Matthew 16:24

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

I enter the pulpit with the assumption that you are a person who would come after Jesus.  We spoke two weeks ago on the “if” in this verse, so “if” you would come after Jesus, which I assume you would, you must deny yourself, take up your cross and follow him.

If you plan is to stand still, than you don’t need to do anything.  But if you are coming after Jesus, then movement is necessary.  “If anyone would come after Jesus, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Him.”

This is imperative.  If we are going to follow Jesus, we must deny ourselves.  Some people go dispensational on us at this point and tell us that it is not for today.  But I come face to face with Jesus’ command to his disciples to “teach them to obey all that I have commanded you…”  This is a command. We are to obey it. 

The major issue in the Christian life is control.  You want to control your life and God wants to control your life.  Who wins?  This is not an area for compromise.  You cannot give to God some of your life and keep others for yourself.  You can do it, but this fight for control will damage your relationships and your life.

This morning we are going to look quickly at seven passages that illustrate and show what denial is using different language and situations.

The first passage is Matthew 16:25.

When Jesus tells us that we need to deny ourselves, he is telling us to relinquish control of our lives.  He goes on in verse 25 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.  Denying ourselves is to lose our life.

How can we be alive and still lose our lives?  We lose our lives when we are no longer in control.

The greatest battle we will face is this first battle.  That is the battle to deny our selves.  When people in our world think about religion, the one religion that they do not want is the one where we are commanded to deny ourselves.  We want a religion of a God who helps us, who is there for us, who lets us run our lives as we wish and lets us come to him like some divine vending machine in which we control the levers and can pick and choose what variety of belief and commitment we want. 

But what about God?  What are we doing for God?  How are we showing our appreciation for all his blessing?  He made us.  We show our appreciation by being what he created us to be.

God chose before the foundations of the world to bless us in Jesus Christ.  Blest people bless others.

God has wonderfully forgiven our sins.  Forgiven people forgive others.

God loves us.  We love him and obey him because he first loved us.

The second passage is Genesis 2:15. 

This battle for control started in the Garden of Eden.  Genesis 2:15 (NIV84): The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.

God directed the path of Adam and Eve.  They were created for God’s purposes.  They were given a task to do.  They did not determine their own destiny, look to do their own thing, follow their own dream.  They woke up every morning, not to do their own will but the will of God. 

Denying ourselves is not denying ourselves of things such as food or fun.  Denying ourselves is giving up the right to run our own lives. 

A third passage is found in Genesis 12.

Abraham is another example of someone who denied himself. Genesis 12:1,4 (NIV84) 12 The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you…4 So Abram left, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran.

We pride ourselves on being able to live where we want and do what we want.  But Abraham denied himself that right.  He lived where God wanted him to live and did what God wanted him to do.

A fourth passage is Genesis 16.

Abraham had been promised a child by God.  He was getting old and God had not yet given him a child.  So Sarai, his wife came up with a plan.  Genesis 16:1–2 (NIV84) 16            Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar; 2 so she said to Abram, “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my maidservant; perhaps I can build a family through her.” Abram agreed to what Sarai said.

This is not a message telling men not to listen to their wives.  But the Arab-Israeli conflict of today comes out of the conflict between the son of Hagar and the son of Sarah. 

Notice what Abram does.  He does what Sarai wanted him to do.  What did she want him to do?  She wanted him to help God.  God wasn’t working fast enough.  She was old enough that having a child was impossible.  So she comes up with a plan. 

The problem with the plan was that it was Sarai’s plan, not God’s plan.  It sounded good to Abram.  He doesn’t see anything wrong with this plan. However, Sarai’s desire to have children was so strong that though she acknowledged that the Lord had kept her from having children, she was determined to have a family even if it meant going against God.  The issue for Sarai and for Abram is clear:  Who is in control of their lives?

Jesus said, “If we will come after him, we must deny ourselves…”

The voice of God will never violate scripture and the voice of God will never lead you to do anything wrong.  The people who deny themselves are people who have given up their authority to God.

Denying our selves means losing control of our lives.  Denying our selves means giving our lives to someone else.

A fifth passage is 2 Corinthians 5.

Paul puts it this way. 2 Corinthians 5:15 (NIV84)15 And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.

As we approach the Easter season, we find purpose in the cross.  Jesus died so that we would live for him.  You cannot live for Jesus and live for yourself.  We either deny ourselves and live for Jesus, or we deny Jesus and live for ourselves.  

A sixth passage is Galatians 2:20. 20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Notice that he say, “I no longer live.”  That is because he is denying self, setting aside his right to run his life and is giving it over to Jesus. It is Christ who controls his life, it is Christ who lives in Paul.

A seventh passage is 1 Thessalonians 1:9–10 (NIV84) 9 for they themselves report what kind of reception you gave us. They tell how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, 10 and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead—Jesus, who rescues us from the coming wrath.

Paul commends the Thessalonians for turning to God from idols.  This was huge for them.  Often their work, their family, their life was controlled by these idols.   A person would need to deny their own life to follow Jesus.  This denial is exactly what God requires.

Another word that could be used here is the word repent.  To repent means to turn away from something.  Jesus calls us to turn away from the control of our own life and to give our life to him.

As I was cleaning my office, I came up on a letter I received in October from Cadence International.  This missionary organization was founded by Jesse and Nettie Miller shortly after World War II.  Jesse had been in the Baton Death March, survived, and returned to Japan to minister first to the Japanese and second to the military.  He met Nettie and after I think a nine day courtship, married her and their marriage survived for over 50 years.  They were the couple who opened their home to servicemen in Athens, Greece when I was stationed there and had a big influence in my life.  He died in 2001 and she died on September 27th of this past year at the age of 90.  Her daughter included this poem at the end of the letter as a way of describing her mother’s life.

“My goal is God himself.  Not joy nor peace or even blessing, but Himself, My God.

‘Tis His to lead me there—Not mine, but His; At any cost, dear Lord, by any road.”

This morning I share with you on the authority of Jesus Christ, that if you want to be his disciple, you need to deny yourself.

What does this look like?  Let me give you some examples to flesh this out.

You have met a nice young man or lady.  You get along real well together.  The person wants to take the relationship to the next level.  Do you go?

That depends on who controls your life.  If you control your life, you have a decision to make.  If you deny self, then God controls your life.  You now have clear scriptural guidelines on what you do and who you can marry.  God tells you what is permissible on the next level and what is not.  If you want to be a disciple of Jesus, you deny self and take God’s way.

You are looking at what you will do for a career.  The world around tells you that you are smart, go for the job that gives you the most money and the most pleasure.  But the person who denies self asks first this question, “What is best for the kingdom of God?  Where can I go where God can use me the best?”  That answer is not always the place of money or pleasure.

You are frustrated with how people are treating you in your life.  You want to give them a piece of your mind.  So you are tempted to hurt them, ignore them, or make them pay for what they have done.  But the person who denies self asks this question, “God, what do you want me to do?”  They accept that the natural response may not be the godly response.  They deny self and do what God wants them to do.

Whether it is in our raising of children, our decision on how to spend our retirement years, how we will deal with death and taxes, God wants us to deny self, take up our cross and follow Jesus.

            There is no one who better illustrates this than the one who calls us to self-denail.  In John 6:38 (NIV84) Jesus gives us these words: 38 For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. Jesus’ trip to this earth was not for sightseeing or for his own benefit.  He came to do the will of his heavenly Father.  Many we do the same.