Have you ever been eating from a box of donuts, and after you had eaten two or three you may have reached for one more, but then told yourself, “Why am I eating another one? I’m not even hungry anymore,” and forced yourself to stop eating? You have the power to eat as many as you want, but you chose to limit yourself. You denied yourself.
The word deny means to refuse to grant (something,) or to restrain (oneself) from gratification of desires. And it is this definition that is the topic of our verse passage today, in the denial of one’s own desires in their life and choosing to give themselves to the Lord.
Matthew 16:24-27 Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.
For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.
For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?
For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.
Many people wake up each morning before the sun rises to the sound of their alarm clock. Ring, ring. Ring, ring. Opening their eyes they slowly sit up and get up out of bed, still tired from the night before. Certainly it may be desired to get another couple hours of sleep, but the demands of their job require that they get up early to get ready and be at work at a certain time. This won’t happen if someone chooses to ignore their alarm when it goes off each morning. They must deny themselves their nice warm bed and go to work.
As Christians, Jesus calls us to serve Him, and do God’s will for us. Not to serve sin or what we want to do, but to keep His commands. This is something that not everyone seems to understand, as many people may label themselves a Christian, but their works show that they clearly are not. As we read from Christ Himself, we must deny ourselves, take to our cross, and follow Him. Not to do what we want to do with our lives, living in any manner that we please and without the guidance of the Holy Spirit, but to serve Him.
A life really is so similar to a job, because at a job you serve something. It may seem weird to think of it this way to some people, but you truly do, because when you work you are fulfilling the desires of your employer as you complete your tasks. You could be doing something else with your time, maybe going for a walk, or reading a book, but you don’t. Why? Because you have denied yourself to serve someone else. We, as Christians, must deny ourselves in this life the things which we may have done before we believed in Jesus. Without Christ we may have wanted to lie, steal, or do other things which are sinful according to the Bible, but when we decide to follow Jesus we must deny ourselves those sinful urges and desires. We may have had a different vision for our lives before we believed in the Son of God, but when we learn about God’s love and mercy for us we must turn our lives in a different direction, the direction that He wants us to live.
It is a sacrifice that people must be able to make. Many people may say, “It’s my life, I’ll do what I want with it.” Yes, it is your life, to do with as you please, to make your own decisions. But don’t you want something even greater? Wouldn’t you sacrifice something so insignificantly small for something so incredibly big? Wouldn’t you give up a penny for a million dollars? I would say that you would have to be insane not to! Yet this type of trade millions upon millions of people refuse to make each day when they refuse to give themselves to the will of the Lord.
Matthew 13:44-46 Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto treasure hid in a field; the which when a man hath found, he hideth, and for joy thereof goeth and selleth all that he hath, and buyeth that field.
Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man, seeking goodly pearls:
Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it.
This life is so short it is almost laughable that people would choose to not follow Christ, if it wasn’t for the fact that it is so sad. They won’t trade their short one hundred years for an eternity in Heaven. They won’t give up their time on this Earth to serve the Lord so that they can rest in paradise forever. I can’t speak for you but this is a trade that I am willing to make.
In Christ
Andrew
Teufer Lake King James Bible Church 