Years ago I was in a bookstore (remember those?) when I spotted a book entitled “MuIe Eggs and Topknotts”. Now with a name like that I had to buy it.
The first story in the book was set in the early 1930’s about two brothers from New York who decided that they were fed up with city life, so they bought a ranch in Texas. Once they realized they needed a mule, so they went to a neighbor’s ranch and asked if he had a mule to sell.
The rancher didn’t have a mule for sale, but he couldn’t resist the opportunity to have some fun with the city slickers. He pointed to a honeydew melon and said, “I don’t have a full-grown mule, but I do have some of these mule eggs. Take this egg home and in a couple of days when it hatches, you’ll have a brand-new mule.” So, they bought the melon, placed it on the back of their truck, and headed down the bumpy road toward their ranch. They were almost home when they hit a bump and the honeydew melon bounced off the back of the pickup, hit the road, and burst open.
The driver saw this through his rearview mirror and turned around to retrieve his mule egg. Meanwhile, a big Texas jackrabbit came hopping by and saw the melon in the road. He hopped over to it and began to eat it. When the brothers approached, they saw the mule egg in the road and the long-eared creature in the middle of it, and said, “Look! Our mule egg has hatched! Let’s get it!”
When the jackrabbit saw the men coming it took off hopping at lightning speed with the two New Yorkers in hot pursuit. They gave it everything they had but were unable to catch him. Finally, they hit the ground, exhausted, as the jack-rabbit hopped off in the distance. One of the men said, “I guess we lost our mule.” The other man said, “Yes, but, you know, I’m not sure I wanted to plow that fast anyway.”
I am afraid that a lot of us today feel the same about our Discipleship. We want to be Christ followers we just don’t want to do it that fast. But if you want to be a true disciple you need to be ready to do some fast plowing. The cost of discipleship is this: you must be willing to do things God’s way. He sets the standards, not you. He sets the pace, not you. He makes up the rules, not you. You must be willing to do things God’s way. The process of becoming a fully devoted disciple requires that you take your relationship with God seriously. It’s not just a one-day-a-week event; it is an ongoing process that is the core of your every thought and action. It takes a serious commitment.
Then Jeus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. Matthew 16:24