STUDY GUIDE

The Cross & the Glory

An Orderly Account:

Encountering Jesus in the Gospel of Luke

Luke 9:18-27

The Text

Now it happened that as he was praying alone, the disciples were with him. And he asked them, “Who do the crowds say that I am?” …

Introduction:

Jesus Christ is well known for making shocking statements. For instance, “Love your enemies and do good to them who hate you,” or “Unless a man hates his father and mother, he cannot be my disciple.” And in Luke 9:23 Jesus says that if anyone would follow him, he must not just expect difficulty—he must welcome and embrace self-denial and gladly go to his own execution.

This is the only way to be his disciple. It’s the only way to really know who he is. In fact, Jesus says, this is the only way to experience his glory and the glory of the Father.

So, if we will follow Jesus, we must:

1. Hear His Deadly Call
2. Learn His True Identity
3. See His Future Glory

1. Hear His Deadly Call

We’ve reached the point in Luke’s gospel when Jesus begins repeatedly telling the disciples that he’s going to suffer and die.

Though the crowds love Jesus, the opposition of the religious leaders is rising. So, he gather’s his disciples to explain that he hasn’t just come to be a miracle worker or a popular teacher. He’s come to suffer and die. And following him will be costly.

He wants them to know what they are getting themselves into. He wants them to count the cost of being his disciple.

But in verse 23, he doesn’t just say that suffering is coming. He says a true disciple will, as it were, welcome death every single day.

And he said to all, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.

Jesus says a disciple practices self-denial. It literally means, to disown. It’s the same word used to tell us that Moses, though he had been raised in Pharaoh’s house, disowned Pharoah’s name and chose to suffer with God’s people. So, you disown yourself. Jesus says, “To follow me, you give up the rights to own your life.” And if that didn’t jolt the disciples enough, he then says they have to take up their cross daily.

We hear this differently than they would have heard it. For us, the cross has become wondrous. We have crosses in our stained glass and our jewelry. But for them, this would have been utterly scandalous, and here’s why.

Crucifixion was not just a punishment; it was a statement. In other words, if Rome wanted to just kill you, they could cut your head off. There are far more efficient ways to punish people. Crucifixion was slow, excruciating, public, humiliation. It made the statement that Rome was completely in control, and the person on the cross was utterly under their power. It was Rome’s way of saying we will do whatever we want with you.

And therefore, when Jesus calls us to take up our cross, he’s saying, “There can be no halfway measures in following me. There can be no partial subjection to my leadership. You must willfully and daily submit to my complete control. You have to submit yourself utterly to my power and plans. Whatever I purpose to do with your life, you’ve got to let me do it, even if it means your death” In other words, to follow Jesus is to daily say, “Not what I will, but what you will.”

Now, we are not facing crucifixion for following Christ today, but American culture’s attitude to Christianity has shifted rapidly since the mid-1960s.

In 2022, Aaron Renn wrote that since the 1960’s we’ve basically seen what he called three distinct “worlds” based on how society views Christianity.

1964-1994, he called the “Positive World.” Being a Christian was socially advantageous. Identifying as a Christian helped with social status and Christian morality was basically seen as aligned with the public good.

From 1994-2014, Renn says we saw the “Neutral World.” Christianity became one option among many in a pluralistic culture. Being a Christian was socially neutral. It didn’t help or hurt in most contexts.

From 2014 to the present, we’ve been living in the “Negative World.” Being publicly known as a Bible-believing Christian, as someone who holds to the moral teachings of Scripture, has become a social liability—especially in academia, media, and corporate leadership. Christian teaching is often portrayed as a threat to the public good.

Today, you may have to choose between Jesus Christ and professional advancement. Agreeing with Biblical teaching on sexuality, gender, or marriage might get you labelled as “difficult,” passed over for promotion, or excluded from important projects.

Following Jesus may risk social acceptance in your neighborhood or school. You may be known as the awkward family, receive fewer invitations to events, or be ignored or even made fun of at school.

I know several of you who, because of your love of Christ and his commands, are suffering rejection from family.

You want to know what Jesus asks of us? He says that following him means nailing our hope of a successful career to the cross, executing our desire for social acceptance when it comes at the cost of disobedience. It’s total renunciation. Self-repudiation. It’s a deadly call.

Have you heard it?

2. Learn His True Identity

Jesus does not call us to take up our cross because he is a sadist who likes inflicting pain. Rather, he calls us to walk the very same path that he is on.

Our text began with a question: “Who do the crowds say that I am?”

And they gave a variety of answers: John the Baptist, Elijah, one of the prophets. Ok. They crowds all see Jesus as a teacher and miracle worker. So, Jesus asks, “But who do you say that I am?”

And Peter pipes up, “You are the Christ of God.” But he does not mean what you and I think when we say “Christ.” He wasn’t confessing Trinitarian theology, or the incarnation. The word Christ is the Greek word for the Hebrew word Messiah—and it means “anointed.”

So, if you go back and read Psalm 2, Isaiah 59, Isaiah 61, Zechariah 9, Daniel 9, God promised to send a deliverer, an anointed warrior king who would fight against the enemies of his people and liberate them.

So, when Peter says, “You are the Christ of God.” He’s saying, “You’re more than a prophet! You’re the warrior king. You are the deliverer.”

How shocking must it have been for Peter when Jesus responds, “That’s exactly who I am, but don’t tell anyone. Because I have not come as a warrior. I have come as a sacrificial lamb. I must suffer, be rejected, and be killed.”

John Calvin wrote that “Christ must commence his reign, not with gaudy display, not with the magnificence of riches, not with the loud applause of the world, but with an ignominious death.”

You see, Isaiah 53 taught that before Messiah would be a conquering king, he would first come as a suffering servant. That’s what Jesus is explaining to the dismay of the disciples.

Here’s what Isaiah taught. What good would it do, for the Christ to deal with all of our enemies “out there,” if he doesn’t deal with the enemy “in here”? All the other deliverers of the Old Testament rescued God’s people from their national enemies, but every single time the people fell captive to their internal and eternal enemy, their own sin.

So, Jesus is teaching us his true identity. He’s stretching Peter’s foundational understanding into new categories. He’s saying, “You can’t follow me, until you know my true identity. And you will never be truly delivered from the enemies without, unless I first deliver you from the enemy within.”

In other words, Jesus is saying, “You will never take up the cross for me, until you know that I have taken up the cross for you.”

You see, in going to the cross, Jesus wasn’t submitting himself to the control of Rome. He was submitting himself to the control of his Heavenly Father. He was submitting himself to the curse of God against sin.

He was saying: there’s no halfway measures to my obedience to God, no partial subjection. I willfully and daily submit to your complete control; to your power and plans. Whatever you purpose to do with my life, do it, even though it means my death”

In Gethsemane, Jesus Christ prayed, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” (Luke 21:42)

You see? Not my will! What was he doing? He was denying himself. He was disowning himself. He was taking up his cross. No… he was taking up yours.

And here’s the important part: he did not take up the cross in order to get something from you in return. He did it to get you.

You say, “But why would he want me? I’m not lovely.” No. You aren’t. He didn’t die for you because you are lovely. He died because he chose to set his love upon you. Friend, he died, that he might spend the rest of eternity making you lovely.

Even in this very passage, he calls us to look beyond the cross, in order to…

3. See His Future Glory

Having called the disciples to embrace the cross, in v. 26, he tells them of future glory.

For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of Man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.

Now, you might not catch it, but right there, Jesus calls himself the Son of Man. He’s alluding to Daniel 2:13-14 which foretells that one like a son of man presented himself to God the Father:

   And to him was given dominion

and glory and a kingdom,

   that all peoples, nations, and languages

should serve him;

   his dominion is an everlasting dominion,

which shall not pass away,

   and his kingdom one

that shall not be destroyed.

Jesus says, “I’m the Son of Man Daniel spoke of. I’m the one who, when I’m raised, will ascend to the Father, and he will give me glory and dominion.”

Now, imagine the disciples, Bethsaida, by Galilee. They’ve been told to deny themselves, welcome the cross, because the man speaking to them is going to suffer and die, and then he will be given eternal glory and dominion.

The disciples are standing there, hearing these words, but they aren’t seeing it. And that’s the hard part isn’t it. It’s one thing to be told that suffering will lead to glory, but it’s hard to see it.

And that’s why, in the very next passage, Jesus takes three of his disciples to a mountain. And it’s there, on the mountain, that Jesus is transfigured. For a brief moment, he unveils his glory. He shows them the glory that is to be revealed after his resurrection. He gives them a preview of future glory. He doesn’t just tell them, he shows them.

Now listen, you can be told about the glory. But you need to see it for yourself. This is what will strengthen you to bear your own crosses, a vision of the glory of the Son.

This is why the Apostle Paul, in 2 Corinthians 3 says that when you turn to the Lord, the veil is removed, and you can see. And with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Jesus Christ, you are transformed into his image, from one degree of glory to another.

Turning to Christ transforms crosses into glory.

Richard Wurmbrand was a Romanian pastor who endured a 14 year imprisonment and torture at the hands of a Communist regime. He spent three of those years in solitary confinement, broken bones, and starvation. But not only did he not renounce Christ, he came out surprisingly joyful. And he writes this in his book Victorious Faith:

“There was once a fiddler who played so beautifully that everybody danced. A deaf man who could not hear the music considered them all insane. Those who are with Jesus in suffering hear music to which other men are deaf. They dance and do not care if they are considered insane.”

The Christian view of suffering is not that the suffering itself is good. But what it produces in us, by identifying us with Jesus Christ is good. We hear a music to which others are deaf. And, because we’ve seen the resurrection, because we’ve beheld the glory, we can face the crosses.

So, in the last few minutes, how do we practically work this into our lives?

Are you facing sacrifice? Behold his cross. Listen—it isn’t enough to just confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord. Paul says you have to believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead. In other words—you will only embrace the crosses his gives to the degree you see the cross he has taken for you.

Have you denied yourself? Have you placed limits on what he can ask of you, your relationships, your career, your thoughts? If he’s God, then there’s nothing he cannot ask of you. But if you know he’s gone to the cross for you, there’s nothing you’ll withhold.

Are you suffering? Are you being rejected and mistreated for your faithfulness to Christ? Turn to him. Nothing can separate you from the love of God in Christ Jesus, so turn to him in your suffering. If you are in him, nothing can kill you—it can only drive you deeper into his arms.

Turn your eyes upon Jesus.