The invitation of Jesus Christ is “take up your cross and follow me.”.

What does the gospel message still offer today? It offers an opportunity for a unique relationship. In this world of convenience and temporary comforts, Jesus invites us to choose him over cultural and personal fixations.

We are offered and inspired to any way of living in the world. Conversely, in a life with Christ we are asked to “take up our cross”.

We have a plethora of resources explaining ways of caring for our wellbeing…so what is this about “taking up our cross”? It stands out amongst other ways of going through life because it leads us deeply into our souls in a relationship with the Creator of all things. Jesus asks us to carry the heavy load while promising he will be carrying it with us, and that He will give us rest (Matthew 11: 28-30). We are not alone.

Under our cross we can know God’s peace and comfort. It seems impossible, yet it’s true. Taking up our cross reveals a tenderness. We are no longer pretending we’re “fine”. Here we realize we don’t need to distract ourselves from hurt and loneliness.

The cross is not the end, but rather a way of being in relationship with a Father who carried his first and said “Not my will but thy will be done.”. This surrender of ourselves to God’s will is an act of our love expressed through trust.

Pain and disappointments are natural. Some of them may have felt near fatal, and these things that crushed or felt like they broke our hearts also broke them wide open. This is the paradox. The open wound also opened our hearts. Jesus understands agony. His gift is that he has gone before, gone all the way, and is with us now. We may be suffering right now but we can also receive His love and peace right now.

I leave you with 1 Corinthians 13.

“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. 12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.“