The Ultimate Price

In a previous post, I mentioned four of my own heroes in the faith who paid what we call ‘the ultimate price.’ That would be the highest and costliest sacrifice any believer in Jesus can pay in being his follower and making disciples among all peoples: extreme suffering and physical death, in a word, martyrdom. Correct?

I’m not so sure.

Not to detract from this list of modern men and women of faith, who joined the list of those who did not love their own lives, even unto death (see Hebrews 11:32-38 for a biblical description). I want them to remain in front of me for as long as I live. If nothing else, it helps keep an ‘average’ American Christian like me in his place. After all, who am I to reach anybody in the rest of the world—where I sometimes travel to—with a Gospel that assures us that when we go through the fire, He will be with us?

But I have a bigger question, perhaps:

Is martyrdom a bigger sacrifice than a lifetime lived consistently, faithfully, and obediently for Jesus?

I die every day! (1 Cor. 15:31)

What did Paul mean by that? Perhaps one thing he means is that his own identity was joyfully and totally bound up with Jesus, so much so that he could embrace suffering as an inevitable and important companion, on his journey Home?

It might mean that faithful Christian parents who have lived out their lives in a Midwest farming community, loving Jesus and encouraging their little church fellowship to be genuine, global disciples, have also been examples of ‘the ultimate price’. (As you might have guessed, the reference is biographical. I'm referring to my wife's family.)

What about the Christian husband who stays faithful day by day, rejecting the voices, both those on outside and inside of the mind, dangling empty promises of short-term satisfaction?

What about the Christian wife who joyfully juggles the pressures of modern life, protecting herself, her family, and her marriage from the superficiality of affluence in what we deceptively call the ‘American dream’?

What about the Christian single with the narrow bed and the wide heart, who makes us of his/her opportunity to serve God with less 'distraction' than most married folks (1 Cor. 7:32-33)?

And finally, what about the missionary who exchanges a promising career for one that is challenging as it is lacking in remuneration and respectability among one's peers? I've been privileged to meet many such, most of whom slog it out in some of the toughest places on earth.

I wonder if these aren’t examples of the ultimate price as well, because they are bound up in the Ultimate Price of the One who 'made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant . . . .' (Phil 2:7)

I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. (Gal. 2:19-20)

US Director