"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." - John 3:16.
The Lord said, "Anyone who wishes to become my disciple should deny himself, CARRY HIS CROSS, and follow me," [Matthew 16:24; Luke 14:26; Mark 8:34]. Denying the self means fully conforming one's self to the person of Jesus Christ as we have discussed here. Carrying one's cross would mean living with one's trials, burdens and challenges; to face the troubles of life and not avoid them; to be persecuted for the Faith and finally to even die for it. To follow the Lord is to fulfill the will of the Father in our lives in the same manner that He did accept and fulfill the Father's will while in this world.
To carry one's cross is not necessarily having to carry "a physical cross"; it is more about accepting and living with the reality of sufferings, worries and sorrows of one's life. However, it doesn't mean surrendering or giving in to such sufferings, worries, and sorrows. Yes! we need to surrender ourselves but not to these but to the One who will help us overcome these sufferings, worries and sorrows: the Lord Jesus Christ. In the same manner that God sent Him to help us become free from the bondage to sin, the Lord Jesus Christ will lead us to conquer these negatives in the same manner that He overcame the world.
It is not easy to carry one's cross - many times, crosses. How much more if you will have carry a cross that is not your own. This Station is about the Lord carrying His cross but was it really His cross that He carried? Fact is, it was not His own: He carried the cross of humanity because humanity was not capable of carrying its own cross and be freed from the bondage to sin. God has to send Someone else to do the dirty - though edifying - work and undergo something that no ordinary man could accomplish.
"And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us!" [John 1:14]. Yes, God sent no one else but the Word who was in the beginning with God and was God: the Second Person of the Most Blessed Trinity. To save mankind, the Son has to deny Himself, leave His divinity and become a man like us in everything and to die like us with a death that was considered gruesome and inhuman even in a time when human rights was not yet even thought of perhaps: death on the cross! Through His passion, death and resurrection He was able to redeem mankind and free humanity from the bondage to sin.
So God the Son was born as a human being like us. And as man, He made His own the cross that humanity has to carry in order to be freed from sin. So Jesus really carried His cross and He is challenging us to carry ours too. Important thing is that He already made a great example and we only have to FOLLOW HIM.
As His friends, we must be comforted by the fact that when the Lord said, "There is no greater love than this: to offer one's life for one's friends" [John 15:13], He did offer His life for His friends - us!
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