From JAP:
Mark 8:34-37—“If anyone would come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for Me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world yet forfeit his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? If any one is ashamed of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when He comes in His Father’s glory with the holy angels.”
We sometimes look at the joy of being a believer like living in a beautiful fairy tale with a happy ending. And it does have a VERY happy ending, but meanwhile there is much we must give up—for what good is it for a man to gain the whole world and yet forfeit his soul? It may be a struggle to give up the things that the world has taught us to hold dear—prosperity, sinful pleasure, and personal fame. But each successful step will draw us closer to our Lord’s plan for us. (Jeremiah 9:11)
With that plan comes the need to no longer conform to the pattern of this world: “but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—His good, pleasing, and perfect will.” (Romans 12:2)
But even as we face that difficult change, God has sent help. “From the beginning God chose us to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief of the truth” (2 Thessalonians 2:13-15), and the Holy Spirit has come to be with us forever, sometimes directing through thoughts and sometimes through the more direct means of His voice.
But we must be willing to step out into the unknown through faith to hear that still, small voice that Elijah heard, as the Holy Spirit leads us on our pilgrimage. We will sometimes make mistakes and then think “I did not hear a voice,” but He always speaks. We were not listening.
That is why we must willingly leave behind everything that would interfere with God’s intentions for our new life: “We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose. For those God foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of His Son that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those He predestined He also called, those He called He also justified; those He justified He also glorified.” (Romans 8: 28-30)
“If anyone obeys His word, God’s love is truly made complete in him. This is how we know that we are in Him: Whoever claims to live in Him must walk as Jesus did” (1 John 2:6) and the Holy Spirit will help us make that change.
Jesus expects us to be willing to die to the pleasures of the world, to learn the sometimes painful lessons of our new life, and if necessary, to suffer to do God’s will. He wants us to commit to prayer and worship and to fellowship with love with other “brothers” as we become more Christlike and begin to conform to His image. One of our greatest challenges will be the fiery darts of doubt the devil will aim at us, but God has already planned for his deceit.
“Consider it pure joy My brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. If any of you lacks wisdom he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does” (James 1:2-8).
When we have denied ourselves and taken up our cross to follow our Lord, we will be prepared to meet Him when He comes in His Father’s glory with the holy angels, to live the happy ending of our real life fairy tale!
Amen!