We Must Finish

"And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after Me, cannot be My disciple.

"For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have [sufficient] to finish [it?] Lest haply, after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to finish [it,] all that behold [it] begin to mock him,

"Saying, This man hath begun to build, and is not able to finish." Luke 14:27-30.

It is not enough to lay the foundation in the Christian life-accepting and believing in GOD's pardoning love-as important as that is. We must advance farther on, allowing that love to transform us into His image and likeness. We must finish what we started; we must build to completion. For Christ's sake and the gospel's. For the sake of those we love. For ours.

The Holy Scriptures never say that the transformation will be an easy process, that we would always enjoy it. In Malachi 3:3, GOD is likened to the "refiner's fire, and like fuller's soap:" The LORD asks in Jeremiah 23:29, "Is not My Word like as a fire? ... and like a hammer [that] breaketh the rock in pieces?" Ephesians 6:17 states that His word is the "sword of the Spirit", and Hebrews 4:12 says it is "sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and [is] a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." Fire, soap, hammer, sword. All those either purge or destroy. GOD's Word isn't there to make always make us comfortable, though it can comfort; it's there to show us what we are, and to remove all our wickedness. To make us the noble people GOD intends for us to be.

We allow this to happen by choosing to deny ourselves, and do according to GOD's will; when we surrender whatever (idea, hope, practice, etc.) that is not in harmony with His Word. No, it won't always be enjoyable at the moment. It won't free us from difficulty. It won't make us popular, even with the Christian world. In short, it won't make smooth-sailing out of this life. Even our Saviour wasn't free from a thorny path, and if we honestly follow Him, neither will we be. Yet, just as we shall know of His suffering, we shall know of His joy. He will not leave us alone, and there will be reward in this life as well as the next for our sacrifice. The joy, the reward, of leading some souls-or soul- to Jesus by our example.

And if nothing else, when all is said and done, when all the sorrows and trials are passed, we will inherit life everlasting, and we may be sure that we uplifted our Saviour most clearly to a dying world.

Blessings,
Jean