I recently reread the below written words of my father. They were found shortly after he passed in 2007 in a Christmas letter that was never completed, but was addressed to us - his family. I read it every year at Christmas, and every year it challenges me in a different way. “To live is Christ, to die is gain. While I live the greatest gift I can give to anyone, including my own family, is to carry my cross He gave me upon the surrender of my life to Him – with consistent humility, self-sacrificing my own desires for the love of my Lord. The greatest gift to be given by frail humanity, even by our own family, is to live as true examples of Christ.”
It causes me to catch my breath. As I sit here in the stillness of the night, after a day filled with church planting difficulty. I found myself for probably the millionth time saying, “I DON’T WANT TO DO THIS”. Yelling at God, let’s be honest, I was cursing and yelling - “I don’t have what it takes. I am not strong enough. I don’t want to sacrifice in these ways. I am already tired and we have barely started. I am calling it quits. I AM OUT.”
And, yet, I know. I know, I know, I know. All I want is to surrender. All that I deeply desire is to obey. In the midst of the hard. When chaos ensues, and the questions are going unanswered…I just want to obey. BUT, the sacrifice. The risks we are taking…sometimes it seems too much.
Obedience was never meant to be easy. And I’ll admit after having various conversations with well-meaning individuals who are simply curious - I wonder. I wonder what do we expect of this life called faith? Are we really willing to consider what it may mean for us to “take up our cross and follow him”? I have been slightly surprised at the incredulous questions and responses we have gotten from brothers and sisters of the faith. Why? What? How? And the shock that we would leave it all and go to a place with no location and no present faith community.
Why? He said go. Well, it should be that simple, but I find myself in my own insecurity and need to answer with something profound grasping for something tangible to give to people. I don’t know why - that maybe a profound answer will cause them to be proud of me, to think well of me -rather than to think that we may be crazy. And we may be - in fact - crazy.
But, really, He said go. Because “Christ love compels us”…to go. Because this…
“To live is Christ, to die is gain. While I live the greatest gift I can give to anyone, including my own family, is to carry my cross He gave me upon the surrender of my life to Him – with consistent humility, self-sacrificing my own desires for the love of my Lord. The greatest gift to be given by frail humanity, even by our own family, is to live as true examples of Christ.”
This is what I want for my own family, for my church family, for my friends - for those that know me well and those that don’t know me at all.
“While I live the greatest gift I can give to anyone, including my own family, is to carry my cross He gave me upon the surrender of my life to Him – with consistent humility, self-sacrificing my own desires for the love of my Lord.”
Acts 20:22-24: “And now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. 23 I only know that in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me.24 However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace."
This right here. It’s the beat of my heart. And, yet, in my own frail humanity - I have to ask. Am I enough? Do I have what it takes? Can I persevere? Nonetheless, I will go to bed tonight and I will wake up again in the morning - picking up my cross and following him. My hope is joyful surrender, not resisted obedience. However, I know I must work through the pain of the resistance. There is life and freedom in full abandonment.
Everyday there are hard choices in front us. Choices and paths that will require sacrifice. What are the hard steps of faith he asks of you? In what ways, do you need to surrender to the full work of Christ in you? What path of dying to self do you need to take, so that you might indeed find true life?