08/30/2026
GOSPEL MESSAGE
August 30, 2026
LECTIONARY 22
Take Up Your Cross
Jesus issues a difficult invitation to his disciples: “Take up [your] cross and follow me” (Matthew 16:24). While the disciples may have hoped for a Messiah who would set the world right through satisfying displays of force and strength, Jesus offers them a different vision. His new kingdom or reign will not be built on traditional concepts of power and glory. It is instead a kingdom centered on the cross.
Today we, too, may long for a mighty Messiah to put the world back in order, throw down corrupt rulers from their thrones, and take away suffering once and for all. And like Peter, we may find ourselves crying out in disbelief, “God forbid it, Lord!” (v. 22) when Jesus redirects our gaze to the cross.
The cross reminds us that following Jesus requires nothing less than our whole lives. To follow Jesus is to love our neighbors with a self-sacrificing love, to sit in the discomfort of another’s struggle, and to be willing to lay down our own power and privilege to see the world from our neighbor’s point of view. Following Jesus requires practicing courage as we show up for one another in the least glamorous moments of life: in the hospital room, at the gravesite, in the living rooms of the brokenhearted, in the streets marching for justice. To follow Jesus is to open our hearts to the world’s pain and to practice loving others with God’s generous love, trusting that there is always more than enough.
Putting love of God and neighbor above power, prestige, and comfort is countercultural. It might even get us into trouble. But through Jesus’ own life, death, and resurrection, we are freed to enter into the world’s suffering, trusting that God’s love always gets the last word and that we will indeed be brought to new life through God’s resurrection power.
From sundaysandseasons.com.
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