Campus Crusade for Christ popularized Bill Bright's Four Spiritual Laws. For several generations of young people, in order to be a Christian, one had to believe these four laws: God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life; man (sic) has been separated from God through sin; Jesus Christ died for our sins and reconciled us to God; and everyone that accepts Christ will be saved and receive eternal life.
Sunday's Gospel Reading from Luke reminds those of us who call ourselves disciples of Jesus that following him has never been--and will never be--a picnic nor a walk in the park. Discipleship is not a club membership with fees, duties, benefits, privileges, and Sunday Best attire. Discipleship is not just confessing the Four Spiritual Laws. Discipleship is beyond using the Bible, God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit as props.
If we believe that Trump, Vance, Duterte, Marcos, Bato, Curlee and Sarah Discaya, and their ilk answered Jesus’s call to discipleship, then we're following the wrong Jesus!
The cost of discipleship is very high. The cross that Jesus of Nazareth talks about does not refer to the challenge of being married to one's spouse, nor the responsibility of taking care of elderly relatives, nor the burden of pastoring a big church, nor to any of the other metaphorical "crosses" we have come up with.
The cost of discipleship is very high. It's completing the tower--even if we die in the process. It's winning the battle--even if we perish along the way. We don't go build without finishing. We don't wage war in order to lose. Many among us want to go to heaven but are afraid to die. Many among us want to be resurrected but are afraid to be crucified. Many among us want to see a new day but are afraid of the night. We cannot have one without the other.
My friends, we cannot trully follow Jesus unless we are ready to carry our cross. When Jesus calls us, he bids us, "come and die."
*art, "The Cost of Discipleship," from inductivebiblestudy app, 2020.
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