“Renounce yourself, take up your cross and follow me.” This Lord is Your invitation Lord for me to love and be loved in and through You. For You O Lord are LOVE!
Why have I been so reluctant in the past to take up Your offer? Was it fear of losing my autonomy? Was it fear that I was expected to experience some form of horrible death as You did upon the cross? Was is fear of losing my little enjoyments and pleasures? Fear of this and of that! Was it simply FEAR that prevented me from entering into a deeper relationship with You?
You O Lord had spoken lovingly and ever so often in Your Word telling me each time “Do not fear…”
‘Do not fear for I am with You, do not fear only believe, do not fear little flock.’ And so the truth Lord is that I did not trust You enough to surrender to Your endearing love for me.
I was a fool for going my own way Lord, for there is nothing more fulfilling then falling deeply into Your loving embrace when I renounce myself, take up my cross and follow You. I know now that as I live in the world, this is not a one time thing but a daily decision.
I have decided this day and every day to trust and follow You, my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen
First reading
Deuteronomy 30:15-20 ·
I set before you today life or death, blessing or curse
Moses said to the people: ‘See, today I set before you life and prosperity, death and disaster. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I enjoin on you today, if you love the Lord your God and follow his ways, if you keep his commandments, his laws, his customs, you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you are entering to make your own. But if your heart strays, if you refuse to listen, if you let yourself be drawn into worshipping other gods and serving them, I tell you today, you will most certainly perish; you will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today: I set before you life or death, blessing or curse. Choose life, then, so that you and your descendants may live, in the love of the Lord your God, obeying his voice, clinging to him; for in this your life consists, and on this depends your long stay in the land which the Lord swore to your fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob he would give them.’
Gospel
Luke 9:22-25
Whoever loses his life for my sake will save it
Jesus said to his disciples:
‘The Son of Man is destined to suffer grievously, to be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes and to be put to death, and to be raised up on the third day.’
Then to all he said:
‘If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross every day and follow me. For anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who loses his life for my sake, that man will save it. What gain, then, is it for a man to have won the whole world and to have lost or ruined his very self?’
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