"The Cost"

Luke 14:25-33 "For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether you have enough to complete it?" Children: Let’s build a tower! When my California nephews and nieces were younger one of my favorite games with them was to build a tower that would reach right up from the floor to touch the ceiling. What did we use to build the tower? We started with wooden blocks, legos, tinker toys, and when we ran out of those we began to use anything we could find, telephone books, boxes, even chairs. It took a lot of tries until we got it just right, and even then it was wobbly, ready to tip over with a mighty crash. In fact the younger ones there were far more interested in seeing the tower fall down than in building it. Ellieana seems to think that way, too. Whenever I pile up blocks she crawls over and loves to knock it down! For those interested in building the tower, each crash becomes an opportunity to learn: what did we do wrong, what can we do to build a stronger foundation, which blocks do we want to save until we get to the top levels? Isn’t it interesting that Jesus talks about building a tower? He’s talking to adults in this story, but I wonder if he played with blocks as a young boy? His father was a carpenter, and maybe there were chunks of wood lying around for Jesus and his friends to play with, maybe they tried building a tower that could touch the ceiling, too? Adults: I once saw a bridge in Pittsburgh that soared high over the Allegheny River, a mighty four lane interstate highway leading out of the city heading north. When I first saw the bridge I laughed, and you would have laughed with me. Because if you drove your car across it you'd fall into the river - the bridge hadn't been completed! The bridge stopped three quarters of the way across the river, a dead-end in mid-air. My Uncle Jim said that they had run out of money to complete the bridge. Someone hadn't figured the whole cost of the job. If you're going to be a Christian, says Jesus, make sure you know how much it’s going to cost. Or else you'll be like that bridge, full of possibility but leading nowhere! I should have learned my lesson from my Uncle Jim about counting the cost of things, but I didn’t. When I was 19 I bought my first car, I spent $700 on a used Volkswagen Fastback. It was an incredibly bright shade of orange, with bright blue Maryland license plates. When I paid the bill I had only $100 dollars left from my summer job that would have to last through the whole year. And after my first fill-up I realized what I had never considered. There were hidden costs to owning a car, fuel, insurance maintenance, and repairs. I hadn't fully counted the cost. I was swayed by the dream of driving around in my own car, but I hadn't considered the full cost of owning a car. The same thing is true of our Christian faith. We’re glad to be among the faithful, but we need to count the cost of discipleship. We can call ourselves Christians as soon as we become attracted to the story and message of Jesus, yet even from the start we have to learn to count the full cost. The cost involved may not be money or possessions; the cost comes in knowing that our relationships, our vocations, the words that we speak will change. I want to tell you about Michael, a 7th grader I once knew who was fascinated by fast cars. One day, we watched a yellow Corvette speed down the street. It had an engine that roared and big tires that kicked up gravel as it squealed around the corner. Wanting to impress me with his grand scheme for success in life, Michael said to me, "that's the kind of car I'm going to own". Then he asked me, "don't you want to have a car like that?" When I said "no" he was shocked! He was thinking: why would anyone want to own a dumb looking car like mine when they could have a bright yellow corvette instead? "Michael", I said, "that yellow corvette is a great car, but have you thought about all of the extra expenses that go along with it? My car gets 25 miles to the gallon. That yellow Corvette gets less than 10. You'll buy twice as much gasoline. When you spin your tires you'll wear out your tires twice as fast as I do, and Corvette tires are twice as expensive. And when you buy insurance you'll probably have to pay $3000 a year, because they'll figure that your fast car will have a lot of accidents. Michael was discouraged when I helped him see the real cost of the yellow corvette. But he was learning. A few days later we were talking about making money. Michael was saying that he could make a lot of money selling cocaine (yes, I had a very interesting time as a pastor in that neighborhood), but I reminded him that there would also be a lot of pain for his family and for the whole neighborhood. Michael spoke right up, saying, "yeah, it's just like that yellow corvette, it really costs a lot more than you think!" Well Michael and I standing on the corner of Locust Street and Fulton Avenue in Rochester is a long way from here. It’s easy to criticize Michael. As far as I know, none of you are thinking that owning a yellow Corvette is your primary purpose in life. So what does it cost you to be a follower of Jesus? Let’s add it up, in the same way we added up the costs of that yellow corvette. What does it cost? Some of you might respond quickly that it costs money. Maybe it does, though we don’t charge admission and we never send a bill. In fact, you could come to this church every Sunday for fifty years and never offer a single dime. But there is something about the vision we have for this church and our world that in part requires money. Backpacks for hungry children only get filled when people donate. Heifers and other livestock that we want to give to poor villages cost money, too. So the cost of being a follower does include money. What other costs are there? Well, some of you might think of time. And for those who participate in our ministry there is an hour of worship on Sunday, there are youth group activities, sometimes going all the way to dawn, committee meetings, Bible studies, prayer shawls, choir practices and all of these take time. Being a follower of Jesus costs us a lot of time. What else can you think of? I think being a follower of Jesus cost me a friendship. In high school I had one friend who behaved more and more like a racist, and finally I couldn’t be his friend any more. My friend Sarah used to be a whiner. She would whine about everything – her health, her husband, her neighborhood – but we asked her to be a deacon, and she realized that being a follower of Jesus would cost her in a way she never expected, a lifetime of whining had to be given up. One Sunday Sarah stood up for her first Minute for Mission ever. She said, “I used to think only of myself, but when I became a Deacon I began to think about other people”. Sarah had to give up something; it cost her in a way she never imagined. But Sarah's story helps us see the flip side of the cost involved. To be a follower of Christ involves a full accounting, not only of what we might have to give up, but also what we might become. We misunderstand this passage if we conclude that being a Christian is to give up everything. So that’s the question to be asking, not so much what the cost is, but what you might become. Jesus says, “For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether you have enough to complete it?"