"What about you?" he asked them. "Who do you say I am?"

Peter answered, "You are God’s Messiah."

Then Jesus gave them strict orders not to tell this to anyone. He also told them, "The Son of Man must suffer much and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the teachers of the Law. He will be put to death, but three days later he will be raised to life."

And he said to them all, "If anyone wants to come with me, he must forget himself, take up his cross every day, and follow me. For whoever wants to save his own life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. Will a person gain anything if he wins the whole world but is himself lost or defeated? Of course not! If a person is ashamed of me and of my teaching, then the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in his glory and in the glory of the Father and of the holy angels. I assure you that there are some here who will not die until they have seen the Kingdom of God."

Luke 9:20-27

The "cross" Christ referred to is an act of putting to death our own heart’s desires and quietly submitting to God’s will. Such dying means denying our need for more and better of everything. It means making do with what God has blessed us with.

Jesus said we must take up our cross daily. We are to rise each day and cheerfully, and bravely shoulder our load. God will provide us with sufficient strength through His grace. We cannot do it alone, but we can do it with Him. He promises us that through our dying He will make us more alive than ever before. Are you dying to live?

In acceptance we find peace.

Our Daily Bread – May 8, 2003