Category: Christian

Taking Up Our Crosses and Embracing Jesus

If my reputation is good, if I fit in with people wherever I go, am I really following Jesus?

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depositphoto Image ID: 2846879 Copyright: rghenry

“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.”[i]

What does it mean to take up our crosses and follow Jesus? What does it mean to lose our lives for Christ’s sake?

In the context of this passage, it means that we should embrace Jesus and His words, and not be ashamed of them. If we read the first two verses in the context of the third verse, taking up our crosses daily means daily embracing Jesus and His words and not being ashamed of doing that.

Wide is the road that leads away from Jesus. Narrow is the gate through which we must go to be saved. Following Jesus has never been the popular way. It costs, above all things, the thing that we seek most. It costs our pride, our reputation in the world. It costs our ability to fit in with the world. It costs our self-esteem and self-promotion.

Am I really following Jesus? If my reputation is good, if I fit in with people wherever I go, am I really following Jesus?

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What is Hidden Will Be Made Known

What will the movie of my life be like? Will I be proud? Or ashamed? Will my good deeds outweigh the bad?

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For nothing is hidden that will not be made manifest, nor is anything secret that will not be known and come to light. (Luke 8:17)

Shakespeare was right. We strut and fret our hour upon the stage.[1] But who are we performing for? Our friends and family? Neighbors? The public? Do we perform for ourselves alone?

We have but an hour. Rather, it is more like a minute, a second… a millisecond in the scope of time, on this stage of space/time in the very small act we call human history. According to Shakespeare, our lives are “an idiot’s tale, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing”.

That may be so if there is no God and no life beyond this brief, strutting hour. It would all be meaningless, an idiot’s tale indeed, if this universe is not the work of a Creator and we are not His image bearers.

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Justice and Mercy, and How We Measure Our Own Relationship With God

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I don’t see anywhere in the teachings of Jesus a statement that we will be judged by the degree to which we have achieved justice for the wrongs that have been done to us. God is just. In fact, he is perfectly just, but He didn’t leave us any instruction to that effect.

We may think of God’s justice in the context of an eye for an eye.[A]  Where there is a wrong, perfect justice requires recompense. We don’t feel this any more keenly than when we have been wronged ourselves by others.

But there is a flip side to God’s justice. The flip side of God’s justice is God’s mercy, and God desires mercy more than God desires justice.[B] God desires to extend relationship to people rather than assign punishment. Our own relationship to God also can be measured by the quality of our relationships with others, to the extent it is in our control.

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Conflating God with People

We can’t judge God by the conduct of the people

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I have an old friend who is “disgusted” that many Christians supported Donald Trump and were a significant factor in Trump winning the election. She, like many women (and men), cannot get past the infamous words that Trump spoke how about a woman reporter. I won’t repeat them here. They are too vulgar for polite company.

My friend has been so turned off of Christians and “the” Church by the fact that many Christians voted for Trump and were a factor in electing him, that she no longer goes to church at all after decades of being a church-goer.

I don’t want to get into politics here. That isn’t the issue I’m focused on.

I have family and friends who say that they can’t believe in God, or can’t believe in the Christian God, because Christians are hypocrites. This is what leads me to write this piece.

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Whose Side Are We on?

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Where will Christians stand in history as we look back? Some would say we were on the wrong side of slavery, the Holocaust and Apartheid, but Christians were most definitely on the right side of each of those evils – at least, some might say, the real followers of Christ.…

Source: Whose Side Are We on?