Daily Denial of Self

July 26, 2017 | By Chuck

From the time we are little children we know what we want. You remember having a favorite toy that you always wanted to play with. The last thing you wanted to do is deny yourself the chance to play with that favorite toy. As adults, our issue may not be toys, but we still don't want to deny ourselves. If we're honest, no one, regardless of age, wants to deny himself. Then we decide we want to become a Christian and live our life for the Lord and we're hit right in the heart with a very difficult teaching that we must accept and practice. Jesus said: "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me."(Lk.9:23) We want to follow Jesus but we don't want to deny ourselves. This teaching of daily self-denial is difficult because it's the complete opposite of what we've been taught our whole lives. The world says that adults can do whatever they desire. In fact, the world's belief is that your life is all about you and you should get all that you can get from it. When the Christian denies himself he is putting himself and his desires on the back burner and putting the Lord first in his life. We all face temptations every day and we will as long as we're in this life. Learning to deny yourself every day and putting God first in your life will help us to overcome Satan's temptations and attacks. See, when I deny myself and God is first in my life, my focus is on Him and I'm not thinking about ways to gratify the desires of the flesh. Satan uses our weakness of the flesh against us with the many temptations he uses in his attacks. Reality is we'll have far more success overcoming temptations when we practice Jesus" teaching of daily self-denial. We have to remind ourselves every day that we died at baptism and this Christian life we are striving to live is not about us. "In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus."(Rom.6:11)