Economics

Economics is a social science that deals with production, distribution and consumption of goods and services. Sure. But we really understand it to be much more general than that. It is a management concept. It is the management of limited resources. Those resources can be just about anything, from advanced banking to personal energy. If you have an unlimited amount of X where X is any resource you may wish to consider, you don't have to be economical about it. You don't have to manage it. You can spray it everywhere, so to speak. But we live in a finite world and resources are always limited and we have to figure out how to manage that.

Turns out that Jesus talked about that. Jesus famously said, "Which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?" (Luke 14:28). "Really, Jesus? You're concerned about building towers?" Not so much. Look at the context.

Now great crowds accompanied Him, and He turned and said to them, "If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple." (Luke 14:25-27)

Ah! Context makes a big difference. It wasn't tower-building that Jesus was concerned about. It was being His follower. If you want to be His follower, there will be a cost. Be sure you know the cost before you set out to do it, because if you don't, it won't end well for you (Luke 14:29-30).

Jesus's economics, then, was around the cost of being His disciple. What was that cost? Do you know? It first cost everything. Everything. There can be nothing of higher priority than Christ. Not parents or wife or children or family. Not even you. Next, it requires pain and sacrifice. "Bear his own cross" (Luke 14:27). We often suggest that being a Christian is easy. "Just repent and believe, and you're in!" Maybe so, but "repent and believe" is much bigger than "You and me, Jesus; You and me. We'll be pals." If "repent" is μετανοέω -- metanoeō -- literally to "think differently," that "change your mind" is huge. Love God first and foremost. All that other stuff, including yourself, is much lower in priority. That is what Jesus was referencing when He told His disciples to "count the cost."

If economics is the management of limited resources, biblical economics in this context refers to the limited resource of you. "The cost" of being Christ's disciple is ... everything. The payout is huge. But Jesus was abundantly clear. If you want to be His disciple, it requires making Him your highest priority, dying to self, and following Him. That, in essence, is the change of mind that "repent" includes. And, oh, by the way, that cost is well worth what we receive in exchange.