Then Jesus said to them all: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it
-Luke 9:23,24-
What do you understand about carrying the cross? Why did Jesus use the symbol of the cross?
Too often people mistaken their problem and troubles as the cross, they will say im carrying my cross and often their cross present their family, their career, their , their studies etc etc. But the truth is the cross got nothing to do with us at all! It is only the thing that we are doing for Christ is the cross.
To me I have a rather radical view on what it means to carry the cross. At that time when Jesus asked them to carry their cross, He had not died on the cross yet, so in the original context the symbol of the cross is death. In fact it was a very humiliated, suffering, torture and long pain that lead to death.
Jesus uses the symbol of the cross to tell the people at that time that following is not as simple as it looks like, it is not having to do nothing and having a simple life. In fact it will cost us if we were to follow Him. On the other hand it will cost us more not to follow Him.
In my opinion when we go to church, go for cell group, go for bible study or go for fellowship etc etc, all those do not represent the cross because those are the thing that benefit us without costing us much. It is true that we sacrifice the time and petrol but is it something we are doing for God or ourself? I believe all of those are more for our benefit.
Instead by sacrificing our time and money in preaching the gospel, reaching out to the lost, unloved, unwanted and those in the old folks home, visiting orphans and sharing the love of God with them, doing something for the community so that people will see God through us, being persecuted by friends for not following their way because you want to obey God, doing missions etc etc.
In short we are only carrying the cross when we are doing what God wants us to do instead of what we want to do despite how much it cost us including our lifestyle/life. It is no wonder Jesus continue to say “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it.” (Luke 9:24)
I have to confess myself that I am barely taking up the cross daily, and recently this is what God is challenging me to do so. I pray that more us will carry up our cross and follow Jesus obediently
It will cost us to follow Him, but it will cost us more not to follow Him.
Watch the video to understand what the sentence above mean.
