Title: Take Up the Cross in Prayer
take up the cross in prayer
Luke 22:42-44 ‘42. He said to him, “Father, if it is your will, remove this cup from me. But not my will, but your will.” 43 An angel appeared to Jesus from heaven and strengthened him, 44. And he prayed more earnestly and with all his might, and his sweat became like drops of blood falling to the ground.' - Amen.
The text is a scene in which Jesus prayed with blood and sweat in the Garden of Gethsemane the night before His death on the cross. Even after the resurrection and ascension, in Romans 8:34 and Hebrews 7:25, it is said that He continues to pray for us. Then, what would be the most important part for us believers who follow the Lord to live a cross life? It can be said to be a prayer life. Today, I would like to share grace with this title, <Take up the cross in prayer>.
1. Prayer must be embodied
The Christian life of faith is not a religious and cultural life that comes and goes in and out of the church because of time and boredom. It is a completely new pattern of living spiritually in the midst of prayer and truth in which the will to live is changed by changing the fundamental state of the soul. The prayer life of Jesus was an act that taught the emotions of the life of the saints. God's will is a world of a completely different sense from man's will, and if you follow and obey, it will work out, but it is difficult to accept at first like clothes that do not fit your body. Because of this, we cannot follow without prayer. Earlier in the text, Luke 22:39 says, “Jesus went out and went to the Mount of Olives according to his custom, and his disciples followed him…”
2. I pray to live and die according to the Father's will
As a believer, when you have knowledge of faith and experience, you should pray more from then on, but prayer is strangely lacking. The Jews, descendants of the mother-belief, boasted only of their religious traditions, their prayers were hypocritical, and they did not earnestly seek to live according to God's will. Just by looking at the circumstances in which they sued Jesus, we can see that they were emotional and human.
Luke 22:42 “He said, “Father, if it is your will, remove this cup from me. But it is not my will, but your will.” He was the one who knew everything until the Second Coming. So, in order to carry out the Father's holy mission better, he always tried to bear the cross as the Messiah through prayer.
Why should the saints pray? You can answer and act on anything you know about, but if you want to glorify God with your perfect words and actions, you must pray and carry out your work. Otherwise, you will become human, and you will only be a Christian with words, and it will bring about unfaithful results. 2 Corinthians 1:9 “… so that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead.” Philippians 4:6 “…in everything by prayer and supplication…”
3. Build a life of the cross through bloody sweat
It is wrong to think that we pray regularly and accomplish great things. The bigger the task, the more prayers are requested. Jesus' mission is now fulfilled by dying on the cross, and if this death was the greatest burden, it was a burden.
In Luke 22:44, “Jesus prayed more earnestly, and with all his strength, his sweat became like drops of blood falling to the ground.” If it is too painful, capillaries may burst and blood may come out. The words that his sweat became like drops of blood speaks of the spiritual suffering of Jesus.
Prayer is prepared as earnestly as the desired purpose of prayer. In Luke 18: He taught us to pray earnestly in the parable to relieve a widow's grudge, and it says that the center of prayer will be like resentment. The purpose of prayer must be that earnest. That way you can trust and rely on it. A person with a weak purpose has a poor prayer life. Hebrews 12:4 There is a saying, 'You have been fighting sin, but you have not yet resisted it to the point of shedding your blood.' If we want to solve our sinful lives and receive answers, we can live while enjoying God's grace. It means you have to pray even to the point of shedding your blood.
It is possible if we set our minds on Sunday holy water, tithing, evangelism, and even volunteer work in our religious life. However, the prayer life is actually easier than those elements, but it is the most difficult and painful. It's not just about making a promise. Perhaps it is more difficult to live a life of earnest prayer every day than to perform miracles.
I learn and listen to a lot of lessons about the Christian life of the cross. It's gracious to hear, but it's always difficult to live like that. There are many reasons for this and that, and finally, I give up saying that I am human. However, as human beings, we must pray to take up the cross. If it's too hard today, when the Lord is having a hard time, just like in verse 43, an angel appeared and gave strength.
If you want to live your life successfully, hoping for God's power to help those who pray whenever it is difficult, you should spend more time in prayer relying on God rather than the method. He is a God who finds those who earnestly seek him.
There is still a cross given to each of us today. The Lord also received the death of the cross well by praying with blood and sweat, so I pray that we can also carry the cross that was given to us through prayer.