Which Cross Are You Living By? Part One

As we approach Easter in the church we begin to focus more on the cross, how Christ died for our sins and how great that is for us.  This is all good, I can’t help but wonder are we too focused on the wrong cross.  In three of the gospels Christ tells his followers this, ““If any of you wants to be my follower, you must put aside your selfish ambition, shoulder your cross daily, and follow me.”  This recorded in Mark 8:34, Matthew 16:24, and also Luke 9:23.  Not just one but all three, this tells us that it must be important that we do this.  If we claim to be Christians then we are saying that are disciples, followers, and if that is the case then we are to be doing as Christ told us.  Why is it so important that we die to ourselves?  Why not just accept the truth of the Gospel and live as we want to?  The thing is one simply cannot take part of a truth and ignore the rest.  It would be like someone walking into a store that has a sign that say shoes and shirt required, they tell the owner the store, “I accept that you must wear shoes but I don’t believe in shirts.”  Then the owner saying “that is good enough for me happy shopping.”  Yet so many Christians are saying that to God, “I accept that you sent your son to die for my sins, thanks for the forgiveness.  I don’t really accept that I have to pick up my own cross and die to myself that is just too hard.”  Then they figure God will be ok with that. 

We have to begin to realize that if we want to be Christians we have to begin to die to the Gospel.  We cannot treat God as just a consultant, as someone we get advice from which we may or may not take.  We must begin to allow our lives to be dictated by God.  This may sound a bit much but it is what Christ is telling us, we have become so focused on the Cross being our salvation we have forgotten that we to must die and begin to allow God to change us from the inside.  In her interview with Christianity Today Kate Bowlor says this in response to being asked it the church needs to lament “Jesus dying for my sins is fundamental to my salvation. But that’s actually not what I need to hear right now. What I need to hear is about the breaking of the kingdom. What I need to hear about is the sense that after the resurrection Jesus breaks the power of death and wants to transform us from the inside out.”¹  So many times we just want to go live our lives, feel good about who we are, we don’t want to be changed. We desire to be us and not worry about what pleases God.   We don’t want to ask the tough questions like do my political stances line up with the gospel, are my actions and words showing God’s love, do I treat people as God would want them treated?  Is God really changing me from the inside out?

We have to be working at growing stronger in God’s word, in our prayer life, and growing to know God better.  We are His children but at the same time we are also His servants, ever notice how many of the letters written started with so and so, a bond servant of Christ.  Peter tells us this, “So, dear brothers and   sisters,  work hard to prove that you really are among those God has called and chosen. Doing this, you will never stumble or fall away. And God will open wide the gates of heaven for you to enter into the eternal Kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”(2^nd Peter 1:10-11)  This leaves us with the question which Cross are you chasing after

1 On Dying and Reckoning with the Prosperity Gospel

How church historian Kate Bowler's cancer diagnosis brought her face-to-face with the beauty and terror of the popular movement.



Interview by Morgan Lee/ FEBRUARY 23, 2016