Looking Beyond our Cross

…and the third day I shall be perfected. In any case, I must press on today and tomorrow and the next day…” Luke 13:33.

Wow! I have never noticed the determined response of Jesus after He was told to get out of town because Herod was planning on killing Him. Keep in mind, this was a few days prior to the weekend when He would be brutally tortured, dragged through the streets, publicly ridiculed, mocked and nailed to the cross to die. His response to the threat is nothing short of astonishing …remarkable…miraculous. He looked beyond the cross and focused on His perfected life in Heaven. His mission for the moment was to press on…to continue in the walk of God’s will…that day…and the next…and the day after that. ‘The news that Herod wanted to kill Jesus meant that He was walking in God’s will for His time on earth. However, this doesn’t change the fact that the upfront news was bad. Jesus knew He would soon face unspeakable pain and shame on the cross, and He showed us what kept Him steadfast in His mission to defeat it.’ Determined, Heather Dixon, p. 152. He got through His season of suffering on earth the same way we must get through our painful journeys…one day at a time.

Until we experience our own perfected ‘third day resurrection’ in Heaven we must press on today…tomorrow…the next month…the next year. I know many of you are walking out some earth shattering, life-changing, and heartbreaking circumstances. You wake up with it on your mind, and wrestle with it throughout the day. You lie awake at night thinking about facing it another day. It’s tough to look beyond our crosses as they stand tall and cast dark shadows across the landscape of our lives. But the thing about shadows is that they are bigger in perception than the reality of their size. The shadows extort things…the shadows convinces us that we will never be okay…the shadows exaggerate our realities…the shadows threaten things that never come to be. That is why we must look beyond our own crosses and have the determination of Jesus to face our toughest days by pressing through our sorrow one day at a time. And just like Jesus, one day we will find ourselves in the perfection of Heaven reconciled completely from all our pain on earth.