Costly things that are worth the price

In addition to my current job as a preschool teacher assistant, I am also interning at a preK classroom 3 cities away from my current city. For valentines day, we organized a field trip to the downtown shops to hand out valentines to the people in thanks to their financial support to children’s education. A week before, the children made purple valentine cards to give away and yesterday, with big grins on their faces, we piled into a yellow school bus (my first real school bus ride) and drove to downtown.

Halfway along the fieldtrip, one of my students glumly said after giving out a valentine, “I’m giving away my hearts and no one’s giving me anything in return! Where are the dollars?!” After a moment of consideration, I realized that he thought giving away the cards will assure him that he get the ‘money from the city people’. I had to suppress a giggle, how alike we are at times, to give only to hope for something in return and then our expectations grow and we get disappointed.

This made me reflect on costly things in life, where we have to give a lot of effort to but that are worth the price.

Life for Christ - This is probably the costliest relationship ever. Christ gives us salvation for free but the cost of following Him is very high and the cross is very heavy. However, it is one thing that I can say is well worth it. In 24 years of living, I have faltered and stumbled broken back into that well-worn but narrow road and have realized how beautiful it truly is.

Fellowship and Ministry - It is not easy to be around people. People are all broken and most don’t come with an easy to read manual, but God gives us a command to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Church is one of the best things and can be a family for us, but it also is filled with people who are also broken, just like us. It is costly, demanding of time, effort and the occasional nudge away from your comfort zone, but when you love Jesus, it just really works out.

Family - Family is a smorgasbord of quirky people and cool characters. I was somehow put in a big family with people that have really strong personalities. I grew up being used to quiet and only had my parents so it’s really a huge adjustment. You have to get used to a lot of changes, but it has its cool days. And my parents are totally awesome and supportive parents!

Friendships - I have a lot of friends from different places, but I have very few confidantes enough to count on one hand. I value friendships a lot, maybe because I didn’t really have any siblings so I like having big groups around despite my non-talkative nature. Friendships are costly, they involve a lot of adjustments, arguments, humility, and commitment to stay in them. They’re totally worth it, my friends and I are still pretty much in touch despite the distance that we have.

Education - Education is fast becoming very expensive, readily accessible and also not as valued as before. Knowledge is just being made free and books and journals are getting published so fast! But it is costly to stay a student and follow through with your educational goals and desires.

Marriage - Having some older married friends, I’ve been told that marriage is very costly especially when it reflects Christ’s relationship with his bride, the church. My older guy friends have informed me that marriage has truly humbled them and broke them in order that they become more like Christ and lead and serve their families. My older female friends have told me of the many struggles in marriage and how important it is to have two sinners (two very broken people) who love Christ with all they are. They tell me it becomes easier for them to both be molded by Christ and become more compatible with each other as time passes. It is truly humbling and exciting hearing their stories because their struggles are real, their faith is real and God just really proves He is greater than anything in this world. When he brings two people together and the man loves Christ more than anything in this world, and the woman loves christ as well, it’s just amazing! I know because I’ve seen marriages like that and they aren’t perfect, but there’s respect and love in those marriages and all due to Christ.

Parenting - Being parents are becoming so financially stressful that a lot of people opt out or delay it to a really long time. My parents always remind me how hard it was to raise a child considering the instruction, discipline, education and affection aspects of parenting. My mom chose to sacrifice a career in accounting to serve as my primary educator and that is a sacrifice of hers that I value and hope to continue on to my kids. She taught me to love God’s word at an early age, how to find where she locates the switch (for my discipline hehe) and to love learning from books. My dad worked hard, very hard, in order to provide for the family and send me to good school and all those musical, athletic and art lessons. My other family friends tell me how big of a headache children can be (and as a teacher and only a teacher, I will agree with them); and they also tell me how great of a joy children are (and even as I am only a teacher and not a parent i agree with them as well). I love kids, and there are challenges and a lot of power struggles but I know they are a gift from the Lord and I’ll continue having that view.

When i was in high school, I came across a saying from a nun which goes, “Love dies without sacrifice.” and I agree with that. Love doesn’t always get appreciated, returned, repaid and all that but love still exists and love still wins. Faith, hope and love. the greatest of these is love. [1 Corinthians 13]

What are other costly things that are worth the price?