What's Comfort Costing You?
My first lesson in freshman economics was “everything costs”. Nothing is free. As I tried to think through all things life and prove Mr. Sewell wrong, he always had the cost required for each of my selections. So my economics question for us today is what is comfort costing us? We would all agree that our culture values comfort above all else. Numerous markets and inventions make millions by appealing to our constant need to feel more comfortable.
I came across a story in Acts several months ago that hasn’t left me alone. I just keep thinking about it’s phrasing, “As they were worshiping -they were fasting as they waited for guidance-the Holy Spirit spoke: “Take Paul and Barnabus & commission them for the work I have called them to do. So they commissioned them. In that circle of intensity and obedience, of fasting and praying, they laid hands on their heads and sent them off.” Acts13:2-3 MSG. “Intensity and obedience” something about those words grips me, awakens me. When was the last time we felt passion for something outside our own cry for comfort? When was the last time we felt intensity for something that had nothing to do with us, had nothing that would benefit us personally and on the contrary would cost? Has our obsession with comfort cost us our passion for the things of God?
Each of us has a calling. We each have a God designed purpose. Each of our callings differs in profession, style, size, and location but in the depths of our hearts we all know those things God has purposed us for. Romans 8:30 says that “those God chose, He called, and those He calls He qualifies.”
I realized recently that I rarely tell myself, “no” and I don’t think I’m alone. I think most Americans have most needs and wants pretty readily available and so we don’t feel a need to say, “no”. When was the last time you told yourself, “no” to the dessert offered but not needed? When was the last time you told yourself “no” when you wanted to watch just one more episode of your favorite Netflix show? When was the last time you said “no” to picking up your phone and checking social media? When was the last time you told yourself “no” to the perfect temperature, to your favorite restaurant, to Starbucks, to that new shirt? Our world is full of so many “yeses” to our comfort that when God asks us to say “no” to our comfort in order to say “yes” in obedience our response isn’t intensity but hesitancy.
Most of us want our lives to matter. We want to be a part of something bigger than we are, but are we willing to lay down our lives of immediate gratification to sacrifice for the kingdom of God? What if our obsession with constant comfort is costing us the one thing that would satisfy us most deeply, awaken us to full living, wonder and adventure? What if our comfort is stifling the cry of our calling so that the one “no” we are unintentionally saying is to really living?
When God says go, when God says give, when God says stay, when God says sacrifice, when God says wait, when God’s call is inconvenient will we still say “yes”?
2016/10/13 at 7:23 pm