Jesus, lunatic or God?

One day when Jesus was teaching those who had gathered around to learn, he laid down the basic requirement for becoming one of his followers. He said to them, “Put aside whatever you might want to do with your life, pick up your cross and follow me!” (Mark 8:34). The imagery is vivid, the cross being a symbol of death. They are to die to one’s self and all it wants to get out of life and “live” sacrificially for others. Scripture requires us,  as followers of Christ, to “Give up everything you want and do what I want.” But that is the only way to become follower of Jesus.
       If you haven’t already stopped reading this site today and are wondering if I’ve lost control, the answer is that I’m doing my best to pass on what Scripture has to say on the subject. That it doesn’t represent the cultural climate I gladly accept. It is distinctly counter cultural. Today I have indicated that to be a Christian calls for nothing less than to give up one’s own plans for life (to “die” to oneself”) and live to do what God wants.  If this sounds radical, all I can say is that it is what Scripture teaches. Listen to Jesus: “The one who tries to save his life [get as much as possible for himself out of this life] will certainly lose it; but the one who loses his life [surrenders it to me and the Good News] will be rewarded with a full and abundant life” (Mark 8:35, Jesus, In His Own Words,  p. 117). That this saying of Jesus played an important role in the life of the early church is seen in the fact that it is one of the very few sayings of Jesus that is recorded in all four gospels. What the first century itinerant country preacher, Jesus, demanded of those who wanted to be his followers was complete and absolute commitment to him and his message! As C.S. Lewis is often quoted as saying, “He was either a lunatic or who he said he was, the Son of God” (shortened version).
       I believe we understand that by dying to self Jesus means putting our personal concerns aside in order to act as a servant and do what he wants us to do. It is less a once-for-all decision as it is a daily commitment to carry out what he has in mind (Luke has “take up his cross daily,” 9:23). But “losing” one’s life isn’t the entire story. It is by losing life that we “find” it. This is the most socially incorrect advice ever given to man. Don’t keep sweating it out in order to get the most out of life; just forget what you want and live for Jesus and the Good News.  That is when you will discover that the little you gave comes roaring back in a storm of much more. You might call it a “transformational boomerang” because it circled around and returned as something new and infinitely superior. You threw away the temporal and back comes the eternal; it left your hand as self concern and returned as joy in serving, out it went as unrest and back it comes as peace. In short, you threw away what you thought you wanted and back came what God knew all along would give would give you the deepest satisfaction. Not only to the new recruit but to all of us as well, Jesus is promising that if we’ll die to self he’ll give us what we really want.  
       You’ve got it right there in your hand; now’s the time to throw it away . . . but don’t leave, it will come back transformed into a life of such joy and profound satisfaction that you‘ll hardly recognize it.