Good Shepherd Lutheran

Are You Ready? – Mark 8:27-38
Who is Jesus? Historical figure? Wise teacher? Prophet? Or a crazy man who taught a lot of impractical things? If that’s all He is, then He’s easy to ignore and dismiss. But if Peter was right and He’s “the Savior who is Christ, the Lord”, then that changes everything. It changes everything because it means that your Savior has come looking for you. It means that He’s putting it all on the line for you, and He’s here to liberate you from sin and death.
If that’s who Jesus is, then it changes who you and I are, too. It changes the purpose of our life. “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. (Mark 8:34)
So, how do you deny yourself? He doesn’t mean deny yourself something like giving up chocolate or coffee. It means you need to surrender the ownership of your life. When Jesus says, “Deny yourself,” He means turn the title of your life over to him.
Now why would you want to do a crazy thing like that? You’d want to because no matter how much you think you own your own life, the reality is you’re going to lose it. It’s only a matter of time.
No matter how hard you hang on to your life, you’ll still lose it in the end. That comes with a 100% guarantee. But if you give the title and ownership of your life to Jesus, you get it back, now and for eternity.
But the second step in truly living as Jesus’ disciple is to take up your cross. In Jesus’ day, when anyone picked up a cross it meant only one thing. They were going off to die.
That’s not a great recruitment ad and it’s not what the disciples expected. When Peter said, “You are the Christ,” he assumed the next thing his Warrior Messiah would say is, “Prepare to defeat our occupiers!” Instead, He says, “Take up your cross and prepare yourself for death.”
Taking up your cross means putting your selfish desires to death with the help of the Holy Spirit. The more selfishness dies, the more your spirit can live. Our culture says, “Grab for everything you can. Try to gain the whole world.” But Jesus says, “What good is having the whole world if you’re not around to enjoy it? Give your life to me. I’ll save it for you. I’ll keep it safe. And then do one more thing. Follow Me.”
To follow Jesus is to do what you see Jesus doing. It means to walk His walk and talk His talk. When you do, you receive the gift of eternal life.
So, it all comes down to this. Do you want eternal life? I you do, are you ready to pick up your cross and follow?