At What Cost ~ by Anonymous
Whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Matthew 16: 25,26
What is the cost of discipleship? How much of the ordinary life can I keep?
Many are hoping that when all the demands of discipleship are met, the poor natural self will still have some chance, and some time, to get on with its own life and do what it likes.
But Christ says, “Give me all. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work—I want you. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked. I will give you a new self instead.”
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in his book The Cost of Discipleship, attacked “easy Christianity” or “cheap grace.” The cost may seem heavy but the alternative is devastating. Non-discipleship means no abiding peace, no life penetrated by love, no faith that sees everything in the light of God’s governance for good, no hope that stands firm in the most discouraging of circumstances. In short, it costs exactly that abundance of life Jesus said he came to bring.