Buy Low, Sell Never

We believe that we are all saved the same way, by the undeserved grace of the Lord Jesus. -- Acts 15:11 NLT

I have a horse. She's a 6-year old Thoroughbred and the daughter of a pretty successful racehorse. To see her and her mother running around the pasture on a cool, sunny morning is about enough to take your breath away. Their manes and tails flying in the wind, their eyes wide with excitement, and the pounding of their hooves that you can feel from a good distance away...can't help but smile even thinking about it.

When we got them three years ago, my horse (Bella) had always been around people but had never really been taught any discipline. You might say she was a spoiled brat. She's also really good at hurting her feet. Over a year ago now, she split her foot open so badly that it still has never really healed. Though it doesn't affect her at all, it's pretty ugly to look at it because there is a big mass of flesh that grew out of the back of her foot where the injury was, and the only thing we can do about it is go have it cut off at some point. The thing is, through all of her injuries she and I have developed a bond. Where other people see a spoiled brat with attitude, I see a sweet but spirited animal who loves her owner. Where some might focus on the ugly sore on her foot, I choose to look at the beauty of her running across the pasture.

We all have ugly sores on us. Oh, we like to try and cover it up and make ourselves feel better but in the end we're really all the same in God's eyes. You see, that's the thing about what Jesus did for us. He endured pain that any of us would shudder to really think about. He endured the anticipation of what He was about to go through...it was so bad He sweated blood. Jesus is our eternal Get Out Of Jail Free card and what it took for Him to win that for us is something we should never, ever take for granted. Think about the price of absolutely every human being who's ever walked the Earth's sin. Every horrible thing that's ever been done from the smallest mishap to the biggest evil is 100% forgiven when we believe completely in what Jesus did for us.

God saw the beauty in us instead of focusing on the sin in us. Seeing Jesus being beaten, spit upon, mocked, and hung on a cross had to be the low point. The market had truly bottomed out, which was the perfect time to buy our salvation. Now that our faults have been paid for, we eternally belong to Him. So every time you see the ugliness of the world, turn your attention to its beauty instead and remember the price that was paid on your behalf!