Sept 2008: Manifesting Christ Taking up Your Cross

PART 25 THE STAFF AND SWORD MINISTRY SEPTEMBER 2008

ING CHRI

TAKING UP YOUR CROSS

by Nancy-TONI Younghrandt

Jesus' prayer to the Heavenly Father shortly before His death on the cross in John 17: 21-23 was as follows:

"That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee,that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thouhast sent me. And the glory which thou gayest me I have given them;that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me,that they may be made perfect in one;..."

To accomplish or experience some level of this oneness means we must seek to knowJesus, to be one with Jesus and to be like Jesus in all ways possible. The question then is:how might this be done within us? Well, I believe that once we have accepted Jesus as ourSavior, then we should not only make a point to spend time in prayer and abiding gettingto know Jesus but we Must also seek to do as He said to His disciples when He told themto den y themselves. take up their cross and follow Him. In Luke 9:23 Jesus further stressed."... If anv man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross dull', and

follow me." — with the emphasis on DAILY. This means that this is going to be a continuousand on-going process in our fives.

So then the question could he raised as to just what is our cross'? Is it one fixed thing inor lives or can it have multiple applications? For a long time, I identified our cross as beingour sin-life, our self-life to which we must die daily ... and that is accurate to say. However.I have also seen how the Holy Spirit and Jesus have led inc view specific things such asparticular trials, burdens, fears and struggles as crosses in my life which I needed to ceasestruggling with and to surrender to the Will of God. Once I did that, then I came to peacefulterms with God's workings in my life. So, in this article I have the leading to further explainjust what it means to deny one's self and to take up our cross, and just how you can applythis teaching in Jesus's in your life. ____

Page 2 MANIFESTING CHRIST — TAKING UP YOUR CROSS September 2008

JESUS' EXAMPLE

To better understand what Jesus is telling us to do, we must first understand what He did

inwardly in His prayer-life when He went to the Cross. Through Scripture we know that He

was well informed by the Father of what lay ahead for Him. He knew He would suffer, be

crucified and be raised from the dead well before it happened. He knew He was God's only

begotten Son and was sent to take on the sin of mankind and to die on our behalf that we

might have life eternal. However, that doesn't mean that He didn't struggle within His soulwith the Cross that He knew lay before Him. In Matthew 26:38 Jesus told His disciples,"My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death..." It goes onto explain that Jesus wasin such distress that He went a little farther away from the disciples and fell on His face inprayer — truly an indication of the state He was in. He then prayed to the Father, "MyFather, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will but as thouwilt." He then went on to pray this way two more times in which He made in His preferenceknown but then denied His own will and ultimately yielded to the Father's Will. He waswilling to accept God's Will over His own at work in His life.

With this in mind, I propose that a `cross' in own daily lives doesn't have to be one thatis literally life-threatening and as traumatic as physically being crucified on the cross asJesus was since He paid the ultimate price for us, but rather our own `cross' could rangefrom being beaten, imprisoned unjustly or martyred to anything in our lives which causesus fear or anxiety, or that we struggle with, resist or feel burdened by. In other words, across can be anything to which we need to deny our self-life and self-will and yield to theWill of God. It is basically the willingness to accept God's Will over and instead of our ownin any and all circumstances.

My experience is that while we may have a willingness to accept God's Will in our liveson a general basis as we give our heart to Jesus, there are still issues, circumstances andchallenges that arise in our lives that put that to the test. There comes a time for an activeprayer time where we consciously pray to yield a specific situation, fear. trial, or whateverthe case the niav be, to Jesus in surrender to His Will and God's Will through Him. Perhapsthe clearest way to tell when you're not quite denying or dying to self is if you find you areNOT experiencing what Jesus spoke of in Matthew 11:28-30 when He said:

"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: andye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

So if you are labouring and struggling under some heavy burden then you haven't reallygiven all over to Jesus and His Will for you. As long as we feel the weight of our cross


JESUS' EXAMPLE continued

then it is often our self that is struggling against it or resisting it in some way.

Now perhaps some believers think that you should feel the weight and that suffering andstruggling is to be part of our walk so that we may suffer in some way as He did, but as youcan see, that isn't what Jesus wants for us. He paid the p rice so we shouldn't have to`labour' and be heavy laden' but rather we should have a peace and rest within our sou]even when we are carrying our cross, even when we are yoked with Jesus.

TRUSTING JESUS AND GOD THE FATHER

Upon closer look. I would be remiss if I didn't point our that at the heart of denyingyourself and taking up your cross there needs to be a deep love and trust of Jesus and Godthe Father. After all, you're surrendering to God and His Will and bearing a cross orsituation or fear or burden that might very well crush you or overwhelm you or hurt youdeeply if you let it go. And yet to really deny one's self, it means facing the worst possiblething which you could imagine and to deny it's power over you and your self-life but rathertrusting God and Jesus that — #1: if this is His will for you, then He will bring you through,and — #2: if it is not His will for you. He will remove it entirely and it won't be an issue.Again, denying your self-life means trusting in God and being willing to go through evenour worst nightmare IF ... and that is a big IF... that is God's Will for you. We should notpresume to know either way but be willing to trust Him no matter what.

The funny thing about this is that once you've surrendered, I mean really surrenderedyour will to God' Will and you know it deep within, it's amazing how liberating that can be.Suddenly the fear is gone and the darkness that once seemed to envelope you is liftedbecause now you are in God's Hand and He will protect and keep you.

It is a sad reality but many times is our own fear of a thing that gives it such power overus and serves to burden us and wear us out. We walk in defeat rather than in victory throughChrist Jesus. I found years ago that if I came to God with my fear, acknowledging that Icould no longer keep struggling against it, and that if it overpowered me then so be it butI was surrendering it up to God no matter what, that God was more than ready to take it fromme. It seems that once I prayed in my heart: "Dear Father, I give up this fear to you. 1/etgo of it and if it overwhelms me, that is okay because it will be Your Will and You 'I/ get incthrough this. And if it is not Your Will for me, then I pray that You take itfrom me. " — onceI did that, then the Father took the fear and peace took its place.


CROSSES IN DAILY LIFE

Since that time I have found many times in my walk when praying that way freed mefrom a burden or trouble that I found myself struggling with. To give you an example ofhow I applied this, I can remember one time was a few years ago when we went through anextensive remodel of the house we are in now before we moved up here to Colville. It hadgotten extremely stressful for me as I tried to keep up with what 1 usually do in the ministryand then pack for the upcoming move, make trips to Colville to arrange things with acontractor and make the seemingly endless decisions as to what was need for the newkitchen, two bathrooms and a dining room/great room. Needless to say, there were times Iwas just plain overwhelmed. Just looking down a solid wall of faucets was mind-bogglingenough to get discouraged but when you add to that a desire to want to make the `right'decision and not one we'd regret for years to come, it got to be too much. During all thistime, I was praying for the Holy Spirit's help but it was difficult to know what was the Spiritof God and what was me. Lastly, I realized I needed to surrender all to Jesus and actuallyIet myself be overwhelmed, knowing and trusting in Jesus that He would be there to helpme make the decisions I needed to make. I no longer resisted and tried to control what wasbombarding me, but to let it happen and then resolve to trust Jesus that He would lead mein the right or best decisions as they were needed. Boy, what a relief to just submit to whatwas happening and to ride it out with Jesus at the helm. For me, it took a willingness to beoverwhelmed, even if it felt like jumping into deep water, because I knew and trusted thatI would surface, the darkness would lift and God's light would shine through once again.

The other similar time carne after we got Topaz, our then young puppy. At first I thoughtI could rely on Chuck-JOHNEL to know what to do since he had had puppies and dogsbefore. Well, unfortunately, he had forgotten what it was like to have a puppy and was oftentoo tied up with work to help. For me. since I had never had a puppy, I really started tostruggle as I saw I was falling behind in ministry work and the other things I normally didin trying to potty train and take care of this puppy. Finally, I realized that my cross in thiscase was actually my old life before this puppy and that the harder I fought to hang onto thatold life, the more difficult this new life became. It was then that I went to Jesus in prayer andsurrendered to this new life I now had with this puppy and gave up my old one. At this pointI sought to see Jesus in the arrival of this new puppy and that He could use this puppy toshow me things as He could with any other thing in my life. 1 prayed to surrender my willto God's Will and see Him in that situation; once I did that, things started to smooth outquickly for me. Suddenly I knew the thing . to do was to read up on the subject and as Ilearned more and applied what was written, we steadily got Topaz trained and peace onceagain filled our home.

Through both of these experiences, in a lot of ways the cross 1 was struggling with the


CROSSES IN DAILY LIFE continuedmost was my previous life —the life I had before the impending move and remodeling, andthe life I had before Topaz and the things I did with the time I had prior to both of thoseevents. These things of themseIves should not have created a conflict for me nor should theyhave separated me from Jesus but they did when 1 withdrew into my self-efforts and self-will. It was when I saw these things as being from God and therefore yielding to Him withinthose situations that they became more of a j oy than a trial.

This, I believe, can be applied in every aspect of your life, especially when it is somethingnew in your lives or something that you may be struggling with in terms of preparation orwhat may be lying ahead of us as a nation and as it pertains to the events to befall us as partof the Judgment and Wrath of God. No matter how great or small, every circumstance, trial,trouble, illness or burden is an opportunity to draw closer to God and to be yielded to HisWill at work in your daily life.

OUR OWN WORST ENEMY

So often it turns out that much of the time, we are indeed our own worst enemy. Theenemy of our souls, the Devil and his bunch, can certainly trouble us but more often thannot, we do a fine job all on our own. When our Iives don't go the way we think they shouldor we fear what our lives may be like down the road, our own imagination can cause us quiteits share of grief. This is where we need to be careful. In our zeal to prepare for what iscorning, we can keep track of Jesus' Word, research and study what is going to behappening in the near future, and make the prudent and necessary preparations that we areable to make, but we must always keep coming to Jesus, denying our self-life and taking upour cross and following Him. We need to be willing to endure what ever God has for usdown the road without becoming fearful and resistant to the various possibilities nor tooover-reliant on our own self-efforts to keep us safe either.

As the pace of Judgment quickens and events continue to unfold and progressively getworse, it is increasingly more important for each and every believer and Christian to befound in the center of God's Will for them, personally.

After all, every one is different and has different abilities and capabilities. As we look tothe times ahead and what we need to do to prepare, and j ust how much an individual can andshould do, that in itself will be a cross for most and should be a cross for all. All of us, nomatter at what stage in our preparations we are from the little to a lot, we should all bepraying, "Not my will, but Thy Will be done.

We can have real fears and anxieties about the future that lies ahead of us but in truth,


OUR OWN WORST ENEMY continuednone of us can really know what it will be like exactly. We can picture this or that scenarioin our mind, our imaginations, but in all reality we can never really know for sure what willhappen in our lives, nor can we prepare for every contingency. So. I would suggest that ifyou have picture in your mind of some situation which you fear may happen to you in thefuture or if you are depressed because things are not happening in your life as you believedthey would, then now is a great time to take those images and die to them on the cross. Letyour self-life go to God. Surrender those images to God, saying, "Father, not my will butYour Will he done. " If you're facing a fear then you can also pray, "Father, if this notYour Will fog• me, then take it from me. But if it is Your Will for me, then I will trustthat You 7/be with me and that You 'II bring me through this. Ipray to be willing to gothrough anything as long as You 'll he there to see me through. "

If you're depressed then you also could pray, "Father, I lift up to You this darknessand surrender my t'ill to You completely. 1 give up to You my heavy bw-den and that

my life hasn 't gone as I thought it would. I surrender to You now and am willing to dowhatever is Your Will. You will bring me through this and I will walk in Your Lightonce again.

LIVE ONE DAY AT A TIME

Lastly, I am led to encourage every reader to remember to live life one day at a time .

We're not to live in the past or in a time ahead but to have our eyes and heart fixed onJesus today, one day at a time.

Yes, we can look ahead and make plans and preparations as is prudent and necessary, butwe are not to be living there. We can miss the here and now if we're living in another time.We can miss the Blessings God has for us today if we fret too much about tomorrow or

yesterday.

It's like what Jesus said in Matthew 6:33-34:

"... seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all thesethings shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow:for the morrow' shall take thought for the things of itself."

May you find the peace that passes all understanding as you surrender yourself to Jesusand our Heavenly Father, and live your days one at a time. S„ 5cs.,- Low A&,.s.,d- . -'

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Sept 2008: Manifesting Christ Taking up Your Cross