“Take up your cross and follow Me” (Matthew 16:24; Mark 8:34; Luke 9:23)?”
What is this cross that Jesus was talking about? The cross of shame? The cross of imperfections? The cross of pride and bad character?
Have you been at a point where you are so hurt and forgiving is just a nightmare? Have you felt like you are persecuted for being good and hated for doing what is right? Have you been at a position where you have to lose friends you dearly love for the sake of Christ? That is the cross Jesus was talking about.
Woe unto you the unrepentant for you have laid down your cross and chosen your own ways.
Woe unto you who all you do is judge others. Woe unto you who keep grudge at heart, that forgiving seems a boulder you cannot break. Woe unto you who carry thick and heavy Bibles but deep inside are filled with pain and anger and bitterness for what your friends and enemies did to you. Woe unto you whose pride is at its peak, that your ego cannot let you apologize or want to make things right. Why have you abolished your cross? Why is evangelism easy for you but forgiving a brother is a nightmare?
His only sin was love. He dragged, not his cross but my cross and yours along. He was beaten, nailed, spat at and speared for a crime He didn’t commit. He hang on the cross, crying to the father to forgive us for we do not know what we were doing. But we know that a non-forgiving heart is evil, treacherous in all ways and but why do we still want to return Him to the cross? He says even before we give or serve we should sort issues with our brothers and sisters. It is painful to ask for forgiveness for something you never did. But what if He were too mean not to say it is finished? What if you became the ‘Greater Fool’ and drag your cross? The cross of a burdened heart, the cross of being spat at, the cross of slander and hate and followed Him?
SEE ALSO: Wicked Woman 9
He carried the cross for everyone in the world, why is carrying your own cross hard? Why do you take Him back to the cross?
“For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it” (Matthew 16:25-26).