Cross Bearing Time!

Picking up the cross for the Lord can look different for each person; however, they all have one thing in common.

Let’s examine Jesus’s call to action for His followers.

Luke 9:23-27 “Then He said to [them] all, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. 24 “For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will save it. 25 “For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and is himself destroyed or lost? 26 “For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words, of him the Son of Man will be ashamed when He comes in His [own] glory, and [in His] Father’s, and of the holy angels. 27 “But I tell you truly, there are some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the kingdom of God.” There are many who preach, teach, quote, and otherwise use this verse for a whole group of reasons. However, today I want to boil it down to a rather remarkable angle that many fail to recognize. Jesus provides a description that is very applicable to the individual, while simultaneously providing us all a universal signature of a true born-again believer. You might be scratching your head at what I just said, and that is okay. Let’s jump into it and see what Jesus is referring to.

Jesus is opening the door for all people; for the Calvinist, they have to ignore or take Scripture out of context. For the scripturally sound believer, who takes what God says seriously, this is simple: “if anyone” means “if anyone”; it is open to all. The person who wants to come after Jesus must deny themself. It means we have to want what Jesus wants, not what we want. It starts with understanding who Jesus is. John 14:6-11 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. 7 “If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; and from now on you know Him and have seen Him.” 8 Philip said to Him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is sufficient for us.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; so how can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 “Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own [authority;] but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. 11 “Believe Me that I [am] in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves.” We must recognize that this comes with action. If we love Jesus and desire to come after Him, we must obey His commands: 1 John 5:3 “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome.” What a marvelous thing to see that if we take up our cross and follow Him, we can know that the cross is light! Some will say I am connecting dots that shouldn't be connected, but that is not true. There is a joy that comes to the believer when we do God’s will, and He has promised to be with us through the end of the age. Thus, His command, our cross, is not heavy but rather something to help us. We must want this more than losing our life. We must want this more than profit; we must want this more than the shame the world might throw on us.

A born-again believer will obey the commands of the Lord and live their individual life, and that life will be shaped by the individual’s personal calling. It will be different for each of us, yet identical in wanting to follow the Lord, obey His commands, and be reliant on Jesus Christ. This is why James says that we can be known by our fruits. This is why Paul gives the characteristics of the Fruits of the Spirit to us. This is why we here at Mill House Ministries do what we do. We want you to have the opportunity to build on the solid rock of Jesus Christ. To encourage you to run the race with all earnestness and focus. For God is good, and His burden is not heavy, but rather a remarkable one to help us in our time of need. So pick up the cross daily, obey the commandments, and seek ways to glorify God in your own life.

Hold until relieved; our Blessed Hope is coming,

JL