The Word: Matthew 16: 24(KJV)
24 Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.
Dig Deeper: Matthew 16: 25(KJV)
25 For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.
Think about it
SAVING, LOSING AND FINDING LIFE
Jesus usually made profound statements. Those statements are deep truths. Many times those statements were confusing for some of the hearers. Other times people didn’t fully understand what he was saying but for those who understood him, it was liberating, life changing, perspective moulding. One of those times Jesus said:
25 For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.
The question is:
– How do you save your life, How do you lose it and how do you find it?
To save is to preserve. In other words a man has the tendency to be self preservative. Because of that tendency, self come first. And it’s not completely a bad thing that we think of our comfort, our goals, achievement first. But Jesus is saying: in the world, the principle for survival is self first. But in the kingdom the principle to life is self last. In the world it will make absolute no sense to relinquish an opportunity for someone else to have it. It would be silly to put others before ourselves. But in the kingdom: as we are thinking about ourselves, we are also thinking about others and what we don’t want others to do to us, we don’t do to others.
So in the kingdom, anyone who is selfish, always putting himself first is trying to save himself. That person will eventually lose what he is trying to preserve. However anyone who will put God first and be considerate will eventually find what he thought he lost.
Matthew 16: 26
26 For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?
If we gain money at the expense of righteousness and we lose our peace with God. Is the money worth gaining to lose our relationship with God? If we win an argument but God is not happy or we lie or cheat is it worth it?
The worth of a soul is the blood of Jesus. All things we have on earth are temporal things, the eternal things far outweighs the temporal. A true disciple will not trade temporal things for eternal treasures
Nuggets:
A true must learn to judge and know what is of eternal value and what is of temporal value
Our memory verse for March 2018
Luke 9: 23
23 And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.
Let’s take a few moment to learn our memory verse for this month by heart. It can be memorised in 3 lines:
Line 1: And he said to them all,
Line 2: If any man will come after me, let him deny himself,
Line 3: and take up his cross daily, and follow me.
Once you say it a few times it will stick.
Prayer focus: Our next level prayers:
Lord help me to put you first in all I do
On Grace:
Masterlife Workbook: The Church is embarking on weeks of discipleship workbook study: Masterlife now on the 2nd workbook: The Disciple’s personality