And he strictly charged and commanded them to tell this to no one, saying, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.”
And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels. (Luke 9:21–26 ESV)
Now great crowds accompanied him, and he turned and said to them, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’ Or what king, going out to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and deliberate whether he is able with ten thousand to meet him who comes against him with twenty thousand? And if not, while the other is yet a great way off, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace. So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.
“Salt is good, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is of no use either for the soil or for the manure pile. It is thrown away. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.” (Luke 14:25–35 ESV)
I’ve seen a bumper sticker on the back of a car that has a double-edged question: Do you follow Jesus this closely?
This bumper sticker both confronts you for how you are driving as well as asks you to assess how devoted you are to Jesus. The presumption is that you should follow cars less closely and Jesus more closely. This is a good question for you and me to consider as we pass through Lent and recall Jesus’ journey to the cross. How closely are we following Jesus? Are we willing to follow Him through the pain, suffering, and trial of picking up our own cross? Are we willing to put our own safety and life above doing what He calls us to do? Will we love Him above even our own families and their desires and wants for us—above their needs and our own love of them? Will we trust the Lord to take care of them and even us, when following Him and doing what is right means loss for us? Will we maintain our faith if we face the suffering and tragedy of Job?
Or will we turn back and forsake the path of Jesus because it has become too hard and too difficult? Will we go a different route because the route before us means suffering and trouble and heartache? Will we try to avoid giving up the things and people we love rather than avoid offending Christ?
In this regard, I sometimes think about what church tradition teaches about St. Timothy. Apparently, he witnessed people heading to engage in false worship of a false god. So, he attempted to call the people away from this false worship and to abandon this path. For their sake, he pleaded with them but they would not listen. More than that, they were so angry at his call to repent that they beat him to near death. He lived a few more days before he died.
I think about this. Clearly, he loved them enough to call them to repent even though it cost him his life. Where is my love for others like this? Where is my love to risk my neck, whether literally or even just figuratively? How many times could I have said something but I remained silent? How many times could I have shown love or compassion in some way but because of fear, I did not?
How well and faithfully we are in following Jesus is a question we all need to assess. What crosses has God given you that you are afraid to pick up? What crosses are you reluctant to carry? Perhaps it is good for us to identify what these crosses are, first.
Most of us have crosses to carry that are tied to fulfilling our vocations. For example, as children, one of the crosses we have or had was obedience to our parents—an especially difficult cross when we either thought we knew better or didn’t understand our parents’ reasons for their commands or demands. Parents get to bear the cross of patience teaching the same lesson over and over, and the cross of watching their children suffering and not being able to change things. Husbands are called to sacrifice their wants and desires to put their wife’s needs first, especially by protecting and providing for her; and wives are called to die to what they think is best and follow (that is submit to) their husband’s direction as unto the Lord. Such crosses are found in any vocation because all our vocations require us to sacrifice something of ourselves for the sake of another. We are called to deny ourselves and act in a way that helps someone else.
You will notice “love” is at the heart of carrying your cross; and love is properly directed outward toward others. Love is about denying yourself for the sake of and for the benefit of others. Love is about giving of yourself—sacrificing—so that someone else might live, so that someone else might not perish or die. This is what defined Jesus’ own sacrifice at Calvary. He gave of Himself for you and me. He carried the burden of dying to Himself—not taking His anger and wrath out on you and me and instead carrying it Himself and putting His righteous justice to death in Himself (that is forgiveness) and in our flesh (that is atonement) so that we might be set free from sin and from the power of death and be restored as His creatures, as His people.
Jesus showed what carrying the cross meant. He showed us what true love is and He has called you and me to follow Him, to pick up our crosses and walk in His path of love even when it is costly, even when it means pain, suffering, and death. He has called us to sacrifice of our well-being for others and in heeding His Word of what is good and right.
In the Garden of Eden, we judged that God’s Word and command was not good and we went our own way. Still, today, we struggle when God’s Word commands something difficult or dangerous to our life. Will we follow Him or chart our own course and path? Jesus calls us to pick up our cross and follow Him.
So, what does this mean? It means you and I will suffer. It means we should expect to suffer. It means we should be prepared to suffer. It might be physical suffering or it might be difficult circumstances. It might be mental suffering or emotional anguish. It might mean remaining in this world a lot longer than we really want to or it might mean leaving this world far sooner than we really desired. It might mean being uncomfortable and going out of our way to do what is good and right; it might mean seeing what good works God has placed right in front of you and not neglecting them. It might mean facing fear and loss or struggling with the danger of wealth and the deceitfulness of abundance.
God has place before you a path to walk in this world and it is filled with suffering, troubles, and trials. Part of the reason for this is the nature of this fallen and sinful world. It is with what Christ Jesus Himself dealt and suffered. It is the problem that sin has brought into creation, into our world. The other part is that it is the price to love those who are in that sinful and fallen world.
It is like the suffering a fireman goes through in order to rescue some caught in a roaring fire. He heads into the building, facing the heat, facing the fumes, facing the smoke in order to find people to that he can drag out and rescue. Sometimes, they are easy to locate and he gets them out quickly without suffering much from the task. Other times he searches and searches but can’t seem to find those who are trapped; maybe he is blocked from gaining access to them. He may be able with his ax and wits to gain access and help them get out. In the process, he may be injured or burned or suffer long-term from the toxic fumes and smoke. He pays a price in order to try and rescue another life. If he succeeds, he deems the effort and sacrifice worthwhile but if he doesn’t succeed, he may consider the aches, pains, and damages he suffers afterwards to be pointless. Yet, if he didn’t face the risk, if he didn’t try to be there to save anyone, then none who could have been saved would have been saved.
However, this is why, if you want to be a fireman, you have to count the cost of taking up that profession. You have to weigh the risks and the sacrifices you will be making—are you willing to face the suffering, pain, heartaches, and headaches that will accompany that risk, that sacrifice? If not, you should reconsider being a fireman.
Likewise, Christians are to take into account the cost of following Jesus—to count the cost. But unlike the fireman example, one must also see and count the cost of not following Jesus, as well! The cost of trying to save and preserve your own life has its own cost—namely, the loss of your life!
So, on the one hand, you face suffering and death (maybe even an early death, or a lingering, prolonged suffering before death) for following Jesus into eternal life; on the other hand, you may have a much easier life in this world only to have eternal destruction in the world to come. Do you understand the cost and what it means?
Lent is a good time to re-examine that cost as we see the very cost that Christ was willing to pay for each and every one of us. He understood the immense suffering and the true and full weight of bearing our sins in the flesh and with His life. He counted the cost and decided that He would enter the burning building in order to save as many as could be saved from the very fire we started and flamed!
And now that Christ has accomplished that salvation fully and completely for all people, He sends those He has redeemed and rescued back into the burning building that we might work with Him to save more—that we might be His arms and legs and mouth seeking out and acting for those still lost or trapped in the flames. He gives us the assurance that the flames will not conquer us or overcome us as long as we remain in and with Him Who overcame the flames and the fire. He calls us to be little lights, to be salt in this world—salt that is salt because of Him Who rescued us. He calls us to deny ourselves and risk our lives—to follow in His footsteps as firemen seeking to rescue those trapped in this burning world—to follow in the risk and danger—to make the sacrifice of remaining here, even dying here, for the sake of others and to be His servants serving His purpose in rescuing those in this world. We stand as the flesh and blood embodiments of Christ’s body in this world continuing His incarnational ministry. Some of us will stand on the front lines in that fight while others play a more supporting role.
But when it comes to the risk and the cost, it doesn’t matter whether you are on the frontlines or behind the lines running support. The cost and danger remains the same, although the risk often times is higher on the front lines.
And what is the cost? What is the danger? The cost is the suffering and pain of living in this dying world: illness, aging, weakness, the failing of the body to function well, sorrow, agony, death… The danger is bodily harm, persecution, reputation loss, pride, being overcome with desires, fear, worry, loss of faith…
Jesus calls for us to pick up our cross, to hate our families, even our own lives, to willingly die to ourselves and to the world, to follow Him, facing all the dangers and suffering the cost unto death. When we do this, when suffer in this world and when we face the dangers, we are walking in the way of Christ. For we are not doing this for our own benefit so much as for Christ and for His Church and people whom He sacrificed and loved unto death. When we walk this path, we walk with Christ.
And it is the path for you and me because Christ has attached Himself to us. The Bride follows Her Bridegroom, Her head, for He has attached Himself to His Bride in baptism. He has attached you to Him and Himself to you. You were baptized into His death—you were connected to Him Who connected Himself to our flesh and blood to make us His own. And connected to Him, you will suffer as you follow Him—none of us is above the master (Matthew 10:24). But connected to Him also means you will rise in the glory of His resurrection (Romans 6:3-5). He is the firstborn of the dead and so once you have passed through this life, you will find a resurrection that far outpaces the price and suffering of yesterday, today, and whatever tomorrows exist before the Last Day arrives and the fullness of Christ’s salvation is realized and experienced by all His people.
Until then, let us pick up our cross and follow Jesus and let us support, encourage, rebuke, strengthen, and teach one another as necessary (2 Timothy 3:16; 4:2; 1 Thessalonians 4:18; 3 John 8; Romans 1:11; Hebrews 12:12; Acts 15:32; 1 Corinthians 12; Ephesians 4:15-16) and carry the burdens of our fellow Christians according to their need (Galatians 6:2; James 5:13-20; 2 Corinthians 8:8-15).
Lord Jesus, You willingly came into this world in the flesh in order to serve us and to rescue us out of the grips of sin, death, and the devil. Grant us courage to follow in Your love for those around us. Help us to sacrifice with a willing spirit and to remaining Your witnesses and salt in this world. Preserve us in faith and strength our trust in the time of trial and trouble. Prepare us for and support us in our suffering, losses, and sacrifices so that we know we are not alone. Keep us ever ready to join You, filling us with Your hope and joy that You fulfilled and carried as You kept Your eye on founding and perfecting our faith while enduring the cross and suffering shame for us. Finally, strengthen us to endure until You come for us for You live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God now and forever. Amen.