I accepted Jesus as my Lord at a very early age. I wish I could say that since that day, I have been living for God, but that just isn’t the truth. When I was a teenager and young adult I chose my own path. I scoffed at Godly counsel, ignored scripture and effectively turned my back on God. If asked I would say I was a Christian, but even a glimpse at my life would reveal the opposite. I ignored God and decided to do things my way.
That’s not to say God gave up on me. Several times, I could feel God trying to call me back. I felt convicted to change things in my life. My life seemed to be one disaster after another, but for some reason I wasn’t ready to give up the sin in my life. I would actually stop and think about the sin in my life and, although I could see how doing things my way was causing my life to crumble, I would tell myself that I would miss the sin too much to walk away. I couldn’t follow God because I couldn’t walk away from the momentary pleasure I received from the very things that were causing massive amounts of stress and long bouts with depression and suicidal thoughts.
It makes me think of the young man in Matthew Chapter 19. After asking Jesus what he needed to do to gain eternal life, he was told to keep the commandments. The young man said he already did that and wanted to know what else he should do. “Jesus answered, ‘If you want to be perfect, go sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasures in heaven. Then come, follow me.’” (Matthew 19:22) Certainly I can see this as a difficult thing to do, but I find the next verse to be very interesting. “When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.” (Matthew 19:22)
What I find interesting is it doesn’t say that he was sad because he didn’t want to sell his home. It doesn’t say he needed clothes to wear or that he couldn’t leave his job. It says he was sad because he had great wealth. So, in the young man’s mind, if he was a poor fisherman it would have been easy to sell everything and follow Jesus. This tells me he was looking at it as a profit/loss issue. He had too much to give up and not enough to gain. It is worth noting: Jesus clearly knew this profit/loss issue would be the hang up for this young man. In responding to a question about gaining eternal life, Jesus specifically states that the man would gain treasures in heaven. The issue was, in the man’s mind, earthly wealth was of greater worth than what Jesus was offering.
I certainly wasn’t wealthy, in fact I was constantly struggling, but I still felt like I had to give up more than what God was offering. I felt like I would be getting a bad deal; cheated out of having fun. I was just making a smart logical decision. I realize now how badly my calculations were off.
Eventually, I was able to see that I needed a change. I started to seek God a little at a time constantly feeling Him leading me to seek and follow Him more. I started to attempt to give up the sin in my life. Some that I had once held so close to my chest now seemed so trivial. I was able to walk away and never look back. Some were much harder, but I realize now it wasn’t because I missed them. It was because I sometimes struggled to stay focused on God. With the absence of eternal reward, suddenly instant gratification was all that I was left with. I recognized now they were cheap and shallow, but when I don’t focus on God and His gifts, it is the only joy left to be had.
When I did my calculations I didn’t consider eternal rewards; I was too focused on the here and now. I didn’t think about the love and relationship I would have with God; only about the friends I would lose. I didn’t think about the blessings Jesus promised, but worried about the things I would need to give up. I forgot about the long term joy God would give, because I was so caught up with the few minutes I was getting here and there. I didn’t even include the promises God made to provide, because I was too busy worrying about how I would pay my bills. Thinking about it now, I’m not even sure what I put into God’s side of the equation.
I would venture to say the young man had the same issue. He didn’t truly ponder what it meant to have treasures in heaven, or even what eternal life really meant. If he had, I think he may have decided the treasure offered by an all knowing all powerful God easily trump any treasures that man could possibly gather.
Paul came to realize this: “What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ – the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.”(Philippians 3:8 and 9) Paul realized what I failed to, that there is nothing I could possibly possess that can compare to what Jesus offers; nothing I can hope to accomplish that God can’t make possible. There is no amount of love I could find in this world that God’s love doesn’t surpass and no riches I could acquire that God couldn’t provide 100 times over.
Now that I can see the whole picture, let’s reassess this profit/loss margin:
What have I lost? I lost my fear, I lost my feelings of hopelessness, I lost some destructive hobbies and I did lose a couple friends, but honestly that was more due to their choices than my decision to live for God.
What have I gained? Faith, hope, courage, unconditional love, provision, eternal life, grace, peace… I could keep going, but this is getting ridiculous. I’m clearly in the black with Jesus.
