The Most Valuable Thing in the World

Imagine if you woke up in the night to find your house on fire. In the din, you hear your parents yelling to you, telling you to get out as quickly as possible. In those few split seconds, a thought flashes across your mind: "I wonder if there's there time to grab my ________!"
You fill in the blank. What would be that thing in your room, house, or closet that you would risk life and limb to try to snag before you got out of the burning building?
Jesus put this same question to those who were following him in Mark 8:34-36. "And when he had called the people unto him with his disciples also, he said unto them, 'Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel’s, the same shall save it. For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?'"
Basically, he was saying that obeying Jesus Christ is the most important thing in the whole world. To support that, he asks the pointed question, "What earthly possession is more valuable than life itself?"
That's a pretty good question. What difference does it make if you have everything you want in this life and then die? Life is more valuable than any material possession. We instinctively know this: our emergency personnel cut a $25,000 car into little pieces to extricate someone trapped inside. Fire fighters may smash windows, doors, and walls in a burning house to gain entrance and search for survivors. Those who suffer from rare diseases may spend hundreds of thousands of dollars seeking treatment to either cure their sickness or extend their life.
But do we actually live that way day by day? Do we live like things are the most important thing in the world? Are we more interested in obeying God and pleasing him or getting more stuff? I hope we understand that the most valuable thing in the whole world is obeying Jesus Christ.