And he who does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me.
Jesus says this at the end of His charge to the twelve, before His own crucifixion. So the first reader has two questions: what cross could a disciple carry then, and what does it mean to be "worthy" of Christ?
Jesus is sending the twelve out, and He tells them in advance what it will cost.
The first hints our Lord gave His disciples about bearing the cross were in no way vague or ambiguous. This saying is not a mere isolated statement either — from verse 16 of the chapter to the end, the whole passage runs on the persecution that would fall on His faithful witnesses. He, the Lord of the harvest, was sending out His labourers into the harvest. He warns them ahead of time of the enormous opposition they would meet. It would come from those who oppose every new thing out of sheer stubbornness. It would come from the powers that be — governors and kings. Hardest of all to bear, it would come from their nearest relatives: fathers, mothers and children.
One writer draws out how far this reaches beyond the men standing in front of Him.
There is no service to Christ which is without a cross… He said this to the twelve in particular, as servants of God. Yet in principle it is true of every disciple's service.
In that world the cross was not a symbol. It was a way of killing, and a shaming one.
It seems to me that Scripture ties the cross above all to shame and disgrace. The cross itself was a cruel and shameful heathen way of putting a man to death. Even the heathen kept it for the very worst. It seemed to say: here is a wretch whose feelings count for nothing. His sufferings can be dragged out to frighten others away from doing what he has done.
Read that way, the picture Jesus draws is of a man already sentenced.
As the other Gospels show, the Lord had used expressions like "taking his cross" and "bearing his cross" as pictures of one truth: His disciple must be ready to come under the death sentence of the world.
The wording is precise: his cross, not Christ's.
Christ did not say, "And whoever does not bear My cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple." That would mean perfection of reproach, and would imply perfection of walk. But every believer, in his own measure, suffers reproach. It is the same character as Christ's, and so it is called a cross; but it is his cross, not Christ's. Every disciple bears his cross. But God forbid that he should glory in it. He glories only "in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Gal. 6:14).
Everyday speech stretches the word to cover any trouble at all. Scripture is narrower.
People use the word for every kind of trial and suffering, without distinction. Unbelievers use it, and others use it about unbelievers. Yet using the language of Scripture, it is clear that no unbeliever bears a cross. The world loves its own; it does not hate them (John 15:19)… It is the reproach of Christ. Only one thing earns the name cross: the suffering or reproach that flows from man's unjust judgment on what is like Christ in us.
This verse follows straight on from Christ's claim to outrank father, mother, son and daughter.
For any mere man to demand this would be wickedness. But this Man is the eternal God, worthy of unconditional worship, and entitled to the absolute obedience of every creature… Christ has willingly accepted the cross of mankind's rejection for our sake. Every disciple of His is therefore to take his own cross. That is, he chooses to identify himself with the rejected Christ of God, and to follow Him in this path of rejection. He expects no recognition from the world, but reproach instead.
This is where the verse is most often misread, as if God's acceptance were for sale.
This worthiness does not refer to standing before God. Forgiveness of sins and acceptance with God rest on grace alone, never on merit of any kind (Eph. 2:8). The point is not relationship but discipleship… To dodge the cross is to forfeit the title of a worthy witness for the Lord Jesus in the world.
Christ asks nothing of His followers that He avoided Himself.
If the Lord was going to make those who followed Him take up the cross, He had to bear it Himself. He went ahead of His sheep in this path of self-denial and devotedness, to prepare the way. He went alone.
- He went first. The Lord would not lay a cross on His followers without carrying one Himself. He walked that road alone first.
- Your cross, not His. The verse says his cross. The disciple shares Christ's reproach, not His perfect walk — and glories only in the cross of Christ.
- Shame, not misfortune. The cross was the death reserved for the worst; it stands for the world's sentence on you, not for hardship in general.
- First place or no place. The demand sits beside a claim to outrank father, mother and child — a claim only the eternal God could rightly make.
- Worthy means witness. "Not worthy" touches discipleship, not salvation. Acceptance is by grace alone; worthiness here is the loyalty that proves whose you are.
He that finds his life shall lose it, and he who has lost his life for my sake shall find it.
Jesus is sending out His twelve disciples, and He has just warned them that loyalty to Him will split families. Now He states the rule behind that cost — and it sounds like a contradiction until you ask which world each half belongs to.
This saying keeps coming back in the Gospels.
Of all His wonderful words in the Gospels, this is the only one I know of that comes back, with slight changes, no less than six times. Read these passages: Matthew 10:39; 16:25; Mark 8:35; Luke 9:24; 17:33... So He pressed this truth home four times: when He sent out His twelve disciples; just before His transfiguration; when giving a prophetic talk not long before the end of His ministry; and within a few days of His death.
The verse sits at the end of hard words about families divided over Him.
The Lord boldly meets the case. I have come to bring in My principle, and it sets child against parent... He shows that His coming would bring the opposite to a path of ease in this world. Yes, we must make up our minds to suffer trial, rejection and scorn.
Much depends on which word Jesus used for "life."
The word translated "life" here is usually translated "soul." It refers to that "soul life" which marks man in his natural fallen condition. The soul is not the same as the spirit. The spirit is the higher part of a person, able to put him in intelligent touch with God. The soul is the seat of our natural desires and longings. So "soul life" is the life of enjoying all the things that naturally appeal to us.
Read the two halves as belonging to two different worlds. That also keeps the verse from shrinking to those who die as martyrs.
In the world to come, the finding and losing of the soul in this present world are turned around. There the finding becomes losing, and the losing becomes finding. The man who makes himself the object of his life loses himself and is cast away. The man who sacrifices self and its interests for Christ's sake is really keeping everything safe for the world to come... And you do not have to lay down your life as a martyr for this to apply. Can only those who die a martyr's death live for ever?
Everything hangs on three words: "for My sake."
The Lord goes on to declare the reward, connecting it with the conditions He has already laid down. "Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life" — not simply as having done this, but — "for My sake, will find it." This is not a rule of harsh self-denial, or anything like that. It is His love ruling in the face of a hostile world.
Something in us fights this, and it has a slogan of its own.
So if the cross had to be His portion, His followers must accept the cross too. For Him the cross meant atonement for sin, as well as rejection and shame. We share the rejection and shame only. But nature shrinks from this, and even resents it. Its motto (suggested by Satan) is "Spare yourself"; God's motto is "Deny yourself." Someone has truly said that Peter "at the last denied the Lord because he had not denied himself."
The trade is not blind. What is surrendered is real, and so is what replaces it.
One who found his life — that is, chose a life of ease and comfort on earth — would only lose it. A man cannot keep what he tries so hard to hold. But suppose someone loses his life for Christ's sake, and makes Christ his object. It might cost him life's natural pleasures and aims. Yet he would find his life after all: a satisfying life of lasting value and blessing, with eternal good in view.
- Repeated — no other saying of Jesus is recorded six times. He said it when sending out the twelve, before the transfiguration, in prophecy, and days before His death.
- Reversed — what counts as finding in this world counts as losing in the next. Make yourself your own object and you lose yourself.
- Yourself — the word usually translated "soul" means the seat of natural desires. The losing is not limited to dying as a martyr.
- For His sake — these words rule out harsh self-denial as a system. This is His love ruling a disciple in a hostile world.
- Result — nature says spare yourself; God says deny yourself. Peter denied his Lord because he had not first denied himself.