Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Giving God Bargain-Basement Stuff!

"However, the king said to Araunah, 'No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price, for I will not offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God which cost me nothing.' So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver" (2 Samuel 24:24)

All of us have no doubt either at least seen or even participated in a department store's "bargain-basement" sale, beloved! You know how it works, don't you? Merchandise prices slashed to the bone, piled haphazardly on tables, usually in the aisles of the store. And that is before hungry customers get their hands on them! But then, who doesn't enjoy saving money on a good bargain?

King David had a definite thought about offering "bargain-basement" merchandise unto the Lord. When Araunah the Jebusite offered to give to the king his threshing floor and also wood for the fire and oxen for a burnt offering to stave off a plague from the hand of God, all that David had to do was to accept the gift free of charge from Araunah. But the king had a different idea about such a transaction. He did not believe that any sacrifice should be offered unto Jehovah that did not cost the giver something. And the sacrifice was from David and not Araunah! So he paid a price of 50 shekels of silver to Araunah and only then built the altar and offered the burnt sacrifice unto God.

It is so easy today for us as Christians to fall into the habit of offering to God that which costs us little or nothing, beloved! We have become so accustomed to quick worship that even grace itself has become "cheap" to us, a term coined by German theologian and pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer. How many of you remember what Jesus said to the multitudes who were following Him, most of them for all the wrong reasons?

"Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple. For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who observe it begin to ridicule him, saying, 'This man began to build and was not able to finish'" (Luke 14:27-30)

These are harsh-sounding words from the Master, are they not? Yet how many supposed Christians find themselves in such a predicament today? Having professed their faith in Jesus Christ, they begin to follow Him with a certain amount of fervor, only to become disillusioned at last by the apparent price of true discipleship. They begin to substitute the inferior for the genuine, the "bargain-basement stuff" for high-quality living, to the point where Jesus Himself becomes a commodity sold at the lowest possible "bargain-basement" price!

Jesus' message to all of us today is graphic and clear, beloved - count the cost! Salvation may appear to be free because it is God's own gift to you, but following Jesus Christ as Lord will cost you your life. If you are precious enough to the Father for Him to sacrifice His only begotten Son on the cross for your sins, then Jesus should be precious enough to you for you to offer Him only your best. A New York Baptist minister named Howard Grose wrote and published in 1902 the lyrics for a beloved hymn of the church that speak directly to what God expects from each one of us as His servants:

Give of your best to the Master;
Naught else is worthy His love.
He gave Himself for your ransom,
Gave up His glory above.
Laid down His life without murmur,
You from sin's ruin to save.
Give Him your heart's adoration;
Give Him the best that you have.

Ron