Navigating Change: Following the Footsteps of JesusSample

Deny Yourself, Take Up Your Cross, Follow Jesus

Over the past week, we have followed in Jesus’ footsteps through the end of His earthly ministry and He has offered a masterclass on ending well. With this final day, let’s distill everything down to its essence. If you remember nothing else from this Plan, hear this—if you want to finish well, choose to follow Jesus.

Then he said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it.” Luke 9:23-24 NIV

In Luke 9, right after once again predicting His own death and resurrection, Jesus says those words.

They are big and bold, but what do they mean?

Working backward, Jesus is saying that if we spend our lives focused on self-promotion and self-preservation, we will fail to really live. But if we, like Jesus, live a life of self-denial and self-giving love, we will find the kind of life that’s truly life.

How do we go about living this kind of life, especially when we’re in times of increased pressure, change, or chaos?

First, we deny ourselves. In a culture that says to really live, you need to be true to yourself, Jesus says deny yourself. That both simplifies and complicates things for us. It simplifies things because we no longer have to embark on the wild goose chase of “finding ourselves” so we can be true to ourselves. We get to say yes to the adventure of following Jesus wherever He leads. We get to follow a real person, not chase some idealized version of ourselves that no one ever really tells us how to find. It also complicates things in the sense that we have to develop discernment and get ruthless about the voices that influence our choices.

This might mean eliminating social media, finding a new friend group, or not watching or listening to certain forms of entertainment.

Even hearing that, you may feel resistance—“But I like those things. But that’s how I wind down. But these are the people I’ve known since I was a little kid.” Each of those points of tension is an invitation to deny yourself or gratify yourself. To follow Jesus, we decide on self-denial.

Second, we take up our cross daily. This isn’t just a mindset to adopt, it’s a posture to live with. It’s embodying our whole-life commitment to God, to the point where it actually changes how we walk in the world. Just like Jesus. Jesus embodied His commitment to the Father by living every day in humble obedience to Him, and that looked like interacting with people who it was social suicide to interact with. It looked like standing up to people that it was physically dangerous to stand up to. It looked like saying no to opportunities that it was detrimental for business to say no to. He did things that it didn’t make sense to do and said things it didn’t make sense to say, apart from radical submission to God. To follow Jesus, we have to take up our cross.

Finally, we follow Jesus. We actually go where He goes, trust what He says, do what He says, and love how He loves. Again, doing this requires us to leave it all on the line and go all in. Because you can’t follow someone halfway. You’re either following them, or you’re not.

If you want to start well, finish well, and just live well, choose to follow Jesus. Deny yourself, take up your cross daily, and follow Him.

Stop and consider: Where do you need to deny yourself? How will you practice taking up your cross? In what areas do you need to assess how you are following Jesus?

Don’t stop here. To discover more about the character of Jesus and how to follow Him, check out the Plan,Learning the Jesus Way of Life.