Worth The Risk

The reviews weren't that good, in fact one called it the most boring Bond movie in 30 years. Still I had to catch Spectre, the latest 007 flick, for the sake of catching it. It is Bond, James Bond, even if I found it rather 'forget-able' . Maybe I am getting too old for the antics of everyone's fave spy. Maybe I just don't like Daniel Craig's steely looks. Well, at least they cut down on the philandering episodes; I will never understand nor appreciate why Bond has to bed almost every female that crosses his path. Ok, I know, it's just 'expected' of macho-man. Still the ending of this Bond redeems him somewhat, as the never-say-die spy actually chooses the girl instead of his career; effectively terminating his days as arguably moviedom's most famous secret agent/playboy. The final shot of him walking away from his boss at one end and turning towards his lady-love at the other end with the theme song playing the stirring lyrics.... "is this where I give it all up... for you I have to risk it all... " is obviously so contrived and oh, so soppy.

It struck a chord in me though, as I wondered what most precious thing would I give up in this world? Who would I 'risk it all' for? Some weeks back, an American preacher came to my church with a testimony so moving I attended not just one, but 3 of his 4 sessions with us. Long-haired Pastor Bill Wilson is no ordinary pastor. He runs the world's largest Sunday school in New York, ministering to some 100,000 children in his services. But that's not the clincher. The clincher is he does it in the inner city ghetto of Brooklyn in the roughest of rough neighborhoods ; in fact he and his team live in the ghetto themselves. The church is a warehouse. At 67 years old, he still drives a bus, not a Mercedes - to pick up the children. He goes around the ghetto neighborhood, visiting homes of gangsters, drug addict dads and prostitute moms. He's been mugged, beaten, even shot at. His face still bears the disfiguring scars of a bullet just missing his head.  Best of all - he's white and everyone around him is black.... Talk about giving it all up and risking it all...

This is no fictitious dare-devil James Bond. This is so real it's unreal. But it's easy for me to relate to it , because every Saturday, I experience  a small part of such a world in the streets of KL Chinatown. It's a totally different world from my own. People seem to think I am so sacrificial, so noble, giving up my Saturday afternoons to serve folks whom society has written off.  But really the 3 hours I give away every Saturday is not worthy to be termed a sacrifice. The worst risk I have ever encountered is a purely psychological fear that I might get infected by some virus or other as I sit and talk  to HIV positive people, TB patients  or those with yukky-looking skin sores oozing  pus. I did get threatened by a man with obvious mental problems a couple of times, but he has become my friend ever since I started serving him tea personally.

After it's all over, I drive my car to go home to my nice double-storey house, take a nice cleansing shower and go to sleep in a nice bed. And I can tick off another Saturday on my 'do good' list. But for all the 'good' that I do,  I have never been homeless, never had to sleep on the streets. My pockets may not have much, but they have never been totally empty. I have always had (at least)  3 square meals a day in my stomach. I have a job I love.  So in fact I have not given up anything much at all nor have I risked my life by any measure of reckoning. I was supposed to go to India on missions, but the trip was cancelled because of bad floods there. I couldn't help thinking ...is my life so precious that I can't risk the inconvenience or the dangers of being caught up in a flood?  Man, no need to even talk about far away India, I don't even volunteer for relief work in our own back-yards in Kelantan, Johor or any one of the several states in M'sia already hit by floods.

Of course I can console myself that I shouldn't compare nor should I feel guilty. After all there are many ways to 'do good'. So I can't do much, but the very least I can do is talk about Jesus; that's the best good I can do, given the big mouth that I have. The worst that can happen is I risk being rejected or being thought of as a fanatic, a nut-case or an extremist  every time I proclaim Jesus as the only Way, the Truth and the Life. Although apparently, in some places in the world, talking about Jesus can land me in court or in  jail or even worse get my head chopped off. But then what would my life be worth if I kept quiet about the best thing that's ever happened to me, that can happen to anyone and everyone? If I dare call myself a Christian, I should dare to give it all up, to risk it all, for the very simple reason Christ considered me worthy, not just to risk His life for, but to lay it down completely.

We make much of human love. James Bond can give up a career that's the core of his life for the sake of a woman's love; he was prepared to take the risk because he considered this love worth the sacrifice of all else he held dear.  That so resonates with the romantic in us. Yet how many know that God Himself is the greatest Lover of all, because His love knows no bounds; it doesn't even depend on the beloved's response. Even if I didn't love God, even if I reject Him, He would still love me, He would still want to save me from a sure trip to hell. In fact, the wonder of it is He already did when Jesus sacrificed Himself to be hung on a cross, all for my sake. Now that's love. How can I resist such a love? How can I not respond to such a love? And knowing all that, how can I not do likewise?  I can't save the world, but I can tell 1 man, 1 woman, 1 child that God considers him/her worth loving and dying for. I can pray, trusting that that will make a difference to that 1 life, somehow, someday.

Like the apostles of old who all told the same story and died in the face of persecution , like so many un-named others down the pages of history who did the same, like so many who still continue to believe and do the same, I too must be prepared to give it all up... for Him I have to risk it all.  Otherwise my life and my faith is worth nothing.

"...I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace" - Acts 20:24