Going Once? Going Twice? Gone!

What price tag would you put on a Chinese vase? It’s only good for holding flowers at best right? What about a postage stamp? Not exactly a staple product. In this day and age, you can live without one. What are you willing to pay for a painting? Art is very tricky but how much would you actually cough up? What do you think you are worth?

‘For you were bought with a price…’ (1 Cor 6:20a)

An auction is a process of buying and selling goods by offering them up for bids and taking bids. The person who values a specific item the most (the highest bidder) receives it. All the participants would have assessed the item on sale and would decide how much they are willing to pay for it beforehand. The man who manages bids coming in is known as the auctioneer. Some interesting auction records include an 18^th Century Chinese vase sold for £53.1 million, a Ten Rupee Mahatma Gandhi postage stamp went for a minor $205 000 and a Picasso was sold for just $106.5 million. Picture the auctioneer, after the final bid comes in, saying ‘Going once? Going twice? Gone! Sold; to the gentleman in the electric pink shirt with lime green poker dots! Congratulations sir.’ 

With every experience in your life; every interaction; every event; you are involved in an auction. The item on sale is your life. Ironically, you are the auctioneer and every participant in your life is bidding after having evaluated how much you are worth. You have the hammer and decide each time who wins the sale. People might tell you that you are not worth much. They might say that you will never do anything significant with your life. Maybe some guy put a price tag written ‘sex’ for a girl. Your boss might have tagged you, ‘slave’. You may have been told you are ugly. Oddly, we accept most tags, slam the hammer and sell ourselves for the cheapest bids.

The highest bidder knows more about you than anyone else. He has carefully assessed your worth. He has already proved you are worth so much that He paid the price before you were born and before you even considered His bid. That bidder is God. He is Jesus Christ. He found you worthy of His life. He put in a bid that makes the ridiculous records above look less than pocket change. He did not have to, but he took your well-earned punishment.

Every day, people compete against His bid. It is up to you to decide who you will listen to in that moment. Will you value yourself as Christ values you or the man/woman with the sweet smile? Will you consider yourself worth the life of the Son of God or drunkard? Is your price tag written ‘Perfectly loved by God’ or ‘Good for nothing’? ‘Sinner saved by grace’ or ‘nobody’. If the former is true, then your only response is to “…Honour God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s” (1 Cor 6:20b). You are not your own. You either belong to people and their perceptions of your value or you are God’s. Remember, when you slam the hammer on yourself, it will be too late. Going once? Going twice?

Tweet, share, email, text, send a smoke signal, do what it takes to get this out there if you conferJ!

Yours in the service of the King,

Yunam

Wired for Love

… God is Love. (1 John 4:8)

Recent studies in neuroscience have shown that when a person is attracted to another, the brain constantly releases a set of chemicals, including pheromones, dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin which stimulate the brains pleasure centre and lead to side effects such as an increased heart rate, loss of appetite, an intense feeling of excitement and loss of sleep. In other words, scientifically, it feels good to be in love. No wonder William Shakespeare made a killing with Romeo and Juliet (pun intended). People are wired for love.

There is a deep internal need in us to love and be loved. We were created in the image of God and God is love. But in this fallen world, love has certainly been distorted. We take advice on love from friends, romance novels and television. We let the need for a good dose of those pleasurable chemicals drive us towards the wrong places. We do everything for the image of love and reject the original love.

There is no greater love than to lay down one's life for one's friends. (John 15:13)

How do you measure love? John 15:13 tells us how Jesus measures it. The cross is the place where true, great and full love was demonstrated. The rest of it is an image. This is where God intended for us to get our fix of love and we, in turn are called to give him perfect love (Luke 10:27). He illustrated His love to us by dying on the cross (Rom 5:8) and we are called to illustrate ours to Him by walking in His commandments (John 14:15). This does not mean love between people does not happen, after all, ‘it is not good for a man to be alone’ (Gen 2:8). But even that love, is measured against the sacrifice of Christ (Eph 5:25).

Applying this is the tough part. Accept, supply and expect. First we need to accept the love that God has already given. Even when times seem rough and it seems that God does not love us any more. Remember He has already proven Himself and that His love is perfected and free. Take it. Next, we must be willing to supply this love to others. Actions speak louder than words as they say. Love is more about opposite party than it is about oneself. Be willing to sacrifice. Lastly, we need to expect nothing less from those who say they love us. Their actions must show it. However, if people do not give you perfect love, you should still strive to love them perfectly because God’s love is not conditional, neither should ours be.  

We are wired for love and we often take it and give it in its diluted form. My prayer is that we start going back to the original design.

 

With Love

Yunam