(Text and Audio)
Title: Self-Crucifixion, Part One
(Assign Exodus 12:5 and Romans 12:1)
What are some ways in which we make sacrifices in order to achieve a desired result? (Take answers.)
-We sacrifice time with our family to provide a better living for them.
-We sacrifice time and physical comfort to stay in better shape.
-We sacrifice food we like to be healthier.
The Opening Statement: “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.”
This is such a powerful verse in and of itself that it was one of the verses that Viktor Kuligan chose for his book “10 Things I Wish Jesus Never Said.” Which, as most of you know, I’ve taught through in various studies several times, in fact, that very book is what we are currently studying on Wednesday nights here at Heritage. Not only that, but we just concluded the chapter in Kuligan’s work which was based on this very verse. Kuligan appropriately entitled that chapter “The Art of Spiritual Self-Crucifixion.” And, of course, I borrowed that terminology for part one of series in this passage.
This isn’t a sermon series where the exegetical work will reveal some insights in the original language. What Jesus says here is rather direct and not very mysterious. Where it becomes a monster passage is in how deeply we apply these concepts to our lives, and that is why I’m going to encourage you to think personally and specifically about how these next few messages apply to you.
I think to properly understand and apply what Jesus is and is not saying here we need to do a few things.
First, question, “What does it mean to deny ourselves?”
Second Question, “What does it mean to take up the cross of Jesus?”
These are very common questions to Christians, and most of us in this room have wrestled with both of these questions at some point in the past. The challenge I’d like to offer this morning is to attempt to teach as specifically as possible about each of these questions and challenge you individually in this way:
Two notes before we begin:
First: What I’m about to teach will be personal to each of you. We each have strengths and weaknesses in our walks with Christ. For some of you, you will look at some of these areas and you will be honestly able to say, “I think I’m doing well in that area…” But it is also quite possible that the person next to you may be squirming in their seat with agony over what they know is their lack of fully turning that area of their life over to the Lord.
Second: This is a series. Not all of your questions will be fully answered today, but my prayer is that they will be by the time we wrap this passage up a few weeks from now. As always, there will be plenty of time for Q&A at the end of the sermon, but, unlike some weeks, there may be a question or two where I will grin and say, “That’s a great question, but let’s wait and see if it gets answered next week.”
I’m planning on handling this unbelievable passage in a series of shorter, but extremely challenging messages. I’m doing that because I want you all to really stew in what we will discuss, I want to let it sit you with, and that may be uncomfortable, but extremely necessary for our lives as well.
Part One: A look at the language
“If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.”
Before we begin diving into the specifics, I just want to take a moment, with the verse outlined with some color, to explain what Jesus wants to happen here.
First, we see the “Me” in green representing Jesus, representing what is good, what it good for us.
Next, in red, we see the word “himself” representing the bad, the thing that needs to be denied, to be discarded.
The result, then, is that “his cross” (again in green) becomes our own. In other words, we own our Cross. What we crucify is BOTH universal and personal.
How?
Exodus 12:5 Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year. You may take it from the sheep or from the goats.
Romans 12:1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.
We universally all crucify the sin in our lives. We sacrifice and discard what is not pleasing to God, so that when we place ourselves on the altar, as a sacrifice, we are then without blemish.
Imagine a New York Strip Steak.
(Show image)
(Now, I want to remind all of you at this point that your pastor is not being mean, I’m not trying to torture you with this picture. But I will take this opportunity to remind you of the potluck luncheon immediately following service.)
Can we eat this as it is?
What would you do to this steak before eating it?
What all would you do to this steak before ingesting into your body for fuel and pleasure?
Remember, you want this to be presented as the perfect steak, so you discard, you cut off what is not nutritious for you. Now, you could fry up that fat and eat it, and that fat will taste good, but it will it be good for you?
What happens to you (particularly over time) if you continue to just eat the fat?
Q: So how then, is our self-crucifixion also very personal? (Take answers.)
A: Because WHAT we sacrifice can be very different from believer to believer. Your particular sin, may not be something I necessarily struggle with, and vice versa. No one is arguing the fact that we all have sin, but that sin manifests itself differently in each of us. That is why Jesus tells to personally take up our cross in order to follow him.
In other words, salvation and sanctification can not be reduced to a few rules that we are all to follow, boxes that we each check off, sacraments and church duties that we are to perform in order to be right with God.
No, friends, it is far more personal than that. It is far more challening than that. We have to first look at and understand the perfect image of Jesus and then look at ourselves, see what the perfect, sinless sacrifice looked like, so that we begin the process of cutting away what is sin in our lives.
(Pray)