Have you ever done something, and as soon as you did it, you realized that you did something wrong? Have you ever needed help from someone, but you were afraid to ask, because you knew it would cost you something to get that help that you needed? In today’s text, David is going to have to deal with both of these things. David sinned by taking a census of the people. A census that his closest advisor, Joab, had warned him not to take. However, David went ahead with the census, and as soon as it was over, David knew he had sinned against God. He immediately confessed it, and hoped to not have to pay too high of a price. Yet, God was going to again teach David that sin comes with consequences. The consequence in this case was a plague was sent that would cost 70,000 people their life. God send the prophet Gad to tell David what he must do. He was to buy a threshing floor from a Jebusite, and he was to build an altar on that threshing floor. Today’s text is from the negotiations for that threshing floor. 2 Samuel 24:24 says, “Then the king said to Anaunah, ‘No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price; nor will I offer burnt offerings to the Lord my god with that which costs me nothing.’ So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.”
In this text, David gives us a very important principle. It’s not a sacrifice if it doesn’t cost of something. Araunah was willing to give the threshing floor to David. But David knew for a sacrifice to be acceptable to God, it was going to need to be offered from a right heart. An acceptable sacrifice should be something of value to us. To be clear, being saved costs you nothing, because salvation is a gift from God. However, to live for Jesus will cost you everything. Jesus said in Luke 9:23, “If any man desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow Me.” Jesus said to live for Him means that we must die to ourselves and live a life of sacrifice.
Here is one of my greatest concerns with American Christianity. American Christianity is too comfortable. We often treat the commands of Jesus like we do food on a buffet. We take only what we want, and leave the rest alone, as though any of Jesus’ words are optional for the disciple of Jesus. Many times we respond to a difficult text like one of the soils in Jesus’ parable in Matthew 13. I like how Pastor Robby Gallaty describes this parable. Gallaty says that this isn’t about four different types of people and their response to the Gospel. Rather, it is one of four ways that we personally respond to Jesus and the Gospel. One of the seeds landed in the weeds. While it sprouted quickly, it was soon choked out by the cares of this world. How often do you and I say that we want to follow Jesus, but then turn back because we feel that what Jesus is asking of us is just too much? A true sacrifice will cost us something. Yet, we won’t look at what we are losing. Instead, we will focus on Who we are getting. When we love Jesus more than our sin or our stuff, we will see that growing in Jesus is far greater than anything this world has to offer us. I guess the question we need to ask ourselves is this, are we convinced that Jesus is worth it? We will know how we answer that question, not by the words we say, but rather by the live we live, and who we live it for. May we see the indescribable worth of Jesus Christ, and may we echo the words of Jim Elliot, “he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”
By His grace and for His glory,
Pastor Justin