Death of me

Today I carried a cross. It was damn heavy. A nice big wooden cross, little bit small for me though. So as I was carrying it across a field I began to think about how Jesus would have felt carrying a full size sucker. Pretty sore I am guessing. We have all heard about carrying our own crosses. "Take up your cross and follow me" or something like that yes? What does that mean to us? How can we crucify ourselves? I have a few ideas. . .

What was Christ doing on that cross? He was dying for us. Christ willing went through pain and suffering and then death so that we don't have to fight sin by ourselves. So that though we may lose battles we can win the war. Christ was defeating and defeated sin. Ergo our "cross" is already done yes? No. As Christians we cant camp at salvation and be content that Christ won the war. Christ is eternal, we are not. The war is over but battles still rage. Everything we do can still turn us away from God, or get us closer to God.

We need to find our cross, our battle. We need to get crucified, win the battle. We need to start pulling our weight in this relationship with God. How you may ask? What battles aren't you winning? Here's some examples: for myself it is struggling with lust and desires (yay for being male huh?) and I feel . . . awkward. . . talking about God to friends that aren't Christian. Its almost as if I am ashamed. Yes that's right, for those who know me those may come as a shock. Your cross isn't just sin but anything that the devil (oh no I used the D word!) has a hold of in your life. For me, I guess its shame. Now does this stop me from saying yes I'm a Christian? no, but i wont go and start a conversation on God.

How do we win our battles? Right now I am dreading publishing this blog on the net. I really don't want to. In a way I am dying. I am telling that whoever reads this that I am a sinner, that I don't have it all perfect. I even mentioned what. I assure you this is not a normal occurrence for me. What i have concluded is that when we know we have sin, the last thing we want is for someone to find out, when we have something that isn't "normal" by societies standards we don't want it to get out. We have to fight our sin. Expose the darkness. Now stop right there! I'm not saying go shout it out. I'm saying go to your pastor or wise council and get a extra gun in your fight. God forgives our sin, God gives us strength but ultimately it is us who sins. It is our call whether we continue the cycle of sin.

Taking up your cross is a battle. It is a fight that we cant win alone. To win these battles we need to help each other, help each other in Christ. My advice is to taking up your cross, find your cycle of sin, get together with your pastor and let what Christ did on that cross last in your life.

(ps: dont go nail yourself to a real cross, its just downright painful)

(man I am loving these brackets)

LJA