TIEPOLO, 1749

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TIEPOLO, 1749
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Lets Talk About
The Burden of the Cross
John 1917 tells us that Jesus, bearing His
cross, went out to be crucified.
And
Mark 1021 has Jesus saying, take up the cross,
and follow Me. So
To get an idea of whats required in bearing
ones cross, lets follow Jesus
Tony E. Denton, 5/07.ASiteForTheLord.com
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fromGethesemane
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to Golgotha.
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The Burden of the Cross was firstly borne by
Jesus in the form of the Emotional Stress found
in Self-Denial and Loneliness.
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Jesus feared His death.
He prayed, Remove this cup from Me (Luke 2242).
But it probably wasnt the thought of death
itself, but the thought of dying apart from His
father that motivated His resistance. See In His
death Hed bear the sin of the world, and as He
died bearing sin, His holy father would turn away
from Him. So its likely that nothing hurt Jesus
more than the prospect of losing His union with
His father for a time but His sacrifice for our
sin would mean exactly that (Mark 1534).
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Jesus prayed in agony.
The Bible says, Being in agony He prayed more
earnestly (Luke 2244). Yes, He dreaded the
thought of losing His union with the Father by
bearing our sin, but this very relationship with
God was what motivated Him to keep moving toward
the cross, for to refuse to die would be to
refuse His fathers will so understandably He
agonized.
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Jesus denied Himself.
The Lord ended His prayer with the words,
Nevertheless, not My will, but Yours be done
(Luke 2242). I.e. He relinquished to the Father
that which He wanted to keep for Himself more
than anything elseHis will!
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Jesus was alone in His darkest hour.
Judas betrayed Him just as foretold by David
Even My closest friend, in whom I trusted, who
ate My bread, has lifted up his heel against Me
(Psa. 419). The disciples forsook Him, just as
fore-told by Zechariah Strike the shepherd that
the sheep may be scattered (139). Even Peter,
the one who had assured Him of his loyalty,
denied Him with an oath (Mat. 2672).
Next
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The Burden of the Cross was borne by Jesus in the
form ofPhysical Abuse.
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Jesus endured horrific beatings.
The writers use 6 different terms to ex-press the
action of beating which Jesus endured, 3 of which
reveal the various ways He suffered blows. He
was slapped around (John 1822). He was
struck with the fist (what beat in Mat.
2667 means). And He was thrashed so that
His skin was stripped off of Him (what beat
in Luke 2263 means). Now
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Picture the bruised and swollen faceof a boxer
his eyebrows and cheeks bloody and his eyes
swollen shut! Re- member Rocky? Jesus endured
this type of treatment not once, but twice
(and without gloves)! Both the Jews the Romans
attacked our Lord. And this was only the
beginning! After being spit on beaten in this
manner
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Jesus endured scourgings.
No, the thrashing of Luke 2263 wasnt the end of
it Luke 2316 goes on to speak of Pilates
chastisement of Jesus. (Cf. John 191 where it
reads as scourging.) The scourge was generally
composed of a rod with leather thongs attached
on the ends of the thongs were attached pieces of
lead or bits of bone designed to rip out pieces
of flesh. These beatings were so savage that
Roman law forbade its use on Romans.
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Eusebius, a Christian historian of the 3rd
century, once described the deaths of some
martyrs of scourging like this
Everyone around was horrified to see them so torn
with scourgings that their very veins were laid
bare and their very bowels were exposed.
The intensity of scourging was so great that the
Jews had a law that no man could be lashed more
than 39 times, but the Romans had no such law
they could scourge a man until he was a heap of
mangled flesh if they wished.
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Jesus endured the crowning as well.
Oh No! It wasnt just placed on His head the
thorns, like nails, were beaten into His skull
(Mat. 2730)! The pain was immense as with each
stroke the thorns sank deeper into His brow the
bleeding was profuse and blinding as it ran into
his eyes. Prophecy said that Hed be wounded for
our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities
(Isa. 535).
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This was the Jesus Pilate presented to the Jews.
There stood Jesus His head crowned with thorns
and blood clotted hair His swollen face, barely
visible behind the sweat, spit, and blood and
His body riddled with holes from the scourge.
Pilate beckoned to Jesus with his hand and said
to the Jews, Behold the Man! Prophecy said, His
appearance was marred more than any other man
(Isa. 5214). The term for marred means
disfigured or destroyed.
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This picture might give us a clue as to how Jesus
looked at this point.
Even with all this
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The Jews, His own people, had no com-passion on
Him they cried out, Crucify Him! Crucify Him!
And Pilate, desiring to avoid total chaos, gave
Jesus to them to be crucified.
All that we have discussed to this point,
the emotional and physical trauma, was a part of
the burden of the cross from Gethsemane through
His numerous beatings. Now we approach the burden
of the literal cross that He bore.
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The Burden of the Cross that Jesus carried
through Jerusalem was more than any man
(especially in His condition) could physically
bear.
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The cross was a burden in itself.
It seems that Jesus didnt even see the entire
cross when He was forced to car-ry it scholars
say that Jesus couldnt have carried the entire
cross consisting of two beams of rough hewn wood
such a cross wouldve been too large and too
heavy for a healthy robust man to carry, much
less the weary Jesus.So (contrary to the first
picture we looked at) Jesus likely bore the
horizontal cross-member to Calvary, for it of
itself was burdensome enough for one man.
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This picture might give us a better clue as to
what Jesus actually bore.
And when you think about it, this may have been
even more difficult to carry, having nothing on
which to hold.
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The journey to Calvary was a pro-cession of
humiliation.
Ever wonder what it wouldve beenlike to follow
Jesus as He bore His cross? Do you picture a
simple lone stroll through the countryside? One
verse says that A great multitude of the people
followed Him (Luke 22 27a), and (historically)
at the front of the group were four soldiers, one
of whom held up the accusation-plaque
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Directly behind Jesus and the soldiers followed a
group of mourners (whether sincere or not, Luke
2227b) and sur-rounding them and close by the
soldiers was another group a taunting,
perse-cuting mob who mocked Him, spat on Him, and
pulled at His beard. Prophecy quoted Jesus
saying, I gave My back to those who struck Me and
My cheeks to those who plucked out the beard I
did not hide My face from shame and spitting
(Isa. 506). So
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The road to Calvary was like a gauntlet a double
line of men armed with clubs to beat a person
forced between them. To Jesus, the road to
Calvary was just like this, seemingly, Im sure,
with no end in sight but eventually He cameto
the end the end of His strength, and He could
no longer push Himself forward.
So
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Jesus collapsed in exhaustion be-neath the cross.
No one knows how far the Lord carried His cross
before falling beneath it, but Matthew indicated
that He collapsed near the entrance to the city
As they came out of Jerusalem, they found a man
Simon. Him they compelled to bear His cross
(Mat. 2732). When did they meet Simon? When
they came out of the city. At this point
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Jesus was so utterly exhausted that He (as well
as His cross) had to be carried the rest of the
way They brought Him to Golgotha (Mark
1522). The term for brought reveals the
sever-ity of Jesus fatigue someone had to bear
Him to Golgotha the same Greek term is rendered
carry in Luke, describ-ing what Simon did with
the cross.
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As Jesus reached the crest of Calvary, He knew
His cross-bearing would be over in a few short
hours. But There remained yet millions of
crosses to be borne by His followersa cross for
each disciple Jesus said, If anyone wishes to
come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up
his cross, and follow Me (Mat. 1624).
So
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What can we learn about bearingour crosses
fromthe way our Lord bore the burden of His
cross?
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Our crosses are submission to the Fathers will.
The burden of the cross that Jesus bore in
Gethsemane was the struggle to submit His will to
that of His father thats part of what His
be-ing human was about. Jesus said that the
crosses of His disciples must be borne daily
(Luke 923) we may not suffer for Jesus daily,
but we must submit to Him daily. However
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Before we can bear our crosses, we must deny
ourselves.
Before the Lord took up His cross out-side
Pilates Hall, he denied Himself in the
garden. When He called us to follow Him, He
stated two prerequisite actions which must take
place in consecutive order 1Let him deny
himself, and 2take up his cross (Luke 923). See,
if we fill our hands with our own projects and
wills, we wont be able to carry our crosses as
with the cross Jesus bore, our cros-ses are
designed so that we must give up everything else
to carry them.
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The greatest thing about it all is that the
burden of our crosses is never too heavy to bear.
John wrote, This is the love of God that we keep
His commandments, and His commandments are not
burdensome(1 John 53). And Jesus said, Come to
Me all you who la-bor and are heavy laden, and I
will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and
learn from Me, for I am gentle and low-ly in
heart and you will find rest for your souls. For
My yoke is easy, and My burden is light (Mat.
1128-30). So
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Like Simon of Cyrene, we receive our crosses from
Jesus who already bore the hard part for us. Our
crosses are more like this one Ours are small
light have wheels!
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Jesus yoke is easy in comparison to the burdens
of a life without Jesus, the burdens of the
Christian life are light. In exchange for our
burden of guilt, fear, and hopelessness, Jesus
gives us a load we can joyfully bear. Besides If
we feel we cant bear one particular daily load,
God is certain to send help, even if He has to
send someone (like Simon of Cyrene) from 800
miles away.
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The burden of our crosses, then,is nothing
compared to the burden that Jesus bore for us.
Were we to bear the Lords cross for one mile,
wed probably never again com-plain about our
little inconveniences. Imagine you were Simon
You bear the cross by force you feel the burden
you hear the mockery your clothing is soiled by
the blood and sweat. Youre the only person in
history to literally pick up a cross and follow
Jesus! You alone can see from the Lords
perspective! Now
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Can you walk away from the cross as the same
person? Simon couldnt he had to learn more
about this Man. He found the answer to his
questions, and the truth mustve stunned him that
the cross he was forced to carry was that upon
which the Son of God died for his sins and the
sins of the world. Simon became a disciple, and
his two sons after him (Mark 1521).
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Simon was forced to bear the cross un-til he
learned who it really belonged to when he
learned that Jesus had borne that cross for him,
he was then motivat-ed by love and gratitude to
carry his cross for Jesus. Likewise Were you to
bear the Lords cross for a mile, youd never
think of cross-bearing as a favor you do for
Jesus rather, youd consider it a privilege!
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So what will you do for Him who died for you?