Luke 9:22-25 NIV
And he said, “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.” Then he said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit their very self?
What does it mean to give up ones life to save it? I have asked myself that many times. It means to surrender or submit completely to the Lord. Our flesh wants to be in control. Our flesh wants to have what it wants to have consequences be damned. Our flesh is where the enemy gets a stronghold on us and where ever we have not given complete control over to the Lord, he has control over us. By dying to our flesh, by losing our lives, we give complete control of ourselves to God! This is why he says we must pick up our cross daily! We are fighting against our very nature to do what God asks of us. Luckily he understands that and he loves us so much he died for us to make sure no matter how many mistakes we make, if we accept Jesus into our lives, our Father will always forgive us.
When Jesus came to be with us, he became the example of how to live our lives. He felt the same temptations, the same pull towards his flesh that we do. His divine strength overcame that flesh. It is his Divine strength that can help us overcome our flesh as well. When we’re tempted to sin, we can go to his word and see how Jesus overcame the enemy by quoting scripture and relying on God to show him the way out of each temptation! Through God’s word we have the weapons we need to battle everything that comes at us! And through our faith we know that God will never leave us to do battle by ourselves!
Dear Lord thank you so much for your wondrous gift of your blood being shed for us. For the gift of knowing exactly how to live our lives for you Lord. You have given a perfect example of how to live our lives knowing we will never be able to live up to that example and still giving us so much grace and forgiveness that we can rest assured that no matter how many times we fail, you’re still going to pick us up and love us and be there to comfort us through it all. We’re so grateful for your grace, you guidance and your love. Help us to remember to go to your word first!! To run to you Father, with all our fears, with all our mistakes, with everything in our lives Lord. Because in you we find freedom from our flesh, freedom from our sins, freedom from our fears! We’re so grateful for everything you do for us on a daily basis! Thank you Lord, our Father!! Amen!