Then Jesus said to his disciples, ‘ whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.

Mathew 16:24(NIV)

As believers, we are called to be disciples of Jesus. We can only testify about Jesus when we take up the mandate as disciples.

You aren’t a disciple if you aren’t carrying your cross and following Jesus. You can’t carry and follow Jesus untill you deny yourself. In this episode of ‘ The Believer’s Cross’, we will talk about ‘ Denying Yourself’.

DENYING YOURSELF

Denying yourself is an act of sacrifice. You let go of desires that pleases you and you take up another’s desires. When you place God will above yours, you deny yourself.

As believers, denying ourselves means giving our lives to fulfil the will of God.

If Jesus had placed his will before that of God’s, he wouldn’t have fulfilled the purpose of God. If we call ourselves disciples, we need to learn to deny ourselves.

To fulfill purpose, we would need to deny ourselves some desires. The self here represents the flesh and our will. This is because the desires of the flesh is always against the will and desires of God and the purpose He has for us. Jesus prayed, for the cross to be taken away from him( that was his will then) but he again said, ‘ not my will but yours oh God'(Luke 22:42). Leting go of your will and taking in the will of God, is self-denying.

We are struggling with following Christ because we are full of ourselves. We are full of desires that are against the will of God. You can’t carry your cross and follow Jesus if we are full of ourselves. We need to deny ourselves by allowing the will of God.