Cross-Centered Discipleship

 

Follow Me. Matt 4:19a

 

And I will make you... Matt 4:19b

Deny yourself, take up your cross. Matt 16:24

And I will raise [you]... John 6:44

It is a call worthy of great contemplation. It is a call that is impossible. A call that is irresistible. Not irresistible because it promises pleasure or attraction to us, but because of the authority of the One who calls.

It bids us come and die.

DIE.

The Living Water is a deadly drink indeed. It means that all we valued before the call becomes a rotting corpse.

Suddenly, none of that matters, because we see the appalling sight of His glorious, perfect life becoming sin at Calvary.

We see our sin transformed into His glorious life as He rises from the grave.

What grace this is, to be called to Him! It is a loss of all things, to gain that One thing. A reality almost impossible to express, because it cannot be fully understood. Even in suffering, His grace is what leads us. We are called to be disciples; but He is the one who makes us so. We are called to deny ourselves; but He is our resurrection. Without His call, we would still be living in death, but now we die with a great and glorious hope! Praise Him, for He has done it.

This is the gospel I must fix my mind on, because in Him, even though I may fall, I have been raised to life.