Transcript
Will you take your Bibles and turn with me to the Gospel of Luke, chapter 23, and verse 26? Luke 23:26. Luke chapter 23, reading verse 26. Luke 23:26.
“Now as they led Him away, they laid hold of a certain man, Simon a Cyrenian, who was coming from the country, and on him they laid the cross, that he might bear it after Jesus.”
In December of last year, Leslie Cotter was 23 years old. She had a mountaintop experience which I am sure that she is never going to forget. Earlier in the month she had graduated from TCU. And a few days before Christmas she was in Winter Park, Colorado, assisting with a youth group ski trip.
But in the meanwhile she had been telephoning her boyfriend, Randy McCabe, who lived back here in Dallas, that she was ready to come home. On the morning of December the 21st a friend made sure that she got into the 10 o'clock ski lift which would carry her to the top of the mountain. You can imagine her surprise when she got out of the ski lift and found herself face to face with her boyfriend, Randy, whom she thought was still in Dallas.
To make a long story short, Randy got down on one knee. He told Leslie how much he loved her. He gave her a solitaire diamond. And before he could get to the words, “Will you marry me?” a group had gathered around and they were rooting them on. Needless to say, Leslie accepted his proposal.
Much later she told the media that she had absolutely not expected it. But she said it made Christmas more interesting. Immediately after the proposal the two of them flew back to Dallas where friends were waiting for them at a surprise party.
Now just for the record, Randy McCabe is an account coordinator with a direct mail marketing firm. And if you ask me, his dazzling proposal on the mountaintop was a very successful piece of direct marketing. And he snared the only customer he was really interested in: his bride-to-be.
Randy and Leslie planned to be married this past September 16th. I am assuming that they went through with it and that they are now husband and wife. And I totally agree with the newspaper article that reported this remarkable event when they said that Randy McCabe had carried the art of proposing to new heights.
That is to say, all the way to the top of a Colorado mountain. Now this morning, my Christian friends, I want to present you with a mountaintop proposal. A mountaintop proposal. In fact, this proposal is so significant and so critical that your response to this proposal will determine the nature and character of your life and experience here on earth.
And with that in mind, I want to discuss with you for a few minutes the following topic. The topic is “Climb, climb up Calvary’s mountain.” And that reminds you of a song that we frequently sing here. It should. But I’m not talking this morning about sunshine mountain. I’m talking about another mountain entirely.
And so just to be sure that you have the title of my message correctly, let me repeat it. My title is “Climb, climb up Calvary’s mountain.”
Now I strongly suspect that every person in this audience just about could wake up at 2 a.m. in the morning, sit bolt upright in bed, and without the slightest assistance or prompting, you could sing our song, “Climb, climb up sunshine mountain.” We’ve sung it so often it’s almost second nature with us.
Have you ever noticed what a happy song it is?
“Climb, climb up sunshine mountain, heavenly breezes blow. Climb, climb up sunshine mountain, faces all aglow. Turn, turn from sin and doubting, looking to the sky. Climb, climb up sunshine mountain, you and I.”
And you know something? If we thought that the Christian life was like that song, we would probably think of the Christian life as a kind of pleasant hike up a sunlit mountain path. I’m sure that all of us would like the Christian life to be like that. But that’s not a completely accurate picture.
If you want a much more accurate picture than that of the Christian experience, then you need to look at the experience of the man named Simon whom we read about just a few minutes ago in the Gospel of Luke. It is the experience of Simon, I think, that presents us with one of our most remarkable examples, one of our most striking illustrations of the real significance and meaning of Christian living.
Now remember, the Lord Jesus Christ has just been sentenced to execution by crucifixion. And although the Gospel of Luke does not record it, He has been whipped by the soldiers. He has been taken to the Praetorium and He has been mocked and ridiculed by the soldiers.
Apparently He has been led by the soldiers through the streets of Jerusalem. And He is now leaving the western gate and He is moving with the soldiers in the direction of a hill. It was really not much more than a hill, but in tradition we have called it Mount Calvary. He was moving in the direction of Mount Calvary.
And just as they come out of the city, here comes a man named Simon who is coming from the country. And he encounters Jesus and the soldiers who are leading him to Calvary. Now I’m sure that what happened next was a great surprise to Simon.
For one thing, Simon was not even a native of the land of Israel. He is called here a Cyrenian, which means that he came from a region in North Africa called Cyrene. He’d come all the way, hundreds of miles, to the land of Palestine. For what reason we do not know.
Now the time of day, as near as we can fix it from other indications in the biblical account, must have been somewhere between six and eight in the morning. The fact that he was coming out of the country indicates the possibility that he was a night worker. Perhaps he had put in a night’s work in somebody’s field or in somebody’s vineyard.
And he was now through with his work and coming back to his residence in the city of Jerusalem at this precise time. But whatever his reason was for coming from the country, one thing is clear: God had brought him to this moment. God had brought him all the way from the land of Cyrene.
God had brought him on this particular morning, at this particular time of day. And Simon finds himself face to face with the Savior who is about to be crucified. And much to his surprise, and I’m sure much to his dismay, he becomes a part of the death procession of the Son of God.
Or to put it another way, my friends, Simon from Cyrene becomes a part of the Calvary experience of Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord. He becomes a part of His Calvary experience. And that is the only way that we know Simon down through the ages of history, because he played a part in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
And may I suggest something to you this morning? That if you are a Christian, if you have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ for the absolutely free gift of everlasting life, you have become a part of our Lord’s Calvary experience. You have become a part of His Calvary experience.
Do you remember the words of the Apostle Paul? He said,
“Do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death? Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death, that like as Christ was raised up by the glory of the Father, so we also should walk in newness of life.”
And who can forget Paul’s famous and lovely words which he wrote in Galatians chapter 2?
“I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. And the life that I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”
Do you realize, I mean do you really understand, that the moment you trusted Christ, not only did you get eternal life, not only were you born again into the family of God, but every Christian at the moment of their faith in Christ has been baptized by the Holy Spirit? And the Holy Spirit has united you with the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
You have, in a real spiritual sense, become a permanent part of the Calvary experience of the Son of God.
On January the 30th, 1973, Patrice Tamato, who lived in Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic, allowed himself to be nailed to a cross. He said as a sacrifice for world peace and understanding among men. While thousands of people watched on television, they took six stainless steel nails and drove them through his hands and his feet.
Tamato had planned to remain on the cross for 48 hours. But after 20 hours he had to call it quits because of an infection in his right foot. The next day the newspaper article that carried the story also carried this headline: “Crucifixion for Peace Falls Short.”
Now my Christian friend, this morning there’s one thing I can guarantee to you. That your co-crucifixion with Jesus Christ has not fallen short. It is not temporary. It is not reversible. You have, like Paul, been crucified with the Son of God.
What does that mean? Well, that means at the moment of our salvation that old self that was inside of us died. And when we are born again a new self comes to life. Now please don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that automatically after we become Christians we learn how to live the Christian life.
But I am saying this to you: At the moment of your faith in Christ a new person came to life within you. The old person was dead and buried. And this new person has the capacity, with the grace of God and by the power of the Holy Spirit, this new person has the capacity to live for God, to live by faith in the Son of God who loved us and gave Himself for us.
So the first thing I want you to know is that if you are a born-again Christian this morning, you are a part of the Calvary experience of Jesus Christ.
Now Simon wasn’t expecting that. Nor was he expecting what happened immediately after he became a part of this. You see, they took the cross that Jesus was carrying and they put it on the back of Simon so that he might bear the cross after Jesus as Jesus went up the slopes of Mount Calvary.
Now at this particular time it has been suggested we need to be reminded that Jesus had had no sleep all night long. He was arrested after the Last Supper the previous night. He has stood before the Jewish high priest. He stood before the Roman governor Pontius Pilate.
He stood before King Herod. Again before Pontius Pilate. He’s been whipped. He’s been mocked by the soldiers. He’s been led through the streets of Jerusalem carrying his cross. He’s been led out the gate of the city.
And although the Bible does not say so specifically, it’s obvious that He must have been tremendously exhausted. And the soldiers noticed this. And that’s why they bring Simon into the picture so that he may take the cross off Jesus’ back and carry it on his own back and follow Jesus up the hill called Calvary.
Now I really can’t believe that anybody in the early church who heard or read the Gospel of Luke and heard about this incident for the first time, I really cannot believe that anybody who heard about this incident did not remember the words that Jesus had spoken in many ways at many times. You remember some of them.
Jesus says,
“If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself and let him take up his cross and follow Me.”
And Jesus said,
“Whosoever will not take up his cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.”
And my friends, there is a very real sense in which it can be said that the Christian life is a process of cross-bearing. It is taking up whatever burden, whatever trouble, whatever trial, whatever requirements God lays upon us and carrying that burden in fidelity to Jesus Christ, following Him all the way.
There was a minister one time who was having trouble with his congregation and they were criticizing him severely. And so he went to the church official who was over him in the particular denomination to which he belonged. And he announced to this church official that he was going to resign.
Much to the minister’s surprise the church official said, “Have your people spit on you?” And the minister said, “No, of course not.” And then the church official said, “Have they dressed you up and mocked you and tried to make a fool out of you?”
And the minister said, “No, they haven’t.” And then the church official said, “Have they stripped and scourged you, crowned you with thorns, and crucified you?” And right there the minister interrupted and he said, “No.” And with the help of God until they do, I’ll hold on.
Now it doesn’t matter whether you’re a minister or a mechanic. It doesn’t matter whether you are a salesperson or a homemaker. If you are dedicated to Jesus Christ there will be opposition. There will be resistance. There will be criticism. There may be painful experiences both physical and emotional.
And what it really means to take up the cross and follow Jesus is that we accept as our burden whatever it is he lays on our back. We ought to be able to say with the songwriter,
“Jesus, I my cross have taken, all to leave and follow Thee. Destitute, despised, forsaken, Thou from hence my all shall be. Perish every fond ambition, all I’ve sought or hoped or known. Yet how rich is my condition! God in heaven is still my own.”
Can you truthfully say this morning, if you are a born-again believer, that you have taken up the cross and that you are following Jesus Christ up Calvary’s mountain?
Now I can almost hear somebody in my audience saying, “Well, Zane, there is one way in which Simon is different from every disciple. I mean, Simon didn’t do this voluntarily. The soldiers drafted him. They forced him to take the cross of Jesus and they forced him to follow Jesus up the hill. And that’s different from every disciple.”
And you know, I have to admit that in one sense it is different. I mean, nobody’s going to put a gun to your head and say, “Unless you follow Christ I’m going to blow your brains out.” Nobody’s going to put a knife to your heart and say, “Either give your heart to God or let me cut it out.”
Now there’s some people today who are trying to put a spiritual gun to our head and they’re saying, “Unless you become a disciple you’ll never get to heaven.” And we get to heaven by the grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ and nothing else.
And so there is a very real sense in which when we follow Christ it’s a decision that we make and that we make freely. But may I suggest something this morning? There is a sense in which every really dedicated disciple is forced. He is compelled to follow Jesus Christ.
Do you remember the words of the Apostle Paul in Second Corinthians chapter 5? Beautiful words. He says, “The love of Christ compels me.” The love of Christ forces me.
Because I judged thus: that if One died for all, then all died. And He died for all, that those who live might no longer live unto themselves but unto Him who died for them and rose again. Listen, says Paul, this is the way I think about it.
Jesus died for us. And those of us who have received life through him have received that life not to continue to live selfishly but to live our lives for the Son of God. And then he says, “And that’s what I’m doing because the love of Christ compels me.” I am compelled by the love of the Savior to do that very thing.
May I make a suggestion to you? You won’t last as a disciple unless the driving force of your discipleship is the love of Jesus Christ for you. Nothing else will work. Nothing else will keep you going. But if you are compelled by his love, then you will take up your cross and follow Him.
Many years ago during the dreadful Boxer Rebellion in China, the rebels captured a missionary station. They surrounded it and blocked every exit except one. In that missionary station at the time there were a hundred students of the missionary school.
And the rebels, using that one entrance that they left open, put a cross flat on the ground in front of the exit. And they said, “Anybody who will come out the exit and trample on the cross will go free. And anybody else who refuses to do it will be shot.”
The first seven students were terrified and they did as the rebels demanded. They trampled on the cross as they came out the exit of the compound and they were permitted to go free. And then there came a young girl.
And when she came to the entrance of the exit of the compound she knelt on her knees and she prayed to God for strength. And then very carefully she stepped around the cross so that she did not tread on it at all. And she went out to face the firing squad.
The remaining 92 students were so inspired by her example that they did exactly what she did. And all of them were shot for their loyalty to the Son of God.
Now the chances are good that you will never confront a situation like that in your entire experience as a Christian. But there’s more than one way to trample on the cross. We can trample on the cross by our indifference. We can trample on the cross by our disobedience to God. We can trample on the cross by our lack of commitment to Jesus Christ.
But why should we do that when he loved us so much? Why should we not be able to sing gladly and from our hearts the beautiful words that were spoken by the songwriter?
“King of my life, I crown Thee now. Thine shall the glory be. Lest I forget Thy thorn-crowned brow, lead me to Calvary.”
“May I be willing, Lord, to bear daily my cross for Thee. Even Thy cup of grief to share, Thou hast borne all for me.”
“Lest I forget Gethsemane, lest I forget Thine agony, lest I forget Thy love for me, lead me to Calvary.”
Shall we pray?
Father, we are constrained. We are compelled by the magnificent love of Christ. Help us to go out the door this morning more determined than ever to follow Him wherever He leads. We ask this in His name. Amen.