Merritt, Cawston Opening Song: #246 Worthy is the Lamb Title: Taking the Cross
Scripture: Luke 9: 23, If anyone would come after Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross daily and follow Me.
A young man named Charles Murray was a student training for Olympics as a high diver. Charles’ friend spoke to him for hours about Jesus and forgiveness. Charles was not raised in a family that went to church, so it was all new to him. One day his friend asked if Charles was ready to trust Jesus as his Saviour. His reply was sadly, “No”. In days that followed, Charles was very quiet, greatly troubled. In training for Olympics, Charles had special privileges at University pool. 10:30 one evening he decided to go practice dives.
It was a clear night, full moon. The pool was under ceiling of glass panes so the moon shone bright against the wall. Charles climbed the highest platform to take his first dive. At that moment God’s Spirit began to convict him. Charles stood on the diving board backwards to make his dive, spread arms to gather balance, looked up at the wall and saw his own shadow from the moon. His shadow was in the shape of a cross. He could bear his burden of sin no longer. Sitting on the platform, Charles accepted Jesus over 20 feet high in the air. Suddenly, all lights came on as the janitor entered the building. Charles looked down from the diving board; it was an empty pool drained for repairs. He almost dived to his death, but the cross had stopped him.
“Take up your cross and follow Me” was always hard for me to understand. I felt my childhood with an alcoholic father was a heavy cross to bear. I thought if I was somehow better, my parents would not have abandoned us when they divorced. My pain was so familiar, it felt normal. Because pain is draining, I distracted myself by caretaking other people who were in pain. I got a martyr complex, because after all, didn’t Jesus say we must all bear a cross? Many folks interpret the cross as a burden they carry, a thankless job, illness, losing a loved one, saying in self pity, “That’s my cross I have to bear.” Is this what Jesus meant by a cross? "But He was pierced for our sins, He was crushed for our iniquities; punishment that brought us peace was upon Him, and by His wounds we ARE healed.” Jesus took on Himself our punishment, our wounds, our affliction. So really, I don’t think Jesus wants us to suffer.
Harry had everything, a lovely home, great family, bright future. Suddenly, his wife said she no longer loved him and left for another. Harry felt like a failure, that his life was over. He was at a church to discuss something they needed him to publish. Arriving early he sat, feeling beaten in despair. Then he saw a picture of the cross with the words, “I know how you feel. I’ve been there Myself.” Harry found hope in the cross; he serves God who came to him in his greatest need.
Time of the Romans, they nailed people to a cross, death by the most painful way. Because Romans forced convicts to carry their own cross to place of crucifixion, bearing a cross meant carrying their own execution device, ridiculed along a path to death. The disciples took Jesus' saying literally, to take up their own execution. Many apostles were martyred. Does Jesus expect us to go to deepest Africa and die for our faith today? There are Christians in over 40 countries who face jail, persecution, even death. My husband took me to see Czechoslovakia; we met a man who was in prison 9 years because he wouldn’t stop giving Bible studies.
Canada has freedom of worship, so does Jesus expect us to carry a wooden cross or wear a golden cross? I don’t think Jesus is speaking about a literal cross. “He must deny himself and follow Me.” To deny oneself is to surrender to Jesus. When Jesus said He was going to die, His popularity sank. Many followers were not able to put to death their OWN ideas, plans, and exchange them for His spiritual kingdom.
SONG: MORE THAN JUST A HILL
Discipleship means surrender and Jesus never hid that cost in Luke 9:57-62. Would anyone respond to an altar call like, “Come follow Jesus and you may face loss of friends, family, reputation, career and possibly your life”? Television evangelists preach, “Follow Jesus and you’ll be rich, powerful, successful, have everything you want!” So what IS the way of the cross?
Martin Luther preached how to know God. Man’s way is by our human goodness, efforts, mystical experiences, and accepts God through miracles, signs, blessings, victory, glory. But Luther believed we know God through the cross. Jesus is where human wisdom would not expect to find Him, God dying on a cross. “Recognition of God is in the crucified Christ,” said Luther. Rather than finding God through our efforts or initiation, Jesus came to earth to the least expected place, a cross. Man says, “Let Him come down from the cross THEN we will believe in Him.” Jesus could have exploded fireworks and stepped down from the cross! Yet He displayed God’s love in what this world considers weakness and foolishness. Anyone who wants to know God finds Him in Christ crucified.
It was Jesus’ choice at Calvary. "No man takes my life from Me, but I lay it down of Myself," John 10:18. Soldiers could not seize Him! God gave Himself. Our cross is our surrender motivated by love for Jesus. We may have inward struggle, but nothing compared to what Jesus had. It must be free choice to follow Him.
King of Prussia, Frederick William III, found his nation in trouble. He made great effort to bring prosperity, but war drained the treasury. After prayerful thought, he wrote an open letter to women of Prussia asking to bring their gold and silver to melt down. He offered a small token of thanks to all who donated jewelry, a simple iron cross inscribed: I gave gold for iron. Response was overwhelming! Women prized the king’s gift more than possessions and freely gave to their king. Women wore the iron cross with pride! And gold became unfashionable.
Taking up our cross means to make Jesus Lord of our life. If Jesus is our Lord, then our desire is to please Him. Galatians 5:24, Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed passions and desires of their sinful nature to His cross and crucified them there. Colossians 3: 3, For you died to this life, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God. Galatians 6:14, God forbid that I should boast about anything or anybody except the cross of our Lord Jesus, which means the world is dead to me and I am dead to the world. In Rembrandt’s painting called Three Crosses, in the shadow stands Rembrandt, for he realized his sins nailed Jesus.
SONG: NAIL IT TO THE CROSS
Christians are sensitive. We want to be liked, accepted, agreeable, peaceful, close, and loving. We don’t want to be persecuted. Jesus doesn’t say to go looking for persecution! He avoided it until time came for Him to be sacrificed for our sins. He told people He healed not to tell anyone, to keep silent about the miracle. He stayed away from Jerusalem where He knew Pharisees were waiting to catch Him.
A man has a poster in his office as a reminder. A minister is in front of church preaching before hundreds of members. And there in the front row is Jesus, fast asleep! Jesus was not crucified because He was BORING, but so dynamic that church leaders decided He was dangerous to their influence! Jesus was willing to go where the Spirit led Him, even Gethsemane and the cross. But He did not cause it Himself or bring it sooner. We don’t harass people in witnessing or hit them over the head with the bible thinking we win heaven by bringing persecution on ourselves.
A minister was preaching on Minor Prophets. After an hour, everyone got restless. TWO hours he said, "Finally." Then to their horror, he said, "Oh no! I forgot Micah. What’ll we do with Micah?" An old lady stood up, “Micah can take my seat. I'm going home!” I think church should NOT feel like a cross.
The cross is a teaching for the babe in Christ, not just old warriors. Army of God is not a call to elite super-saints or hidden teaching for only wisest, greatest elect. We follow Jesus because we love Him.
Jesus says, “I don’t want your money, your time or your work. I want YOU.” A man got a call at his office to say his wife had severe allergic reaction, anaphylactic shock, and passed out. Her blood pressure dropped to 50/30, so they injected her with adrenaline. She revived. As the husband drove to emergency, it was a blur in his memory. I can tell you, that he held her tighter, realizing in a new way how precious she was. Fact that he came close to losing her gave him appreciation. I know that’s exactly how God feels about each of His children, someone incredibly precious!
I think many of us, when Jesus removes one or two sins that were an obvious nuisance, we feel we’re now fine. And we’d like God to leave well enough alone. Imagine yourself as a living house. Jesus comes in to rebuild. At first He’s fixing wires, pipes, leaks in the roof: you know those jobs needed doing so you’re not surprised. But He starts fixing the house in a way that hurts. What is He up to? He’s building quite a different house than what we thought, adding a new wing, extra floor, tower, windows. You thought you were going to be a decent little cottage, but He is building a palace temple to dwell in it Himself! Things that to us feel like sacrifice, God designs for our beauty.
SONG: I FOUND THE ANSWER
Should we carry our cross out of duty or delight? Five young men went to most remote tribesmen of South America, Auca Indians of Ecuador. Jim Elliot was one who accepted the call. Aucas had never seen a white man. The missionaries went fully aware of danger. Sadly, warriors killed them. Months after Elliot's funeral, a friend saw his widow Elisabeth. "How do you deal with how he died? How do you handle that?" The young widow replied, "My Jim didn't die in the jungle that day." The friend thought Elisabeth was in denial. “No, Jim died one night in high school, kneeling by his bed. He prayed, ‘Dear Jesus, You did all this for me; I can never repay You. I'm Yours.’ That's where my husband died!"
To deny our self is to admit we have NOTHING to commend ourself before God. Nothing good in our human power to earn our salvation. It is only the person who realizes we are unable to save ourselves, who is able to accept the cross of Jesus as ours. The broken and contrite heart, Psalm 51:17, not self-righteous or self-satisfied. The law was not to show us how to earn God’s favor, but to show us our spiritual need, so we would come to the foot of the cross. To come to Jesus is to come to the end of Isabelle and accept Jesus’ righteousness, valuing HIS finished work on the cross every day. We walk after the flesh if we rely on our willpower, our strength, our ability. Taking the cross is accepting Jesus as our ONLY Savior. He died to pay a debt He didn’t owe, because we owed a debt we couldn’t pay.
A professor said, “Jesus didn’t die on the cross! Bible says His pierced side had blood and water. But in death, heart stops pumping and blood drains to the lowest part.” Yet in cardiac tamponade, trauma causes heart to burst from strain. Blood mixes with fluid in the pericardium and piercing that, you’d see blood and water!
At Passover people brought lambs to sacrifice. To clean all that blood, water was pumped from under the temple then washed into trenches to the Kidron Valley. Farmers went to Kidron to get blood fertilizer. If you stood at the trench, you’d see blood and water, but Jesus’ sacrifice means we don’t need any other lambs.
Pastor John Ramsey’s church provided him with a rose for his suit lapel. As he was leaving one day, a boy said, "Sir, what will you do with the flower? If you're just going to throw it away, can I have it?" The preacher asked why he wanted it. The 10 year old said, "Sir, I'm going to give it to my granny. Mom and dad divorced. I was living with mother, but she married again and sent me to live with father. I lived with him for a while, but he said I couldn't stay. Grandma takes care of me. She’s been so good to me, I wanted to give her that pretty flower just for loving me." The preacher’s eyes filled with tears, touched by God’s love. He unpinned the rose.
"Son, that is the nicest thing I heard, but you can't have just this flower. In front of the pulpit, is a bouquet of flowers. Please take the bouquet to your granny because she deserves the very best." Then the boy said, "What a wonderful day! I asked for one flower and got a beautiful bouquet!" Like that boy's grandmother, Jesus gave ALL for us.
Are you willing to come to Jesus? He does not call you to carry someone else’s cross. “Take up your cross” not Peter’s or Magdalene’s. Whatever Jesus calls you to, that is between you and God. He doesn’t call us all the SAME way. For some, our problem is pride, self-righteousness, materialism, a hard heart, sitting on our pity-pot or wallowing in guilt and shame. Jesus calls to bring our heart and life to the foot of the cross. He gives us the power to do so, for He carried the cross before us.
SONG: VIA DOLOROSA