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Wonderfalls is rife with religious ideas and from the outset lets us know that religious belief is its subtext. For instance, the souvenir shop where Jane works has a display called “I Surrender to Destiny,” centered around a video that tells the Native American story of the Maid in the Mist. You see, the god of Niagara Falls randomly killed people. The people wanted to appease him with gifts. One might think that this story attempts to highlight the arbitrary nature of "God" and the silliness of myth and religion, but it actually points to the silliness of man’s interpretation of what "a god" wants. Anyway, the tribe decides that the god wants virgin girls in sacrifice, and the chief’s daughter decides that she should be the one to surrender to destiny. Even after the chief has a change of heart, she refuses to turn around. Well, the god spares her and asks her to live with him. She does, and so he blesses the land.
--MAURICE BROADDUS

ON SACRIFICE

Christians are often accused of being morbid when they talk of the joy of sacrificing. I think it is one of the deepest truths of the Christian religion. Far from being a source of sadness, sacrifice is a great joy and source of illumination—perhaps the greatest of all. I also think that to live modestly is always a richer experience because you are living like the majority of people.
--MALCOLM MUGGERIDGE (1903–1990)

For anything worth having one must pay the price; and the price is always work, patience, love, self-sacrifice—no paper currency, no promises to pay, but the gold of real service.
--JOHN BURROUGHS (1837–1921)

I never made a sacrifice. We ought not to talk of sacrifice when we remember the great sacrifice that he made who left his Father’s throne on high to give himself for us.
--DAVID LIVINGSTONE (1813–1873)

Our notion of sacrifice is the wringing out of us something we don’t want to give up, full of pain and agony and distress. The Bible idea of sacrifice is that I give as a love-gift the very best thing I have.
--OSWALD CHAMBERS (1874–1917)

SACRIFICE AND OFFERING
From Holman's Bible Dictionary

The physical elements the worshiper brings to the Deity to express devotion, thanksgiving, or the need for forgiveness.

Sacrifice in the Ancient Near East Israel was not unique among the nations of the Ancient Near East in their use of sacrifices and offerings as a means of religious expression. Some type of sacrificial system characterized the many religious methodologies that the nations employed in their attempts to honor their gods. The presence of sacrifices and offerings in Israel, therefore, was a reflection of the larger culture of which this nation was a part.

Many references to the offering of sacrifices exist in extrabiblical literature. The primary approach to the gods was through the sacrificial system. In Babylon, part of the ritual of purifying the temple of Bel for the new year’s festival involved the slaughter of a ram. The animal was decapitated and the priest, in turn, used the body in the purification ceremony. The ram’s body then was thrown into the river. The ritual accompanying the replacing of the head of the kettledrum that was used in the temple required that a black bull be selected for sacrifice. After an elaborate ceremony that culminated in the sacrifice of the bull, its hide was dipped in and rubbed with two separate mixtures and then used to cover the kettledrum.

While the above sacrifices were performed on special occasions, a variety of rams, bulls, and birds were offered as meals to the idols on a daily basis. Barley beer, mixed beer, milk, and wine also were placed before the deities, as well as loaves of bread.

The sacrifices and offerings were designed to serve the gods by meeting any physical need that they may have had. The sacrifices were the food and drink of the gods. Faithfulness to the preparation and presentation of them was an act of devotion.

THE STORY OF ABRAHAM'S ULTIMATE SACRIFICE
Genesis 22:1-19 (Message Bible)

After all this, God tested Abraham. God said, "Abraham!"
"Yes?" answered Abraham. "I'm listening."

He said, "Take your dear son Isaac whom you love and go to the land of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I'll point out to you."

Abraham got up early in the morning and saddled his donkey. He took two of his young servants and his son Isaac. He had split wood for the burnt offering. He set out for the place God had directed him. On the third day he looked up and saw the place in the distance. Abraham told his two young servants, "Stay here with the donkey. The boy and I are going over there to worship; then we'll come back to you."

Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and gave it to Isaac his son to carry. He carried the flint and the knife. The two of them went off together.
Isaac said to Abraham his father, "Father?"

"Yes, my son."

"We have flint and wood, but where's the sheep for the burnt offering?"

Abraham said, "Son, God will see to it that there's a sheep for the burnt offering." And they kept on walking together.

They arrived at the place to which God had directed him. Abraham built an altar. He laid out the wood. Then he tied up Isaac and laid him on the wood. Abraham reached out and took the knife to kill his son.

Just then an angel of God called to him out of Heaven, "Abraham! Abraham!"

"Yes, I'm listening."

"Don't lay a hand on that boy! Don't touch him! Now I know how fearlessly you fear God; you didn't hesitate to place your son, your dear son, on the altar for me."

Abraham looked up. He saw a ram caught by its horns in the thicket. Abraham took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son.

Abraham named that place God-Yireh (God-Sees-to-It). That's where we get the saying, "On the mountain of God, he sees to it."

The angel of God spoke from Heaven a second time to Abraham: "I swear—God's sure word!—because you have gone through with this, and have not refused to give me your son, your dear, dear son, I'll bless you—oh, how I'll bless you! And I'll make sure that your children flourish—like stars in the sky! like sand on the beaches! And your descendants will defeat their enemies. All nations on Earth will find themselves blessed through your descendants because you obeyed me."

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