everything?

1 Peter 1:10-16; Ps 98 The Lord has made known his salvation; Mark 10:28-31

The other day I had a conversation with two gentlemen that have been well seasoned through life.  They were just a  few good ole boys who liked to live off the land and were unafraid to work with their hands.

In fact, I could tell they had done their share of manual labor, they were thin as a rail but their forearms were like massive pipes and their fingers were like steel rods from gripping and shoveling and hammering and doing whatever else came their way.

One of them shared this bit of wisdom with me.  He said if you hire the laziest guy to do the hardest task they will find the easiest way to get it done. 


IT is true not just for the lazy folks.  All of us look for the easy way out, the loop hole. 


IT is especially so when it comes to living the gospel, following in the footsteps of Christ.  How often we look to cut corners, make excuses, justify our inaction all in the name of the "path of least resistance."

Peter and Jesus remind us that the task at hand requires a total commitment.

Peter int he first reading exhorts us to "gird up the loins of our minds to live soberly, and set our hopes completely not he grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ."

As JEsus instructs us, "There is no one who has given up house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands for my sake and the sake of the gospel who will not receive a hundred times more now in this present age."

IT isn't easy.  To be a follower of Christ is certainly not for the lazy man nor the pathos least resistance.

Somethings have to go.

IT requires "everything."

Have we given everything?

Do we not hold back.  Do we not keep in reserve things we do not want to let go.  Do we not keep back parts of our life in hopes of the path of easier resistance.

Today we must take a long look into our lives and begin to let go, to no longer hold back, to give up and over to him.

The reward, the hundred times more now int he present age we long for is kept from us because we keep from him.

IT is time to gird the loins of our mind.

There is no easy way, there is only the way, the truth, the life.

Then the salvation will be made known to all.

Today is the birthday of G.K. Chesterton.  So here are few jolts form Chesterton to get you going:

"A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it."


"Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions"


"Among the rich you will never find a really generous man even by accident. They may give their money away, but they will never give themselves away; they are egotistic, secretive, dry as old bones. To be smart enough to get all that money you must be dull enough to want it.”


“I believe what really happens in history is this: the old man is always wrong; and the young people are always wrong about what is wrong with him. The practical form it takes is this: that, while the old man may stand by some stupid custom, the young man always attacks it with some theory that turns out to be equally stupid.”


“To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it.”


What a gem of a man.