A Foot in Both Camps
Luke 9:23-24 Jesus continued to say to all of them, "Any of you who want to be my follower must stop thinking about yourself and what you want. You must be willing to carry the cross that is given to you every day for following me. Any of you who try to save the life you have will lose it. But you who give up your life for me will save it.
Have you ever found yourself torn between wanting something good today, and sacrificing it for something much better tomorrow?
Pretty much anything in life that’s worthwhile, requires us to sacrifice things today, so that we can gain that worthwhile thing in the future. If you want to buy a house, you need to save up a deposit. That means forgoing a whole bunch of spending, missing out on dinners and holidays that you’d like to have now, in order to put the money away so that you can have that house when the time comes.
An athlete who wants to be successful has to spend time and energy training hard, while all their other friends are taking it easy. If you want to lose weight, you have to give up those bad foods now, in order to achieve your goal later. Yep, pretty much anything in life that’s worthwhile, requires us to sacrifice things … today.
Following Jesus is like that. If you want to follow Jesus, there’s a price to pay – now.
Jesus continued to say to all of them, “Any of you who want to be my follower must stop thinking about yourself and what you want. You must be willing to carry the cross that is given to you every day for following me. Any of you who try to save the life you have will lose it. But you who give up your life for me will save it. (Luke 9:23-24)
Now, our natural reaction to that is … “Well, you know, I don’t really want to pay the price today. At least not yet. In fact what I’d really like, is to have a foot in both camps please – follow Jesus on the one hand, skip the paying the price bit on the other.“
But it doesn’t work like that.
I used to smoke heavily, up to three packets a day. When I gave up – almost forty years ago now – there were no half measures. There was a real price to pay. It was a craving-by-craving proposition. But today, I’m fit, I’m healthy, I exercise, I feel fantastic. Was the price worth it? Sure it was. But … you can’t be a smoker and a non-smoker. You can’t have a foot in both camps.
You can’t save your life and lose it at the same time.
That’s God’s Word. Fresh … for you … today.
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