[Note: This sermon was delivered 23 October 1977, Montreal. A correction is noted at the outset: the reference given last week was in error — the correct text is Luke 14:27, not Luke 16:16. Luke 14:27: "Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple."]
Human beings are ingeniously inventive when it comes to evading the hard demands of Scripture. There are several well-worn techniques. One is to say: "That teaching applied to a different time — it doesn't apply in our situation today." Another is: "The Lord's standard is impossibly high; he is only setting an ideal, not expecting us to actually reach it." A third: "I am being humble by not presuming to obey such a demanding command." Each of these techniques does exactly what the Lord Jesus condemned in the Pharisees: it makes void the word of God through human tradition. A rabbi once had to rule on the commandment "Do not boil a kid in its mother's milk." Over centuries of interpretation, this had evolved into elaborate rules about keeping separate utensils for milk and meat, waiting hours between eating them, and not allowing steam from cooking milk to touch meat. Eventually someone reasoned: if you coat meat with pine oil so that a dog would not eat it, it is technically not food by definition — therefore it is no longer "meat," and you may put butter on your steak. The Lord's reaction to this kind of ingenuity is explicit: "You make void the word of God through your traditions." Christians do exactly the same with his hard sayings.
The Lord himself asks the question that cuts through every such evasion: "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and do not do the things I say?" (Luke 6:46). Calling Jesus "Lord" while treating his commands as optional is not merely inconsistency — it is a fundamental contradiction. The word "Lord" means master, the one whose word is authoritative and final. To call him Lord and then negotiate with his commands is to use the title without its content.
In John 13:34 the Lord gives what he calls a new commandment: "Love one another as I have loved you." The same commandment is repeated in John 15:12 and 15:17. The newness of this commandment does not lie in the instruction to love — the Old Testament already taught love for neighbour. The newness lies in the standard: "as I have loved you." This "as" transforms everything. It is not merely love of the warm feeling or good intention variety; it is love defined and measured by the cross. First John 3:16 makes this explicit: "By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers." The cross is the definition of the love we are called to.
The Lord Jesus loved in seven specific ways. First, with compassion — deep, visceral compassion at human suffering and lostness. Second, with involvement: Hebrews 2:14 says he took on flesh and blood, identifying with our condition completely. You cannot love from a safe distance; love enters the situation. Third, with humility — washing his disciples' feet, taking the place of a servant. Fourth, with forgiveness: Colossians 3:13, "as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive." Fifth, with reconciliation: Ephesians 2:16 and 2 Corinthians 5:18 — the ministry of reconciliation, bridging what was divided. Sixth, by becoming poor: 2 Corinthians 8:9, "though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich." Seventh, by laying down his life.
The failure of this love in the church is one of the most damaging testimonies against the gospel. A brother who served as assistant pastor was paid £8 a week — the church's attitude being that since he was willing to work, they need not pay him properly. Churches bicker and divide over petty matters. The Lord says in John 13:35: "By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another." The world looks at the church and does not see this love — and that is why John 13:35 is not being fulfilled as it should be.
# Take Up Your Cross — Matthew 11:12 / Luke 14:27 (Part B) — Becoming Poor, Serving, Forgiving, Reconciling, and Laying Down Life
[Note: This is Part B of the sermon on Matthew 11:12 / Luke 14:27, continuing directly from Part A. Delivered 23 October 1977, Montreal.]
The sixth way Christ loved is by becoming poor. Second Corinthians 8:9: "Though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich." This is not spiritualised — it was materially true. The Son of God who created the universe was born in a stable, had nowhere to lay his head, and died with nothing. Following Christ into this kind of love costs something. There are inheritances not received, careers not pursued, comforts not enjoyed — because the cross was chosen instead. This is not a theoretical point; it is a pattern that runs through the lives of all who have taken the command seriously.
There is a mentality that has become common, especially among educated women — and this must be said plainly — of getting rather than giving. A woman with a PhD in chemistry who is at home looking after three small children is not wasting her gifts; she is giving herself, which is more than she is doing if she is advancing her career while her children grow up without her presence. Washing the disciples' feet — John 13 — is the Lord's enacted parable of this principle. Doctor Thomas, despite his exhaustion, carried luggage to the airport because he said it was a privilege to serve. That is the spirit of the cross made visible in daily life.
The habit of making jokes at other people's expense must be confronted directly. When you make a joke that diminishes another person in order to make yourself look clever or amusing, you are pushing that person down to lift yourself up. This is the exact opposite of the cross. Porcupines protect themselves with their quills — every quill that goes into the neighbour is one less wound on the self. Christians who use humour as a weapon are doing the same thing: protecting their own pride by puncturing another's. This is not wit — it is sin.
First John 3:14 gives us the test of assurance: "We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers." The assurance that you are truly a Christian is not found primarily in your doctrine or your feeling or your experience of conversion — it is found in whether you love the brothers. If you do not love, you are still in death. This is a searching word. The cross as a standard for love does not allow us to rest comfortably in easy assurance.
Colossians 3:13 says: "As the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive." The analogy of the rice bowl captures what forgiveness costs. If a servant breaks an expensive bowl, the master who forgives does not get the bowl back — he absorbs the loss. That is what forgiveness is: absorbing the cost. You pay the price of what was done to you and release the debt. This is painful; it is meant to be. The cross was not painless. The ministry of reconciliation in 2 Corinthians 5:18 goes further: not only forgiving but actively working to restore what was broken between people. The seventh way Christ loved — laying down his life — is the culmination and the goal toward which all the others point. "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends." This is the love the Lord Jesus defines, demonstrates, and commands. This is what taking up the cross means.