Of all of the false presentations of the gospel that I have been a part of… this thing I started to write about yesterday… that Jesus did it all for little old me… if I was the only person on earth at that time, God would still have sent His son to save me from Hell so I could go to heaven… that is the one at the top of my pet peeve list… but… it is the next step in that presentation that really grabs me…
Not only did He do this for Philip because He loves me so much… but it doesn’t cost me a thing… it is totally free… Father paid the price for me… by sending His Son to die for me… all I have to do is accept this and I can go to heaven… isn’t that wonderful? sorry… NOT !!
Have you ever had anyone try to sell you something that is totally free?… that doesn’t cost you a thing? How did that go for you? There is nothing that is free… certainly not the price that Father paid with the death of His Son… it will cost me everything... He bought me with a price… He owns me… I am His possession… forsaking all that I have to follow Him… presenting my body a living sacrifice… He becomes more and more my life only as my natural man dies… inch by inch of me… Everything I am and everything I have belongs to Him…
Illustration: We had our B&B for almost 20 years… every school … every non-profit from near and far would make an appeal to us to offer a “free night” at the B&B for them to include in their fund raising event where they would auction free things to those in attendance. It took me much too long to finally realize that folks were donating to the organization and the free night was irrelevant because it was free… it had no value to them… the biggest issue was all the last minute calls where they couldn’t make it tomorrow and would want to reschedule for another night… or simply just not show up…
I stopped giving free nights to anyone for any reason…. because they had no value… reservations had a great value to people who paid something… there was a cost to stay at our B&B… it was valuable….. they paid for it.
🙂