Pick up your cross and follow me?

[larrry]

how do you determine what your cross is ?,
and can you see what other people’s cross is?

is this just an analogy ?

what were your thought on this concept?

 

[drac16]

I think that whatever you have to do repeatedly is a cross to bear. One of the crosses I have to bear is singleness. I don’t really like being single, but that’s where God has me right now. God has helped me gouge out eyes and cut off limbs, so I have control over my sexual desires; it’s not perfect, but it’s manageable. One of the things the devil likes to do is to tell me that God has forgotten me. Paul was single, though, and he wasn’t forgotten by God.

Whatever you have to deal with on a regular basis, that is a cross to bear. We have to look unto Jesus to help us stay focused on our goal (Heaven).

 

[Ad_Orientem]

So we’re talking about Matt. 16:24.

I think it’s an analogy for detachment, self-sacrifice, and the challenge of being a Christian. We can either live for the enjoyment of this world, or we can “die” to this world and live for God. Living for God is not easy. We have to practice virtue, which requires effort and discipline, and deny ourselves things we want to do or to have. It’s not wrong to enjoy created things, but we tend to use them to excess and in wrong ways, so we have to practice detachment, perhaps use them less, or in some cases not at all. And ultimately our hearts should be centered on God, not on this world.

 

[St_Francis]

Our crosses are all the big and little things we view negatively in our life, from inside-out socks in the laundry to your car being totaled. Anything that causes us hardship.

And we should offer each and every one up. This is very hard to remember, and sometimes even to realize!

 

[Billy_Buescher]

To me that would mean we need to have faith in Christ and follow Him no matter where it leads us.

I read about converts to the Catholic faith have difficulties when they finally realize that the Catholic church is the Church that Christ founded. That being known, would to me, mean that they would need to convert, or not follow Christ, the Truth. that the Church is His body.

Leaving their faith belief for the Catholic Church is a tough cross to carry.

 

[joeybaggz]

Cross/ Anything that stands in the way of one’s individual peace and happiness. One of the corporal works of mercy I see on the stained glass windows of a parish I attend occasionally is “bear wrongs patiently”. I think that is as good a definition as I could come up with.
In spite of the hardships we face daily, the idea is to live life joyfully in belief in Christ’s teachings and hope for the joy He promised all who follow Him.

My :twocents:

 

[elohimrules]

Jesus literally carried the cross to His place of sacrifice where He gave Himself as the perfect sacrifice for our sins. He literally carried all our burdens and sins with Him to the cross and nailed them to the cross. He took all our sorrows. So a cross is a burden we carry just like Jesus carried our burdens to the crucifixion. For example, something we suffer from can be a cross, a speech impediment, mental illness, physical illness, all these can be crosses, many things. It is something we have or are dealing with that we would rather not have in our life. Sometimes the suffering of our own “personal” cross leads us to a place of great closeness to our Lord as we have to lean upon Him for help. The apostle Paul had a cross he had to bear. He asked God to take it away several times but God just said my strength is made sufficient in weakness, not sure the actual quote but it is close.

So, when we ask for some sort of suffering to be removed and it is not, perhaps that is our cross we must bear that brings us even closer to the suffering savior.

 

[Blessedwithfive]

We really don’t know what others are going through.

A friend of mine told me that if everyone were to come out of their houses and lay their cross on the front lawn and we could “pick” any cross to carry instead of ours, we would all chose to carry the cross we have been given.

I think about that a lot. Maybe Christ knows just what cross we “need” and can “carry”.

 

[Michael_Mayo]

I am only just beginnng to see it as empowerment. All to often we can pray for pity, help, and mercy which are tantamount to “ease my cross or even take my cross”. Often, we feel that we are not up to the challenges placed on us. But, “Take up your cross and follow me.” Is a command of confidence that we already have the strength or where with all to deal with whatever comes our way in this life. And we don’t have to go looking for our crosses. They come with life. Our prayer then becomes one of gratitude.

And so on Good Friday when we venerate the cross, we venerate the symbol of our discipleship and hence, our relationship to Jesus.

 

[GLam8833]

I look at Jesus on the cross and feel
comforted, b/c Jesus was MEANT to
carry the cross and die on it. When
WE carry our cross, we can be assured
of the Father’s approval, we are MEANT
to bear our crosses and die for it, if that
is God’s intention.