"If any man would come after Me, let Him deny himself and take up, his cross and follow Me"

Matthew 16:24

One Sunday morning, a preacher delivered a beautiful sermon on Jesus' love for little children. The next day, he caught a little boy in the act of pressing his foot into the Church's spanking-new, still-wet sidewalk. He grabbed the lad by the arm, jerked him away from the freshly-paved concrete, gave him a severe tongue-lashing, and sent him home. Minutes later, he received an irate telephone call from the child's mother. "My little boy just came home in tears," she said angrily. "When I heard your sermon yesterday I thought you loved little children." "Indeed I do love little children," the preacher replied, "but I love them in the abstract, not the concrete."

"If any man would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up, his cross and follow Me." In today's Gospel Lesson, Jesus is saying that His genuine followers love Him not in the abstract, but in the concrete.

The ultimate test of our Christian discipleship, is not what we think about Jesus, not what we say about Jesus, but what we do about Jesus. In concrete terms, how does our relationship with Jesus affect the way we conduct our lives? How does our relationship with Jesus affect our relationships with others? How do we demonstrate our love for Jesus in the specific, nitty-gritty, down-to-earth events of our lives? In Luke's Gospel, Jesus says, "If any man would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross" (Lk. 9:23). This is a Christian imperative. If you want to follow Jesus, pick up your cross -- pick it up daily. Concretely, what does this mean?

"Follow Me ... pick up, your cross daily" is the "bottom line" of our response to the Good News of a gracious God who loves us infinitely. It is the sum total of our response to all Jesus said and did. It is the answer to our every prayer for the abundant life we crave at the deepest level of our being. We come together and we listen to the Word of God as it is revealed in Jesus. In Jesus, we discover God's promise never to abandon us. In Jesus, we discover God's promise of forgiveness. In Jesus, we discover God's promise of eternal life. In Jesus, we discover God's power of healing. In Jesus, we discover God's Holy Spirit of compassion. In Jesus we discover that death does not have the last word. In Jesus, we discover the immensity of God's Love. Praise the Lord! In Jesus, we discover how to harmonize our life with God's Will.

While strolling through the park, a clergyman struck up a conversation with a soap salesman. They soon began to talk religion. Said the soap, salesman: "The Gospel you preach, doesn't seem to have done much good after two thousand years. There is still a lot of evil and wickedness in the world." The clergyman pointed to a little boy making mud pies. The child was exceedingly dirty. "I can see that soap hasn't done much good either. It's been around for a long time but there are still a lot of dirty hands and faces." "That's true," said the soap salesman, "but soap, is effective only when it's applied." To which the clergyman replied, "So it is with the Gospel we proclaim."

We are so incredibly valuable to God that He chooses to remain present to us always. Jesus described this awesome reality as the "Kingdom of God within." It is the Source of the strength we need to take up our cross daily. It is the Source of the love we need to make the Gospel we preach effective in the world.

The Divine Goodness -- the Source of all beauty and harmony and order and peace -- is in our heart. But there is no way to experience it, no way to demonstrate it, no way to share it except to establish a working, living, growing relationship with it. "Daily, take up your cross and follow Me."

There is nothing grim about the command "Take up, your cross daily." It is not intended to make us wince or clench our teeth. It is an invitation to experience the joy of a living, working, growing relationship with the Divine Power of Love that is with us always. It is an invitation to experience the joy of realizing our true human potential moment-by-moment, day-by-day. It is an invitation to experience the joy of demonstrating our love for God through our love for one another.

Jesus hanging from His Cross is God's way of saying to us: "Now do you see how much I love you?" And that is precisely what it means to accept Jesus' invitation to take up our own cross. As Jesus' disciples, as doers of the Word, moment-by-moment and day-by-day we ask our children and our spouses and our parents and our brothers and sisters everywhere: "Now do you see how much I love you?"