Is Your Life In The Cross

* Is Your Life In The Cross 1 Cor 1:18

I look back on a year gone by and I look forward to the days ahead and then ....I look again.... at the cross.

I am convinced the two most important questions I can ask people are these

(1) Do you know Jesus as your Savior?

(2) Is your life in the cross

And if an individual should answer yes to the first ...then he or she should also be able to answer yes to the second

The first question asks....

(1) Do you know Jesus as your Savior?

The answer of many is ....Oh Yes

I do know Jesus as Savior...

...Yes....I have believed on what He did on the cross....I confessed to Him my being a sinner, and have admitted my great need for Him....I have put my trust in Him.

But if the answer to that is Yes than it should be equally easy to answer YES to the second question as well ...

Are you ready for the question?

Here is the question...

Jesus Christ is asking it of me today and He is asking it of you.....The question is this....

Is Your Life In The Cross?

The message I share with you this morning is about something we can’t just forget about until next Easter.... but rather it is something we must remember everyday. The message of the cross.

It is a question of our having embraced the cross and having entered a life that is daily found in the power of the cross.. It is the Yes or No of our seeking to walk daily in the way of the cross.

1 Corinthians 1:18

For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

So how do we answer this question of

Is Your Life In The Cross...

I believe that it is first to ask the question...

I .Do you Love the Cross?

What would it mean to LOVE the cross.

There is perhaps nothing in all the world that is so ugly as a cross...... and yet nothing in all the world so beautiful...because of what the cross means...

Because of what the cross communicates

and because of what was accomplished on one specific cross at a place called Calvary many years ago.

The cross has become a symbol for many but we wonder what it means to certain ones. We see millions of people who wear cross necklaces or cross earnings but I feel confident many of those who bear the cross have a shallow understanding if any understanding as to sacrifice of which Jesus bore upon the cross for all of us.

He loved us enough to take the pain and suffering and sorrow and even the shame of the cross.

He loved us that much. I often wonder how that love can be returned.

The Bible says Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.

Jesus did nothing short of that in His dying on the cross for you and me?

A. Think with me about the design of the cross?

Designed for Jesus? In part yes... But more importantly the cross was Designed for you!

Absolutely! You say "ME?"

"The cross was designed for me?"

The design of the cross was that it would meet the specifications for which the son of God could die upon it so that all man kind ....who would trust and believe would find eternal life through Jesus.

Jesus loved us enough to go to the cross and when we look to that cross and to that Savior our heart turns to God to and we are in awe at that great love.

So one’s life being in the cross means loving the cross in sense of a love for Christ who first loved us even enough to go to the cross for us.

Oh how I love Jesus ...

Oh How I love Jesus

Oh how I love Jesus ....

Why?.....because He first loved me!

To love the cross is to glory in it Gal 6:12-15

V 12 some glory in the things of this world

When guys love stuff....Hunting, Sports, Cars they Glory in it!

V 14 Paul says I glory in the cross

Put quite plainly ...Paul says I love the cross...

It’s my glory....

Grandma’s & Gpas Glory in their grandchildren

They share pictures and show off grand-kids

They’re proud of those grand-kids and parents glory in their children.

Your spouse ought to be a part of your glory.

We glory in family BUT....

But Paul said here is something worth glorying in ...it is the cross of Christ. Why the cross because when Paul thought cross ....He thought Jesus Christ.