The Price of Success

What price, success! Things don’t just happen; they don’t just take care of themselves, and they don’t just do it quickly and easily, especially big things, important things. Success calls for a willingness to do whatever it takes in effort made and in risk taken—in loss, danger, suffering.

Christ had no personal home or immediate family. His work led to rejection by the religious establishment and growing threats against his very life. Finally, he felt the pain of thorns, scourging, and crucifixion as the forces of evil resisted his campaign for good.

General life lessons show themselves in specific events, particularly in important specific events; that is no more evident than in our Lord’s finishing his ministry to us. As with so many great causes, he could not just turn away, because there was no one else to pick up the responsibility.

All these factors are ingredients we draw from these tokens of testimony to his work. We take them in commitment to him and in making common cause with him in our time in this place to his honor.