“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. 27 Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. 28 For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, 30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ 31 Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? 32 And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. 33 So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.
Luke 14:26-33 (ESV)
My wife and I have been reading through Luke with our kids through the month of December, leading up to Christmas. This passage sparked a great family conversation.
What in our lives do we love more than God? There’s an easy answer, “Nothing”, but is that truthful? If you want to give love a shallow definition of merely being lip service, you may get away with that answer. However, if we look at love as not only the desires of our heart but also the commitment of our time and resources, what’s the real answer? We shared as a family the different things we know we prioritize over our relationship with God. It wasn’t necessarily a fun conversation, but I watched as all four of us sat in the realization of changes that needed to be made in our priorities.
So now it’s your turn. What in your life do you love more than God?