Week 38 Luke
One day the Lord was speaking to a crowd.
He said that if anyone wanted to follow him there was an if and a then: if any of you wants to be my follower, you must put aside your selfish ambition, shoulder your cross daily, and follow me.
If I don’t want to follow the Lord then there aren’t any requirements. But if I do I have to:
a) set aside my selfish ambitions, and
b) pick up my cross each day.
It’s a short list. Innocent-looking. Kind of ambiguous. Not too complicated. I might think that I don’t really have major selfish ambitions. And I might figure that I do lift up one end of my cross from time to time. But the thing is the Lord’s saying that, unfortunately I’m definitely selfishly ambitious, and I’m clearly cross-reluctant. Both of which get in the way of following. So maybe if I’m a follower my first priority is mulling over what my joe-focused ambitions are, and also try to figure why the cross seems like such a drag on my daily schedule.
Many things about the Lord are pretty appealing. But there’s a no-kidding-around side to him too.
Note: quote from Luke 9:23 (NLT)