Deny Your Self(ies)

It’s the end of another week, how many selfies have you taken? How many pictures of your food? How many posts have you made about yourself on your social media? According to a recent report by Eksposure, a photography and design resource company, every day approximately 93 million selfies are captured worldwide. (…) A recent study reveals that Gen Z takes, on average, 3.16 selfies a week—which is almost 2.5 times as many selfies as millennials who take an average of 1.37 selfies per week. Is it possible to post about yourself, your food, or even take selfies while denying yourself?

“‘If you want to be my disciple, you must, by comparison, hate everyone else—your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even your own life. Otherwise, you cannot be my disciple. And if you do not carry your own cross and follow me, you cannot be my disciple.’” (Luke 14:26-27)

If you are taking selfies multiple times a week, are you denying yourself? As you focus your camera on yourself, isn’t your focus in general on yourself? Jesus is telling the crowd that they must hate their own life when compared to how much they love Him. Matthew 16 words it this way, “…you must deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me.” How often do you deny or die to yourself as a Christ follower? Jesus says we must take up the symbol of death to follow Him because following Him is a death to self. We don’t really have a symbol like the cross in our modern day but would you be willing to give up your phone to follow Jesus? Would you give up your social media and all your followers to follow Him?

“‘But don’t begin until you count the cost. For who would begin construction of a building without first calculating the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it?’” (Luke 14:28)

Jesus goes on to warn the crowd not to start following Him unless they have counted the cost. This is the “don’t start something you can’t finish” argument. Jesus gives a practical example of this discipline, stating that someone wouldn’t start building a house if they didn’t have enough money to finish it. This discipline is not often practiced in our modern society today. A quick google search shows that around 340 million Americans are carrying some kind of debt, around 77% of the country’s citizens. And we rarely practice this discipline in our churches when people come forward wanting to be baptized. How many people choose to follow Jesus, get baptized and quickly return to the ways they said they were going to leave behind? Do we as Christians make sure people understand the cost of following Jesus before we baptize them into Him? If we don’t count the cost of following Christ, then we may not finish the race and if that is case we will indeed be faced with a debt we cannot pay.

 “Then Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Whoever want to be my disciple must deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow me.’” (Matthew 16:24)

We must deny ourselves and take up our cross to follow Jesus. How are we doing at that? Does your social media indicate this type of lifestyle? When others look at you do they see a self-denying, cross-carrying disciple of Jesus? It is going to cost everything to follow Him. Are you truly willing to give Jesus everything? Have you counted the cost?

To the glory of the Lord God, whose I am, and whom I serve.