Today’s Daily Lesson comes from Mark chapter 8 verses 34 through 37:
34 He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. 36For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? 37Indeed, what can they give in return for their life?”
The most alive will be are times when we are stepping out of our comfort zones, speaking up on things that matter, risking danger and loss for something good, and going beyond the boundaries of what is safe and known in order to follow Jesus into the unknown.
For some, this is the call to go across the tracks in order to volunteer at a school where the students don’t look like their children or grandchildren. For some, this is the call to go half way around the world to be witness to what God is doing amongst a religious minority community. For some this is deciding that even though they have nothing themselves to gain, fighting City Hall is still the right thing to do.
Well, actually there is something to be gained — their lives.
“And what will it profit them to keep the whole world and forfeit their lives.”
Our real lives are out there today. They will not be found by playing it safe, or staying within our own zip code. They are to be found by taking up a cross and following across the street, across the city, across the world.
And in losing our lives we find them, and in giving our lives as we know them away, we save them in ways we could never have imagined.
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