Mark 8:34-35.

Nate Schlomann

[0:00] This morning we are continuing a summer series today called Anchors, where we’re [0:04] looking at key verses from Scripture that anchor our faith, and I’m excited [0:07] to be sharing with you this morning a few verses from Mark that have done just [0:11] that from me. We have an issue of authority in America, and I think really [0:17] it’s human nature in general, but our culture is suffering from this [0:21] specifically right now. Everyone wants to be able to define every part of life in

[0:26] their own terms, and we don’t want any outside authority telling us what to do. [0:31] So you hear things like, this is right for me, or this is my truth, and that kind [0:36] of creeps into faith, and you hear things like, this is who Jesus is to me, or this [0:40] is how I see God, and we don’t want to submit to any outside authority that [0:44] would tell us, this is how reality really is, regardless of how you feel about it, [0:48] this is real. We don’t like that because who gets to decide what is reality, who

[0:53] gets to decide whose authority counts? That’s always what the question of [0:58] authority comes down to, is who gets to decide. And Christianity is based on the [1:03] idea that God has spoken and he has revealed himself, and that he can be [1:07] known because he has told us who he is. So God’s revealed himself personally to [1:12] Israel, to the prophets, through the scriptures, and ultimately he’s revealed [1:15] himself through Jesus and through the scriptural testimony about Jesus. So

[1:20] here’s how we get to our anchor verse this morning. I think for faith to become [1:24] real, for it to become lived, for it to become the kind of thing that changes us, [1:29] at some point we all have to be confronted with the truth of Jesus’ [1:32] authority, and who he is, and what he has asked of us to become his followers. Who [1:39] does Jesus really say he is? What does he really want from us if we’re his [1:43] followers, if we’re Christians? What does that mean for our lives? So the big idea

[1:48] this morning is this, if scripture is true about who Jesus is and what Jesus [1:53] said about following him, it makes no sense to ignore what he said and to keep [1:58] on living life as usual, because Jesus says some things in these verses that [2:02] we’re about to look at that really are pretty radical, and we’ve got to be [2:06] changed by this if we are his followers. So let’s get right to the text. This is [2:10] Jesus speaking in Mark 8, 34 through 35. He said,

[2:18] He said to them,

[2:32] So what does it mean to be a Christian? We like to say it means that we’re [2:37] followers of Jesus. We like to say that being a Christian means that God has [2:40] saved us. You see both of those right there in that passage. Followers of [2:43] Jesus, God has saved us. But what does that actually mean? Jesus has some [2:48] specific and hard things to say here about what following him looks like. And [2:53] we have an amazing capacity to just move past a text like this and not

[2:57] consider fully what it means or what we need to do about it as far as our lives [3:01] go. We don’t want to deal with text like this. It’s a very jolting verse when you [3:05] consider what is being said, and you can’t just explain it away as an [3:09] exaggeration of Jesus. He says that in order to follow him, we have to deny [3:13] ourselves, we have to take up our cross, and we have to lose our life for his [3:16] sake and for the gospel’s sake. And we can’t just move past this text. Either we

[3:21] obey this, we care about the things that it says, or we don’t really have the [3:24] faith that we claim that we have. Because the thing about a verse like this is it [3:28] has to mean something. It has to mean something. Think about this. Even if it [3:32] doesn’t mean that we literally have to lose our physical life, if Jesus’ point [3:37] is that we have to do something that’s like losing our life, that’s still a [3:40] pretty huge deal. That should still stop us in our tracks and say I need to

[3:44] understand what Jesus, who I claim is my Lord, my King, is saying in this verse. [3:49] You don’t just move past a text like this without understanding it. That’s [3:54] why this has been an anchor verse for me. This is a verse that confronts us [3:57] with the authority of who Jesus is when he says we have to lose our life to [4:02] follow him. And there was a time for me when I came to this verse, and I realized [4:07] that whatever was happening in my Christian life, I knew it didn’t look

[4:10] like that. I knew that there was no way I could justify to myself that I was [4:13] losing my life for Christ. And either I needed to start doing that, to start [4:18] working on figuring out what it means and how do I lose my life for Christ, or [4:22] else I need to give up this game that I’m actually following Jesus because he [4:25] clearly says that I’m not. So this is a verse where Jesus is basically saying [4:30] you’re either following me or not and there’s no sitting on the fence. So this

[4:35] morning what we’re gonna do is we’re gonna look at Mark 8, 34 and 35 and at [4:38] what Jesus means when he says we have to lose our life to save it. But first I [4:43] want to set the context for us a little bit and make one important note about [4:47] when Jesus is making this statement. The context of this is we find Jesus [4:53] challenging his disciples with this teaching at the near the end of his [4:57] public ministry. You find the same basic account actually in Matthew and Luke and

[5:03] also in Mark here. And Jesus is nearing the end of his public ministry so he’s [5:06] been teaching for a long time, he’s been healing people, he’s been performing [5:09] miracles, he’s been living with the disciples pretty much for two and a half [5:13] years. And now it’s time for the disciples to decide if they’re really [5:17] going to follow him. And so right before this, Jesus asked the disciples who they [5:22] think he is and in Mark 8, 29 we see their response from Peter. It says Peter

[5:28] answered and said you are the Christ. So the disciples confess yes Jesus is God. [5:34] He is the Son of God, he is God. And the next thing that happens in all these [5:38] accounts and all the Gospels is that Jesus then says you’re right that’s who [5:41] I am and I’m gonna die and I’m gonna rise again in three days. And so right [5:45] after that Peter kind of pulls you aside and says hey Jesus you gotta cut that out. [5:50] This is not a good look for us. You’re our leader, you’re saying you’re gonna

[5:53] die. This is not looking good for our little group here, you got to stop that. [5:56] And Jesus after he gets done calling Peter Satan for that, he turns to all the [6:01] disciples and he says no you don’t know what a good look is for us. In fact, and [6:05] that’s when you see this Mark 8, 34 and 35, in fact you need to deny yourself, [6:09] you need to take up your cross and follow me, and you need to lose your [6:12] life just like I’m gonna lose mine. So that’s the context of this verse and

[6:17] it’s decision time for them at that point. And the point that I don’t want us [6:20] to miss here is there’s a reason that these challenging verses we’re gonna [6:23] look at this morning, they come right after Peter’s confession that Jesus is [6:28] God. Because if Jesus is God, that truth changes everything. It’s something we [6:32] talk all the time about here at Village Church. And so Jesus responds in light of [6:37] that confession, yes Jesus is God. And Jesus responds that if that’s true, if

[6:41] he is God, it only makes sense that the disciples better be willing to give [6:45] their lives up in order to follow him. If Jesus is God, we can’t keep living life [6:50] as usual. If Jesus is willing to lose his life, we better be willing to lose ours. [6:55] And so now let’s look and see what it is that Jesus means when he says we have [6:59] to lose our life to follow him. So back to Mark 834. The first thing that we [7:05] see there is one part of losing our life to follow Jesus is to deny yourself. It

[7:09] says, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself. So my first point this [7:15] morning is that losing your life requires denying yourself. So what do [7:20] you have to deny about yourself in order to follow Jesus? Notice that Jesus [7:25] isn’t talking about denying specific things. This is not a call to do without [7:30] material possessions, though that could come later as a part of the application [7:33] of what he’s saying. But Jesus’ call here is much different. He’s calling the

[7:38] disciples and he says anyone who would come after him to deny their very [7:42] self. This is about denying what we want. It’s about denying our desires, denying [7:48] the plans that we’ve made for ourselves apart from following Jesus. Following [7:52] Jesus is going to mean that we give up desires and goals and plans that don’t [7:56] align with living for Christ. And the reality is that tends to be a whole lot [8:00] of things when we’ve built a pretty big life apart from Jesus by the time most

[8:05] of us come to this verse and are truly confronted by it. Denying ourselves is [8:10] part of the way we lose our life for Jesus because it means letting go of the [8:14] life that we had and letting our old life die so that we can live a new life [8:18] in Jesus. And that sounds nice, letting our old life die, living a new life in [8:22] Jesus sounds nice until we actually have to give things up. And I think more [8:28] than anything, denying ourself means putting every part of our lives on the

[8:32] table for God to change. It means being willing to say no to anything that’s [8:36] taking us away from the mission of Jesus. That requires a great deal of honesty [8:41] with ourselves and a great deal of self-awareness and that’s hard. And so [8:46] usually we don’t fully consider how much of our old life really needs to be [8:50] denied to follow Jesus. Denying yourself has a lot to do with the key [8:56] discipleship concept that we have to prioritize the mission of Jesus and

[9:00] being and building the church. See we can mentally agree that nothing matters [9:05] more than seeing souls come to faith and we can mentally agree that the way [9:09] that happens is when we practice practically being and building the [9:13] church. It’s God’s gathered and scattered people. That’s God’s plan for [9:17] reaching the world. We can mentally agree to that but the difference between that [9:21] and actually making the hard choices to prioritize that are two very

[9:25] different things. And so saying yes to something in our lives is saying no to a [9:30] whole host of other things. And Jesus’s teaching here that a key part of [9:34] following him is understanding and learning that we’ve got to say no to a [9:37] lot of other things and deny things in our lives so that we can say yes to [9:41] Jesus and his mission. As much as we want to avoid it, the kind of denying [9:46] yourself Jesus calls out in this passage requires giving things up. How

[9:52] can we honestly say that we’re losing our life for Jesus if we’re not giving [9:55] up anything to follow him? His teaching here is clear. In order to follow Jesus [10:00] we have to be able to look at our life and identify what it is that we’re [10:04] giving up to follow him. So what part of your life are you letting die so that [10:08] you can live the life Jesus is calling you to? If we can’t answer that question, [10:12] if we have no thoughts about that, if we have no way to articulate that

[10:16] concept of letting parts of our life die so we can live Jesus’s life, then [10:19] we’re not following him. Giving up your desires and denying yourself is only [10:25] half of turning and following Jesus. So that’s stopping your movement away from [10:29] him. But the second part of Jesus’s call here in 834 is to start doing something [10:35] else. It’s to start moving towards him and it’s just as challenging. Jesus says [10:39] in Mark 834 to take up your cross and follow me. So the next thing I want us

[10:44] to see in these verses is that losing your life means living for Jesus. This is [10:48] the flip side of denying yourself. Losing your life means living for Jesus. [10:54] There’s a movement towards Jesus that is required in this call when he says take [10:58] up your cross and follow me. We generally just like the follow me part and we [11:03] don’t want to consider what the taking up your cross part means. And it must [11:07] mean something. This is not an incidental phrase that Jesus just threw in there

[11:10] for the heck of it. He’s telling his disciples something specifically about [11:14] what following him looks like when he says take up your cross and follow me. [11:19] He’s teaching here on how to follow him. And this is one of those places again [11:23] where that issue of authority pops up because we want to define for ourselves [11:27] what following Jesus looks like. We like the idea of following Jesus as long as [11:32] we’re the ones that get to decide what that means. So we end up with the Jesus

[11:36] who taught some great things. We even believe that he was God’s son. We believe [11:40] that he rose again. We believe he did miracles. It all sounds great. So [11:45] following him sounds like a great idea. And that kind of following him then [11:49] leads to an idea that following him means we’re a Christian. It means we’re [11:53] moral. If we’re really good we do some church stuff. But other than that we get [11:56] to define what following Jesus means. But Jesus is the one with the authority to

[12:03] And in this text he says following him means taking up your cross. And so we’ve got to care and know what does that mean to take up our cross.

[12:14] Realize that to the audience Jesus was talking to a cross was a very specific thing. [12:18] They didn’t have all the religious connotations of the cross that we have now. [12:21] The cross means something very different to us now because we’re on the other [12:24] side of the cross. Jesus has been to the cross. We see this I don’t know about you [12:28] I think of love when I see the cross right. I mean it’s ingrained in us and [12:32] that’s a good thing. So the people Jesus was talking to he hadn’t gone to the

[12:36] cross yet. The cross was a method of torture and a death sentence to them. And [12:41] so for them the idea of taking up your cross was a symbol of active sacrifice [12:46] and dying. Something that they had to do to lead to dying. And realize this whole [12:51] set of verses. Jesus’ whole big point here is he’s trying to get across if you [12:56] want to follow me and find life you have to lose your old life. So taking up [13:01] our cross is an active sacrifice that we pursue for the mission of Jesus that

[13:06] causes us to lose our old life. We’ll see the same concept later from the Apostle [13:11] Paul. He in 2nd Corinthians 515 he’ll write this when he says of Jesus. [13:16] And he died for all that those who live might no longer live for themselves but [13:21] for him who for their sake died and was raised. We’ve got this idea of no longer [13:26] us who living but now we’re living Christ’s life. Losing your life means [13:31] living for Jesus instead of yourself. And this is the essential flip side of

[13:35] denying yourself. What are you denying yourself for? Jesus isn’t asking us to [13:39] give up our old life just to prove our devotion as if he wants us to suffer to [13:44] prove our love for him. No Jesus is asking us to give up our old life [13:47] because he intends to use our lives for his plans and purposes. So taking up our [13:52] cross is sacrificing for the mission of Jesus. What does that look like in our [13:57] lives? How do we practically take up our cross? A few thoughts here. We have to know

[14:03] what Jesus asked us to do in order to sacrifice for him. So part of taking up [14:08] our cross means choosing to obey Scripture no matter what. And again this [14:13] theme this morning that sounds nice but the idea of choosing to obey Scripture [14:17] no matter what is completely meaningless unless we also commit to [14:21] knowing Scripture. So there’s a lot of sacrifice involved in that. We have to [14:25] sacrifice to get Scripture into us, to read it, to study it, to put ourselves in

[14:30] environments where we can know what it is that Jesus is asking of us. I can’t [14:35] think of anything more important than that because every other practical [14:37] application of sacrificing for God and his mission is going to just be an [14:41] application of Scripture. So taking up our cross to follow Jesus also looks [14:45] like serving. Serving requires sacrifice. It can’t be done just in our spare time [14:51] when nothing better comes up. Taking up our cross means prioritizing discipleship

[14:57] in our lives. Are we being discipled? Are we discipling others? We have to sacrifice. [15:01] It’s not just going to happen again in our spare time. If we have a family [15:06] taking up our cross means prioritizing discipling our family. It means loving them. [15:10] It means doing the things that need to be done to see them flourish and that [15:14] take sacrifice. Taking up our cross means sacrificing to build the church [15:19] because the church is God’s plan for mission. It means serving and being

[15:23] present and believing God that the gathered church is more important than [15:28] most anything else we could be doing with our lives. Taking up our cross means [15:33] seeing the world through the lens of mission and that takes an active [15:36] sacrifice of time that none of us think that we have. So Jesus’ basic call in [15:43] this. If you’re going to have to start saying no to your old life that [15:47] was all about yourself so that you can start saying yes to a new life that’s

[15:51] all about me. That’s how you lose your life. Then in Mark 835 Jesus gets right [15:57] to the big point that he’s trying to make. He says for whoever would save his [16:01] life will lose it but whoever loses his life for my sake and the Gospels will [16:07] save it. So there’s one key aspect to this that Jesus throws in the mix here [16:12] in verse 35 that really does change this whole conversation. He doesn’t just [16:16] leave this as some noble act of self-sacrifice for a greater cause where

[16:20] we need to lose our life. Rather God loves us. God wants the best for us and [16:24] Jesus knows that the big truth is losing your life is the only way to save it. [16:29] That’s a profound and life-altering truth if we’ll let that get into us. Losing [16:35] your life is the only way to save it. What we’ve talked about today it might [16:40] sound heavy, it might sound like a big ask. Jesus says we need to lose our life. [16:43] That’s about big of an ask as you can get but if you can get a moment of

[16:49] clarity here you’ll realize that what Jesus offers is a life raft. It’s your [16:53] way out. It’s your only way out. Here’s some basic Orthodox Christian doctrine [16:58] for you. The life that you’ve built for yourself apart from the mission of Jesus [17:02] that life is a waste. It’s meaningless. There’s really nothing of any [17:08] significance in light of eternity in your life. Even all the good things that [17:11] you think that you have will be gone pretty soon and then you’ll die and

[17:15] statistics show that almost all your great-grandchildren won’t know your [17:19] first name. So that’s the reality of our life and on top of all that we’re [17:24] sinners and no one is currently busy trying to mess up our lives worse than [17:27] we are. But the good news is that God’s story is not meaningless. He’s the [17:33] creator, he’s the sustainer. All of history is headed towards bringing God [17:37] glory and we have to realize we’re much much better off playing an

[17:41] insignificant, unremarkable part in God’s story than we are trying to write our [17:45] own story. We’re much better off being faithful, unnamed extras in God’s story [17:50] than we are trying to be the hero of our own story because one of those stories [17:54] is real and will last forever and the other story dies with us. And so our only [17:59] hope in getting out of our own way is following Jesus and following what he’s [18:05] doing. So Jesus’ call to lose our life, it sounds hard but it’s a call to hope if

[18:11] we really understand what our life really is. Living for yourself will [18:15] always ultimately fail. Hoarding your life for yourself will always ultimately [18:20] leave you empty because you can’t keep it but living for God will always [18:24] ultimately succeed. Giving your life for others to know God will always leave you [18:28] full because it’s the only thing that truly lasts. So we have to lose our life [18:33] to save it. It’s an amazing truth. It’s a truth that leaves us with the decision

[18:39] to make. If you’ve never wrestled with that, if you’ve not thought about it, you [18:43] need to but so I hope that that happens. I hope that we’re wrestling with the [18:47] thought of have I really lost my life? Is that really what Jesus is calling you? I [18:52] hope if you’re submitting to the authority of Scripture you agree, yes [18:55] Jesus is clearly calling me to lose my life but I know a large part of us this [19:00] morning does agree with that. You do submit to Scripture. You do have faith in

[19:04] Jesus. You do agree that losing your life is the best way to save it but you [19:10] wonder how can I know if I’m really doing that? That’s the question. How do I [19:15] know if I am really losing my life? How can I learn to lose my life to save it? [19:21] And so I want to run through some quick thoughts on that this morning. You know [19:26] you’re losing your life when you can’t go back but if you’re playing this game [19:31] of having one foot in your old life and one foot in your new life you’re not

[19:35] losing your life and so I think I know as I’m pastoring people and discipling [19:40] them one thing that comes up quite a bit is you need to make some hard changes [19:44] and hard moves that make it impossible to go back to your old life. So what [19:49] needs to happen to cut off the possibility of going back? You need to

[20:01] stop looking at your old life. You’re losing your life when your life looks [20:06] weird. If your life looks a lot like your nominal Christian neighbors who say [20:12] that they’re Christians but know anything about the mission of Jesus and [20:15] aren’t building the local church that’s not good. Your life needs to look a [20:21] little weird to people that you’re not going to be able to see. You’re going to [20:23]

[20:23] This is a real struggle for a lot of us and I realize that. You’re too afraid of [20:28] looking weird to people whose scriptures say are fools because they don’t believe [20:32] Jesus is God and you’re not going to figure out how to lose your life until [20:36] you just frankly get over that. We’ve got to be okay looking weird to a world that [20:42] doesn’t believe Jesus is God. If Jesus is God it changes everything. You know [20:48] you’re losing your life when you don’t settle for good enough. I can’t tell you

[20:51] how many people I’ve run into pastorally in the last 10 years of pastoral [20:56] ministry who are just content and settled for good enough in their [21:01] Christian walk and they’ve come a long way admittedly. I don’t even disagree [21:05] with that from where they were but now they’re good enough. They don’t need to [21:09] study God’s Word. They don’t need to learn more because they’re good enough. [21:13] They know they could disciple their kids more but they feel like they turned out

[21:17] so it’s good enough. It could go on and on. Don’t be satisfied with a good enough [21:23] life following Jesus. That’s not losing your life. I think Jesus’s teaching about [21:27] losing your life is a direct challenge to that kind of thinking. If you’re aware [21:31] of an area, any area where you need to grow in and there are many for each of [21:35] us, there’s no good enough when it comes to laying our life down and following [21:39] Jesus. We always want more of his life and less of our own. I think one of the

[21:46] ways you can know you’re losing your life is when your life is arranged and [21:49] organized around being and building the church. I’ve touched on this a few times [21:53] already this morning. It’s a whole other sermon to really talk about what being [21:57] and building the church is but that is God’s plan for mission. We are the church [22:01] and we have to actively build the church and that means both building up the [22:05] people of the church and it means mission and evangelism that adds people

[22:09] to the church. I think there’s something really significant there in Mark 835. [22:13] Jesus didn’t just say lose our life for his sake. He also added and the [22:19] Gospels and so the issue of authority comes up again because we want to [22:23] define even when we get to this point we want to define what losing our life [22:27] looks like. So we can assent that yes we need to lose our life for Jesus and [22:31] then we want to define what that looks like but Jesus hasn’t allowed us to do

[22:35] that. He’s telling us what losing our life looks like. It means living for his [22:39] sake and the Gospels. That means living for what Jesus cares about. He cares [22:43] about the Gospel, the good news of his death and resurrection that reconciles [22:47] us to God and that good news is what builds the church. So he’s telling us [22:52] here where to put our focus. He’s saying being and building the church can’t just [22:57] be the priority of the pastors and a few super Christians. It’s everyone who’s a

[23:01] follower of Jesus needs to be about him and the Gospel, being and building the [23:06] church. We’re all called to pour our lives out to see people, the people of [23:10] God flourish and see the Gospel proclaim through the church. Finally, and [23:16] maybe this is most important, I think that you’re losing your life when you [23:20] actively seek to submit to and obey scripture. Ultimately this morning is [23:25] about submitting to God’s authority and his word and we play games with God’s

[23:29] word far too often. We say it’s too complicated, it’s not too complicated. We [23:34] say it’s too hard to understand, it’s not too hard to understand. Someone who’s [23:38] losing their life for Christ is not passive about obeying God’s word. We do [23:43] what we have to do to learn it more. We care about the implications of what it [23:47] says. We don’t look for loopholes on how to get by with the least amount of [23:52] obedience possible in submission to God’s word. Losing our life means we’re

[23:56] active in seeking to submit to and to obey scripture. So I think that’s a [24:02] really important part of seeking to lose your life. Do you just wait for scripture [24:06] to be fed to you or are you active to go get it? We’ve seen that losing your [24:12] life is first about denying yourself, it’s about turning from your old life, [24:16] and then the second thing losing your life is about is taking up your cross [24:19] and following, so it’s an active movement towards God and sacrifice for him and

[24:23] his mission. So Jesus teaches that it’s both about what you turn from and stop [24:28] doing and it’s what you turn towards and start doing, but what we need to be [24:32] careful about is taking this teaching and turning it into some kind of work [24:36] based formula of give up these things and do these things and you’ll be good [24:41] with God because that’s not his intention here. At the end of the day [24:44] Jesus is teaching about self-denial and active sacrifice which is absolutely in

[24:48] this text, it’s not about getting you to do more Christian stuff. That’s a [24:53] byproduct of a changed heart and that’s evidence of a changed heart, but Jesus’ [24:57] goal is a changed heart and the danger here is that there’s a way to do a lot [25:02] things for Jesus without actually losing your life for him. There’s a way [25:06] to deny a few things to check off the deny box, there’s a way to sacrifice a [25:10] few things to check off the sacrifice box and not actually have a heart

[25:14] change of losing your life for God. One of the biggest ways I think we know that [25:20] we’ve really lost our lives for Jesus is when you’re living differently and [25:24] serving God, not because of any obligation or commitment, but because it’s [25:29] what you truly want to be doing because you believe it’s the best way to be [25:33] spending your life and you know you really believe it when you’re doing that [25:36] joyfully, not out of obligation, not out of commitment, that’s how you know you

[25:40] believe it. I think you can tell a big difference between a person who owns the [25:44] mission of Jesus as their own life mission and someone who’s just checking [25:47] off religious tasks. That doesn’t mean that sacrifice is always fun, but I will [25:51] tell you sacrifice should not be a burden when you’re sacrificing for [25:55] something greater. Haven’t you met people who sacrifice a lot for God and it [25:58] doesn’t seem to be a burden for them? It doesn’t mean it’s easy, but it’s not a burden.

[26:02] It’s because they really believe that that’s the way to true life. So when the [26:07] mission of Jesus is your life mission also, you’re always about it. You [26:12] don’t have to be told to serve, you don’t have to be told to disciple, you [26:16] don’t have to be told to learn more about God, you don’t have to be told to [26:19] have different priorities in the world with your family and your career and [26:23] your education and your hobbies and your leisure and your money, you don’t have to

[26:26] be told any of this when you’re losing your life for God. That’s the life that [26:31] you want, that’s his life. The call to lose your life is a clarifying [26:36] challenge and it should be challenging to us. There’s no option to halfway [26:40] follow here. Jesus doesn’t say if you lose some of your life, you’ll save some [26:44] of your life. For the disciples this was either you’re with me or you’re not and [26:49] it’s supposed to be the same thing too if we come to the text seriously with

[26:52] the authority that it’s supposed to have. We have to lose our life to truly [26:58] find our life in God. If Jesus isn’t God, we’re wasting our time playing around [27:02] with religion, but if Jesus is God then what he says here has to be taken [27:06] seriously. So this is a hard challenge and it’s supposed to be hard. If it [27:12] doesn’t challenge you when Jesus says things like this, that’s when I’m [27:14] concerned. That’s when I’m a little bit worried about you. If you come to

[27:17] passages like this and aren’t challenged, this is supposed to mean something to [27:22] us. So I challenge you to be challenged. You know, make sure that this text is [27:26] challenging you, but some of you I know in this room are overwhelmed by this [27:30] challenge because you do take it seriously and you I’m not worried about. [27:34] I’m really not, but I do want to encourage you. Don’t get hung up on all [27:38] the details of the scope of the mission that God has called us to. Remember that

[27:42] this is ultimately about a changed heart, but do do feel this as God’s gracious [27:47] hug to move you with him. Think about taking a step. Figure out the step that [27:53] you need to take. Identify where God is working and move to lose more of your [27:57] life. That needs to be a lifelong posture. The grace of God is not an excuse that [28:04] allows us to stay where we are. God’s grace is the thing that lifts the [28:07] weights off our back and allows us to truly move towards him. If this feels

[28:12] overwhelming to you like you can’t do it, of course you don’t measure up to what [28:16] Jesus is asking of you here. That’s the whole point. You need his life, not your [28:20] own. So working on losing our lives for the sake of Jesus and for his gospel is [28:26] a task that will consume us for the rest of our life. We’ll never fully arrive, but [28:31] we do need to have this as our goal and our direction. We need to keep striving [28:35] to lose our life more and more and more. That is what followers of Jesus do. That’s

[28:39] what Christians do. So as the band comes up this morning, we’re gonna move into [28:45] communion. We take communion each and every week here at Village Church. And the tables [28:50] are open to you if you’re a follower of Jesus. The bread represents Christ’s body [28:55] broken for you. The juice represents Christ’s blood and his life coming into [29:00] you. It’s a great time to reflect on what we’ve talked about this morning. This is [29:06] Jesus’s life. You need to let your old life die. You need to take Jesus’s new life

[29:11] into you. That’s the life you want. Lose your life for that. So with that, when you’re ready, [29:16] please come and take communion.