Matthew 16:24-26: The Call to Take Up Our Cross

“If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross...” Jesus, Matthew 16:24-25.

John Harper with his daughter Nana whom he successfully placed on a  lifeboat before going down with the Titanic. 

“When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.”  (Dietrich Bonhoeffer, “The Cost of Discipleship,” chapter 4. Bonhoeffer was a German pastor who spoke out against Hitler and died In a Concentration Camp in WW II).

“Christians [need to be] committed to great causes, not great comforts.  I pleaded with the saints to dream a dream bigger than themselves and their families and their churches.  [Commit to] the great causes of mercy and justice in a prejudiced, pain-filled, and perishing world.” (John Piper, World Magazine, February 23, 2002, p. 37)

The response to the Peter’s bold proclamation of Jesus as the Christ (Matthew 16:16) is not what they expected.   His followers expected Jesus to come out powerfully against the Roman oppression. However, there were no parades, no debutante balls, no open-air stadium rallies, no marches on Jerusalem with shouts of “death to God’s enemies!” Missing were grandiose displays of ethereal power, and any “sign from heaven” (v. 1) which Jesus’ critics demanded.

Instead, the disciples receive harsh warnings to tell no one that Jesus is the Christ (v.20). Furthermore Jesus called his key disciple, “Satan” (v.23).  Then Jesus continued to further reverse their expectations and told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me,” (v. 24).    A modern marketing guru would probably take offense at this and ask Jesus, “Where is the promise of a better life now?   When will you tell us about the secret Biblical money codes for prosperity? C’mon, Jesus! We need to sell books and fill those pews!”

Jesus is pointing His disciples past this temporal life, this vapor of breath, to a MUCH GREATER reality of EVERLASTING joy! Paul says, “For this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,” (2 Corinthians 4:17). Christ’s call is that our hope is fixed not on this dying world but on our eternal life with Him. 

The freedom and the joy in Christianity comes not when we are mindful of bettering ourselves but when we are mindful of whom we serve.   We serve the Christ, the Son of the Living God (v.16). Again, Bonhoeffer: “To deny oneself is to be aware of only Christ and no more of self, to see only him who goes before and no more the road which is too hard for us.  Once more, all that self-denial can say is: ‘He leads the way, keep close to him.’” (Cost of Discipleship, chapter 4)

Let us remember: we serve Christ; He does not serve us.  Run from ideologies that reduce Jesus to a mere spiritual trainer, guiding you to a self-exalting life.  Jesus does not beckon us to a “better” life; He beckons us to come and die, to die to this world, its expectations, its pain, and its futility and find life that is everlasting and centered on him.  “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake shall find it.” (v. 25)

Let us lay aside this world, which we will lose anyway and let us take up our cross and follow Him. “What will profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his life?  What shall a man give in return for his life?” (v. 26).  What good will fame, money, riches and pleasure accomplish on Judgment Day?   May our security in Christ lead us to take great risks.  Lets follow His call to take the gospel to places where Christ is not known and where great danger and opposition await us.   We need fewer Christians intent on living long lives and more Christians intent on dying purposeful deaths.  

On April 14, 1912 the Titanic sank.  1528 people jumped overboard into the frigid waters including a man named John Harper.  Harper was swimming frantically to people leading them to Jesus before the hypothermia became fatal. Mr. Harper swam up to one young man clinging to a piece of debris. Harper asked him between breaths, "Are you saved?"

The young man replied, “No.” Harper then took off his life jacket and threw it to the man and said, "Here then, you need this more than I do..." and swam away to other people. A few minutes later Harper swam back to the young man and succeeded in leading him to salvation. Of the 1528 people that went into the water that night, only six were rescued by the lifeboats.  Harper was not among the six. However, the young man on the debris was.