The cost highlights why faith is so essential to authentic Christianity. Faith is the glue without which our entire spiritual life disintegrates. Without faith, we would not dare pay the price. We would be left only with false religion, no matter how much we cite Christian doctrine. And what faith it takes! Without a foretaste, it is nearly impossible even to imagine anything so wonderful as to make the cost worthwhile. Whatever could move anyone to pay such a price? I suggest the greatest of all motivations: love. The future joy that moved Jesus to endure the cross was not the happiness that ease and luxury gives, nor an empty euphoria like a drug-induced high. What held Jesus to the cross was the thrill and matchless satisfaction of knowing he was delighting the Father who meant everything to him, and the ecstasy of obtaining eternal fellowship with us, whom he loves with an intensity beyond our comprehension. Likewise, it was supernatural love pumping through the hearts of the early Christians that propelled them to exult in what they regarded as the privilege of suffering for their Lord (Acts 5:40-42). And it was that same love that exploded within the heart of Paul, driving him to count all his earlier achievements as trash relative to the joy of intimately knowing Christ and of sharing in Christ’s suffering (Philippians 3:8-10). We love because Christ first loved us. We embrace pain because he first did it for us.

When I remind you that “hope” is a theological term about the certainty of the reward, you will see that we have been discussing the big three – faith, hope and love. No wonder Paul in 1 Corinthians 13 sang the praises of these three qualities. They empower us to embrace the cross and thus plunge into the riches Christ has purchased for us.

Taken from Spiritual Secrets

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