We’re here to be worshippers first and workers only second. We take a convert and immediately make a worker out of him. God never meant it to be so. God meant that a convert should learn to be a worshiper, and after that he can learn to be a worker…The work done by a worshiper will have eternity in it.
A.W. Tozer

What Was The Cost Of Your Salva

What Was The Cost Of Your Salva

WHAT WAS THE COST OF YOUR SALVATION?

. When you think of God, what kind of image comes to mind? Far too many people have a severely distorted image of God and it adversely effects the way they relate to Him. Many see the Father as some kind of old tyrant sitting on his big throne making tough laws that nobody can obey perfectly and then getting angry over our failure, ready to kill us any moment. When we envision Jesus, he is seen like a kind of Jewish mother with chicken soup, always ready to protect us from the ole’ meanie and his bonger. Then there is the Holy Spirit, something that is just kind of hovering around like a vapor doing something, but few know quite what.
. While such confusing images are common to the world, it is surprising how much of this kind of thinking is in the church. Failure to properly discern the person of God is one of the basic causes for failure to understand the nature and problem of sin. I want to take a moment here to examine sin from God’s perspective as revealed in the Word of God.
. Jesus said that a wise man counts the cost of a thing before he decides to proceed so that he will not look like the fool when he comes up short. It is important to count the true cost of sin! We have all heard the basic redemption story told from the angle of Christ’s suffering at the hands of the Sanhedrin and Romans. Crucifixion was a Phoenician invention that the Romans perfected into a fine science to make death as painful and slow as possible. Like Gaius Caesar used to say, “make him feel like he is dying.” After the body is ripped to a bloody mass by the Roman lash, the convicted man will be forced to carry his own cross-bar to the place of execution. . There, the proficient executioners will secure the arms in place and feel for the space between the bones just below the wrist. There is a pain nerve that crosses this area, and it is here that the large spike is driven through the wrist and fastened by the nail head to the crossbar. Once the arms are secure, the feet are then also fastened with a single spike so that the knees are slightly bent. The cross is then lowered with a jolt into the hole, often causing the joints in the body to be dislocated in places.
. The stress of the weight of the body on the chest with the arms secured in this way is such that one cannot breathe. To breathe, one must stand on the nail pinned feet to push the body up and relieve the pressure on the diaphragm. Thus, survival is lengthened as the victim repeatedly rises and falls in order to breathe. This is why breaking the legs speeds up the death process.
. Friend, whenever you pull out your calculator and add up the cost of sin, I dare you estimate the agony of Jesus. Yet it was your sin that cost Him that pain and death. Our Father has made forgiveness so easy and available that we have entered a “take it for granted” type of attitude toward it. We seem to think that we can be lax on sin, lax in prayer, diligence and holiness, reckless with our spiritual walk and the only price we have to pay is taking the time to ask forgiveness. Salvation may have been free for you, but it was not cheap. Let’s look a bit deeper here.
. Is there any doubt in your mind that the Father loved His Son? What father doesn’t, except the debased? How intensely the Father loved His only begotten Son who was perfect in every sense of the word. He NEVER disobeyed. Yet, “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son…”, not just to let Him come to earth, but God gave Him to the cross. The pain that must have been in God’s heart is unknowable. Not only did the Father allow Jesus to suffer a horrendous physical death, but he also was forced by the law of righteousness to turn His back on Jesus at His time of supreme need. . On the cross Jesus quoted David’s Psalm (22:1) when He said, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” The verse goes on to say, “Why are you so far from saving me, so far from the words of my groaning?” The penalty for sin is not only physical death, it includes banishment from the presence of God. God must turn His back on sin, and in eternity, turn away from the sinner that has not forsaken his sin. On the cross, Jesus was dying as our substitute so He had to experience the full impact of sin’s penalty. When they offered Jesus a pain killer he refused for He knew that He must experience the full blast of God’s wrath. He must not only drink the bitter cup, He must drain it to the dregs. . I can not imagine how it must have anguished the Father to so turn His back on His Son. Why did He do it? Because, my friend, He loved you! He saw you dead in your sin and there could only be one substitute. The price for sin was either your life or His, and He chose to give His for you. Jesus died for the sin of adultery because it was the sin of adultery that drove those nails home. He died for the sin of lying and bitterness, because those sins drove the Roman lash. He died for your selfishness and rebellion, because man’s rebellion brought the curse of thorns into the world and forced a crown of thorns into His precious brow. . Get out your calculator and add it up! Before the sum reads “Freebee Grace”, remember the price somebody had to pay. Calculate it out, friend, before you curse your circumstances, treat a brother rudely, cop an attitude, or sleep with someone you should not be with. If you can proceed with sin, knowing the cost Jesus and the Father had to pay, then you lie when you say you love Him. Nobody would put somebody they loved through that just to please the lusts of the flesh. Sin is a reproach and deserving of eternal hell, especially if it is persisted in in light of the cross. . Finally, we have the command of Jesus Himself when He says that we should forgive just as we have been forgiven. Before you cop an attitude or embrace a bitter or unforgiving attitude in your heart toward someone, remember the debt you were released from. If what they did to you comes anywhere close to what your sins inflicted on Jesus, then I suppose you are now dead and this message doesn’t even matter. If you are still alive, then you must forgive. . I assure you, forgiveness is still just a repentant heart away, but I pray that the knowledge of the weight of what it cost will cause you to consider your ways and rush to an altar of prayer, not just for forgiveness, but also for His delivering power. “Come near to God and He will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will lift you up” (James 4:8-10).

J.Jefferson (John J. Clark II)

Computers for Christ – Chicago