Take Up Your Cross Daily

Little Jimmy fell out of bed every night. No matter what his parents tried, he’d roll out of bed while sleeping. Uncle Bill came to visit. As usual that night, they all heard his thump & cry. Next morning, Uncle Bill teased Jimmy. “Why do you fall of bed out so often?” Little Jimmy thought. “I guess it’s because I stay too close to where I get in.” Don’t many Christians suffer from the same problem? Staying too close to where we got into Christianity? Aren’t we instead supposed to pick up our cross & follow Christ? In Lk 9:1-6, Jesus sent His disciples out to preach the KoG & heal the sick. They were to leave everything & go. Many thought they were throwing their lives away. They gave up their jobs & income. They were in danger for hanging out with Jesus. In our verses, Jesus assures all His disciples. Putting Him 1st is doing the right thing. Let’s look at Luke 9:23–27. 23aHe spoke to all His disciples. This message wasn’t just for the 12. It’s for us. 23b“If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself & take up his cross daily & follow me. In 1st C. Judaism, to come after Jesus means to become His disciple. We want to come after Jesus. But what does it mean to deny self? Deny things? If not, how does it differ? If we deny a thing, we give it up. Give up meat for Lent, for example. Limit our use of the internet, alcohol, food, or some luxury. Do that, & we deny a thing. Giving up things is the 1st step in denying self. But it’s only the 1st step. Denying self goes much deeper. Denying self is the reason to denying things. To deny self is to deny my ambition. Give it up. Deny my desires. By itself, that’d be ascetism. But denying self isn’t for us. If we deny self, we’re free for something else. We deny self so we can live for Jesus. If we deny self, we live to get closer to Him & to do His will. Not ours. If we deny self, we’re free from all else. Once we’re free, we can we take up our cross daily to follow Jesus. Following Jesus—we get that. Become His disciple. But how should we “take up our cross daily?” 1st, we need to look at what that meant in Jesus’ day. Criminals were publicly paraded out to be executed. All who saw them knew they’d lost their freedom & were going to lose their lives. On the way to be crucified, they had to carry their cross’s crossbeam. They also carried shame from the reproach on every face. They bear a burden that others don’t. What does taking up our cross daily mean for us today? Put Jesus 1st. Deny self. Forsake our ambitions & desires. Pursue His ministries & mission. Not ours. Do all for Christ. Not us. That’s our burden—our cross. We may suffer others’ reproach when we do. That’s taking up our cross daily. We have to do it each day, each minute. Put Christ 1st. That’s what Jesus says in the 1st, greatest commandment (love God) & Mt 6:33. Seek 1st His Kingdom & His righteousness. We worry that focusing on Christ 1st could mean we’d do without things we need. Look back at Mt 6:33. Jesus says it’s just the opposite. Seek 1st His Kingdom & His righteousness, & all these other things will be given to you as well. This is a spiritual principle. If we go after what we need with all we got? Idolatry! Look what Jesus says next in our verses. 24aWhoever wants to save his life will lose it. It’s a paradox of the kingdom. Earth’s way up is the Kingdom’s way down. Try to gain the world & we’ll lose our life. In the Kingdom, the converse is also true. 24bWhoever loses his life for me will save it. Just so, the earthly way down is the Kingdom way up. Keep seeking to gain the kingdom, & we’ll gain the world, too—at least the things we need. God’s Kingdom ways run counter to our ways. Counter to every impulse. If we think in earthly terms, finders are keepers. But if we think in terms of Jesus & the Kingdom, losers are keepers. Why adopt Kingdom values? Why deny ourselves? Why lay our lives down for Jesus? As if we still need answers, Jesus goes on. 25What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, & yet lose or forfeit his very self? Seeking 1st His Kingdom, laying our life down, isn’t just for rewards. It’s a salvation issue. If we try to gain it all in this world, we may lose it all for eternity. What does this look like in practice? William Borden (1887-1913) had it all. He was a Yale grad & heir to a large fortune. But he denied himself, gave it all up for Christ’s sake, & headed to China as a missionary. He got as far as Cairo, Egypt. At 26yo, he died of cerebral meningitis. History’s assessment of him surely agrees with Christ’s. No reserve. No retreat. No regrets. If we focus totally on Christ, the world won’t like it. We can talk about God to anyone. Just try talking about Jesus. The world reacts when Jesus is preached. We may face persecution for our faith. To avoid persecution can we pretend we don’t know Christ—just ask forgiveness later? Jesus answers that question. 26If anyone is ashamed of me & my words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in his glory & in the glory of the Father & of the holy angels. What if Christ is ashamed of us? What if we’re too afraid to claim Him? Would Jesus really refuse to claim us? That’s scary!! Maybe it isn’t a salvation issue. (I don’t want to find out.) But surely, we’d lose our reward. We can go after this world’s glory, fame, good reputation, wealth, or power. If we do, we risk losing our reward. We also risk seeing Christ’s glory if He returns in our lifetime. 27I tell you the truth, some who are standing here won’t taste death before they see the kingdom of God.” If we give it all up for Him? If we acknowledge Christ, no matter what? Even if we have to suffer for it? We won’t just see His glory when He returns. He may give us a foretaste, just as He gave a foretaste to Peter, James, & John. Let’s wrap it up. Jesus is saying that being His follower isn’t about receiving from Him. It’s about giving. It’s about choosing daily not to live for ourselves. Not seeking what we want. Not seeking what will make us happy or secure or comfortable. Not even seeking what we need as our sole focus. Want to follow Jesus? Be His disciple? 23Turn from our selfish ways. Take up our cross daily. Then follow Him. Too many see Christianity in terms of what we get out of it. Not what we’re supposed to give. We want to go to church for what we get. But be the church? That’s asking too much. Isn’t that for the officers & Bible thumpers? We want to be the crowd that’s fed & healed by Jesus. Not the followers who daily give up our lives for Jesus. We focus on how God can meet our needs. What God can do in our lives. We focus on how full & abundant our lives can be as Jesus’ “followers.” Let’s hear Jesus carefully. Let’s understand clearly what He’s saying in our verses. The things we want are good. God can meet our needs. God can do amazing things in our lives. And God does lead us into full & abundant lives. But if we want to be Jesus’ disciples, we can’t pursue those things or focus on them. We can’t emphasize worldly things. We can’t even concentrate on our needs. The world does. But if we do, we’ll miss the Kingdom. In the Kingdom, wants & needs come 2nd. In the Kingdom, all God’s good things result from turning from our selfish ways, taking up our cross daily, & following Jesus. 1st the cross, then the crown. So, let’s ask. Are we willing to follow Jesus the way He defines discipleship? 23If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross daily, & follow me. Are we willing to commit to Jesus 1st? If so, what will we do to start practicing our commitment? Many of us already know where we should start. Maybe it’s by firmly deciding to start each day in focused prayer. Or maybe it’s to do that thing we know God called us to do but we’ve been putting it off. Maybe it’s something else. Whatever we need to do, it needs to be daily. It needs to be deliberate. And it needs to be consistent. Today, Jesus is inviting each of us, “Turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross daily, & follow Me.” I’ll close with a few minutes of silence. It’s space for us to ask Jesus, “What do you want me to change in response to Your invitation to take up my cross??” Let’s pray.