Beware the cost…

Grace is free…

This gift has been given to all. You can’t think of a person who hasn’t been given this lavish display of love. It comes to us when we least expect it, at birth, and is inherent with us throughout our entire life cycle whether we know it not. The rewards it brings and offers are beyond all comprehension, boggling the minds of young and old alike through all the ages. For all its complexity and generosity, grace is vastly underestimated by entirely everyone. Yes, even me too.

Mark Twain is credited with saying that youth is wasted on the young. I would agree. I might even venture to apply this same principle to the matter of grace: Grace is wasted on those who need grace. Just as young people have no clue what the greatness of being young is about when 90% of your life is being old, those who need grace – which is all of us – have no clue of the greatness it offerings throughout the 90% of our life when we’re not even aware of it. How can this be? How is it that something so grand, something simply given to us can be so misunderstood that it’s misapplied? In my opinion, as humble as it is, youth, or maturity is at the heart of this matter.

How many of you attending a church service, sitting week in and week out, year after year, have heard proclaimed from the pulpit, “God is doing a new thing!” and wondered just what this “new thing” looks like? Have you ever considered that a new thing, all new things, never seem to be given the opportunity to reach maturity before they are eclipsed by another, younger sibling? Is it possible that “new things” are wasted on the young, previous “new thing” proclaimed last month, last spring, or last year? Have you ever considered that a people saturated in the “new thing” never mature into the things of God instead they are bottle fed on the milk of the word of the Christ? (Heb 6:1-2) How come no one ever talks about the “old thing” of the last epoch except as a means to show how the “new thing” is so much better? Have you ever considered that you’re an old “new thing” to the new “new thing” everyone is talking about?

Grace is free, but maturity has a price.

When you were born, your parents understood that you would never remain in diapers. Growth creates changes in all aspects of our nature and character. Often that growth forces us to sacrifice something which has a current value and esteem in our perception to attain the next level or stage of maturity. A nipple is sacrificed for a bottle, which is sacrificed for a thumb, which is sacrificed for a blanket, which is sacrificed for…on and on up the stages until today we have put off the childish things to press forward toward…screech!

People grow naturally in many ways, spirituality is not one of them. You’re taken as child dropped into a nursery at a local church, and excepted to grow in the Lord which, regrettably only means you know what the Christmas/Easter story kinda means, throw in an ark and maybe a lion’s den or giant for good measure. These myths follow you into adulthood where finger painting is replaced by pew sitting and bible reading. By all appearances, you have grown up. However, a quick survey of any congregation across the western church will demonstrate that there are people who have spent 20, 30, even 40 years pew sitting in spiritual diapers.

Why? Spiritual maturity is a personal act of responsibility. It cost you to grow. Grace is free, maturity has a price. The “new thing” is free, maturing that “thing” costs you your life. Preachers don’t want to tell you this for primarily two reasons; 1) People don’t like to commit to something where they can’t see instant results; 2) The growth of a “thing” also requires the maturing of the person who pronounced its arrival.

I could cover a lot of territory in just these two issues but today maturity is at hand. This statement is a demonstration of what maturity does: it sacrifices the immediate desires for a long-term perspective. Presenters in a congregation look for short-term results that they can dictate and evaluate, not long-term interactions which require and foster independent thought and inquiry. Maturity in a church ultimately costs the pastor his role because mature people know where they are being led by God.

Are you longing to grow into the things of God? There is a cost, a price you will pay for a gift freely given. It may be your time or it may be your activities; it could be a relationship with a superior or a person you’ve always looked up to. Maturity arrives when your parents become your partners; and that is the last stage that is the most difficult price to transcend for all.