My Cross is My Friend: Perseverance To The Last
For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
Romans 8:24–25
Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
James 1:2–4
This is the sum of it, to be saved we must endure pain and sorrow. That is, we must carry and die upon many crosses in our lives to enter the hope of hope, eternal life. How praytell can one accomplish this? The answer to this is my aim in this discussion.
First, as the title indicates, The personal Cross is the friend of the one who wants to endure to the end. James, above, says various trials (crosses) PRODUCE steadfastness or the ability to endure. Why is that? because enduring hardship causes the heart to mature to the extreme. It makes one LEARN to say "I glory in my afflictions" (Romans 5:3).
Furthermore, to endure the cross is to cease from sin:
Since therefore Christ suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves with the same way of thinking, for whoever has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live for the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for human passions but for the will of God.
1 Peter 4:1–2.
The same mechanism is described in Romans 8:
For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.
Romans 8:13–14.
Thus, the Cross is the door out of living in flesh and the gate into living in the Spirit.
So if you want to live, and not die ("For if you live according to the flesh you will die" v. 13 above), you must learn to love your personal cross. You must learn to glory in your afflictions.
The Cross also unlocks the depths of union with Christ and God. Another way of saying this is: if you have perished (your flesh is dying) what is there left if you are a true disciple but the life of Christ in you? In other words, Jesus increasingly takes the wheel.
And so, if what is merely human in you perishes, if the life of Christ is all that's left, WHAT CAN POSSIBLY FALL AWAY? Can Christ stumble? Then the key to perseverance is simply this, enough of YOU dies that the only matter of perseverance in trial is Christ taking the helm of you and getting you through Zion's gates.
Who at the gates of Zion would refuse Christ? No, they will not merely open the gates, they will let you sit on his throne and reign as him:
The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
Revelation 3:21–22.
Yes, endure the cross, despising the shame, but do not refuse it. It's your ticket to glory, honor, and immortality to the age of the ages. And, finally, the Personal Cross of the true Christian is the only key in perseverance to the last.
S.D.G.
Such a beautiful truth that has been perverted by most of today's church into the exact opposite, that Jesus bore His cross so that we wouldn't have to bear any. How different that is from the truths of the old hymns such as "Must Jesus Bear The Cross Alone and All the World Go Free?" Truly, The Way of the Cross Leads Home (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaPzcioqmS4). For a better understanding to the essential nature to the gospel of bearing our own cross readers may wish to meditate upon the many scripture passages at https://inductivebible.org/?page_id=4736. God bless you and thanks for posting.