Effort and reward that’s the way your school or college works, that’s the way most jobs work, that may even be the way parts of your home life work. It’s simple you go to classes and learn, that’s effort. You write essays and take exams, that’s effort. Then you get given a grade, that’s reward. You may have a job where you go to work that’s effort. You may have to do chores at home, that’s effort. Then you get paid cash, or get given an allowance, that’s reward. See the whole world works on effort and reward. You put effort in and work on one thing to get rewarded or earn another. Life is simple and we all understand how it works. But then as normal God works by his own rules, I guess that’s Ok as it’s his world. With God it works like this. You do nothing and you get rewarded for free. Hmmm sounds cheap doesn’t it, maybe the rewards not worth having. I said you get it for free, I didn’t say it cost nothing. No your reward of eternal life in Heaven cost a whole lot; it cost the life of the Son of God brutally nailed to a cross. So now we remember how much our reward cost, maybe we can start remembering that we can’t earn our way into Heaven because the cost has been paid by Jesus. So we can stop feeling guilty and doing things to earn our way into Heaven, and start doing things because we are grateful that God has paid the cost. Next time you stack a chair at church, befriend a loner at school, do something for the elderly to help, remember why you are doing it. It’s not effort and then reward with God, it’s reward and then thanks.
