The message of the cross is not a popular message, is it? When we are faced with the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the Son of God on the cross, it challenges us to give up our own lives. The great missionary, C. T. Studd wrote: “If Jesus Christ be God and died for me, then no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for Him.”
To speak or write about the cross doesn’t grab people’s attention. It was conspicuous how few people looked at Friday’s post about the cross, “What is the Predominant Theme in Your Home?” And yet without the truth of the cross and learning to lay down our lives, we will not learn how to truly live.
On Saturday we hosted a lovely wedding at our home. Colin married the young couple and spoke about the power of the cross working in our marriages. It is the message of the cross that teaches us how to build a marriage that lasts.
I often think that if we only had one Scripture in the whole of the Bible to teach us how to live as married couples, we would find blessing and success from Philippians 2:5-8 (NASB): “Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death.”
What an attitude! And we are to have the same attitude. Not hanging on to our own rights but laying them down for others.
2 Corinthians 5:15 always challenges me: “And he (Jesus Christ) died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again.” Jesus showed us the way in laying down His life for us. We no longer live to ourselves, but to Him. And we show that we live to Him when we lay down our life to live for others. This works out in the one who is closest to us--our husband.
We have the answer. Now, it’s just putting it into practice, not in our own strength, but through the power of the Holy Spirit who dwells in us.
Blessings to you today,
Nancy Campbell