WHAT ARE YOU WORTH?—A DIALOGUE-SERMON ON WHAT WE OWE
TO CHRIST

Mother was talking to John. “What are you worth, John?” asked she.

John looked up rather indignantly. “Why, what do you mean, mother?” he asked.

“If any one wants to find out what he is worth, he must know what he owes and what he has to pay with, mustn’t he?”

“Yes, I suppose so,” said John, thoughtfully. “Well, then, I wonder if you are not in debt, and pretty heavily in debt, to Christ. Let’s see. In the first place, did your clothes cost you nothing,—not only the clothes you are wearing, but all your other clothes?”

“But I got these from you,” said John, “and not from Christ.”

“Yes,” replied his mother, “but it was Christ who made it possible for me to give them to you, and your clothes for all your life have certainly cost two hundred dollars.”

“Whew!” exclaimed John; “all that?”

“And then, how about your food? How many dollars’ worth do you eat in the course of a year? And then this house,—you have a share in that; and what did the house cost?”

“But you give me the food,” said John, “and this is your house.”

“Yes, but it was Christ who made the food in the first place, and gave it to me to give to you, and the same with the house. And then, there is your school. That large building some one had to pay for, and the teachers, and your schoolbooks. All of these cost money, and you owe for them, do you not? because you have never paid for them. And how many thousand dollars do you think it all counts up? It costs a good deal, you see, to build a little boy into a man.”

“Yes, I should say so,” said John.

“But that is not half all,” said his mother. “This town has to be managed partly for you. There must be police to keep it safe for you, the streets must be lighted, and the sidewalks kept up, and a thousand other things that cost money must be done partly for you.”

“I never thought I was so expensive,” sighed John.

“But,” his mother went on, “there are things that are worth much more than all the gold in the world. There is your health, that no doctor could give you if you lost it, though we paid him ever so much. There is the sun, better than all the gas-lights the town furnishes. There is the rain, that makes the food grow before it comes to us. There are the animals, that give us the clothes that we give to you. And, best of all, and more wonderful than all put together, there is the great love of Christ, which built the church for you, and keeps this home warm and cheery for you, and makes this town safe for you, and prepares a work for you to do in the world. And remember that all of these things for which you are so deeply in debt come, in the first place, from Christ, without whom, as the Bible says, nothing was made that has been made.”

“Then I owe all that?” said John. “How can I ever pay it?”

“You can never pay it,” his mother answered. “But there is one thing you can give to Christ with which he will be perfectly satisfied, and that is, yourself. He will take care of all this great debt of yours, and he has already taken care of it without your asking him. And now you can see, my boy, how little you are worth, and what you must do to become worth something.”