The Struggle Is Real (The Flesh, The World, and the Devil) - Everyone Needs to Die [Ryan Ashley]

Matthew 16:21-27

Matthew 16:21-24

“We have been led to believe that the self is sacrosanct; just as in an earlier time it was thought never fitting to deny God, now it feels never right to deny self.”

-Robert C Roberts

Matthew 16:24-27

Option A: “Deny Jesus, Follow Self”

WILL Lose Your Life

Option B: “Deny Self, Follow Jesus”

WILL Save Your Life

“The cross is laid on every Christian. The first Christ-suffering which every [person] must experience is the call to abandon the attachments of this world. It is that dying of the old self which is the result of [their] encounter with Christ. As we embark upon discipleship we surrender ourselves to Christ in union with His death—we give over our lives to death. Thus it begins; the cross is not the terrible end to an otherwise god-fearing and happy life, but it meets us at the beginning of our communion with Christ.

When Christ calls a man, He bids him come and die. It may be a death like that of the first disciples who had to leave home and work to follow Him, or it may be a death like Luther’s, who had to leave the monastery and go out into the world. But it is the same death every time—death in Jesus Christ, the death of the old man at his call.”

-Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship

Your ability to trust God, and allowing him to lead you, even though he will lead you to the cross.