Cut it out!

I read an article about Governor Brown's proposed tax cuts in California in which the writer described it using the idiom, “death by a thousand cuts.” It means “lots of small bad things are happening, none of which are fatal in themselves, but which add up to a slow and painful demise.”

"What a graphic metaphor," I thought, "for Paul’s I die daily" (1 Cor. 15:31).  We crucify the self-life a thousand times a day when we respond in love and grace to unexpected interruptions, unfair criticisms, demands from 'un-deserving'  people: things that bring out the worst in us! But as we say ‘yes’ to God's interests, the cross cuts to the bone of our self-life: pride, ambition, and a host of what Tozer called the hyphenated self sins: self-importance, self-defense, self-indulgence, self-pity, even self-sensitivity.

The cross proves that God loved the world too much to leave it in its fallen condition. Likewise, God loves you too much to save you and then leave you without a way to cut out your cancerous self-life. The “daily cross” is a very personal focal point in your private life with God.  Unfortunately, not many are willing to take up this cross (Matt. 16:24).  They may acknowledge their co-crucifixion with Christ; they may even say they want to "die daily."  But at the first sign of pain, they pull back, refusing to let God cut it out.