What is Cross-living? Sounds like the title to a new TV mini-series. What does Cross-living have to do with a world of pleasure seekers?
Jesus stated in Luke 9:23 - "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself & take up his cross daily & follow me." When Christ died on the cross for sinners he not only stood in my place, doing what I never could do, but he also showed me how to Cross-live.
Christ’s death saves us from eternal death but not from the cross life! He died so that we could be glorified, but not to keep us from being crucified. "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself & take up his cross daily." For the Christian the cross of Christ isn’t merely a past place of substitution. It’s also a present place of daily putting to death. That is Cross-living!
We can never let the cross lose its crucifying power in our life! We can never let it slip into the muted & murky past as though Christ died for sinners so that we can live for pleasure. That is pleasure-living!
Eternal pleasures are coming! Many are already here! (forgiveness & acceptance & holiness & healing). But just like Jesus endured the cross for the joy that was set before him, so it is with us in this fallen age (Hebrews 12:1-11). Since most of the joy we long for is still over the horizon, we are to "…go forth to him outside the camp, bearing abuse for him. For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city which is to come" (Hebrews 13:13-14).
In other words if you would save your life you must lose it & if you would follow Jesus you must take up Cross-living daily. The huge calamity of much contemporary Christianity is that Cross-living has no appeal. And practically what it means is that Jesus lived in poverty so that I might live in wealth. And the more stuff we have the more we honor the cross - so goes the prosperity gospel.
So what is Cross-living? Plainly put it is taking up my own cross & dying to self, daily.
Jesus stated in Luke 9:23 - "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself & take up his cross daily & follow me." When Christ died on the cross for sinners he not only stood in my place, doing what I never could do, but he also showed me how to Cross-live.
Christ’s death saves us from eternal death but not from the cross life! He died so that we could be glorified, but not to keep us from being crucified. "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself & take up his cross daily." For the Christian the cross of Christ isn’t merely a past place of substitution. It’s also a present place of daily putting to death. That is Cross-living!
We can never let the cross lose its crucifying power in our life! We can never let it slip into the muted & murky past as though Christ died for sinners so that we can live for pleasure. That is pleasure-living!
Eternal pleasures are coming! Many are already here! (forgiveness & acceptance & holiness & healing). But just like Jesus endured the cross for the joy that was set before him, so it is with us in this fallen age (Hebrews 12:1-11). Since most of the joy we long for is still over the horizon, we are to "…go forth to him outside the camp, bearing abuse for him. For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city which is to come" (Hebrews 13:13-14).
In other words if you would save your life you must lose it & if you would follow Jesus you must take up Cross-living daily. The huge calamity of much contemporary Christianity is that Cross-living has no appeal. And practically what it means is that Jesus lived in poverty so that I might live in wealth. And the more stuff we have the more we honor the cross - so goes the prosperity gospel.
So what is Cross-living? Plainly put it is taking up my own cross & dying to self, daily.
1 comment:
Ron,
Just read this one tonight. Thanks.
Dan
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