Take Up Your Cross

The message for every Christian has been the same forever. We are called to FOLLOW Jesus. He is not asking for fans or people who affirm Him. He wants disciples.

We have studied through Luke 8-

After today, we will have studied through .

Jesus gave His disciples lessons on learning His word and be doers of the word.

To be the light to the rest of the world.

Jesus displayed authority over

The wind and waves

demons

Life and death itself

He then sent out His 12 to share the gospel and heal diseases.

They succeeded.

Jesus fed the 5000

He made the disciples identify whether or not they believed Him to be the messiah.

And then He gave the crux of it all. With everything that we have learned, we are called to follow Him in the life that He lived.

Before the offseason, a coach will tell the players the conditions for the players to be on the team. If they don’t meet the conditions, they aren’t on the team. Plain and simple.

In this famous passage, Jesus spells out the conditions that He has for those who want to follow Him.

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1. Self-Denial

Jesus began His teaching with the idea of denying ourselves.

This was a one way trip.

Peter would eventually deny Jesus 3 times by saying, “I do not know the man”.

Israel’s history was full of following and denying God.

The difference in this lesson is that Jesus told His disciples that they would deny themselves the pleasures from earth and pursue a different place.

To put aside plans, purposes, and earthly future, and live according to the needs of the two important laws.

Love God

Love People

The disciples were unaware of how much of themselves they would be denying.

Why would Jesus start with this? Because denying ourselves to Him is where it all begins.

To deny ourselves is to say, “I do not know myself.” To ignore our own desires and walk toward what the Lord has for us.

We are geared to treat ourselves as if we are the most important. Maybe even the most important thing in the world.

If we are to follow Jesus, we must forget that self exists.

How do we do that?

Focus on God and His plan.

Focus on the needs of others.

Period. We find our “self-identity” when we align with the identity of Christ.

2. Take Up Your Cross.

Jesus and His disciples all understood what it meant to take up a cross. They had seen this happen many times in their life.

When Jesus was around 10 or 11, Judas the Galilaean had led a rebellion against Rome by raiding the royal armoury at Sepphoris, which was only 4 miles from Nazareth. The Roman vengeance was swift and sudden. Sepphoris was burned to the ground; all the people sold into slavery, and 2000 rebels were crucified on crosses which were set in lines along the roadside that they might be a dreadful warning to others tempted to rebel.

Carrying a cross was a one way trip.

Taking up a cross meant that they were prepared to face things like that for loyalty to Jesus. It meant that they were ready to endure the worst that anyone can do to them for the sake of being true to their master.

None of Jesus’ followers were uninformed. The message was clear. The road to discipleship was narrow and suffering would come.

Inmates on death row don’t plan on coming home.

Following Jesus is a one way trip. We can’t find a loophole that says suffering won’t come our way.

Our lives are about dying to ourselves and living for Jesus.

We are called to own who we are.

3. Spend Your Life, Don’t Hoard Your Life .

Jesus said that those who seek to live by how much they can get out of life will have nothing and those who seek to live by how much they can give will have full life.

Instead of asking, “What is the safe thing to do?”, we are ask “What is the right thing to do?”

The disciples had given up everything to follow Jesus. Their lives before had been altered in a way that had changed everything. They had given up their families, livelihoods, and comfort to follow Jesus towards certain death.

This wasn’t a metaphor. Their lives were now different.

Jesus was tell His disciples not to run when the problems came their way.

Do you see the opportunity that the church has in front of it right now? We are called to take care of our brothers and sisters in need. When we choose ourselves over others, we are living oppositely of what Jesus called man to do.

Jesus has words for us today! There is no benefit in heading towards the things of this world but there is a great reward to those who hold true to the word of God.

The church has been called to the carpet. We don’t have to shrink back, but our eyes can be open ready and willing to serve any and everyone that Christ would call us.

When the plague came to Wittenberg 

The bubonic plague struck Wittenberg, Germany, in August of 1527. This disease was especially horrific: in just one day, an infected person could show signs of delirium, fever, speech disorders, and loss of consciousness. Soon after, they would break out in large boils that infected the bloodstream and rapidly led to their death. 

Martin Luther and his wife Katharina, who was pregnant at the time, were urged to flee the city. However, they chose to stay in order to minister to the sick and dying. 

When asked by Christians in another city for advice, Luther wrote a pamphlet that is as remarkable today as when he produced it. Titled “Whether One May Flee From a Deadly Plague,” it combines realism and faith in a way that is powerfully relevant to our crisis. 

Luther counseled his readers to utilize medicine and intelligence “to guard and to take good care of the body so that we can live in good health.” As a result, he stated, “I shall fumigate, help purify the air, administer medicine, and take it.” He also practiced what we call social distancing: “I shall avoid places and persons where my presence is not needed in order not to become contaminated and thus perchance infect and pollute others, and so cause their death as a result of my negligence.” 

With this caveat: “If my neighbor needs me, however, I shall not avoid place or person but will go freely.” He understood the urgency of sharing the gospel so as to lead the sick to saving faith before they died and to minister to believers in their final days. 

“Everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die” 

As it turned out, Martin and Katharina Luther were spared from the plague. But they did not know this when they chose to stay behind to care for the sick of their community. 

They could risk their lives to serve others because they were not afraid to die. Their hope was in proper procedures and medical treatments, but even more, it was in Christ. They trusted their Lord to protect them in life and to bring them to heaven in death, whenever it came. 

My point is not that we should refuse the urgent calls to social distancing that are absolutely crucial to slowing the spread of the pandemic. To the contrary, as one primary care physician notes, we must adopt such critical measures immediately. 

My point is that choosing to hope in God as the Luthers did sustains us as nothing else can. It reminds us that the worst that can happen to us leads to the best that can happen to us. The moment we close our eyes on this diseased, fallen planet, we open them in God’s perfect paradise. When we take our last breath here, we take our first breath there. 

As Jesus said, “Everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die” ().

We are called to live differently during the world even in the midst of a pandemic. If this fearful world sees the church panicking, than what hope will they turn to?

I want to ask you to do 3 things in the next 48 hours.

Seek God’s word in a deep way.

In your prayer time, ask this question: “God what are you calling me to do right now?”

Be obedient.

How are you carrying your cross?