But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. (Philippians 3:7, NASB)
Is your job worth it? What about your hobbies? If you play golf, you invest valuable time and money into this wonderful game at the expense of something. Has it been worth it?
For years I thought that following Jesus might be good when I got older and had little else to do.Starting at the age of six, I have now been playing golf for 65 years. If you extrapolate that into an estimated 100 rounds per year at four hours per round, that is about 26,000 hours on the golf course just playing. This does not include travel to and from and practice and thoughts of golf away from the course. That equates to more than 1,000 24-hour days just on the golf course!
And the answer is, yes, it has been worth it. The people. The places. The challenges. The experiences have been priceless. But this priceless value pales in significance when I am asked the question, “Has following Jesus been worth it?”
Everything has a price tag. My conclusion after 30 years of following Jesus is that is has been the most eternally important adventure I have ever experienced—and I believe the best is yet to come.
Jesus asked us, “What does it profit if you gain the whole world and lose eternal life?” (Matthew 16:26, TLB). The mighty truth is that we get it now and later. Both/and. The strength to live the abundant life now, and his promise of much more later.
In 1986, God chose me to submit. I accepted his choice. I know, he really chose me before I was born, but it took me 42 years to understand and respond to his choice. Being found is hard when you think you don’t have a need. I realize now in looking back how much better life with Jesus really is compared to what I was chasing.
C.S. Lewis always has a way to enlighten a profound thought. You see, for years I thought that following Jesus might be good when I got older and had little else to do. I was not opposed to a faith in God, but it really wasn’t that important and did not seem worth the effort and time to explore his claims. I thought life was good. Why complicate it with the thoughts of sin, repentance, and following the narrow road? I was pleased and the wide road was just fine. Lewis wrote, “It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”
I am thankful for the game of golf, but I am eternally grateful for Jesus and his choice to award me grace and the gift of the abundant life now. It has been so very worth it!
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Randy Wolff
July 10, 2017
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The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.