Then Jesus said to His disciples, "If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. 25 For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. 26 For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?"
Well. I will admit, I had heard people talk about this passage enough times that I used to almost skip right by it in my readings. But the other day when I was reading it, the Spirit stopped me and I thought, "Hey, maybe I should actually stop and think about this passage..." The moment you stop and start asking questions about the text, delving deeper into why it says what it says, all kinds of treasures start to come to the surface, and this was no exception.
One of the first things I asked myself was, "why does v. 25 start with the word 'for'? What does it mean?" "For" can have several meanings, and as I pondered this one it became apparent that it was representing a cause-and-effect relationship; "v. 24 BECAUSE v. 25 happens", or "let he who desires to follow me deny himself, BECAUSE he who holds onto his earthly life loses it but he who lets go of his earthly life finds it."
Let's just look at that cause-and-effect relationship backwards to make it even more apparent: He who tries to hang on to his earthly life will end up losing it all, while he who gives up his life for Christ's sake will end up finding real life in the end... SO, let the person who desires to follow Christ deny his earthly life, take up his cross, put away his fleshly desires, and live his life following and serving Christ.
Then it hit me like a lightning bolt. Do you see how tremendously loving that is?
I know what you're probably thinking: "Libby, how on earth did you make that jump?" Think through this with me for a moment: first of all, what is it in the end that will make us truly happy, that will result in a real life and joy and fullness? God. He is the only One who can hold up His promises 100% of the time. He is fully just, pure, holy, and loving to us. He loves us so much that He doesn't leave us ourselves as the ultimate prize, because He knows that we cannot fulfil our deepest needs. God is the ONLY One who will not disappoint or let down. Ever.
So, if God is the only one who will not disappoint or let us down, then it makes sense that our truest joy and fulfillment and, honestly, real life is found in Him. Let's think about verse 25 now, that "whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it." Jesus is saying that the person who gives up his earthly life for His sake will find true life. The person who realizes their complete inability to seek God apart from His Spirit and intervention, and becomes humbled, is the one to whom God will show Himself. This is the person who then finds true life and joy and fullness.
Why? Why do we have to be humbled? Why can't we come to God and true life by holding onto as much of our earthly lives as possible, accumulating things and being awesome? Well, think about it. If we come to God in our own power, are we going to ultimately give Him the credit? No. We'll ultimately exalt ourselves... but we know that having ourselves as the Ultimate Prize will let us down. Every time. Passages like Luke 10:21-22 and much of 1 Corinthians 1 demonstrate how God has made it plain that if we were to come to Him with our worldly wisdom, then we'd cast the credit to our own power, but if we come to Him completely humbled and aware of our utter inability to seek Him on our own, His sacrifice gets the clear credit and He is glorified (thus satisfying us!).
So, circling back to Matthew again, Jesus is saying first of all that the person who gives up their earthly life and is humbled is the one who will ultimately find life and joy. But He's saying more than that. He's saying that if anyone wants to follow Him (something we're commanded to do, btw), they have to take that second route--denying themselves and "losing this life". Do you see it? The only way to follow Jesus is the one way that results in ultimate joy and fullness! Can you see now how LOVING God is to do that for us? He tells us to follow Christ, and then makes true following something that will end up bringing us into real life!
So often the focus of these verses in Matthew seems to be on the denying and "taking up your cross". You hear all about how you "have to give up" your old habits and fleshly desires if you're going to follow Jesus, and then v. 25 is tacked on as a sort of vague comfort. At least that's how I've always experienced it before. But now I see. V. 25 is a promise that makes v. 24 so wonderful for us. It's not that we "have to give up" x, y, and z... It's that, in our awe at God's love, we'll want to trim away these x, y, and z things that hinder us, we'll want to deny them the power they have over our lives so that we can live a life that is fully surrendered to Jesus, serving Him by serving those around us, a life that is full and joyous and truly life.
Meditating on these two verses has made them so much more precious to me. I have had my eyes opened to how much God loves me in yet another way. It even makes passages like Philippians 2, Christ's ULTIMATE example of a humble life, so much sweeter and more alive. I am spurred to let go of this earthly life--let go of my desires for pleasure, let go of my laziness, let go of my pride, let go of feeling like I always know what's better for my brother, let go of my irritations, let go of my insecurities, let go of my idolatries and misplaced affections--and instead lose it, lose it all, let go of it so that I may take hold of my Savior and serve Him and Him alone. Then I will find true life, full life, a joyous life.
Oh that we would all be presented with the intense love of God for us today, and that it would spur us to glorify Him by living for Him... which is the best thing for us as well!
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