Die to Live. Give to Get!

Matthew 10:34 - 11:1

"Don't think I've come to make life cozy. I've come to cut-- 35 make a sharp knife- cut between son and father, daughter and mother, bride and mother- in- law-- cut through these cozy domestic arrangements and free you for God. 36 Well- meaning family members can be your worst enemies. 37 If you prefer father or mother over me, you don't deserve me. If you prefer son or daughter over me, you don't deserve me. 38" If you don't go all the way with me, through thick and thin, you don't deserve me. 39 If your first concern is to look after yourself, you'll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you'll find both yourself and me. 40 "We are intimately linked in this harvest work. Anyone who accepts what you do, accepts me, the One who sent you. Anyone who accepts what I do accepts my Father, who sent me. 41 Accepting a messenger of God is as good as being God's messenger. Accepting someone's help is as good as giving someone help. This is a large work I've called you into, but don't be overwhelmed by it. It's best to start small. 42 Give a cool cup of water to someone who is thirsty, for instance. The smallest act of giving or receiving makes you a true apprentice. You won't lose out on a thing." 1 When Jesus finished placing this charge before his twelve disciples, he went on to teach and preach in their villages.

Food for soul!

Nowhere is the sheer honesty of Jesus more vividly displayed than it is here. Here he sets the Christian demand at its most demanding and at its most uncompromising. He tells his men exactly what they may expect. Here in this passage Jesus uses figure s of speech. He is saying that life is a warfare; and in that warfare it will often be true that a man's foes will be those of his own household.

It has happened that someone refused God's call to some adventurous bit of service, because he or she allowed personal attachments to immobilize him or her. Whenever some great cause emerges, whenever some great idea comes up, it is bound to divide people; there are bound to be those who support the idea, and those who don't. If you come up with a new idea and no one opposes it, abandon it, because it is useless. Every great idea was opposed.

And the people that oppose us by and large are our dear ones; those of our own household. Yes, it is possible for our loved ones to become in effect our enemies, if the thought of them keeps us from doing what we know God wants us to do.

There is no place for a policy of "Safety First" in the Christian life. The man who seeks first ease and comfort and security and the fulfillment of personal ambition may well get all these things--but he will not be a happy man; for all of us were sent into this world to serve a purpose. The way to serve others, the way to fulfil God's purpose for us, the way to true happiness is to spend life selflessly, for only thus will we find life, here and hereafter.

Ask mothers and they will tell you what Jesus means. In order to give birth to new life, they have to risk their life. Every child birth is risky. If our mothers had not risked their life, we would not be born.