Have ya’ll heard the expression the elephant in the room? The website “Phrase Finder” tries to get all technical when they define it as, “An important and obvious topic, which everyone present is aware of, but which isn't discussed, as such discussion is considered to be uncomfortable.” But in everyday terms, the elephant in the room is the thing that everybody knows but no one wants to talk about.
We can probably all think of examples where there was an elephant in the room. For families there are all kinds of elephants in the room – generational elephants like addiction or physical or sexual abuse. In business, the elephant in the room might be that women and minorities are passed over for high level promotions. In politics, the elephants and the donkeys are all over the room from health care; to the economy; to defense spending; to the fundraising practices of political candidates.
This morning there are a few elephants in the room. Now the first elephant in the room that I want to name and claim is the fact that this is the third week of our stewardship campaign. Guess what? A stewardship campaign is about money. We can try and be creative and divert your attention away from that fact, but the simple truth is that we need your money if we are going to continue to do ministry in Lawrenceville and around the world. Believe me; I know the economy stinks because the second elephant in the room is the fact that our giving has been down for months now.
There are some of ya’ll probably thinking to yourself, “I knew it. That’s all church’s talk about is money.” Well right now that is what we are talking about because we are in the middle of a stewardship campaign, and I’d be lying to you if I said I didn’t want you to give to our church because I believe in our ministries. But before you check out or get up and leave please hear me when I say I am not worried about our stewardship campaign. I’m not worried about how much money we receive. I know we will continue serving God here in Lawrenceville and around the world even if that means making difficult financial decisions. We may have to cut our budget, we may have to let staff go, we may have to change the way we do ministry.
Honestly, what I am most worried about is the third elephant in the room. This third elephant also has to do with a stewardship campaign. But this campaign operates within an eternal economy with an investment structure and a currency that our world doesn’t understand, that our world disregards, that it laughs at and sometimes persecutes.
I want us to take a closer look at this other stewardship campaign, and I think we can begin to learn more about it when we read Mark 8:34-9:1. Mark is the second book in the New Testament after the book of Matthew and chapter 8 begins on page () in your pew Bible.
The third elephant in the room is the fact that God is in the midst of an eternal stewardship campaign and the currency he is seeking is not a 10% tithe, or our teaching a Sunday school class, or our serving on the finance committee. The currency God requires for his eternal stewardship campaign is our life our very soul. He wants everything.
In Mark chapter 8, we learn that involvement in God’s eternal stewardship campaign has three essential requirements. Let’s look at v. 34: “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” The three requirements for participation in God’s eternal stewardship campaign are: 1) denying yourself; 2) taking up your cross; and 3) following Jesus. So what do those things mean? What does it mean to deny yourself, to take up your cross, and to follow Jesus?
Unfortunately the first requirement “deny yourself” gets misinterpreted and misapplied all the time. People hear “deny yourself” and they immediately assume Jesus is telling them to deny their self-worth, to deny their emotions, or to deny themselves happiness. They take their own damaged self-image or brokenness and they turn the command “to deny yourself” into a pair of boxing gloves to beat themselves up with.
But that’s not what Jesus is talking about; when he tells us to deny ourselves he’s telling us “to reject,” “to refuse,” “to say no” to our self-lordship. In the words of Darrell Johnson, “denying ourselves” means “saying no to the god who is me.” To deny ourselves is to place our self-will and our self-seeking into the hands of Jesus. It is to say quite simply, “Jesus you are in control and not me...It is thy will be done, thy will be done and not mine.”
The second requirement for participation in God’s stewardship campaign is “to take up your cross.” Again this command gets misapplied and misinterpreted, and people use it all the time to refer to an ongoing illness, or a hardship, or an unhealthy relationship. But these interpretations miss the significance of Jesus’ command.
In the first century, the cross was the most severe and repulsive form of capital punishment that existed. It was reserved for criminals, political radicals - the lowest of the low. Criminals were forced to “take up” the horizontal cross beam they were to be hung from and carry it to the place of their crucifixion. They were dead men walking.
When Jesus commands us “to take up our cross” he is commanding us to relinquish our lives to him and to consider ourselves already dead. “To take up our cross” is to crucify all of our earthly agendas, ambitions, hopes, and dreams. It is to die for Jesus.
The third and final requirement for participation in God’s stewardship campaign is “to follow Jesus.” When we deny ownership of our lives and die to all of our earthly passions for the sake of Jesus, then we begin to follow his lead and his example. To “follow Jesus” is not only about letting him lead; it is about living a life that reflects his love, his obedience, his suffering and his sacrifice. To “follow Jesus” is to hop like a child from footprint to footprint behind the one whose destination is the cross of Calvary.
God is in the midst of an eternal stewardship campaign and you are either in or you are out. There is no middle ground. There are no special circumstances, loopholes, or tax breaks. The choices are clear. You either “deny yourself and take up your cross and follow Jesus” or you don’t. There is no amount of money, being good, or serving at the church that God will accept. The only currency he will take is your life, your very soul.
So I have to ask you, “Have you denied yourself, taken up your cross, and followed Jesus?” You only have two choices either yes or no. One choice leads to eternity with God, the other to eternity without him.
The paradox of the Christian faith is that we have to lose our life to save it. But the good new, the amazing news this morning is that Jesus denied himself and took up his cross and followed the will of his Father in heaven so that we could do the same.
