Is Jesus Worth the Price?
A while back, a church I attended showed a documentary film entitled “The Insanity of God,” which traced several narratives of brutal anti-Christian persecution through the eyes and ears of a missionary couple, Nik and Ruth Ripken. In the early 1990s, the Ripkens experienced some of the persecution first-hand in Somalia, and from there they were inspired to seek out and interview survivors of severe persecution elsewhere – in Soviet Russia, Communist China, and the Middle East. Within the context of suffering related to the Great Commission (Matthew 28:18-20), the underlying question in their search was “Is Jesus worth it?”
Actual interviews were not shown in the film. Instead, the victims’ stories were dramatized. For example, Dimitri was a factory worker in Soviet Russia who had been secretly holding small-group Bible readings and discussions in homes. He was discovered, arrested, and imprisoned for 17 years. During that time, he was beaten countless times by guards for his faith and mercilessly mocked by fellow prisoners. Yet, he never recanted or wavered in praying aloud, singing a hymn to Jesus daily, and writing Bible verses on small scraps of paper, which earned him more beatings. Even his family was brutalized. But the Soviets did not and could not break him.
Then, something miraculous happened. Near what proved to be the end of his imprisonment, as he was being led out of his cell by two guards, he stopped, looked up toward the sunlight shining through a window, lifted his arms in prayer, and started singing his hymn to Jesus. Suddenly, the other prisoners were also lifting their arms in prayer and singing the hymn they had heard Dimitri sing so many times. The nearest guard was astonished. He looked at Dimitri and slowly asked “Who are you?” Dimitri’s answer was “I am a son of the living God, and His name is Jesus Christ.”
In America – the allegedly free United States of America – many or most of us may soon have to ask ourselves more than once “Is Jesus worth it?” as the forces of evil test our faith with ever-increasing oppressions.
At this point, our responses may be relatively easy. For example, you make a statement on Facebook that marriage is a union only between one man and one woman. The “robots” detect it and block your account. Your response is to close your account and do without Facebook. Is Jesus worth it? Of course. Easy.
Or let’s say you’re at a PTA meeting where a proposal to include elements of the Marxist-based critical race theory (CRT) in the high school curriculum is being discussed. You raise an objection and give your reasons, including words from Acts 17:26 – “And [He] hath made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth.” Three days later you receive a note in the mail informing you that school policy forbids the recitation of “religious dogma” on public school property – and “suggesting” that you refrain from attending future PTA meetings. You want to be involved in your daughter’s school activities, but at the same time you don’t want to cause her to be bullied by peers. She’s a believer, and you feel you can see to it that she’s not taken in by anti-Christian beliefs and other leftist propaganda – so (reluctantly) you decide to stay away from the PTA. Is Jesus worth it? Of course, but it’s a little harder than dumping Facebook.
History tells us that when believers stay asleep while freedoms are incrementally being chipped away, the tests of faith become increasingly more difficult. For example, you’re a middle manager at Acme Tool Distributors, and you’re attending a meeting to discuss new sales hires for an upcoming expansion. Several people propose a deliberate search for a “quota” of LGBTQ people – to demonstrate Acme’s bona fides as a progressive (i.e., woke) company. You gently voice an objection, noting, among other things, that certain of such individuals, if hired, could turn off some of Acme’s customers.
In explaining your disagreement, you don’t explicitly say that God made only two genders, male and female, but it’s clear that’s your core belief. A few days later, you’re called into the HR office, given a severance check, and told that your services are no longer required. The reason given is that you have created a “toxic atmosphere” in Acme’s workplace. The thought passes through your mind to apologize and retract everything you said, but after some hesitation you simply voice your disappointment with the decision, take the check, and leave. Is Jesus worth it? Absolutely. But it was a close call, and only your strong faith kept you from caving in to the pretense of gender fluidity. Besides, you’re confident that the Lord has something better in store for you.
Don’t think such a thing can’t happen in the good old U.S. of A., because it already has. People have been dismissed from jobs for things they said on record 10-15 years ago – or, for example, for donating $10 to the Kyle Rittenhouse defense fund. For most of us, that’s probably about as bad as things are for now, but they could get worse in the next few years. Take heart, though, because as Jesus said: “Blessed are you, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceedingly glad: for great is your reward in heaven” (Mat 5:11-12). How, then, can we discipline ourselves to withstand these tribulations and maybe even welcome them?
As the Ripkens noted in an interview about their work, one of Satan’s biggest weapons is FEAR – fear of harm to family or self, fear of imprisonment, fear of job loss, fear of property loss, fear of being mocked, and so on. Indeed, the devil will give you many opportunities to say, in effect, “Sorry, but Jesus isn’t worth that.”
When you come to such crossroads in the future, will you be the devil’s minion? Or will you be Dimitri?
In a Decision magazine article a while back (4/21), Pamela Brunson, mother of Andrew Brunson (who was held hostage in a Turkish prison for two years) noted that even though whole villages of God’s people were being decimated in the Middle East, God was taking the long view with “eternal eyes” and would see that those victims are rewarded in the future with eternal glory. Mrs. Brunson wrote that “God asks us to see pain through eternal eyes, and so to stand firm” – and that those who are choosing to suffer now do so because they, too, have eternal eyes. Eternal eyes, then, are a state of mind that focuses and stays focused on eternity with Jesus.
Eternal eyes can also bring joy in knowing not only that we are suffering with Jesus, but also, and more importantly, that Jesus is always with us during these tribulations – calling to mind Psalm 23: “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me…”
So how can we develop these eternal eyes? As you’d expect, daily prayer and Bible readings, along with frequent conversations about eternity with other believers, would be key exercises – plus a specific prayer that, in your own words, asks God to help you love Jesus so much that no price would be too high to maintain and openly declare your faith and trust in Him. As with any exercise, the more regularly you practice these things, the stronger your eternal focus will get.
The article in Decision we mentioned ends with another Soviet Russia story. This time, a man sat in one room and his son sat in the next room with a gun pointed at his head. A Soviet officer said to the father: “Renounce your faith or I’ll put a bullet in his head.” Understandably, the father was deeply conflicted, but before he could answer, the son, also a believer, shouted “Don’t do it, Dad! Don’t do it!” In this case, it was the son, facing death, who had eternal eyes.
The lesson here, I believe, is that most of us need a lot of “exercise” before we’re ready to pass the difficult tests that are surely coming for us to affirm the infinite worth of Jesus. As Nik Ripken put it: “There will be times when everything seems like crucifixion with no resurrection.” Those will be the times that really try our souls. So get ready.
Norbert J. Kuk