The Receipt in the Attic

In 2019, a woman named Elena Vasquez was cleaning out her late grandmother's apartment in San Antonio when she found a faded envelope tucked behind a dresser mirror. Inside was a receipt from 1953 — proof that her grandmother had paid off the family's land in Guadalajara, not with cash, but by selling her wedding ring, her mother's pearl earrings, and every piece of jewelry she owned. Elena had always known the family owned that land. She never knew what it cost.

She sat on the bedroom floor and wept. Not from sadness, but from the weight of understanding what had been surrendered so her family could have a home. Every holiday spent on that property, every cousin's birthday celebrated in that yard — all of it purchased by someone who gave away what was most precious to her.

Peter tells scattered, struggling believers something similar: You were ransomed, but not with anything as common as silver or gold. The price was the precious blood of Christ, chosen before the foundation of the world. The Almighty didn't pay for your freedom with what was convenient. He paid with what was most costly.

Most of us walk through our redeemed lives the way Elena walked through that yard for years — enjoying it without understanding the price. Peter wants us to find the receipt. To hold it. To let the weight of it change how we live every single day we have left.