We must remind ourselves that the image Jesus used here of the cross was the preferred instrument of capital punishment by 1st-century Romans. Sometimes we hear people who are going through difficult times say, \u201cI guess that\u2019s a cross I have to bear.\u201d They are usually speaking about circumstances and situations that they wouldn\u2019t want to go through if they had a choice. Of course we have all found ourselves in tragic situations that we would rather have avoided, but that is not what Jesus meant when He spoke of bearing a cross.<\/p>\n
When we suffer from sickness, disease, or mental anguish, it might be a horrible affliction or tragedy, but it is not bearing a cross. First and foremost, bearing a cross is an act of volition. It is a choice, a voluntary form of sacrificial obedience that identifies us completely with Jesus Christ. Bearing our cross is not simply making the best of a bad or uncomfortable circumstance, it is something we deliberately take up and choose to carry because of our relationship with God.<\/p>\n
Those listening to Jesus that day understood that to take up one\u2019s cross was to begin a death march. He did not mean that every disciple will be martyred, but that every disciple must lay down everything in their life for Him. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote:<\/p>\n
The cross is laid on every Christian. The first Christ-suffering which every man must experience is the call to abandon the attachments of this world . . . As we embark upon discipleship we surrender ourselves to Christ in union with his death\u2014we give over our lives to death. Thus it begins; the cross is not the terrible end to an otherwise god-fearing and happy life, but it meets us at the beginning of our communion with Christ. When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
In many ways, a dead person is set free.<\/p>\n
“LORD, we want to be completely set free, so we chose to take up our cross and follow You this day.”<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We must remind ourselves that the image Jesus used here of the cross was the preferred instrument of capital punishment by 1st-century Romans. Sometimes we hear people who are going through difficult times say, \u201cI guess that\u2019s a cross I have to bear.\u201d They are usually speaking about circumstances and situations that they wouldn\u2019t want […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10932"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10932"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10932\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15454,"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10932\/revisions\/15454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/packinghouseredlands.org\/devotional\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}