There’s an African tale about a Nigerian king and his princess daughter.

No. Not that Nigerian prince!

In this story, the princess who had come of age approached her father about finding a godly man to marry. Excited about His daughter’s desire, He promises to seek out for her a man truly after God’s own heart.

The king then summons his top security aide (commonly known as, the headhunter) and instructs him to head to the main square in the city first thing on Sunday morning. He tells him to arm himself with his biggest machete, his sharpest axe, and two loaded guns. He is instructed to hold his weapons in full view of every passersby going to Church and to wear on his face his meanest scowl. Then, he is to ask each of them, “Which of you is a servant of the Most High God? God has deeply offended the king and he wants revenge!”

Sunday morning came and the stage was set.

The first group to walk by was the worship choir fully decked in their satin-white choir robes carrying their hymnals. The headhunter jumped in their path wielding his weapons and with a deep growl, asked “Which one of you is a servant of the Most High God? God has deeply offended the king and he wants revenge!”

Before he could even finish his question, the entire group dropped their hymnals and music instruments and ran for their lives. The headhunter gave mild chase as he repeated his question. Still fleeing, the choir with one voice cried out that they didn’t and have never known God. They were not willing to pay the price for God’s sins against the king. The headhunter let them go as he picked up a case of guitar dropped behind by the choirmaster. 

Within the hour, the women came by and they too fled as soon as they beheld the terrifying sight of the headhunter. The men didn’t fare any better as many of them took flight leaving their shoes behind.

Not long after them, the elders showed up. As had become routine, the headhunter asked again, “Which one of you cowards is a servant of the Most High God? God has deeply offended the king and he wants revenge.” 

Shivering in place, the chairman of the elder board stammered on behalf of the group, “Please sah… we… we are just elders… we don’t even know what that means… we… eh… we just got appointed and shouldn’t be held responsible for this God’s actions… you see… sah… we have never known this God you speak of. Please… please sah, forgive us!”

The headhunter felt especially peeved at this group and fired four gunshots over their heads. Within a few seconds, they had disappeared.

A man after God’s own heart still hadn’t been found.

Shortly after, the lead pastor, fully dressed in his newly sewn three-piece suit came by. For him, the headhunter reserved his most aggressive confrontation. The headhunter grabbed the pastor by his collar nearly picking him off his feet and charged, “You are the servant of the Most High God, aren’t you! The king has been deeply offended by God and he wants revenge! You’re the one I’m looking for, are you not?!?”

With tears streaming down his face, the pastor begged for his life. “No, sah! Not me oooo! I was just transferred here, sah. Please… They didn’t tell me that death was in my job description! No Ooooo! I’ll be leaving soon. Please just release me, sah! I do not know this God and I am not His servant!” 

Throwing him to the ground, the headhunter spoke in a low menacing whisper, “Leave now and don’t let me see your face again!”

“Yes sah! Thank you sah! He’s not my God, sah. Thank you, sah!” The pastor replied as he ran off leaving his Bible on the floor. 

The headhunter was about to head back to the palace to give the king the disappointing news when he heard unusually jovial singing coming from a young man strolling toward him with Bible in hand.

Angered that his mere presence hadn’t intimidated the young man, the headhunter treated the young man even harsher than the pastor. 

“Are YOU a man of God, a servant of the Most High God? For I am here to end your life! The king is deeply offended at God and I am his hand of justice!”

“I’m sorry to hear that, sah.” The young man said. “And I am sorry to hear that the king is offended at the Most High God. But to your question, yes, the Most High is my God, and His Son Jesus Christ is my Savior.”

Taken aback by his bold assertion, the headhunter drew out his axe and lifted it up to the young man’s neck. “Think carefully about your next words young man, for I can send you to meet your God this second.”

“I understand, sah. But for me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. God already paid a high price for my soul when Jesus died on the cross for my sins. So, in death or in life, my heart belongs solely to my LORD. I am willing to lay down my life for my Him if it settles the king’s heart for revenge.”

With this, the headhunter’s job was done. He tied the young man’s hand in ropes and led him on the long journey back to the palace. Upon reaching there, the king called for all the citizens of the city to come observe the judgment of the young man. Men, women, and children came from near and far, including the church members who had denied God to save their lives. Many of them even pleaded with the young man to renounce his faith to save his life, but the young man refused to budge. He insisted that Christ was worthy of His suffering and He could never deny the One who had so graciously saved His soul.

At last, the king, fully pleased to see that the young man was indeed a man after God’s own heart, instructed that he be released and clothed in royal garments. Then, to everyone’s shock and surprise, the king gave his daughter’s hand to the young man in marriage, and established him as prince over a large portion of his kingdom. 

many are willing to live a “surfacy” life for jesus, but the threat of death oft reveals one’s true identity.

The moral of this Nigerian tale isn’t that you’ll get a reward in the end if you stay faithful (even though you will). No. Unfortunately, the moral here is a little starker.

The message in the story is that a disciple of Jesus Christ must not only expect, but also be willing to suffer and die for the sake of the Gospel.  This is the ugly cost of discipleship you may not have heard of. Jesus says as much in Mark 8:34-38, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35 For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. ”

That means, like the young man in the story, you may suddenly find a season of unexplained and unexpected hardships thrust upon you should you choose to live a godly life (1 Timothy 3:12). In some instances, following Jesus may even lead to death. 

Why? 

Well, for one, because Jesus Himself had to die, and two, because in Jesus’ own words, “no disciple is above his master.” In other words, if Jesus in His lifetime experienced suffering and death, then we as His followers can be rest assured that we too, on some level, will experience the same thing.

STILL HERE?

Jesus had to suffer and die because you and I owed God an unpayable debt and our forgiveness was dependent on Jesus’ death on that cross.

It was dependent on Him because forgiveness ALWAYS comes at a cost.  

If someone offends you or takes something from you that isn’t theirs, it creates a debt, and you have two options for how you can respond. You can make them pay for it by getting even in whatever form of punishment you choose. Or, you can release them of their debt by absorbing the cost yourself. In other words, you take on yourself the pain that could have been theirs. 

Either way, in every offense, someone ALWAYS has to pay! Forgiveness is never free. It always costs someone.

Now, put that on a cosmic stage and consider what it means for humanity’s sin against God. Our collective and individual sins demand that a penalty must be paid. All have sinned; hence everybody or somebody has to pay. 

GOD CAN’T JUST LET IT GO.

Because of His utterly holy and just nature, God cannot just let sin go unpunished, nor does He simply wave some sort of heavenly magic wand and say, “Delete sin.” That’s not the way it works.  

Remember, someone always has to absorb the cost. 

So, the way forward for forgiveness that God chose was for Christ to go to the cross to absorb the penalty of our sin on Himself.  No one took His life away from Him. He GAVE it freely for our sake.  In John 10:18, He says, “No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.”

It was the giving of His life through His death on the cross that Jesus made the great exchange for our forgiveness with God the Father. And so, when you see the cross, let it be at the forefront of your mind that on it, Christ was making a costly transaction on your behalf by absorbing the deathly blow that you should have suffered because of your sin.

In an interesting twist of cosmic irony, by His death on the cross, Jesus defeated death by rising from the dead. That day on the cross of calvary some 2000 years ago was the day that death died! That is also why Jesus could say in John 11:25, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me will live even if he dies.”

What that means for you is that whatever suffering you encounter in this life for the sake of the Gospel, even if it leads to death, will result in a redemptive glory that vastly outweighs all the hardships you experienced in this life. 

Did you hear what I just said? 

Your pain, your suffering, and your death as a disciple of Jesus WILL NOT BE IN VAIN! The physical and emotional scars your bore in this life will bear a diamond-like quality in eternity in heaven. Even if you experience the worst form of death in this life as a follower of Christ, when you open your eyes in the next life, you will not have to walk through a valley of the shadow of death. Rather, you’ll be escorted by the most beautiful angelic beings whose power can only be measured on a nuclear scale through a valley filled with the brilliant light of the glory of Christ into your eternal home!  

On that day, you will finally be able to mouth off to Satan, to suffering, and to death. On that day, you will finally be able to say, “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” - 1 Corinthians 15:55-57

So, as it turns out, like the young man in the Nigeria tale at the beginning, you DO get a happy ending.

Stay the course, and finish well, my friends!