It's funny the conversations you have with yourself when you've committed to ice cold showers at 0545, but you made that decision from the warmth of your bed the night before. Maybe for you, it's eating cleaner, working out regularly, or overcoming an addiction.
We've all experienced the fear, the doubt, and the Saboteur that is constantly battling our good intentions. It's a clear indication that the spirit and the flesh are separate entities within you, and there's an important lesson from scripture to be learned in this realization.
When Christ says "take up your cross, and follow me." I think the violence of that statement is lost on a lot of people. At the spiritual level, that means putting your values, beliefs and convictions before your comfort or even your very life. But it's even deeper than that.
The cross was the device used to destroy the body of the one who was thrust upon it. It was meant for absolute devastation to the physical self. To lay waste to whatever flesh was nailed upon it. It's a narrow road and a hard path you are called to, and if you are to survive the journey you must die to yourself daily.
The Native proverbs will say there are two wolves, and to only feed the one. The Buddhists will say that inner peace is achieved when sufferings are ignored. Only in Christ are we called to such a violent action of killing ourselves daily.
Of all the voodoo magic in new age spiritualism, there is only one path that demands of you your very life. It's in the 0545 ice baths. It's in the two-a-days. It's in the relentless sacrifice of your own desires for someone else. It's in the selfless service to others at the expense of yourself, and it's in the absolute and complete mastery of your fleshly desires by it's violent execution every single day, at the foot of that old rugged cross that you'll find freedom.
Yes, you can find life, but you'll only find it by dying to yourself.
"For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it." Jesus of Nazareth, Matthew 16:25 KJV
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jozef Lalka is a former Infantryman with the Canadian Armed Forces and founder of War Doll.
Since releasing from the military, Jozef has devoted his life to the scriptural motivation of the warrior culture, and the mentorship of the next generation. Jozef works as a graphic designer, photographer and videographer while pursing a passion for current global conflicts and how they relate to historical events.