This post, by Heather Weir, is a reflection on the “In Exchange for Freedom” sermon as part of the “God’s Kind of Freedom” sermon series.
I’ve been thinking about what it means to be a disciple lately. You heard some of my musings about what it means to be a disciple when I preached just after Easter, then again last week. I’ve been thinking about the process of sanctification, that big word that means becoming more like Jesus. As I’ve thought about being a disciple, I have become aware that it costs something to follow Jesus. On Sunday, Elaine challenged us to think about the cost of redemption, the cost of freedom. At the end of her sermon, she asked us: “Is there a price that’s too high?” This question resonated with me. What price am I unwilling to pay in the journey of discipleship?
One of the books I started to read when I realized I needed to do some work on this sanctification business is called After You Believe by N.T. Wright. Wright is a New Testament scholar and an Anglican priest. He wrote this book when he was the Bishop of Durham to answer questions that came up pastorally in his work with congregations in churches. In the book, he talks about nurturing the Christian virtues – developing character is another way to put it. According to Wright, after you become a Christian, after you believe, developing Christian character through becoming virtuous is the thing to do. That’s sanctification – becoming virtuous.
How do you become virtuous? The short answer is practice. We practice the virtues. We gain Christian character through our experiences of life and practicing virtue in those experiences. Romans 5:3-4 puts it this way: “Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; character, hope.” We develop character through our experiences of the brokenness of the world and deliberately practicing the virtues in those experiences.
Practicing the Christian virtues (such as love, patience, peace, kindness and all the other fruits of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5:22-23) is costly. At the very least it costs us time. Deliberate practice, looking for correction in our understanding of the virtues, growing in our understanding and performance of virtue all takes time. It takes focus. It takes effort. I am sure there are other costs to practicing Christian virtues. Discipleship is costly. Am I willing to pay the price?