything (He can use anything)He can use anythingJust sit back and watch HimThere’s no waste at the altar
Listen to At the Altar
The Santiago Partnership