Several years ago I heard the story of a young couple who rang the front doorbell at a Baptist parsonage. When the pastor went to the door they asked if he would marry them. Their marriage license was genuine, so he decided to honor their request. At the conclusion of the ceremony the groom said, “How much do I owe you, preacher?”
Having a good sense of humor, and thinking it would be to his advantage to take a novel approach, he replied: “I don’t usually charge to conduct weddings, but just give me what you think your bride is worth?” The groom reached in his pocket, pulled out a dollar, and gave it to the preacher.
This puzzled the preacher, and he wondered what the bride looked like whose new husband thought she was worth only one dollar. So, he reached over, lifted the bride’s veil to get a good look, reached in his pocket, took out two quarters, and gave the groom fifty cents change.
The story is obviously just a story. It did not happen. No minister would be so rude. And no groom would begin his marriage by telling his new bride she was worth so little to him. Even so, it contains a valid observation about life — the value you get out of anything depends on how much you are willing to invest.
Every one of us is part of a community. Some of us are members of organizations, civic or otherwise. A great many of us are members of a Christian church. What does being a member of each of these mean? This requires that we answer another question, “How much will it cost? Every organization or group to which we belong is worthy of our best effort. This is especially true of a Christian church.
Just joining a church does not make anybody a Christian. In order to become a Christian and one day go to heaven you must go to Calvary’s cross, confess your sins, lay them down, accept Jesus Christ as both Savior and Lord, turn to the right, and keep straight ahead. There is no other way. Not everybody who claims the name of Christian has done that. Some are satisfied just to add their names to the church roll. Like the groom mentioned in the paragraph above, “They don’t want it to cost them very much.”
All across America there are multiplied thousands of churches whose pews are at least half empty each Sunday morning. Members who are absent may attend the Christmas cantata and on Easter Sunday. Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whosoever loses his life for me will find it” (Matthew 16:24).
To be a dedicated disciple of Jesus Christ, you must be willing to give Him top priority in your decisions and actions. As C.T. Studd once said, “If Jesus Christ died — and died for me – then no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for Him.” Yet tens of thousands of churches all across America are half empty on Sunday mornings because a large number of its members, who once made a public commitment of their life to Christ, have forgotten how important worship is to the living of the Christian life.
If you want to hear what is wrong with the church, ask a church member who hasn’t attended in the last year or so. A church member who expects to answer “when the roll is called up yonder” should give priority to being present during his lifetime on earth when the roll is called down here. “Not good if detached” is as true of church members as it is of airline tickets.
If you could sell your church membership on the open market and it was purchased for one dollar, would the buyer, once he examined its value, want you to give him back fifty cents in change?
The Paper Pulpit 
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