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"For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it. {25} What does it profit them if they gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit themselves? {26} Those who are ashamed of me and of my words, of them the Son of Man will be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels."
(Luke 9:24-26 NRSV)
The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others. He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces. He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else. For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those playthings that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understand all about it.
"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"
"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become real."
"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.
"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."
"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"
"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't often happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."
This short excerpt from "The Velveteen Rabbit" illustrates much concerning the Christian life and how it becomes real and evident in us. The human nature and the secular world compel us to seek our own advancement and welfare. There is nothing of greater importance than the securing of one's own happiness. In opposition to this philosophy of life is where we find God. It is His way for us to seek the advancement of His Kingdom and the welfare of His children, setting aside the pursuit of our own happiness. While this way is in contradiction to our nature, it is the only way for a child of God to act. We are to pursue holiness and Christ-likeness at all cost even to the point of giving up our temporal existence. In so doing, we make evident our position in the Kingdom of Heaven. However, as we become more like Christ, as we become more real, to those who do not understand, we become ugly and undesirable. Just as Christ was ". . . despised and rejected by others; a man of suffering and acquainted with infirmity; and as one from whom others hide their faces he was despised, and we held him of no account." (Isa 53:3 NRSV), so we too, if we are striving to be like Christ, will become despised and rejected by others.
This is the principle of discipleship. And it is one which has been forgotten in the church for too long. We have the opinion that to be a Christian simply means to avoid doing in public those things which are not socially acceptable and to be a spectator at the weekly worship service. We try to maintain our secular life of work and friends seperated and unaffected by our spiritual life. We attempt to do what the Bible calls the saving of oneself. We place the importance of our own temporal happiness over and above the importance of becoming like Christ. That is why Jesus said "For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it. {25} What does it profit them if they gain the whole world, but lose or forfeit themselves? {26} Those who are ashamed of me and of my words, of them the Son of Man will be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels." (Luke 9:24-26 NRSV)
There are several paths an individual may take on their journey through life. The majority of those paths claim to seek the betterment of the self. They say "travel my way, and you will find happiness." These are the ways of vanity. In his book Pilgrims Progress, John Bunyan writes about a fair called Vanity-Fair, at which "are all such merchandizes sold, as houses, lands, trades, places, honours, preferments, titles, countries, kingdoms, lusts, pleasures; and delights of all sorts, as whores, bawds, wives, husbands, children, masters, servants, lives, blood, bodies, souls, silver, gold, pearls, precious stones, and what not." I daresay that there is at least one item in that list, if not a multitude, that has become for every person his or her own pursuit. And while these paths claim to lead to happiness none of them lead to holiness and all of them lead to ultimate destruction.
Of all the paths that we can take only one way is the true way to eternal happiness and that is the way of Christlikeness. Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote: "Just as Christ is Christ only in virtue of His suffering and rejection, so the disciple is a disciple only in so far as he shares his Lord's suffering and rejection and crucifixion. Discipleship means adherence to the person of Jesus, and therefore submission to the Law of Christ which is the Law of the cross."
As you attempt to decide which way is for you, I'd like to tell you a little about each way. First there is "The Way of Failure". Let's look at a familiar scripture together, Matthew 16:21-23.
Matthew tells us that at a certain point ". . . Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. {22} And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, "God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you." {23} But he turned and said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things."" (Matt 16:21-23 NRSV)
Matthew Poole expands on this statement of Jesus with this paraphrase of Christ's response to Peter:
Peter, thou thinkest that by this discourse thou showest some kindness unto me, like a friend, but thou art in this way an advesary to me. . .. Get thee behind me, I abominate such advice. I told thee I must suffer. It was the determinate counsel of God; it is my Father's will. He is mine enemy that dissaudeth me from a free and cheerful obediance to it. I will hear no more such discourse. For thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men. . .. Thou thinkest not of, or thou understandest not, the things that be of God, that is the counsels of God in this matter, as to the redemption of mankind: thou considerest me only as thy Master and thy Friend, and wouldst have no harm come to me; thou dost not mind or think of me as the Saviour of the world, or the Redeemer of mankind, which cannot be redeemed otherwise than by my death."
The failure of every way that leads to destruction rest in the fact that, while on that path, those who take it think about themselves and their own temporal happiness and not about God and His will for their lives. A. W. Tozer said, "We are called to an everlasting preoccupation with God." But as we travel through vanity fair we are consumed with an everlasting preoccupation with self. We become enamored with securing our happiness, success, and wealth. We spend far too many hours working for perishable things, and far too few in the pursuit of that which is in-perishable. Paul tells us "God did not call us to impurity but in holiness." (1 Th 4:7 NRSV) And He instructed Timothy ". . . as for you, man of God, shun all this; pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, gentleness." (1 Tim 6:11 NRSV)
Therefore instead of following "The Way of Failure" by setting our minds on human things, we, if we desire to know God and have Him claim us as His own, must follow "The Way of Christ" by setting our minds on divine things. In other words, we are to as Paul says ". . . become imitators . . . of the Lord . . .." (1 Th 1:6 NRSV)
The question is what way did Christ take? He tells us, "My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work." (John 4:34 NRSV) In the context of this passage we find Jesus thirsty and hungry at the well in Samaria where He meets a Samaritan woman. Upon seeing that she was a lost child of God, He set about to lead her back to her Father. His disciples were frustrated because they knew he had been traveling for a long time and needed food, and so when they caught up with Him they begged Him to take some time and eat. As you have heard, His response was essentially "doing the will of God takes precedent over all other things even my own personal comfort and wellbeing."
The most poignant way in which Christ demonstrated this fact was when He took all our sins upon Himself and died for them, forgiving us through eternity all the rebellious acts of our flesh. As Jesus' life confirms, God's will for Him was to take the burdens of our lives and make them His own. He was to give up any hold on personal happiness in order to bring peace and restoration into the lives others. If it is true that discipleship means responding to life as Christ responded, then we must realize that "The Way of Christ", the setting of our minds on divine things, entails the relinquishing of our lives in order to restore lost souls to God. Bonhoeffer wrote: "As Christ bears our burdens so ought we to bear the burdens of our fellow-men. The law of Christ, which it is our duty to fulfill, is the bearing of the cross. My brother's burdens which I must bear is not only his outward lot, his natural characteristics and gifts, but quite literally his sin. And the only way to bear that sin is by forgiving it in the power of the cross of Christ in which I now share. Thus the call to follow Christ always means a call to share the work of forgiving men their sins. Forgiveness is the Christ-like suffering which it is the Christian's duty to bear." That truth is supported by Galatians 6:2 which says: "Bear one another's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ." (Gal 6:2 NRSV)
Jesus had an overwhelming desire to please God. It is recorded in John 5:30 that he said, ""I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge; and my judgment is just, because I seek to do not my own will but the will of him who sent me." (John 5:30 NRSV) People, how many times will we make decisions about our lives and for our families and churches and businesses and workplaces and fail because our judgements come not from the will of God? Jesus succeeded in His attempt to save us because when it came to any decision in His life He said, "I will fail if I do my will, but if it is the will of God that I seek and follow, my judgements will be sound and I will succeed."
Now I told you before that as we start to act more like Christ we begin to be rejected like Christ. People will despise us, they will stop inviting us to their parties, they will cease to include you in their conversations at work, they will act differently around us. When we enter the room, the mood will change for we put a cramp in their style. But nevertheless, we are to seek to be like Christ in every way: To love those who hate us, to forgive those who despise us and do us harm, to pray for those who seek and desire our ruin. We are take their burdens and make them our own and give ourselves up to them as a sacrifice for their own lives. I realize that this is contrary to what you believe for the most part, but you must hear it. You must know that to follow Christ is a sacrifice, to take up your cross as He has told you to do is to take upon you His very own death as your own.
Some here are commenting to themselves "it's not worth it", and I would respond as Christ's messenger by saying, "For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? {37} Indeed, what can they give in return for their life?" (Mark 8:36-37 NRSV) In other words, are you willing to destroy your eternal soul to keep your temporary happiness. For that is just it. You may be happy today, but happiness in discontinuous. But if you give up what you cannot keep any way, to take on the burden of Christ, you will allow your soul to be saved from eternal hell.
Dear Friends, no matter which path you take, be it too late or just in time, you will understand what I have said and you will repeat the heart of this pray written by Michael Kelly Blanchard
Jesus in this life of mine, more and more Your grace I find
In the kingdoms I decline . . . in the battles lost.
All that I would hold on to . . . hide away and keep from you
Fade like diamonds made of dew . . . underneath Your cross
All the useless ways of my will, claiming peace while
peaceless still . . . all the dreams so unfulfilled, bitter empty air.
Hollow brag . . . ambition's boast, haunt the heart like tired
ghost . . . leave their lessons and their yokes and their cold despair
Victory's an empty word, success simply seems absurd
When compared to You my Lord and Your hope that heals.
No conditions but the truth, all the shackled shame let loose.
Forgiveness the living proof . . . that Your love is real.
Oh the eyes of human kind, show the pain that numbs the mind,
search the sorrow for a sign of mercy in the maze.
Then there in tears of our sin confessed, wrapped in humble
blessedness, Lord You live the honored guest of your people's praise.
And when my dance of days is through, when my oldest hour seems brand new,
when all desires are for You . . . may my story be.
That my treasures weren't of gold, that my pride lost
all its control . . . to You, oh lover of my soul . . . Jesus to all Thee
Jesus, Lord of all I am, Hold me with Your wounded hands.
Keep me in the Holy Land, of the broken heart.
Amen.
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