The Cost is too High. John 12.37-43

The Cost is too High.  John 12.37-43

Click to read: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%2012:37-43&version=NIV&interface=print

Even after Jesus had performed so many signs in their presence, they still would not believe in him.  John 12.37

Two people can live through a harrowing experience, ask God for help—get it, and then have totally different responses … how can that be?  Like, I know a couple who had a very sick child—sick unto death—medical experts had been unable to diagnose, unable to treat him.  But when many prayers were lifted to God, the child was healed.   Indeed, God healed their young son; one parent pledged to live her life poured out to God, while the husband went back to business as usual.  How do you explain that? 

The same sun that melts wax, hardens clay.*   I have been reading this line over and over, thinking just how true a statement it is.  John writes about many who met Jesus … even though they saw the wonders he had wrought, still did not believe.  Even though they knew that Jesus was different than anyone they had ever met—the beloved Son, the revelation of God’s glory—this knowledge caused blindness in some, hardness in others.  The same sun that melts wax hardens clay. 

For some, they want and recognize truth, but the cost is too high—as it was with some of the Jews in Jesus’ day… it would mean loss of position, power, and prestige.  “Yet at the same time many even among the leaders believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they would not openly acknowledge their faith for fear they would be put out of the synagogue; for they loved human praise more than praise from God.”

I see it in our youth today.  Oh, teen-agers are not so different than we adults … they want meaning, they want purpose, folks to “get” them … they want to ‘belong’.  So I have seen a wide band of high school students come together because ‘Christianity is cool’, ‘belonging’ feels good, and there is certainly purpose to be had!  However, then there is the realization that they cannot act however they want—get high, have sex, etc.—rather, Christianity costs them something.  For some, the ‘now’ is all they see, the ‘forever’ is a long way away, and the cost of following Jesus is just too high … and so they walk away.    

Meanwhile, the nails get hammered just a little deeper into Jesus’ tender wrists on the cross.

Christine

 PastorWoman.com

*attributed to early church theologian, Origen