Take Up Your Cross | A Sermon on Matthew 16:21-28

Introduction
Can you imagine what it was like to be a Disciple who walked with Jesus for three years?  To have heard His amazing teaching first hand?  To have experienced His loving grace?  To have seen Him perform the amazing miracles–feeding 5000 with just 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish, walking on water and calming the stormy sea, healing the blind and the deaf and making the lame walk?  Walking with Jesus on the earth must have been an amazing experience for the 12 disciples.  And they sensed something great was about to happen as they made their way toward Jerusalem.  Was their Messiah finally going to kick out their Roman oppressors and restore Israel?  They hoped He would as the felt His ministry rising toward a great climax.  And Jesus knew their hopes and expectations when He spoke in Matthew 16:21-28.

Matthew 16:21-28
²¹ From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.

²² Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!”

²³ Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”

²⁴ Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. ²⁵ For whoever wants to save their life^[f] will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. ²⁶ What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? ²⁷ For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what they have done.

²⁸ “Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.”

What Does It Truly Mean To Follow Jesus?
Jesus was determined to go to Jerusalem to face the cross and fulfill His mission to die for the sins of the world. Now, He tells His followers that each of us must carry a cross of our own.

This is part of what it means to be His disciple.
Each of us must face the question: what does it truly mean to follow Jesus?

The disciples knew exactly what a cross was. Today, people often think of crosses as decorations in a church or pieces of jewelry. For Christians, the cross has become a beautiful symbol of God’s redeeming love. But the twelve disciples who walked with Jesus had seen people dying in agony on crosses. Sometimes those crosses stood along the roadside, placed there by the Romans to warn anyone who might challenge their power. So when Jesus spoke about carrying a cross, His words had a very clear and serious meaning.

Peter’s Rebuke
And Peter didn’t like it. Peter wanted nothing to do with a cross—not for himself, and certainly not for his beloved Lord. Peter knew Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of the living God. He had just said so in the passage before this one, and Jesus had praised him for his faith.

But Peter did not yet understand the true nature and purpose of the Messiah.

He was still thinking about political and military victory: overthrow Rome, restore Israel, and establish power. His vision was of a limited, earthly kingdom. Maybe he was remembering the glory days of King David’s rule. Or perhaps he was thinking of the more recent Hasmonean kingdom that arose after the Maccabean revolt—the Jewish uprising that people still remember today when they celebrate Hanukkah.

So when Jesus says, “I must suffer and be killed…,” Peter hears something very different. What he hears is, “Our movement is going to fail.” And Peter tries to protect Jesus—to protect the movement, and maybe even to protect his own dream of being part of the Messiah’s inner circle in a free and powerful Jewish nation.

But Jesus knows that His true purpose is far greater than Peter’s limited understanding.

Jesus’ Temptation
There’s something important we need to notice here. Jesus was tempted by Peter’s vision. Who wouldn’t be?

Imagine a choice like a game show. Behind door number one is suffering and death on a cross. Behind door number two is ruling as the powerful king of a free and independent Jewish nation—greater even than the glory of Solomon’s kingdom. Which would you choose?

It’s very tempting. Even for Jesus. In fact, it sounds a lot like what Satan said to Him when He was fasting in the wilderness for forty days. Do you remember the temptation? Satan said, “All this I will give you…if you will bow down and worship me.” (Matthew 4:8–9)

Peter’s vision of the kingdom sounded easier. It promised success without suffering. But Jesus knew that God’s plan was far greater and far deeper. He had to reject Peter’s human vision because it led away from the cross.

So just as Jesus rebuked Satan in the wilderness—“Away from me, Satan!”—He rebuked Peter as well.

Reaching for God’s Kingdom without carrying a cross—that has always been humanity’s sin.
We want victory without sacrifice, glory without suffering, and resurrection without crucifixion.
But Jesus knows you can’t skip the cross and still reach the Kingdom.
The road to real life runs straight through surrender and sacrifice, while trusting God’s plan.

The Disciples’ Cross
So Jesus tells His disciples (and us) plainly what it really means to follow Him.

“Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”

Following Him means surrender, sacrifice, and dying to self. 

Yet Jesus also gives a surprising promise:  “Whoever loses their life for me will find it.” 
The cross is not the end of life—it is the path to true life.

So each of us must ask: What are we really trying to gain in this life? Comfort? Success? Approval? These things can be appealing, but if gaining them costs us our soul, they are a terrible bargain.

The Transfiguration
For many years I misunderstood the last verse of this passage.
I thought Jesus was talking about His second coming.
That was confusing, because He says that some of the disciples standing there would not die before they saw the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.
But all of those disciples eventually died, and Jesus has not yet returned in that final way.

But that’s not what Jesus was referring to.
Jesus was pointing to something that was about to happen very soon. In the very next chapter, Matthew tells us that six days later Jesus took Peter, James, and John up onto a mountain.
There, something remarkable happened. Jesus was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, His clothes became dazzling white, and Moses and Elijah appeared talking with Him.

For a moment, those disciples saw Jesus as He truly is—the King in all His glory.
It was a glimpse of the true Kingdom.

And that moment is very important. Jesus had just told His disciples about suffering,
about crosses, about losing their lives.
But then, He allowed a few of them to see the glory that lies beyond the cross.

The Kingdom of Jesus is not only something that comes after suffering.
Sometimes, God allows us to see glimpses of His glory even while we carry the cross.
And that matters for us.
Because what Jesus said today is heavy. He has told us that following Him means sacrifice.
But the life of a Christian is not all doom and gloom.
It is a life where suffering and glory are strangely intertwined.
Along the road of discipleship there are moments when Christ lets us see His beauty—
moments of peace, moments of grace, moments when His presence becomes so clear that we know we are walking the right road.

The cross is real. But so is the glory.  So be encouraged. Be brave.
And follow Jesus with determination.

Yes, there will be suffering along the way. But there will also be glimpses of His Kingdom—glimpses of the glory of the One we follow.

And one day, the glory we glimpse now will no longer be hidden.
One day we will see Him fully, face to face.

Closing
But today, we need to accept the cross.  Don't let your hope in Christ be a worldly human thing where you settle for a cheap victory without suffering.  Because Jesus says, "If you want to be my disciple, you must deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me."