Luke 14:25-35
Marked by Christ!
Hindsight is 20/20. At least, that’s what we normally say. It’s immensely easier to look back at a prior struggle and think of all the ways you should have done something different. It’s much easier analyzing a situation when you’re not in it presently. Indeed, it’s like watching a game show on TV. You feel so smart when you can get an answer correct and the contestant gets it wrong. But you don’t have any of the pressures, anxiety, or risks that they have putting a strain on your mind. So too is it with us when we’re dealing with something in the moment. Hindsight is 20/20. But this isn’t always true. While time will inevitably bring some clarity to past struggles, there are many struggles that will never make sense to us. Those poor choices we made as teenagers or in college. The unexpected job loss that never led to anything better. The death of parents, siblings, children, or spouse that ripped a large part of us away. This is what we mean when we say that all of us have crosses to bear. Life will have it’s suffering that won’t make sense to us now or ever. It will be something that won’t have a reason, even though we try to give it one throughout our life. As much as we want there to be a reason for the suffering and pain we face, God never gives us one. Rather, we’re told to just keep marching on. For let us understand what it means to be a Christian.
In our Gospel lesson today, Jesus is blunt with us in our walk towards eternity. It won’t be easy. There’ll be pain and suffering which won’t be explained. Lest we suffer the shame from coming up short, let us count the cost of faith so that we may be well prepared. And so, let us learn today this simple, yet profound truth:
TO BE A CHRISTIAN, YOU MUST BE MARKED BY THE CROSS!
I.
Jesus has never promised us a cushy or easy life if we follow him. He’s always been very straightforward with the warnings about suffering and hardships coming our way. Yet, for the most part, those warnings have been about how the world will treat us... not a demand from Jesus about following him. For I want you to consider our text today in this way. Part of the suffering in life for our faith isn’t just about what the world does to us, but about God stripping away everything we’ve used to replace him. Consider Jesus’ words, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple,” Luke 14:26-27. While we’ve talked before about how family shouldn’t tempt us away from our faith, here, Jesus goes one step farther. We must hate even our own life. It takes a cross to follow Jesus. There’s really no way around it. And these crosses can feel heavy at times. Divisions in the family, trouble at work, problems at school, being ostracized from society... all because of what we believe. These and many others are the crosses we bear for our faith.
For why God allows us to suffer in this or that way particularly, we may never know. However, our general suffering, our taking up our cross has but one purpose. We must crucify this body of sin and death. We must remove every so-called “god” in which we’ve placed our trust so that God alone may reign in our life. It’s the undoing of original sin, the fall of our parents in the flesh. Unlike our original parents, we must thrust aside this desire to be our own god, our desire to know everything and always be in control. For we do this with just a few simple words... “I, a poor miserable sinner, confess unto You all my sins and iniquities.” Let us then count the cost of faith. Even as Jesus says, “For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?” Luke 14:28. Faith costs a lot. It costs your life, your gods, your everything... so are you willing to put all that aside to follow Christ? Are you willing to take up your cross, yielding yourself up to God’s will?
II.
No one may be a Christian who isn’t marked by the cross. The Christian life is cruciform, that is, we’re molded by the cross of Christ! For consider this mark not only in suffering but also in joy! Every person that is baptized is marked with the cross “to mark you as one redeemed by Christ the crucified”! Upon your forehead and upon your heart, Christ marks us with his death to remind us that he has crucified the flesh and its desires for us. In our baptism, Christ has marked us that we may be his, joined with him on his cross. This is the beginning of the Christian life, our entrance into the holy ark of the Christian church. For all our sins have been drowned in the flood of God’s grace and mercy. They have been nailed to the cross of Christ so that we may be free and unburdened. Yes, the cost of faith and salvation is high... for it cost the precious blood of Jesus, the one and only Son of God. He had to suffer, to bear the cross for us, lest we fall short of the goal and encounter nothing but shame. Jesus has counted the cost... and he has paid it all!
While we carry our own cross in this life, let us be reminded to look to the cross of Jesus alone. For the cross we bear has already been taken up by our Lord. Now, amidst our sufferings and hardships, calamities and persecution, we know that there is joy for we’ve been marked by Christ. We bear Jesus upon our heart and our mind that we may not exalt in our own strength or work, but in the Gospel of Christ. As John the Baptist spoke concerning Jesus, “He must increase, but I must decrease,” John 3:30. May we magnify the life of Christ in our sufferings, knowing that Christ has borne them all.
So, let us take up our cross, crucifying the flesh with its passions knowing that we follow Jesus through death unto eternal life! In Jesus’ name! Amen!