Prosperity preachers teach that coming to Jesus will bring financial blessings, a life filled with ease, and freedom from worry and hardship. Sunday after Sunday, their churches are packed with unsuspecting people who think they that following Jesus will make their lives easier. Ultimately, they will walk away disappointed because the promise of Christianity that they were promised is not the Christianity they experienced. But Jesus didn’t teach that Christianity would make our lives free from struggle. In fact He said the opposite.
Many blessings come with being a Christian, but there are also important costs that come with following Christ Jesus. I write this not to scare you away from Christianity but to tell you that the benefits outweigh the cost.
When you build a house, wouldn’t you first sit down and estimate the cost to see if you had enough money to complete it? If you lay the foundation and weren’t able to finish it. Luke 14:28-29 tells us,
“For which of you, desiring to build a tower, doesn’t first sit down and count the cost, to see if he has enough to build it? Or perhaps when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, everyone who sees begins to mock him”
Many people today fail to understand that following Jesus comes with a cost. They don’t consider that Jesus would ask them to give up their greatest possessions.
If you want to start a project or work on an idea, wouldn’t you first consider how much of your time and resources it would take before beginning? Likewise, if we want to follow Jesus we should be aware of how much it will cost to follow Him.
To be a true follower of Jesus you have to carry your own cross. Luke 15:27 says,
“And whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.”
The cross represents the suffering that Jesus endured. Carrying our cross means being willing to endure our own hardship for the sake of Jesus. If we are not willing to carry our cross, there is no point in following Jesus.
Just also says something in Luke 14 that’s a little difficult to hear,
If anyone comes to me, and doesn’t disregard his own father, mother wife, children, brothers, and sisters, yes, and his own life, he can’t be my disciple.
This doesn’t mean to hate our loved ones in the way it is thought of today. In this context “hate” is a Semitic idiom that simply means to love less. What Jesus was saying is that in order to follow him we should love Him more that anyone else.
In Matthew 16:24 Jesus explains that following Him also includes self-denial. This means that we need to be willing to lay down some things we deeply love and enjoy for the sake of following Him. Just like Jesus followed the Father’s will and went to the cross. Sometimes this comes easily, and other times it can be difficult. Following Jesus means preserving and doing God‘s will whether it is easy or difficult.
Believing in Jesus doesn’t promise that everything will be perfect. It doesn’t promise that everyone will love us, or that things will always work out just as we hoped. Jesus’s disciples all had to endure hardship for the sake of the cross, and we will too.
Following Jesus isn’t all hardship and pain. It is filled with so much joy and beauty. And any hardship we endure is absolutely meant to lead us toward a beautiful future in the presence of God.
Believers are freed from the power of sin. It can no longer weigh on them like a burden. It also gives them access into the presence of God and unhindered fellowship with our creator which leads to eternal life with God.
From Pity to Praise 