free spiritual blessing

Tags: God, Church, Christianity, Jesus, Christ

Date: 06 April 2012 02:48:31

Forty blogs of Lent

39

That's right. Free spiritual blessings are available NOW to my readers. Don't delay, read my blog today. It would be good if Christianity was like that. Do the right thing and be blessed. But sadly it isn't. Never has been. Jesus was clear on this: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” Mark 8:34-35 In Luke's Gospel it is even stronger, we must take up our cross daily. So do we want to be disciples? The word disciple means someone who is disciplined. It isn't about simply agreeing with Jesus' general philosophy. We must do three things if we want to be disciples: 1. deny ourselves, 2. take up our cross, 3. follow Jesus.

1. Deny themselves

This is not an advertisers dream. Nor does it fit in well with popular culture. We are told about the power of positive thinking, believe it and you can have it. In 1969 (I'm showing my age here.) Jimmy Cliff sang "You can get it if you really want." You have to try and try and try but you can get it. Positive thinking backed up with actions. It is easy for the evangelist to be sucked up into this with promises of spiritual benefits now. But I don't see Jesus saying this, he says deny yourself, don't give in to temptation, what is more denying yourself is more than a simple not eating chocolate during Lent, it is lifelong saying that what God wants is more important than what I want. For the early evangelicals, from whom I take a lot of inspiration much in the same way as an Orthodox (big O) Christian would take inspiration from the Church Fathers, it meant different things. William Wilberforce took the Biblical injunction to loose the chains of oppression literally in regards to slavery. Lord Saftesbury fought for the rights of industrial workers and set up children's homes. We talk of them as great reformers now, but hindsight is a great thing, it was much, much harder when they were alive.

2. Take up their cross

[Jesus said.] 'A slave is not greater than the master.' Since they persecuted me, naturally they will persecute you. John 15:20 All who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution 2 Tim. 3:12. Happy are you when people insult you and harass you and speak all kinds of bad and false things about you, all because of me. Be full of joy and be glad, because you have a great reward in heaven. In the same way, people harassed the prophets who came before you. Matthew 5:11-12 Jesus did'nt promise a good life to his followers. To use a phrase Rev Calvert Prentis used in a recent sermon at Holy Trinity Church, Huddersfield, Jesus "told it like it is." If they persecuted Jesus they will persecute you too, he told it like it is. You will be persecuted. If you want to be his disciple you have to take up your cross. The cross means torture. Not a nice thought. But think about it, this is olympic year, thousands of athletes are denying themselves in order to win a medal. No pain no gain. We have a prize much greater than a bit of gold plated metal. We should daily discipline ourselves so that we don't lose our prize in heaven.

3. Follow me.

When Jesus took up his cross, where was he going? To death. Jesus said, "Take up your cross and follow me." Following jesus means death. For some this is literal. There has been persecution and execution for being a Christian ever since the church began. But even if it does not mean a literal death for us we have to die to self. So when you are insulted or disappointed, there you can dig deep and die to self, die to ego, die to sin. It is something we are faced with daily. This is as much a note to self as it it to anyone else. If I took my own advice on this I would have to spend a lot less time apologising. It is Good Friday. May we follow Jesus to the cross.