At All Costs

"For to this you were called..." 1 Peter 2:21

It was in church in June in 1987 that I came to a point of decision, to surrendered all my heart to Christ. A few years later after Randy and I felt called to serve Christ I came to another point of decision at a service while being deeply moved by God, to give my life to serving Him...and this came with the commitment to do so “whatever the cost”. To go anywhere God wanted and doing anything He was calling us to do.

God began to impress on my heart my priorities. As I sought the Lord first each day He began showing me my other priorities, next as a wife, then mother, and ministry. The more I seen my husbands faith grow as God got a hold of his heart in a radical way my faith grew. I was to come by his side as God designed us women in the privilege we have been given in our first ministries as wives. He made us, so He surely knows us, and His Word speaks clearly of His promises to us as we obey Him and the promise of the fulfillment we will have as we follow His blueprint and manual for our lives. This is so opposite of the worlds ways and our Eve nature within us. In doing so I found completion and great fulfillment as a woman, a freedom, covering and protection of having my identity now founded in Christ. The scriptures tell us in Proverbs 18:22 that “He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the LORD” and that “a wife of noble character is her husbands crown” Proverbs 12:4. God has given a man great favor in giving him his wife and we are to bring glory to our husbands. For those women reading this and married this is so beautiful to remember! How precious your marriage is in the eyes of the Lord! Treasure them and love your husbands and how greatly God will bless you and your homes. This is something we grow in each new day, the rest of our lives, with the help of the Holy Spirit and His Word and through much prayer.

After committing my life to Christ and my service to Him I was more determined to allow God to use me as He willed; despite my feelings of inadequacy. Never serving before, and never truly understanding how God could possibly use me as I looked around and seen so many others so gifted in their service to Him...I had the “woe is me syndrome” thinking “how could God use me”! The lies of the Enemy. I simply began praying and watching God move in our family. God often reminded me of the exchange we made that day...my will for His...and that I would do all that He called me to and I knew it could only be by the power of His Spirit...whatever the cost.

Answered prayer came fast as I was quickly asked to serve in the children's ministry as this was a great need in our church as it was growing with babies and little ones, and even this was a challenge for me as I wondered if I was able to teach these little ones as serving was so new to me and my nature was not to do anything unless "I first" knew that I could. I came to learn that God first sees our heart and a willing heart He will use, regarding any of our abilities, or lack of, it is God alone who enables us. I had been praying and I knew this was confirmation...whatever the cost.

Stepping out in faith meant I was not mine but the Lord’s and He would do as He chose....my capabilities only rested in His doing, He alone was my Enabler. How we always pray to be more like Jesus, and to be used to do His will, don't we? How I was encouraged in the scriptures of the men and women of great faith, the cloud of witnesses that went on before us...used at whatever the cost. I wanted this...I prayed for the Lord to mold me, shape me, use me....and I knew that required never saying “no” to Him but instead relying on His Spirit to do what I could not...and I was understanding more and more, whatever the cost.

I continued to grow in His Word, prayer and fellowship. Challenged each day to go where He asked. My first Ladies Prayer Meeting was so unfamiliar to me...praying out loud was out of my comfort but my husband encouraged me to go and I knew it was what God wanted because it was what I needed...whatever the cost.

Soon attending prayer meetings and ladies studies, I also became knitted strongly together with Christian women and began valuing my time with women who were like minded with me ans who loved Jesus and His Word. I was experiencing God moving in our lives...experiencing a radical transformation as we continued serving Him that my heart was overwhelmed by what God was doing and I wanted to stand up on a mountain top and cry out to others of what my God could do for them as my heart opened to the deeper things of the Lord as I experienced forgiveness and grace and felt the fullness of God’s love. The Lord began peeling off the layers from my heart that the world and my flesh defined me as....and God began defining who I was called to be in Him and opening my heart and giving me His eyes to see myself and others with a heart that was His...the benefits of the cost!

It is glorious “to know Christ” and make Him known but again I came to another decision that God was asking of me....telling me that in my service to Him will come with many trials. That there will be sufferings that are not mine but His. Nehemiah tells us that “opposition will come in when we set our hands to do the good work of the Lord”. I began seeing my trials as testings, for His work to be done according to “His will, His way, and by my faith”. I began reading of Paul's great afflictions but how Paul 'rejoiced always' even in prison and how God used him despite his persecution to pen the many Epistles that have changed lives throughout the centuries. I became more convinced that man cannot thwart the plans of God no matter what comes against us. With service came trials but the Lord gave me Philippians 3:10 “That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death.”..... whatever the cost.

“That I may know Him”, to know Him more each day. Yes, this is our salvation and with salvation is only the beginning of our journey with Christ. “The power of His resurrection” is to be experienced and it is promised along my long journey with Him. There is no other way to experience this transforming power that dwells within us, the same power that rose Jesus from the grave, than through the fellowship of His sufferings. That through our sufferings we are being made conformable unto His death. The overwhelming sense of the privilege we are given, that our Father would stoop down to ask of His children to be used of Him, to be apart of His work, to do something He needs, is something we cannot take for granite...whatever the cost.

In the midst of our many trials and testings one thing we were confident of, our God is nothing less than trustworthy and His Word never fails us. To see God’s transforming grace upon the lives of so many is so overwhelming. Again, a privilege for us all to even consider the fact that our Father would stoop down to ask of His children to serve Him and others is truly overwhelming....whatever the cost.

A year ago this month Jesus asked us to “take up our cross and follow Me” as we had entered the biggest trial yet...as my terrified heart was being flooded with feelings that God had somehow failed me as the lies of the enemy came whispering in my head that this is “unfair” of what God is asking. Walking down halls, through our six weeks of radiation, chemo and MRI’s I felt my flesh being beaten and bruised, tormented and alone. As I cried out to the Lord He instantly made His presence known....He reminded me of the suffering He endured for my sake and for the redemption of the world. He reminded me of the exchange I made early on with Him..."at all costs"...to trust Him to use our lives for His glory and good. He called me to “Come” and “Take up my cross to follow Him”...whatever the cost.

There is always great promise ahead as we stand firm, endure hardships, hang on to the Lord, clinging with every ounce of strength to Jesus, never letting go....all for the world to see. There is a great privilege we have, a promise given, that in exchange for our suffering we will see God at work....we will see others saved, marriages restored, lives redeemed and recovered. This is His Church. There is no price or cost to us all that can exceed the price of the restoration of mankind, of our salvation. This price that was paid at calvary and whatever the cost Jesus would pay for you and me....the cost was Jesus giving His life for us.

All that God gives us are gifts from Him, to be given back, for the redemption of others. What He asks of us, means that He trusts of us. As I walked down the narrow corridors through hospitals I tried not looking to the left or right but only keeping my eyes before me, on Jesus, to light my path each step I made. I began being reminded of how Christ suffered for me. How He was taken, walking along the narrow path of calvary, the path of suffering, beaten and bruised, tormented and alone. Crucified for my salvation and for the salvation of all mankind...whatever the cost.

“Unfair”? When I think of the word unfair regarding the things that trouble our hearts, I am often reminded of I Peter 2:20-23 as Peter so beautifully writes of Christ’s sufferings and His beautiful example to us all and the heavenly perspective my heart needs to remember to have. This word “Unfair” seems very innocent and a very “fair attitude” to have in our heart. But the word “unfair” indicates an attitude in our heart that has no place in the heart of a believer. The Lord Himself, our greatest example, suffered the greatest for us and yet through it all remained silent as He committed Himself to the Father, to do the Father's will...at all costs...for us.

Unfair? Father, transform us this day - by Your grace - to do You will - at all costs. Amen.

“When you do good and suffer, if you take it patiently, this is commendable before God. For to this you were called because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow in His steps” 1 Peter 2:20-21

Michelle A. Guerra