Take Up Your Cross: The Hard Work of Following Jesus

Nobody said following Jesus would be easy — and this past Sunday, Ms. Sissy made sure we didn’t forget it.

A Hard Word from a Loving Lord

The Gospel reading for Sunday was Matthew 10:24-39, and it pulls no punches. Jesus tells his disciples plainly: you are not above your teacher. Then he asks them to count the cost — and the cost is high. He speaks of division within families, of loving him more than father or mother, son or daughter. He calls them to take up their cross and follow him, even at the risk of losing their very lives.

These are not comfortable words. They are the words of someone who loves us enough to tell us the truth.

The Readings That Frame the Cross

What made Sunday’s message land so powerfully was how the other readings set the stage. The prophet Jeremiah, in Jeremiah 20:7-13, is utterly undone by his calling. He cries out that God has deceived him, that the word of the Lord has brought him nothing but mockery and reproach. And yet — he cannot stop. “His word is in my heart like a fire,” he says. Faithfulness costs him everything, and still he cannot walk away.

Psalm 69:7-18 echoes that same anguish. The psalmist bears reproach for God’s sake, estranged from his own family, sinking in deep waters. It is a cry of real suffering — and of real trust.

Then Paul, in Romans 6:1-11, gives us the theological anchor: we have been baptized into Christ’s death so that we might walk in newness of life. The cross is not just a metaphor. It is the pattern of the Christian life — dying to sin, rising to God, again and again.

The Cross Is the Point

What Sissy drew out so clearly is that the difficulty is not a bug in the Christian life — it is the design. Taking up your cross means choosing the harder path when the easier one is right in front of you. It means staying faithful when faithfulness is costly. It means trusting that the God who raised Jesus from the dead is at work even in our losses.

This is the good news hiding inside a hard text: the one who calls us to carry the cross has already carried it himself. We follow someone who knows the way.

If Sunday’s sermon stirred something in you, we’d love for you to keep the conversation going — in worship, in small group, or over coffee. The cross isn’t meant to be carried alone.