03/29/3021
We hear the words of Jesus as He tells us to pick up our cross and follow Him, but what is He is really asking us to do? Is Jesus telling us we are to suffer and die for God, or for Him? I don’t think so, and His life, death and resurrection give us the answer. Jesus came because God loved us, and to redeem us from sin and death. He suffered and went to the cross in obedience to God’s will, but that will was for our redemption. The cross of Christ on Calvary was an unrivaled display of love for you and me; so our crosses should be a continuation of God’s love for man through us... just as it was through Christ.
“By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.”
1 John 3:16 ESV
If we are carrying our cross properly, as Jesus shouldered His, then our lives must be based on two things; we must love God, and love our neighbors. Jesus loves us, not just in a superficial, or earthly manner as a mortal person might love another, but as God loves us. In an Agape love that far exceeds all other loves. We are being asked to put aside our lesser motivations, and to suffer in this divine love, even unto death, for those to whom God sent Christ.
“Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.””
Mark 12:29-31 ESV
Jesus gave us an assignment, that if taken as it should be, is a mission of God’s love for all the world. If we only feel in our hearts the desire to be obedient then we are not really doing what we have been asked to do. Our mission is referred to as the Great Commission, and it is for us to continue the same journey of amazing love that Jesus was sent to make.
“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”
John 3:17 ESV
Holy Week has begun, and the cross is looming ahead; so how do we view the cross our Savior bore? Is it a symbol of death to us, or an instrument of God’s amazing love? Do we allow its ownership to be claimed by those sinful men who nailed Jesus to it, and that He then prayed for God to forgive, or does this cross belong to our Heavenly Father as an amulet of love sent to us through the person of Jesus Christ? This isn’t a trivial question because how we view the cross on Calvary determines how we see our own crosses today. Do we pick up two pieces of wood and obediently walk with them, or do we shoulder God’s love for all mankind, and love the world as we carry them forth in the name of Jesus?
“And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.”
Luke 9:23 ESV
Today let’s contemplate what lies ahead for Jesus on Calvary, and ask ourselves if we want our crosses to be constructed from the traditionally believed cedar, pine, and Cyprus, or from the wood of an olive tree that has borne bushels of fruit all its life. Let’s ask that whatever wood that God chooses for our cross, that it not be the fig tree that Jesus cursed for not bearing any fruit at all.
Love, the Word of God, and the gospel message of Jesus... are these etched deep into the grain of the cross we carry into the world?
Prayer:
Father, thank you for the cross that held your Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ, and served as the ultimate gift of your love for us. Thank you for every Psalm He sung as He suffered, and awaited death. We praise you for each prayer that He offered up to you... especially His plea for the forgiveness of those who knew not what the were doing as they crucified Him. Thank you now Lord for allowing us to carry our own crosses as we continue the journey of love that you sent Jesus on, and that He has asked us to continue traveling as His disciples, and your emissaries. Holy, Holy, Holy, are you our God who loves us so completely, and with whom we share in that amazing agape love. Praised be your name for the wood from which our cross is constructed, and the life it represents. Great are you who can wither the fig, and bless the fruitful olive. Hear our prayers now Lord as we pray for the lost who know you not, and need desperately to hear your Word and the Gospel of Jesus. Strengthen us with your right arm Father as we walk in your will, and give us remembrance and understanding of your Word from the Holy Spirit you have sent to accompany us, but thank you most for the salvation through grace that you sent us through your Son Jesus. Wash us in His blood, and purify us for the journey ahead, so that at the end of our days we will rise worthy from our tomb to spend eternity with you, Jesus, and all those who have gone this way before us.
“And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”
Matthew 10:38-39 ESV
Rich Forbes