What can Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2007) teach us about the cost of following Jesus? In this episode of Geek Devotions, we look at Winters’ story of immortality, regret, and sacrifice to better understand what Scripture means when it tells us to count the cost. Jesus warned His followers in Luke 9:57-62 and Luke 14:25-33 that choosing Him means shifting our priorities — sometimes at the expense of friends, family, or personal desires. But as Paul reminds us in Philippians 3:8-9, everything we give up is nothing compared to the surpassing worth of knowing Christ.

Blog Version

In the 2007 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, we’re introduced to a character named Winters. At first, he looks like he has everything. He’s rich, powerful, and, as it turns out, immortal. But the truth is, Winters didn’t get immortality for a noble reason. He went after it because of greed. He wanted power. And in doing so, he gave up what really mattered.

The cost of his immortality was the loss of his generals, the people who were like family to him. He thought he was gaining something precious, but instead he lost the things that were truly valuable. Winters spent the next 3,000 years regretting his choice and trying to fix what he had broken.

Winters chased immortality without ever counting the cost, and it left him empty. Jesus calls us to do the opposite, to count the cost of following Him and see that what we gain in Him is worth far more than anything we lose.

Count the Cost

In Luke 9:57-62 and Luke 14:25-33, Jesus says that before we choose to follow Him, we need to count the cost. Following Christ changes everything. It means shifting our priorities.

Sometimes that means giving up hobbies, interests, and desires that don’t honor God. Sometimes it means letting go of relationships that can’t handle the change in our lives or are damaging to our lives. And sometimes it means facing criticism from people who don’t understand why we’ve chosen to follow Jesus.

Those are real sacrifices. And Jesus doesn’t pretend they aren’t hard. He simply says that we need to weigh them carefully and understand what it means to be His disciple.

Count It All as Loss

Paul echoes this in Philippians 3:8-9:

Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith
–The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Php 3:8–9

Paul knew what it meant to lose things. He lost friendships. He lost opportunities. At the time he wrote to the Philippians, he had even lost his freedom, sitting in prison for preaching the Gospel. Yet, he still said it was worth it.

Why? Because knowing Christ outweighed everything else. Paul wasn’t chasing after selfish gain like Winters. He was laying everything down for the hope found in Jesus.

What We Can Learn from Winters

Winters’ immortality came out of selfishness, and it left him empty. Following Christ is the opposite. It is a selfless act. We give up the things of this world not because we’re trying to gain power, but because Jesus is worth more than anything else.

It’s not easy. Losing friends, family, or even hobbies can hurt. But we’re not alone in that. The Bible gives us example after example of people who made the same choice, who gave things up for the sake of Christ. And the promise is that what we gain in Him is far better than what we leave behind.

So the challenge is this: Are you willing to count the cost? Are you willing to lay everything down and find your hope in Jesus?