Take Up the Cross and Follow Him. (Matthew 16: 24-25)

Introduction.

We saw last time that the first half of this passage that deals with what’s going to happen to Jesus in the future. Having told them that at this point he turns to the disciples, and he speaks to them. Let’s see what he says.

24 Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. 25 For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. 

(Matthew 16: 24-25)

The opening verse tells us that he said, “If anyone desires to come after me let him deny himself take up his cross and follow me. You have probably heard me say it before and you will no doubt here me say it again, there is a difference in the Bible between sonship, and discipleship. Sonship means becoming a child of God, by faith in Jesus Christ. John 11: 2 says. 

“But as many as received him that then gave you the power to become the sons of God even to them that believe in his name”.

When you trust Christ you become a son, a child of God that is radically different than becoming a disciple. The word disciple means learner, so the issue now is as a son do you now want to learn from your father, because if you do there are certain requirements. Jesus is now about to give us the requirements for discipleship.

The Requirements of Discipleship.

As this verse is normally understood there are 4 requirements mentioned here in being a disciple.Look at the verse 24 again.

“Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me”.

(Matthew 16: 24)

If anyone desires to come after me, number one, let him deny himself, number 2, take up his cross, and 3, follow me.

Do you see three requirements there, so do I, but that’s only three, but look gain. If anyone desires, that is the other prerequisite for becoming a disciple. First and foremost, you first must desire to be a disciple. Discipleship is not something that is a matter of coercion, it is not something you are compelled to do, God leads people he does not force them. Satan is the one who drives people. God leads people, it’s an act of freewill, so there’s no compulsion, there’s no coercion, it’s simply a case of really wanting to follow and learn from him. So if you have decided to follow him then this is what you must do next. Here’s the next requirement, firstly you must deny yourself. So, what does that mean. 

Down through church history this had all kinds weird and wonderful interpretations like beating your body or starving yourself to death have been recommended as an example of denying yourself. Other come to this and think that denying yourself is the same as self-denial and it becomes something like I won’t eat a chocolate during lent.  But there’s a difference between self-denial and denying yourself. So, what’s the difference. Well let me read you what some others have said.

William Barclay says. “In the first place the word deny means to refuse to recognize or to ignore or as many have pointed out it’s something like saying goodbye to yourself”. One other commentator said, to deny oneself is more than self-denial, it means to refuse to make one’s pleasure the aim of life and not allowing you own will to be the rule of your life. his has to do with substituting you desires with the well-being of others and the will of God. It not about denying oneself of possessions or even pleasure, it is to deny oneself as the final arbitrator of decisions you make in life. You going to allow a new boss to make the decisions in your life.

What Jesus has in mind is saying no to yourself and saying yes to God, it is about removing your desires as the dominant principle of life. In other words, those who follow Christ do not indulge themselves. 

Self-denial is denying a hot fudge sundae, but that is not the same as denying yourself. Denying yourself says I am no longer the authority or the one who has the final decision on any decision that is made in life. I am denying myself as the right to rule my own life. To say this as clearly as I can, the first requirement for discipleship is you desire it, and the second is you deny yourself and that means choosing God’s will over you will. 

There is a third requirement, he says take up you cross. This has also been greatly misunderstood and grossly misapplied over the ages. People come to this and think that denying themselves is something like carrying a burden that you have to bear, like living with aches and pains, but this is a far cry from what Jesus has in mind. But we need to remember at this point what the purpose of a cross was in the 1st century. It was an instrument of death, to bear the cross meant to carry the instrument of your execution and they made the criminal carry the cross to the place of execution. So, to bear a cross is an expression of emotional suffering. When you are bearing the cross you are suffering with expectation knowing you need to die to self. Note here it doesn’t say you have to be crucified on the cross you said you had to bear the cross and that is the picture of the awareness of sin and suffering in this life.

Don’t misunderstand me, going to heaven is free, all you have to do is trust Jesus Christ and there are no strings attached to that but if you want to become like him, and follow him as a disciple you’re going to go through at some level what he went through. In other words, it’s that’s going to cost you. To take up ones cross means to identify with Christ and his rejection shame suffering. It means being prepared to suffer, the willingness to endure persecution for Christ’s sake.

The Christian life is meant to be a life of sacrificial service the Christian may have to abandon personal ambition to serve Christ. It may be that he will discover that that place where he can render the greatest service to Christ somewhere where the reward will be small and the prestige non-existent. They will certainly in the very least have to sacrifice time and leisure and pleasure in order to serve God through the service of his fellow men.To put it quite simply the comfort of living a life of entertainment may well have to be sacrificed for the duties of church leadership, the calls of the soup kitchen or the visit to the home of the elderly and lonely. We may well have to sacrifice certain things we could normally afford in order to give more away. 

The Christian life is a sacrificial life, end of quote. It's living for others, and it is living for the Lord, and serving others and because you are living for the Lord and that involves sacrifice and sacrifice often involves suffering. If you choose to serve him I think it means that you may will be misunderstood, you’ll be called a fanatic, and you’ll have your motives questioned. If you love people you want to see them grow and you will spend your time and effort and even money sometimes  to help them, and often they will not be grateful and you might even feel let down or betrayed. 

This same speech by Jesus is recorded in Luke Chapter 9, but in that version Luke adds the little word daily. Take up your cross daily. This is a daily exercise if you’re really following the Lord you’re going to have to sacrifice daily. If you’re really following the Lord if you’re bearing the cross don’t be surprised if you have to struggle every daily. So, the requirements are that there if you choose to become a disciple, a follower of Jesus, in that you must deny yourself as the final authority in your life.

Finally there’s one last phrase in verse 24, he says and follow me What’s involved in following him. That mean you mimic everything he  You have got to believe and trust the leader, and you also have to obey the leader. Embedded in this little phrase, follow me, are the spiritual concepts of trusting and obeying, and as the hymn says, there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey. This tells me to diligently follow him we must be trusting him and obeying him. 

A disciple really wants to be like Christ, right down in the depths of their soul, they want to be like their Lord. They are going to put God’s will first in their life, it’s no longer what I want I what he wants and they are willing to daily make sacrifices, trusting and obeying him. That’s what Jesus is saying it takes to be a disciple. I have a question, why in the world would you want to do that? I mean why in the world would you want to give up who makes the decisions in your life and live by the book, his book, instead of yours? Why would you willingly sacrifice everything, just to serve the Lord and help people, why would we want to do that?

Exchanging Our Soul.

For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. 26 For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? 

(Matthew 16: 25-26)

Let me explain something, you’ve heard me say this before when you see the word, “For”, at the beginning of a sentence in the New Testament that means the writer is about to explain to you what they  just said. So, it seems to me that in the next verse Jesus is now going to explain why you should become a disciple and it’s very complex so bear with me as I try to simplify what I believe Jesus is saying in verse 25. “Whoever desires to save his life will lose it but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it”. What in the world does that mean, what kind of double talk is that?

Actually this is nothing more than saying that if I let the Lord call the shots in my life, if I made him Lord, and I’m servant he’s master and I make him the ruler then I might think I’m going to lose out on what we think was pleasurable but gain so much more. Another, some would say better, translation of the phrase, “Loose your Life” would be better translated "What will a man give in exchange for your life?"  Exchange is an interesting word. In the book of Ecclesiasticus we read: "There is no “exchange”, for a faithful friend," and, "There is no exchange for a disciplined soul" (Ecc 6:15; and Ecc 26:14). Meaning that there is no price with which you can buy a faithful friend or a disciplined soul. Therefore, this final saying of Jesus mean two things.

It means once someone has lost his life, because of his desire for security and for material things, there is no price that he can pay to get it back again.  It also means there is nothing that a we can give to Christ in place of our own life. 

It is quite possible for someone, even a Christian to try and withhold his life. It is still even more common for someone to give God  lip-service. Many people gives their weekly offering to the local Church, but does not attend; but in reality that does not satisfy the demands of church membership. The only possible gift to the Church is us; and the only possible gift to Christ is our whole life. There is no substitute for it. Nothing less will do. Jesus is saying if you lay down your life and do what God wants me to do, when you get to the end of your life you will be able to say, “Wow”, I found what life is really all about by living it God’s way. 

That’s why we all need to become better disciples because in holding on to any part of our life we find out we missed having a better replacement, by far.

27 For the Son of Man will come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and then He will reward each according to his works.

(Matthew 16: 27)

Jesus is saying look if you live for yourself you’re going to regret that. But, if you live for the Lord and do his will, what you will get is an eternal reward and gaining the whole world and all of its possessions and power and pleasure this side of eternity doesn’t begin to compare to the reward that you will get in eternity. What Jesus is teaching is that you to become a disciple it means you are going to put God’s will above your own will, recognizing that may involve sacrifice and may involve suffering but you are still should do that because when you stand before Him you will hear him say “Well done I good and faithful servant enter into the joy of the Lord”.

That’s the reason you do this is because, although it might mean suffering now, but it will mean glory later.

Many years ago, matter of fact in the beginning of the 20th century there was an ad that appeared in a London newspaper the ad read,

“Men wanted for hazardous journey, small wages, bitter cold, months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful”.

Who would apply for a job like that, well the man who put the ad in the paper was the famous South Pole explorer, Sir Earnest Shackleton and he said the response was overwhelming. It was as if every man in Great Britain wanted to go to the South Pole. Why, would they endure such hardship, because they wanted the glory 

That’s what Jesus is teaching, we might suffer now, we might need to sacrifice now, but we do it because we will experience the glory later. I think the apostle Paul captured all of this when he said and he said,

“It is so that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his suffering”.

So, you have a choice, and that most people choose comfort and convenience. Most people want just to be comfortable and live a convenient life. I got it all wrapped up in this nice neat little package, without difficulty or hardship. I’ll talk a good game but just don’t interfere with what I want to do whether it’s the will of God or not. As somebody once put it like this, the Valentine might say.

“ I would climb the highest mountain, I would swim to the deepest ocean, I would crawl the hottest desert, I’ll do anything for you, I would bear any trial or pain, there’s no limit to my love for you”.

I’ll be over Friday night if it isn’t raining”.

That’s what most of us do we talk the talk but when it gets right down to it, we don’t walk the walk. You can either choose comfort and convenience or you can choose Jesus Christ that is as simple as I know how to put it.

You may have heard this story before but it worth repeating because it’s so vividly illustrates the choice we need to make. 

There was a family that had a little boy and some rather expensive antiques, and one was a very valuable expensive vase and one day the little boy somehow got his hand down in that vase and they were horrified that they couldn’t get his hand out. They tried soap, they soaked his wrist with vegetable oil hoping he could slip it out, but it still wouldn’t come out. Finally, they thought we have no choice, so they went to get a hammer and break the vase. The little boy looked at them and said, “would it help if I let go of the pound coin, I found in the bottom of the vase”. 

Don’t hold on to the pound coin today and lose the greater reward later. Sometimes we choose to live for ourselves and not for God. We are so bent on holding on to what we want, that we lose what we need, and we will then miss out on out eternal reward.