Follow Me – 2. Take Up Your Cross

This journey that we are on is one filled with many challenges but also great and precious promises.

It’s a journey of faith and learning to trust God.

Regardless of what we may face and what trials we may encounter there is always HOPE!
A Hope that doesn’t fade.
A hope that is the anchor of our souls. (Heb. 6)
A hope that comes only from Jesus.

Hope of a new life.
Hope of a fresh start.
Hope of healing from pain.
Hope of freedom from addiction.
Hope of provision in the midst of lack.
Hope of knowing God will never leave me nor forsake me.
Hope for a brighter tomorrow.
Hope of eternity with our Father.

Psa. 31.24 (NKJV) Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart, All you who hope in the LORD.

Mark 8.34 (NKJV) When He had called the people to Himself, with His disciples also, He said to them, “Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.
Mark 8.35 (NKJV) For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses (lets it go of) his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it.
Mark 8.36 (NKJV) For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?
Mark 8.37 (NKJV) Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?
Mark 8.38 (NKJV) For whoever is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him the Son of Man also will be ashamed when He comes in the glory of His Father with the holy angels.”

To Follow Jesus is not about trying to fit some mold but trusting the Molder…

Following Jesus is like following a good and faithful shepherd…

To Follow means to…
• …To Believe Who Jesus Is.
• …To Take On The Mind & Heart of Jesus. (learn of him)
• …To Obey His instructions…
• …To Endure Until The End…

Mark 8.34 (NKJV) When He had called the people to Himself, with His disciples also, He said to them, “Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.

Deny = refuse to give or grant (something requested or desired) to (someone).

Self says and lives by this mantra – “I have a right to ________________.”

To Deny is to say “SELF, you no longer have any right to anything that you didn’t see from Jesus.”

Remember, if you didn’t see it in Jesus you didn’t learn it from Him.

Self is your old man or also known as “flesh”… You are not the old “self” any longer…

2Cor. 5.17 (NKJV) Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.

Gal. 5.24 (NKJV) And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Rom. 6.6 (NKJV) knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin.

Mark 14.38 (NKJV) Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

Take Up Your Cross = realization of a man who isn’t coming back…

1. Death of my WILL. Will = The path & plan I have for my life.

I surrender my will to the will of my Father.

Matt. 26.37 (NKJV) And He took with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and He began to be sorrowful and deeply distressed.
Matt. 26.38 (NKJV) Then He said to them, “My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death. Stay here and watch with Me.”
Matt. 26.39 (NKJV) He went a little farther and fell on His face, and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.”

Matt. 26.42 (NKJV) Again, a second time, He went away and prayed, saying, “O My Father, if this cup cannot pass away from Me unless I drink it, Your will be done.”

2. Death of my rights.

Each and every day I gave up rights to live for self.

2Cor. 5.14 (NKJV) For the love of Christ compels us, because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died;
2Cor. 5.15 (NKJV) and He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again.

3. Death of my identity.

I am no longer…
what I achieve,
how I feel,
what I have or
what I did…

Gal. 2.20 (NKJV) I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

Phil. 3.4 (NKJV) though I also might have confidence in the flesh. If anyone else thinks he may have confidence in the flesh, I more so:
Phil. 3.5 (NKJV) circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews; concerning the law, a Pharisee;
Phil. 3.6 (NKJV) concerning zeal, persecuting the church; concerning the righteousness which is in the law, blameless.
Phil. 3.7 (NKJV) But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ.

Identity –
1. Who we are in Christ. (our position before God)
2. How we are known in heaven. (our destiny with God)

Every day our prime objective is to learn how to receive
1. God’s view of us
2. His purpose for us
3. His thoughts toward us.

In God’s eyes, our old life has already met its demise and is finished. The Cross has set us free from our old man. When Christ died, so did we. He did not just die for me, Christ died as me.

You are no longer a slave to sin. It is no longer your nature to sin. Christ has removed it. All that remains of your old life is a powerless corpse that is desperately holding onto us not wanting to give way to the NEW life we have in Christ.

Romans 6:6-8
6 Could it be any clearer[b] that our former identity[c] is now and forever deprived of its power? For we were co-crucified with him to dismantle the stronghold of sin within us,[d] so that we would not continue to live one moment longer submitted to sin’s power.[e] 7 Obviously, a dead person is incapable of sinning. 8 And if we were co-crucified with the Anointed One, we know that we will also share in the fullness of his life.