“There is no discipleship without the cross. I am not a follower of Jesus if I live with Him only in Bethlehem and Nazareth and not in Gethsemane and Calvary, too.” – Brennan Manning
“For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” – Apostle Paul (1 Cor. 2:2)
If we are going to understand the poverty of the life of Jesus than we must make our way to Calvary and stand at the foot of the cross. It is not an easy thing to do. It is a trek unfamiliar to many in our day and time. Through history we have cleaned up the cross. We wiped off the blood, sanded away the splinters, and covered it with gold. We wear it as jewelry, hang it up on the walls of our homes and put it on our steeples. We have become numb to the depth of the sacrifice that was given when Jesus poured Himself out for all humanity. His laying aside all that was His…becoming poor…enduring the cruelty of the cross…suffering the punishment that was meant for us.
When we are willing to go there, to the cross, and look into the face of the One who gave His life for us we will be able to sing with the hymn writer, “and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace”. Perspective. Things become clear in the presence of our Savior…our Lord…the Good Shepherd…the crucified King.
The Apostle Paul was consumed with the sacrifice of Jesus. He couldn’t get the cross out of his mind. It was more important than anything else. He was a smart man educated in the best schools of the day. He had the right pedigree and multiple degrees but none of that moved him like the cross of Christ. The poverty of Jesus was the only thing worth knowing. It was the event that moved him at the core of his being. Everything else paled in comparison to this act of selfless love. When Paul looked at the cross he realized that he was “poor in spirit”. In other words, all that he had accomplished on his own and everything that he had built his trust on was garbage in the light of the cross (Philippians 3:8).
Today, what are you holding onto in your life that you cannot live without? What have you anchored your ship to? Your savings acount? Your house? Your health? Your activities? Your career? Come to the cross. Lay it down.
“Blessed are the poor in spirit…”