Luke 14:28
Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it?

It's good to count the cost of something, or, as we say down here in the sunny South, to do some figgerun'! It wouldn't make much sense to start something if you couldn't finish it, or to do something without first being accutely aware of what it might cost you down the road. Leave it to my son, Parker, to drive this point home on the way to school this morning.

My typical morning routine goes something like this: wake up, no, scratch that. I don't wake up until I'm a good halfway through the day. Get out of bed, make coffee, read a chapter in Proverbs (I need all the wisdom I can get), drink coffee while reading, check email, drink coffee while checking email, take the boys to school, drink coffee in the car on the way to school, go home and start writing, drink coffee while writing, eat lunch, wake up. There. You now know the routine of an award winning author. Well, at least of an author. Sometimes while I'm reading through the Scriptures, one of the children will happen into the room and I'll share something I've read, especially if I think it will help them. This morning, I shared with Parker a wonderfully uplifting verse about how your eyes will be pecked out if you disobey your parents (it's really in the Bible - Proverbs 30:17). On the way to school, I told Parker to tell Will about it and we all agreed it was a disgusting verse, but that it would be a good thing to obey me and their mother just to keep all the bases covered (and both their eyes in their head!). Parker summed it up nicely, though, when he mentioned that it would be painful to have your eyes pecked out because, and I quote, "the birds would have to peck through your opitcal nerve." Well, sure, that and other reasons like, well, it would just really hurt.

It's sort of a disgusting illustration of counting the cost, but Parker did what Jesus wants each of us to do. He thought through the ramifications of obeying - or not obeying - the truth of Scripture. This walk with Jesus really will cost us at times, and it's good to think about that ahead of time. Sin in our lives will cost us, too, and sometimes honestly thinking about that can be enough to keep us as far removed from that temptation as we can possibly be. I don't think that Parker or Will are going to sleep with pillows over their eyes anytime soon so that their eyes will be safe, but if I make pecking sounds the next time they disobey, I bet they'll remember the cost of disobedience and stop. That's the benefit of counting the cost.

So let the counting begin!