The Discipline of Sacrifice

Francis Chan's book Crazy Love has been a encouragement and a challenge to me at the same time. The question I cannot seem to get over is: "What are you willing to give up to follow Christ?" Many times the Gospel is presented to people as a risk free offer. You don't have to give up anything, just let Jesus come into your heart and then everything will be better. This is not a right view of what it means to be a Christian. It is not that we must do certain things to get certain things, a works based salvation, but there are some things that must be given up in order to truly follow Christ. For one thing the Bible calls for us to believe and to repent. While i do not think this means that we must never sin again it does mean a different attitude that no longer readily accepts sin, but seeks to turn away from it. Christ gave everything even his very life in order to be a little Christ we must be willing to do the same. This is in fact how the Bible describes love. We know what love is by the example Christ set when he died on the cross. It is time for our faith to cost us something.