FROM THE DESK OF PASTOR WILL: Embracing our Nails, Embracing our Cross

[Rev. William Griffith]

“And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.” ~Luke 9:23

It is against the very nature of humankind to embrace self-denial. Self-preservation, self-gratification, self-esteem, and self-denial all go against the grain of the flesh. If it tastes good, eat it. If it feels good, do it. If it brings us joy and happiness, keep it. If it doesn’t taste good, if it doesn’t feel good, if it is difficult and challenging, joyless and requires us to replace our needs with the needs of another, then we will find a way to get rid of these things.

Even our road and journey to our faith in Christ is more often than not centered on what “is best for us”. ‘If this church or that church meets all of our needs, then that is where we belong’, we think to ourselves. If our church asks us to serve in a capacity that seems beneath us, like mowing the lawn, washing dishes, cleaning the bathrooms, serving meals to the homeless, then that church certainly does not appreciate our social standing and we must find one that does. Or we can even go a step further and use the example of those preachers who make us feel uncomfortable. “Is he talking to me? How dare he!”.

I am reminded of a story the late-Pastor Adrian Rogers  once told. A woman called him one Sunday after the service and wanted to have a word with him. Her name was Bert. Pastor Rogers said “Bert, what can I do for you?” “Pastor”, she replied, “I heard your sermon today and I have one question for you. Were you talking to me?” Pastor Rogers hesitated for a moment and replied. “Bert, I was shooting down in a hole. If you were down in it, I can’t help it”.  People have abandoned their churches for less. Bert never thought she was being convicted by the Holy Spirit.

Jesus Christ is our primary and only real example of what true self-sacrifice is. He followed God’s perfect will, and even prayed that if there was another way He would prefer to take that route rather than be executed on the cross. And still, He remained faithful to the will of Almighty God. Why? Because of the perfect love Jesus practiced on this planet.

Now imagine this for a moment. A person loves you so much that he offers his very life up to death to save your own. Mocked, called names, beaten until his flesh looked like raw hamburger, stripped naked, humiliated and then forced to carry his very means of execution to the place where he is meant to die. Then he is executed for no other reason than his choice to love you, to defend you, to stand in your place so you may live. We would be eternally grateful to this person. We would feel a degree of guilt along with immense gratitude. People have done this very thing for others. During the Holocaust, there are stories of strangers standing in the place of another to save them from execution. Now imagine after this person does this for them, our gratitude is in rejecting that person. We say how much we appreciate what they did for us, but we continue to live recklessly, squandering our life and never offering ourselves for another. This is what many of us have done to Jesus Christ. Jesus committed the best example of self-sacrifice, and yet so many of us reject His love. We do not meditate on what Christ did for us. And if we do believe, our belief is not strengthened through our daily lives in taking up our cross and following Him, because it requires us to step out of our box and to move outside of our comfort zone.

“And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.” ~Luke 9:23

We complain about our bills, we worry and fret over the way we’re treated at work or at church. We  become so entrenched in the “me, me, me” culture and an attitude of self, that we can not see the needs, hurt and pain of others. It is all about how we feel, how we are treated, what we can get and what people, churches and governments can do to make our lives better. And yet, even as a bloody, barely recognizable human being hanging on the cross, Jesus was forgiving his tormentors and his executioners. “Forgive them Father”, he prayed, “For they don’t know what they’re doing”.

When we are hurt, disappointed, used, abused and mocked, we must rely upon the mercy and grace of Almighty God and the love and redeeming power of Jesus Christ more than ever. We MUST look to the cross. We need to remember His suffering, His sacrifice, the torment He went through and how in the end He conquered death and brought with His resurrection power the salvation of ALL who believe and follow Him. Things begin to change in our lives when we begin to walk humbly before each other and before God. We are human. God created us and therefore knows our weaknesses and our short comings. He only wants us to come to Him. To rely on Him. To praise Him and glorify Him, not simply when things are going the way we want them to go, but especially when things are challenging, difficult and our hope has run out. That is what the cross is for. That was the purpose of Jesus Christ giving His life for humankind. To bring hope and to suffocate the darkness of the human condition. And the best news is that God loves us in our weakness and in our brokenness. The act of giving His only son to die the horrific death of execution on the cross of Calvary  before we have even accepted Christ as our savior, proves His love for humankind.

When we embrace our nails and embrace our cross, in whatever form them come, we are trusting God to handle the rest. Our nails might be a bad marriage, a rebellious child, a taunting boss, or a life threatening health hazard. Our cross might be ridicule of our faith by those we consider our friends, or being called to love our enemies when they persecute us or use and abuse us. And still, everything we can imagine that can go wrong in our lives, none compare to what Jesus was required to sacrifice for the whole of humanity. This thing about following Christ doesn’t sound as comfortable and alluring as it did before we read the Red Letters of the New Testament, huh? But when we step out of this short journey of our lives in this world, we realize that this mortal life is nothing more than a brief path to eternity, whether we accept Jesus Christ or not. We all are born and we all die. And when we die, we will be in an eternity of our own choosing. God loves you just the way you are. You can come to Him just as you are. The open arms of Jesus Christ were open on the cross and they are open now. We can fall into them and rest in them, regardless of what the world brings our way. We need not fear the challenges, for Christ won the victory for us on the cross of what is now OUR SALVATION.

~Pastor Will Griffith

Evangel Pacific Ministries