What Does It Mean to Deny Yourself and Take Up Your Cross?
By Frederick Spieker ·
When Jesus told His disciples what following Him would require, He gave them two commands, not one: "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me" (Matthew 16:24). Most of us blur these into a single idea. But they are two distinct movements, and seeing them clearly changes everything.
Deny yourself: the refusal to grasp
To deny yourself is not self hatred or endless restriction. It is refusing something you want right now because you trust God with what comes later. It is the choice Adam and Eve failed in the garden, and the choice Jesus made perfectly. Denial creates space. It clears the ground.
Take up your cross: the willing cost
Where denial says no to self, taking up your cross says yes to sacrifice. It means giving something at a real cost because you believe the giving leads somewhere worth going. A cross was an instrument of death; to take one up is to lay down your own agenda so that God's can rise.
Two moves, in order
You cannot carry a cross if you are not first willing to set your own desires down. Denial comes first and makes room; sacrifice fills it. Together, freely chosen and rooted in faith, they are what Jesus calls discipleship, and what runs like a thread through all of Scripture.
Why it leads to life, not loss
The world hears "deny" and "sacrifice" as subtraction. Jesus frames them as the doorway to life: "Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it" (Matthew 16:25). The seed that falls into the ground does not disappear. It multiplies.