Was Jesus� death a real sacrifice?

You can find all you need to know in this article:  http://www.christian-thinktank.com/2littlepain.html  It is a response to someone who asked the same question you did.

Summary:  Let me try to summarize some of these points:

1. Sacrifice, in the OT background for the NT understandings of Christ�s death, focused more on the giving element than on the death element.
2. Sacrifice, in the OT, was essentially transfer of property from the offerer to God, with various methods of �delivery�.
3. The victim of the sacrifice became God�s possession, and God could do with it whatever He chose.
4. The nature of sacrifice did not depend in any way on the sacrifice �staying dead��it just had to be transferred to God�s ownership.
5. The offering had to be something of value/cost to the offerer.
6. The offerer could expect some later recompense or blessing from God, to �make up for� the current loss to the offerer, and this expectation was an expression of real faith.
7. People could be offered, and this basically meant a lifetime of dedicated service to God (without a death, obviously).
8. The actual method of delivery (e.g., burning, waving, elevating) was an act, that did not require on-going or continual action.
9. In the NT, Jesus is both the Offerer/Priest and the Offering, and God the Father is the recipient.
10. His death on the Cross is seen as the fulfillment of multiple sacrifices and offerings of the OT.
11. All of these offerings required priestly action AFTER the death of any victim.
12. Since the requirements for the ultimate, non-shadow sacrifice included a Perfect Priest and a Perfect human-plus victim, the constraints of covenant ethics and religious ritual would necessitate that the Victim be resurrected (to avoid the problem of Unrecompensed Righteous Suffering) and the Priest be able to continue the post-death activities.
13. The NT data is very clear that the agonies and terrors of the Cross were significant and horrendous for Jesus, in both anticipation and in the actual experiencing.
14. The NT data also suggests that the emotional pain elements of this experience are present/available to Jesus today, in His function as sympathizer and High Priest.
15. The anticipation of resurrection, although it would be comfort and source of strength for endurance, would not lesson the agonies of death�while the experience was happening.
16. The agonies of this extra-loaded death and the circumstances of that death would likely be significantly more painful, more vivid, more invasive for a pure Hearted and Eternal One, than for us normal humans.
17. The Father�s full experience of His Son�s pain is a corollary of their intense union (not discussed in this paper).
18. These events are constantly in the Father�s memory, and indeed, are actually rehearsed daily in the lives of His people.
19. Even human fathers (parents, loved one generally) experience the phenomena of the never-lost emotional memories of the past, and this re-feeling is not a sign of weakness, but of depth and wholeness.
20. Although discussions of finite-vs-infinite aspects of this question may be on shaky semantic or epistemic grounds, either of the two major approaches to the use of these terms indicate that the Sacrifice of our Lord on the Cross would have been adequate WITHOUT requiring it to be infinite in duration.

What this leads me to conclude is:

• That the death of Christ on the Cross, in the manner and circumstances of that death, was completely consistent with the OT sacrificial framework;
  
  
• That the NT data supports the view that the Cross was a huge personal pain/cost to the Son;
  
  
• That the theological, ethical, and religious constraints that needed to satisfied in effecting the means of His hope-rescuing, life-salvaging, and heart-renewing work, virtually required a resurrection of the only One �fit� to create and manage the forces/influences within history for this redemptive work;
  
  
• That the on-going work of Christ in the lives of His Close Ones evidence the ever-present reality/availability of that pain to Him;
  
  
• That specific experiences of parents everywhere (i.e., vicarious re-suffering of the pain of their children�s pain, through memory recall) witnesses to the ever-present �cost� of the Cross to the Father;
  
  
• And accordingly, that the term �sacrifice� is not only very much to the point, but is also very much an understatement of what happened in that  unfathomable event we call the �Crucifixion of Jesus of Nazareth��

You asked this question before, BMZ, and I answered it but not as fully as this time.  Perhaps if you read the article you will understand the sacrifice of Jesus with fuller understanding.

BMZ wrote: Abraham was ready to slaughter his own son, knowing that the son would be dead and would be gone for ever from his sight. Had he succeeded in killing his son, that would have been the "Greatest sacrifice for God" in the history of the world.

It would have shown that God went back on His word and promise, which He did not do.  If Abraham had killed his son, Isaac, then the only way God could have kept His promise would have been if God had resurrected or resuscitated Isaac back to life.

One last note about Jesus' sacrifice:  you do believe that soldiers sacrifice their lives for others, do you not?  Would it still be a sacrifice if they knew that after they died, they would live again with God?  If you threw yourself in front of a truck barreling down on a group of children and you died and they lived, would you not consider that your death was a sacrifice, even though you thought you would live again?

Peace