Luke 9:23-25 (Jesus speaking)
Then he said to them all: "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?"
What is Jesus asking us to do when he says "come after me"? Shall we seek Him then? I was really convicted by this today. I asked myself...do I take up my daily cross and sacrifice like He did?
I love this piece! There it goes again with the backwards concept of losing your life in order to find it. It sounds all too similar to the Buddhist concept of losing your ego at which point you experience death (not physical of course, but spiritual) in order to reach nirvana. However you look at it thought, this backwards concept works. Putting it into practice though is a tad bit harder than it looks!
ReplyDeleteAs for the sacrifice, I agree with that too.
I feel as though this society can be a bit individualistic at times but if people gave just a little to others without a self benefit, in other words, sacrificed just a little, I think the effects would really be felt.
I think in a sense, it goes hand in hand with the whole concept of losing life to find life. Try losing yourself, or in other words, sacrificing yourSELF... it truly is easier said than done but well worth it.
Sacrificing for others is a great thing, but I think Jesus is speaking about a bit more than that here. I think that the type sacrifice he's talking about is giving our whole lives to him. That means we begin, rather imperfectly, to act like him, and one aspect of acting like him is sacrificing for others. But the reason we find ourselves is that when we come to Christ we find the thing we're made for. Our sins are forgiven, our life is renewed, and our relationship with God is restored. That is very different from Buddhist philosophy:)
ReplyDeleteAh, yes Sanja! I remember our talk about this from last week! I like how Sean took that sacrificial element we talked about regarding taking up our daily cross & putting it more fully to say that it is not only one or two selfless acts, but our entire life we are giving over to Christ.
ReplyDeleteIt is true that there is a difference here with Buddhism - whereas Buddhism aims to break free from ourselves, both spiritually and physically - Christianity focuses on breaking free from the sin holding us captive to darkness and meaninglessness through Christ's sacrifice, and then coming into a full life of what we were meant to be, woohoo!!!