Anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it. Jesus.

In this life there are two principles that are so basic but powerful, in fact the world was based and ran by these two principles. Those principles are surrender and relationship. You can see these principles always color the life of Jesus. In anything that he does or had done you can see these two principles vividly expressed. Until finally he died on the cross you still can see these principles occurred. And through His experienced on the cross we understand what he meant by saying “take up your cross daily”.
On the cross we can see the picture of relationship; vertical relationship with God and horizontal relationship with all human being. Through the cross we also can see that Jesus surrendered his life for the world, surrender to the point of sacrifice. Jesus did not die because he was killed by the Roman’s soldiers but it is stated that He laid down his life for us. Jesus voluntarily and deliberately gave surrender his life for the world.
The disciples of Jesus Christ knew what it means to live out the cross because they experienced how Jesus challenged them in the first place before they follow Him. They have surrendered everything to follow Jesus that is why they can face anything without fear of losing anything. No one can take from you things that you’ve given away. In other word to live in the way of the cross is to live in the way of freedom.
So the question is whether we have the freedom to do the will of God without being held by our own will or being hindered by our selfishness. Most probably our problem is when we followed Christ in the beginning as believer of Jesus Christ we have never been challenged by the cross. That is why we never learnt to surrender to the point of sacrifice or to maintain our relationship strong in any situation. The cross of Jesus Christ is a place of freedom. Anyone who encounters the cross will never be the same again. How can you be the same if you have the freedom to be what your creator wants you to be and in the same time you will manifest the lifestyle that the whole universe have waited for long time.
My challenge to you today is to embrace the lifestyle of the cross and start to understand that your life is in the right direction in that case you will experience what it means to surrender to the point of sacrifice and to maintain relationship with God and others. Welcome to discipleship.

Mereka yang menerima benih yang jatuh ke tanah yang berbatu-batu adalah orang yang menerima Firman dan seketika itu juga bersukacita menerima-Nya. Tapi karena dia tidak berakar, dia hanya bertahan sebentar saja. Ketika kesulitan dan aniaya datang, dengan segera dia terhilang kembali. Yesus.

Menjadi radikal adalah berakar dalam Firman Tuhan dan kedalaman kita dalam Firman akan menentukan kekuatan kita dalam menghadapi segala sesuatu yang datang dalam hidup kita. Akar kita akan menentukan pertumbuhan kita dan pertumbuhan kita akan membangun kekuatan didalam kita untuk menghadapi kenyataan.
Kita perlu mengerti bahwa apa yang kita hadapi sekarang berubah dengan sangat cepat dibandingkan dengan apa yang baru kita hadapi setahun lalu. Sekalipun saya menyadari betapa penting dan perlunya suatu perubahan, kita perlu mengerti bahwa pertumbuhan adalah perubahan tetapi tidak semua perubahan adalah pertumbuhan.
Kita dapat menjadi sangat sibuk bekerja atau sangat canggih menjalankan bisnis dan sangat berpengetahuan dalam menghibur orang banyak dengan program kita tetapi ketika kita terpisah dari akar kita; kita gagal (Ingat ketika Yesus menjelaskan hal ini di Efesus).
Kita semua tahu bahwa masalah dunia ini sebenarnya adalah masalah rohani, sekalipun membanjirnya tehnik pemenuhan diri banyak ditawarkan pada masyarakat kita, masih ada epidemik depresi, bunuh diri, kekosongan probadi, dan pencarian jalan keluar yang mudah lewat obat-obatan terlarang, alkohol, obsesi pengkultusan, materialisme, sex dan kekerasan. Apa yang salah dengan kita sebagai orang percaya? Saya kira jawabannya adalah karena kita DANGKAL. Kita hanya menghidupi apa yang kita percaya dengan sangat dangkal, tidak mendalam.
Kedangkalan adalah kutuk jaman kita. Pengajaran tentang pemuasan instan adalah persoalan rohani yang utama. Apa yang kita perlukan hari ini adalah bukan banyaknya orang pintar atau orang dengan kharisma tetapi orang yang dalam, berakar kuat dalam Firman Tuhan.
Ada beberapa hal yang muncul dalam pemikiran ketika saya mulai merenungkan Firman Yesus ini.
Bahwa yang pertama perlu kita kerjakan adalah tetap disiplin menggemburkan tanah hati kita supaya kita terus dapat berakar lebih dalam lagi. Artinya kita tetap harus selalu membangun hubungan kita dengan Yang Maha Kuasa melalui saat teduh kita dalam cara yang intim dan secara konstan menyirami hati kita dengan Firman Tuhan. Ini adalah DISIPLIN dari PEMURIDAN. Ini adalah akar kita.
Saya adalah pemercaya sejati akan kasih karunia dan dengan mengatakannya kita perlu untuk juga menekankan pada kerelaan kita untuk MELAKUKAN SESUATU AKAN HAL INI.
Marilah kita kembali pada kenikmatan merenungkan Firman Allah sehingga akar kita akan tumbuh lebih dalam. Penerapan praktis akan kasih kita pada Firman Allah akan memberikan hikmat dan kemampuan untuk membuat keputusan yang jelas terhadap hal-hal yang kita hadapi setiap hari.
Banyak dari kita yang menghadapi masalah bertumbuh dalam ketaatan dikarenakan kita tidak tahu bagaimana seharusnya menerapkan Firman Tuhan dalam hidup sehari-hari. Kekurangan akan penerapan Firman Tuhan adlah hasil dari tidak adanya waktu untuk merenungkan Firman Tuhan. Melalui perenungan kita mempunyai kemampuan untuk meresapi bagaimana kita melakukan apa yang kita dengar dari Tuhan. Kita hanya melakukan apa yang telah kita lihat kita perbuat.
Tidak ada penyembuhan yang instan pada kedangkalan. Saudara harus mendisiplinkan diri dalam memliharan keintiman dengan Pencipta dan melalui ketaatan oleh kasih karunia saudara dapat bertumbuh makin dalam dan makin kuat dalam menghadapi dunia yang berubah. Marilah kita memeluk kedisiplinan ini karena tidak ada seorang pun yang hidup diatas disiplin ini dan bersukacita dalam kenyataan bahwa nama-nama kita tertulis di Surga. SELAMAT DATANG DI PEMURIDAN.

The one who received the seed that fell on rocky places is the man who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since he has no root, he lasts only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he quickly falls away. Jesus.

To be radical is to be rooted in the word of God and our depth in the word will determine our strength to face anything that comes into our lives. Our root will determine our growth and our growth will build strength in us to face reality.
We need to understand that what we are facing now is changing so fast compare to what we faced just a year ago. Although I realize that how important and necessary change is, we need to understand also that growth is change but not all change is growth.
We can be so busy doing the work or so sophisticated in running the business and so knowledgeable in entertaining people with our program but when we departed from our root; we are all failed. (Remember when Jesus addressed this issue to the Ephesians.).
We all know that the problem of this world is actually a spiritual problem, although a flood of techniques for self-fulfillment have been offered to our communities still there is an epidemic of depression, suicide, personal emptiness, and easy way out through drugs, alcohol, cultic obsession, consumerism, sex and violence. Our problem is that we are fitted to these problems and not able to be the answer. What is wrong with us believers? I think the answer is we are to shallow. We only live what we believe superficially.
Superficiality is the curse of our age. The teaching of instant satisfaction is a primary spiritual problem. What we need today is not a lot of clever people or people with charisma but people who are deep, and rooted deep in the word of the Lord.
There are some things that come to mind when I started to ponder on these words of Jesus
First thing that we need to do is a discipline to cultivate our heart and so the root keep going down deep. It means we need to always work out our relationship with the almighty through our personal devotion in an intimate way and constantly nourished on the word of the faith. This is a DISCIPLINE of DISCIPLESHIP. This is our root.
I am a true believer of grace and by saying that we need to cultivate it also implies our willingness to DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT.
Let us go back to the enjoyment of meditating the word of God and so our root will grow deeper. This practical implication of our love to the word of God will give us wisdom and ability to make clear cut decision about the things that we face in our everyday living.
Many of us are having problem to grow in obedience because we don’t know how to apply the word of God in our daily living. The lack of implication is the outcome of not having time on meditating the word of God. Through meditation we have the ability to perceive ourselves doing (inaction) what we have heard fro the Lord. You only do what you see yourself doing.
There is no instant cure for superficiality. You need to be discipline in cultivating your intimacy with the creator and through obedience empower by grace you can grow deeper and grow stronger in facing this changing world. Let us embrace this discipline because nobody lives above discipline and rejoice in the fact that our names written I heaven. WELCOME TO DISCIPLESHIP.