Luke 9:23-25

hi my name is Matt Kinnick i’m one of
the pastors here at Antioch Community
Church in Northeast Minneapolis
i’m sharing a little devotional from
scripture i’m going to look at chapter
9 of luke verses 23 through 25.
i think one of the challenges in this
season that we’re having is
focusing so much on the difficult
circumstances
what’s hard about it what makes us tired
or anxious or worried or worn down
and those are all legitimate and it
matters to take some time to focus on
those pray through those
try to mitigate those factors to be able
to endure through this difficult
season but i also want us to think about
as followers of jesus and what i think
god’s been prompting me
through recently is jesus’s call to
discipleship
and what he promises um to his disciples
but also what he calls us to
as his disciples as his followers those
that are learning and apprenticing
becoming more
like him as a part of his family so i
wanted to look at luke chapter 9 verses
23 to
a little bit about what he promises and
calls us to so i’ll read it here
luke chapter 9 23 and this is jesus
speaking he said
to all if anyone would come after me let
him deny himself
and take up his cross daily and follow
me for whoever would save his life will
lose it
whoever loses his life for my sake will
save it
for what does it profit a man if he
gains the whole world
and loses or forfeits himself
so jesus is explaining what it looks
like to follow him
and it’s a pretty stark and challenging
call
that we would deny ourselves take up our
cross
daily and follow him and he explains
kind of some of the implications of that
but i think it’s something we need to be
reminded of as followers of jesus that
he didn’t promise us comfort necessarily
in this life he said let him deny
himself
not indulge himself and not take up
an easy and comfortable life but take up
a cross
daily jesus died on the cross to save us
from our sins
and so he says take up your cross daily
it’s like taking up his death
which is our death for those who trust
and believe in jesus
jesus’s death covers our sin and gives
us his righteousness so
we take up his death which is actually
our life
take up our life in christ daily that
came through his death and resurrection
and then follow him so the life is
one of not indulging ourselves
but embracing his life that is through
his death
that’s what it means to follow jesus or
part of what it means
and so he says in verse 24 whoever would
save his life
will lose it whoever loses his life for
my sake
will save it so in in the act of taking
up our cross the cross of jesus
is not that we would die and sort of pay
for our sins but that we take up the
cross that jesus already did it for us
and that his death means our life
embracing that and not trying to hold on
to
what we think our life should be like or
what we want it to be
but embracing the life of jesus and
letting go of our old life
which is our death to sin in the life
that
we were leading apart from or before we
knew jesus our savior
which ultimately would lead to death so
in giving away and denying and letting
go
of our sort of earthly and sin-laden
life
we take up his new life that came
through his death and resurrection on
the cross
so god calls us not to indulge ourselves
but to embrace
his life that came through his death and
follow him
and he promised difficult things to his
followers that because we’re living for
him and not for our pleasures or
embracing our own life but embracing his
the world will
not like that or disagree with us and
not want to
following what we’re doing and so that
there’s not a promise of having an easy
comfortable life necessary but
necessarily but he promises to be with
us
through the whole process at the end of
the great commission in matthew 28
um in verse 20 it says i will be with
you always to the very end of the age as
you’re going about
making more disciples who would know and
follow jesus as well
so i just wanted to encourage and
challenge and remind us that as we’re
following jesus
especially in this difficult time that
he said this is part of what it would be
like it’s
difficult things but that his life is
better than any life we could cultivate
here
and we need to continue to cling to his
death and resurrection on the cross
as our not as a a life of misery but of
a
life of true life and hope and something
that can
draw us into himself and encourage us
today and tomorrow
as we continue to follow in his
footsteps letting go of our old life and
embracing his new life
i just wanted to share that and
encourage us with that this morning
thanks