Deny yourself and take up your cross

The American way is to seek comfort, to avoid that which makes our way rough. We’ve gone to the 40 hour work week. We go like mad over the weekend, so we’re getting our share of leisure time. My problem was always needing to rest up after vacation. Silly pursuits. I had the same desire for our children, trying to set it for them to have it easy, so they could avoid conflict. They deserve the American way, right?
So I come upon the scripture where Jesus tells me to “Deny yourself and take up your cross daily.” That doesn’t really sound like comfort or avoiding strife. Expletive. I have lots of questions. Why does Jesus want me to deny myself? Doesn’t He want me to be happy? Isn’t getting what I want going to make me happy? I always have lots more questions than I can ever find answers. I have many suppositions.
Perhaps Jesus would like me to think of others before myself. So if I deny myself, it may help me see someone else’s need, or even supply it. If I’m taking up my cross daily, it reminds me of how Jesus sacrificed for me. It reminds me of what He sacrificed for me. He commands us to, “Do likewise.” I remind myself to keep the correct focus, to keep connected to the proper power source, to love, to apply grace, to serve, to have joy, to pray, to obey, and to have a thankful heart every morning. I also need to deny myself. Does that take a conscious effort? Do I need to say, “Oh I won’t injest that, or I won’t do that because I’m denying myself?” Does denying self always involve sacrifice? Should that sacrifice then be applied for someone else’s benefit?
I haven’t arrived at anything definite. Sometimes I hate denying myself. I don’t always find it easy or convenient. I wonder if/how Jesus denied Himself. I’m sure He’s experienced everything I’ve gone through because He understands. I need His strength to go forward. I need others to keep me accountable. I need to be honest and transparent. I’m certainly not perfect, and I stumble quite often. Jesus is my guide and my light. If He says, “Deny yourself,” I’d better obey. All questions will be answered by and by.

Love one another instead of judge one another

I am ashamed. I glibly remark, “Oh, I am so good at judging others. Why can’t they just be like me?” I read, and I truly believe that “Judge not, lest you be judged.” And “You will be judged as you have judged others.” So I am ashamed that I take God’s word and treat it irreverently. I’m not really that funny, and that joke is not funny at all.
I heard a while back that one reason we judge is that we’re impatient with others. They’re not moving fast enough, or they’re not agreeing with us. When I broke that down and examined it, it turned out mostly accurate. How awful that we judge someone else by our own shortcomings. Rhonda tells me that we don’t know the whole story of someone else. There is a reason they’re acting the way they do. We only see the surface behavior and how it doesn’t measure up to our standards. It pays to wait and perhaps learn a bit more of a person before we write them off. That of course takes time, and we have to be willing to listen if we really want to know, “How’s it going?”
Since we don’t know a person’s whole story, we, or am I talking to myself, I should make my first response love. I should suspend the impatience with that person and elevate them, like God sees them. I should ask the second question after the “How’s it going?” Or know the person well enough to ask the deeper, more personal question, “How’s it going with your relationship with your daughter?” I know God smiles at us when we regale others the way Jesus did. I just read that we should spend less time defending our “religious” stand point and spend more time washing others’ feet. It’s hard to judge someone when you’re washing their feet. And it’s easy to love someone when you’ve put them before yourself. Help me love first and ask questions later.