Mentally Counting the Cost

Suppose you are planning to run a marathon; twenty six and two tenths miles.  When do you calculate how much training you will need to prepare for it?  Will twenty-four hours be enough, a week, a month, longer? Running a race doesn’t just mean tying your shoe laces and lining up with all the other runners. There are always unforeseen obstacles to deal with. There is conditioning, training, strategy, attitude and mentally counting the cost.

If you merely want to run a race and aren’t interested in finishing first, then you may ignore the attitude aspect, but if you’re a competitor and winning is important, every detail is important.

Jesus mentioned several parables in the Bible. A word of caution, “always” look a little deeper when Jesus is talking or doing something. In the Gospel of Luke chapter 14, Jesus tells of a parable about someone who was planning to build a tower. Won’t he first sit down and estimate the cost if he has sufficient funds to complete it? If he lays the foundation and runs out of money, won’t people ridicule him and his short-sightedness? Normally you wouldn’t start a project unless you had the ability to mentally count the cost.

All that is true, but, as always there’s more to the story than what lies on the surface. Early in Luke 14, Jesus was talking about a man preparing a great banquet and sending servants out to invite guests to attend. The parable expresses the open compelling invitation to come to Christ for salvation. The teaching of the ladder verses cautions those who follow Christ to consider carefully the cost of full commitment to Christ in a life of service.

In Luke 14 we read Jesus’ words against seeking status, and in favor of hard work and even suffering.  We should not lose sight of the end result of all our humility and self-sacrifice—a joyous banquet with our Lord!  God never asks us to give up something good unless he plans to replace it with something better.  Jesus is not calling people to join him in a labor camp here, but in a feast—the wedding supper of the lamb when God and his beloved church will be joined forever. “Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder, shouting: “Hallelujah!  For our Lord Almighty reigns.  Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory!  For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready.  Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear.”  (Fine lines stands for righteous act of the saints.)  Then the angel said to me, “Write: Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!”  And he added, “These are the true words of God.””  Revelation 19:6-9 This is true intimacy one with God.  Luke 14 shows us the master in the story, the master of ceremonies for this banquet, sent his servant into the streets to invite the needy to his banquet, so God sent his Son to the whole world to needy people to tell them that God’s kingdom had arrived and was ready for them.

Mentally counting the cost is something everybody should do before blindly saying yes to becoming a Christian and continue leading a life that reflects the opposite of who you’re following.  Are you following Jesus?  Do the numbers add up? 

Go figure—VERY CAREFULLY!!