Friday April 5, 2024
John 12:26
“If anyone serves me, he must follow me.”
Jesus has many adherents but few followers.
For no one can be a follower of Jesus without going the same way as His Master: through death.
We love our life, our old self-life. We love it, hedge about it, and defend it. We would improve upon it and dress it up, making it look like new. If we could only escape death.
But life, life in God, never becomes ours until our old self-life dies.
And this death is a fearful thing.
Therefore a long period of time often elapses before a seeking soul will deliver itself and all its life up to God.
But whosoever will lose their life shall find it, Jesus says.
Indeed, when we finally accept the judgment of death upon ourselves, we really learn what it means to pray for mercy. And when we have seen the firm basis upon which mercy is granted in the voluntary death and glorious resurrection of Jesus Christ, then we feel within ourselves the life which never passes away. The life which cannot be attacked or weakened by death, but is most vital, most sound, and strongest in the very midst of death.
This is the innermost and most enigmatic secret of life in God: we live by dying. Our life depends upon whether we are willing to become nothing before God, before ourselves, and before our neighbor.
But this involves a death-struggle. Every day. With fear of suffering and a dread of being completely undone. With a dread of acknowledging before God every day our miserable relationship to Him and of accepting His mercy as lost souls. With a dread of denying ourselves and serving others.
Dear child of God! Do not be dismayed when you experience these sufferings in your daily life. It is the death-struggle. And that must take place.
Eternal life is won and can be lived only by dying.
FOR THE LOVE OF GOD 
You must be logged in to post a comment.