A Comfortable Cross?

Several weeks ago my husband Andrew told me he felt God was leading him to join the police force. I knew this dream had long lingered in his mind. I only hoped it would stay hidden in the recesses.

As we walk through this decision, I’ve been forced to examine just what kind of life God has called us to as Christ followers. Until we’re faced with loss or until God upsets the vision we have for our lives, we don’t truly understand how keen our sense of entitlement is. Is God’s highest goal for His people to be comfortable? Does God’s deepest good involve making life safe and free of sacrifice? These are the questions I’m wrestling with.

My initial response to this situation revealed that a comfortable life is exactly what I thought God owed me. It seemed unreasonable and unkind to think of Andrew leaving a “safe” job with a convenient schedule to work nights and weekends in a more dangerous profession. All I could see was what our family would lose if we moved in this direction. Sure, loss is inevitable in life, but God doesn’t call us to it. Or does He?

In Matthew 16:24-25 Jesus says to His disciples, …”If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.”

Being a disciple of Christ demands a willingness to follow wherever He leads, including places where sacrifice is required. My instinct is to fight sacrifice tooth and nail, for in my mind, loss is synonymous with harm. As I looked at our present decision, I agonized over what the loss of a normal schedule would do to our marriage and home life. God used the above verses to remind me that if we sacrifice the life we know and think we want for the life He calls us to, we’ll find life.
Such is the way of the cross. It is not a path of comfort. It is not a path free of suffering. It is a way that leads first to pain, sacrifice, and death. However, praise God, for Christ and his followers, it ultimately leads to life.

What are you learning about what it means to be a follower of Christ? Can you think of a sacrifice in your life that God has used for your good and His glory?

[By Ashley Davis]