Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

• Matthew 11:28-30

Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.

• Mark 8:34

For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.

• Philippians 1:21

“Yet the outcome of the Reformation was the victory, not of Luther’s perception of grace in all its purity and costliness, but of the vigilant religious instinct of man for the place where grace is to be obtained at the cheapest price. All that was needed was a subtle and almost imperceptible change of emphasis, and the damage was done. Luther had taught that man cannot stand before God, however religious his works and ways may be, because at bottom he is always seeking his own interests. In the depth of his misery, Luther had grasped by faith the free and unconditional forgiveness of all his sins. That experience taught him that this grace had cost him his very life, and must continue to cost him the same price day by day. So far from dispensing him from discipleship, this grace only made him a more earnest disciple. When he spoke of grace, Luther always implied as a corollary that it cost him his own life, the life which was now for the first time subjected to the absolute obedience of Christ. Only so could he speak of grace. Luther had said that grace alone can save; his followers took up his doctrine and repeated it word for word. But they left out its invariable corollary, the obligation of discipleship. There was no need for Luther always to mention that corollary explicitly for he always spoke as one who had been led by grace to the strictest following of Christ. Judged by the standard of Luther’s doctrine, that of his followers was unassailable, and yet their orthodoxy spelt the end and destruction of the Reformation as the revelation on earth of the costly grace of God. The justification of the sinner in the world degenerated into the justification of sin and the world. Costly grace was turned into cheap grace without discipleship.”

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship (Costly Grace)

I used the same Scriptures yesterday.  It seems to fit here, but I added another.  Jesus does not ask us to be followers with no cost to us.  He does not say that there will be no burden, nor does He talk about not being yoked to that burden.  He does say we have to take up our cross.  The end game for the cross is death.  Jesus offers us life, but at a cost of death to self.

Bonhoeffer uses a few paragraphs leading up to this one, talking about how Luther left the monastery to reclaim costly grace in the world itself.  In last week’s quote, Bonhoeffer talked about how the world had grasped the concept of cheap grace, but the monastic orders understood what God meant about costly grace.  Bonhoeffer, being a Lutheran, is naturally going to focus on Martin Luther, but it is an excellent example.  Luther could have stayed in the monastery and lamented that he was merely a monk and could not do anything about the church’s excesses, the church’s adding things to their polity that were not biblical, etc.  He could have stayed quiet, but when he accepted Jesus, he said “no” to self and “yes” to doing God’s Will in the world.  While in the monastery, he was relatively safe, but in direct opposition to the Catholic church, he had a price on his head.

But Luther pressed on.  He gained backing from the local government.  When Rome sent its emissary to debate Luther publicly, he was backed into a corner, but he held his ground.  It was at this point when he shouted Sola Scriptura, the Scriptures alone as a means of testing what is true regarding the faith.

And what about each of us?  We might not need to leave our professions and become a missionary.  We may be needed in our profession to reach the lost, or our profession might be one that helps other people.  In so doing we can show God’s love.

But the thought of making a name for ourselves, making our mark, should never be our goal.  We should be in the “business” of diminishing self and amplifying God.  It reminds me of a Casting Crowns song, Only Jesus.

If we can get to that point, nothing related to self-interest, nothing to pass on as a legacy, that is nothing other than a legacy of glorifying Jesus…  Then we see what costly grace is all about.  Yes, we can be “saved” by simply accepting Jesus into our heart, but once He is there, He is going to want to make changes.  And as a result, we will want to make those changes also, if we truly have Jesus in our heart.

And the more we die to self and live in Christ, the closer to Jesus we become.  And the more we will desire more of Jesus.  I have said it a lot lately, but when we go to Heaven, we will have an eternity to worship Him, and if that does not get your motor running a little faster, if you do not desire to love Jesus forever, then why would you want to go to Heaven.

Lord, guide me. Let me be more like You every day.  Help me glorify You in everything that I do.  Help me show love to others.  Let others see You in me.  In Your name I pray.  Amen.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.