Being Jesus disciple is not without a sacrifice to be made. If you've been following Christ for a while now, you've most likely made a few sacrifices here and there. Some relationships, desires and practices have most likely gone down the drain.
There is a cost to being a Christian, no doubt. And sometimes we think that we are missing out on some things in life by choosing devotion to our faith. You might have heard a friend say that your belief is holding you back from truly enjoying life. Or you may have been perceived as weird, persecuted or even rejected for your faith.
In Matthew 16:24 Jesus says, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me."
The denial of the self is an important element of the Christian faith. Because Jesus removed the old before He brought in the new, some things would have to go.
Some churches and Christian groups try to "lure" people into the faith by telling them how awesome Christianity is and how we get everything we ever wanted when we follow Christ.
Well, that's just not true. There will be times when we will feel benched, becoming spectators to certain things that we should no longer take part in.
We can miss out on more smartphone time because we take time to grow in spiritual disciplines. We can miss out on "fun" because they might be sinful or compromising. We can miss out on gaining more wealth and more power because they cause injustice upon others and dishonour God. We will miss out when time comes when God gives us new wineskin and we cannot go back to the old lest we cause our "wine" to break out.
Yes, following Christ does have a cost. We're not always going to be able to do what we want to do.
But that doesn't mean that following Christ isn't worth it. Every sacrifice we make, there's always a greater return.
There is an undeniable price to pay as Christians, one that we don't have to be ashamed of and one that we don't have to put a mask on or sugarcoat. There's nothing to be ashamed about when we commit to the gospel and live by it.
Just as Paul says in Romans 1:16, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek."
Sure we may miss out every time we make sacrifices to follow Christ. But those sacrifices will never go unrewarded. They will always be worth making. In fact, if we truly walk in God's ways, we would rather miss out on the things of this world than miss out on the things of God.
There's a trade off to everything, and it's in our human nature to choose that which promises a better return. As far as we're concerned, we know and are confident that there is a greater return in being a disciple of Christ, so much so that we need not be ashamed of the sacrifices that we make for Him.
