What Does It Mean: Part Three

 Please review "What Does It Mean" Parts One and Two:

What Does It Mean: Part Three?

Seven Powerful Life Changing Words!

“Take up The Cross and follow me.”

Here are seven words: What do they mean? Answering this question, for yourself, will change your life, “IF” you let it happen, and “IF” you deny yourself, and you are willing to leave the world, the flesh and the devil behind. “IF” you are willing to turn from your law breaking, of habitually breaking God’s liberating limits -- God’s Ten Commandments -- which you cannot keep on your own. Indeed!  phenomenal things will happen for you, and to you, “IF” you “take up the Cross and follow Jesus.”

Taking up the Cross, and following Jesus requires the turning away from all the things previously discussed. It presupposes letting go of being in charge of your life, and it involves letting God be involved in your life, as you surrender your life to God through Jesus His Son, by the power of the Holy Spirit. It necessitates we believe with the authentic belief I wrote about earlier. Yes, we turn from our sinful ways to the one who shed His blood, and who sacrificed His body on the Cross of calvary just over 2,000 years ago.

 

What’s the Big Deal About Shed Blood & The Sacrificed Body?

The shed blood of Jesus, as what God calls “the blood of the lamb” and His body being sacrificed, are foundational for the life transforming Eternal Covenant, of The True and Living God, with human beings. And it is an eternal covenant with you and me, who let ourselves deny ourselves, and embrace this Cross where Jesus gave up His life.

The Ancient Promise That Points to The Cross

For the life of the creature is in the blood: And I have given it to you, upon the altar, to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul.
Leviticus 17:11

This priestly promise, was initially written to the Jewish High Priest of Israel regarding the forgiveness, for sins. It was a part of a covenant that was a shadow of the Eternal Covenant which is bought and paid for by the body and blood of Jesus. It is a promise that points to the great miracles available to us when we let ourselves let go and let God, and take up the Cross to follow Jesus. Check out these promises for Christ Followers:

Covenant Promise Cross Promise:  Hebrews 9:12
It was neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by HIS own blood (Jesus blood) that He entered – ONCE AND FOR ALL into the holiest of all places, and there He purchased eternal redemption (eternal forgiveness for all sin)

When you accomplish the self-denial, or you turn from your sin to the Cross where Jesus died, HIS blood, once and for all, provides for you forgiveness for all your sins or for all your law breaking. When He shed His blood, He set the stage for you being declared NOT guilty.” You need only take up the Cross and follow Him. This is God’s Covenant.

Covenant Promise Cross Promise: Hebrews 10:10

We have been sanctified, by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ, ONCE and for ALL!

Once Jesus sacrificed His body, once and for all time, God sanctified, or made holy, and continues to make holy, and sets apart for holy use, those who deny themselves, turn from sin to Jesus, and to His finished work on the Cross. Embracing Jesus’ Cross results in the Christ follower being set apart, declared holy and causes you to become holy in the way your live. WOW! This is a miracle. This is God’s Holy Eternal Covenant, but there is more!

Covenant Promise Cross Promise: Hebrews 10:14

By one sacrifice, He has perfected, FOREVER, those whom He is making holy.

This promise blows me away: God says, because Jesus went to the Cross, shed His blood, and He sacrificed His body, this sacrifice now makes Christ Followers, who embrace the Christ of the Cross, and the work of His Cross as PERFECT in His sight, and He does so FOREVER! Hallelujah!  But there is even more to come!

 

Covenant Promise Cross Promise: Hebrews 10:15-17

The Holy Spirit also testifies about this:
First, He says, “This is the Covenant I will make with them after that time, says the Lord. I WILL put my laws (God’s Commandments) in their hearts, and I WILL write them on their minds.” Then He adds, “Their sins and lawless acts I will remember NO MORE!

Did you catch that? If we deny ourselves, turn from sin and law breaking, and we let this happen, and IF we embrace the Cross, or take up the Cross, and follow Jesus, we will, not only be forgiven for all eternity, and we will not only be sanctified, and we will NOT only be perfect in God’s sight, God actually transforms us! The laws we cannot keep, are put in our hearts, and written in our minds. We get a new creation heart, and a brand-new way of thinking! We become more and more Christ like.  But listen to the rest of the story! EVERY sin we have committed, and everyone of God’s laws we have broken God intentionally decides to never think of them again.  WOW!  Hallelujah! But there is actually MORE GOOD NEWS!

Covenant Promise Cross Promises: Hebrews 10: 19-23

Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place, by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is his body, and since we have a great High Priest over the house of God, let us draw near to God, with a sincere heart, and with full assurance that faith brings, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience, and having our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful.

Check this out: Christ Followers, who embrace Jesus, and the Cross, where His blood was shed, and His body was sacrificed, are not only forgiven forever, made holy, and are being made holy, perfected in God’s sight and being made new creations, in Christ, where God forms us in His image, by putting His laws on our hearts, and by writing them in our minds, God gives us a daily relationship with HIM, through Jesus, Messiah. And this relationship allows us, as often as we want, to enter into the Holy of Holiest places, to talk with God, and interact with God. We can go each day to wash away any guilt or shame we are carrying around.

You see, when Jesus body was sacrificed, the sky was darkened, and the temple veil was torn (from top to bottom) during those moments and hours where He was declaring “IT IS FINISHED!”  This opened the way for us to do what could never be done before! We could now go and be in God’s holy place, and develop our eternal relationship with HIM.

Let us not forget that Jesus also rose from the dead, and because He lives, we shall also live! Yes, even though the devil comes to kill, steal and destroy, Jesus destroyed Satan’s work, and Jesus demolished Satan’s power over you. He came, and He gives us “life to the full!” He gives us a holy life, with a holy God that transforms us, and it allows us to walk with God daily, through faith in Jesus, through the Holy Spirit’s power …. “IF …

 

IF, we want all of this, IF we deny ourselves, take up the Cross, and follow Jesus.

Now you have heard the whole story, the rest of the story, what will you do?

I will tell you what I have done, and choose to do every day of my life:

I have decided, to follow Jesus.
I have decided to follow Jesus.
I have decided to follow Jesus you.

NO TURNING BACK! No turning back.

 

What will you do?

All the meaning in the world, rest on what you will do with Jesus.