I have long been convinced that one of the biggest enemies of the gospel is our own personal comfort. There are simply some lines that we seemingly are unwilling to cross. Some of our lines may differ, there are levels to which we are willing to tolerate some discomfort but even our discomfort is largely within the bounds of what we are comfortable being uncomfortable with (if that makes sense?) But if we are serious about the cause of the gospel, we are going to have to get a bit uncomfortable.

I am reminded of the missionaries who told me that there seems to be some sort of common belief that they must just be people who love snakes in their beds or civil unrest. It’s alright for them – they probably love the adventure – but it’s not really for me. Whilst I’m sure there are some who relish the adventure, I am sure many more are less enamoured with dangerous animals and less than sanitary conditions and are, instead, motivated by the belief that somebody needs to take the gospel where nobody is willing to go. They chose to be uncomfortable for the sake of Christ.

It is very similar to the kind of noise those of us in deprived communities often hear. It’s alright for people like you, but it isn’t for me. I’m never quite sure what they mean by that in my case. Not least, most who insist it’s alright for people like me because I’m more like the people here than they are usually also want to tell me how middle class my upbringing was and I definitely am. You can’t really have that both ways. But even if they have some other reason – and I know unquestionably middle class people who have gone to deprived places who have heard similar things – the line remains largely the same: that would be a level of discomfort too far for me. But, of course, because we know it isn’t the “spiritual” thing to say, we dress up our discomfort by insisting that the people who do go must just love living next door to drug addicts on council estates or serving in areas where racial tension runs high.

But of course, we have the same problem the closer to home we get too. Forget being asked to move anywhere, we hear these comments from people being asked to share the gospel in the nicer areas they have decided to live in. Churches with evangelists, or any people committed to evangelism, will often point to such people and say ‘it’s alright for you.’ I have been in middle class churches where any evangelistic endeavour or people of a more evangelistic bent are just viewed as loving being gauche, weirdos who must just love awkward conversations about Jesus or people who have no concern about whether they keep their jobs or not. It’s alright for them, but it’s not for me. It’s all a level of discomfort too far.

Then there are the lads who perhaps are a bit worried about evangelism but they’re at least willing to sit and talk with members of the church and help them grow. But meeting up for half an hour, in a lunch break, that’s a bit of a pain. Easier just to not do that. Then there are evenings out, but that’s all a hassle too. There is a level of discomfort even here that stop us from bothering engaging in discipleship and giving up almost any of our time for the sake of building the kingdom.

But it gets worse still because there are also those countless little inconveniences for the sake of God’s people that wind us up and become issues for us. We just often can’t be bothered. The discomfort level – which is fairly minimal – becomes too much. Sometimes it is these little inconveniences to which we can be most resistant too. They somehow (and I don’t know why) feel like a bigger imposition than the massive thing the Lord might be calling us to do. And building it up that way, we just don’t do it. It is a level of discomfort, small inconvenient but regular discomfort too far.

We all do it. We all think these things at least some of the time. I think these things some of the time. But the issue isn’t that we sometimes sigh and wish we didn’t have to do it because it’s marginally inconvenient to us. Rather, the issue is when we allow our discomfort to rule. We won’t countenance going to that hard place, we won’t think about doing that evangelism or discipleship, we have no will to help in those little ways because it is too uncomfortable so we won’t do it.

I am convinced comfort is, and remains, a real idol for the church. Many of us – pastors, elders, deacons and members alike – are all tempted to this particularly alluring idol: an easy life. We know we are serving the idol of comfort and ease when the minor inconveniences are seen as a huge imposition on us and when the things Jesus asks of us – even for us just to think about whether it might be us – cannot be countenanced because we find it too uncomfortable. Sure, we may dress all these things up in pseudo-spiritual language of not being called or not feeling led or not hearing the voice of the Lord or whatever. But in the end, when the basic things Jesus asks of us seem unconscionable and some serious things Jesus asks his disciples to consider are seen as crazy and not for the likes of us, we may well just be serving the idol of comfort and aiming primarily for an easy life.

As self-justifying creatures, we will then immediately point out the ways our life is less comfortable than it might be. You are probably right about that too. But it bears saying, a guilty conscience is quite uncomfortable to live with. What do you do if you have a guilty conscience about not even countenancing stuff that Jesus asks of us, like going into all the world to preach the gospel? We find other, more comfortable ways to salve our consciences that we aren’t doing these things. So, we may give away money, and make it clear that giving away money isn’t without discomfort (which is absolutely true) without acknowledging giving away money to salve our conscience that we absolutely will not go ourselves is much, much more comfortable to us than going of itself and it provides us something helpful to point to as proof we are not simply aiming for comfort.

Of course, giving away money isn’t the only way we do this. There are countless ways we might do it. What I find more comfortable might be different to you. So, I will do other things that might look uncomfortable to some in order to justify why I won’t do the thing Jesus asks of me that I find particularly uncomfortable. As a self-justifying creature, I may be inclined to make much of the fact that other people would find what I do particularly uncomfortable even though to me it is more comfortable than a bunch of other things. Even missionaries might genuinely find the move to the mission-field more comfortable for them than, say, moving to a community like mine. And it might be easy for them to highlight that I don’t particularly want to go to whatever hard place they have gone to in order to prove that they are willing to countenance quite a lot of discomfort. But then we get into a terrible comparative game of discomfort top trumps! Who, exactly, has made the most uncomfortable sacrifices for the kingdom? We may as well just ask Jesus for that seat on his right and left directly when we do this. Or, if not that, admit that this is often cover for other stuff Jesus asks of us that we don’t want to do.

We have historic examples of this. Many of us are pretty keen on John Wesley’s itinerate ministry and think he was a wonderful evangelist. Few of us know, or want to note, that he had such an unhappy marriage that he seemed quite happy to neglect his homelife this way. The discomfort of being on the road “for the gospel” was less uncomfortable to him than being home with his wife! Other historical examples can be found in a whole host of ways.

My point here isn’t to diminish the uncomfortable choices some have made for the gospel. It is simply to say we all have our levels of discomfort we seem willing to bear and our levels of discomfort, what we even find uncomfortable, differs from person to person and all of us, at some level, will allow that lure of an easy life to overtake. When Jesus calls us to take up our cross and follow him, this is precisely what I think he is calling us to put to death. For the sake of the gospel, we must die to our comfort. Those of us who won’t will end up killing the church.