When you hear the phrase "tough guy," who do you think of? Some people think of baseball iron man Cal Ripken or NFL icon Brett Favre. Or perhaps you recall your favorite film hero. Certainly William Wallace or Maximus Decimus Meridius come to mind for many! And they qualify as tough guys, no doubt.
But none of them carried a cross to Golgotha and then allowed themselves to be hammered to it with 7-inch nails. And if we had been eyewitnesses to the crucifixion, we wouldn't read Luke 9:23 the same way:
"If anyone will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me."
Take up your cross.
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We say it so effortlessly, so flippantly. But that's because we read it figuratively. It's estimated that a Roman cross weighed 300 pounds, and even if Jesus carried only the crossbar, it was still placed on raw flesh that had just been flogged! And He carried it no less than 650 yards down the Via Dolorosa.
In my new book, Play the Man, I introduce seven virtues of manhood. The first virtue is tough love. Here's what I mean by that: Being a tough guy doesn't mean sticking up for yourself when you get offended. A true tough guy sacrifices himself for the sake of others.
Tough love is sacrificial love—a love that is willing to be nailed to a cross for someone else's sin. Tough love is unconditional love—a love that is not dictated by someone else's performance. Tough love is covenantal love—for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health.
It's easy loving your wife when everything is going great, right? When it's not going great, it's not so easy. Why? Because our love tends to be reactive. Tough love is proactive. It's not a need-seeking love; it's a need-meeting love. It doesn't seek validation, because it doesn't need any! It adds value to the beloved!
One of the great mistakes we make is thinking that God feels about us the same way we feel about ourselves. So we project our imperfections onto God. The reality is this: There is nothing you can do to make God love you any more or any less than He already does. God loves you perfectly, eternally.
I know you know that, but do you believe it?
Simply put: You mean the cross to Christ.
When we are at our worst, God is at His best. Think of it as the sacrifice of love, and like the sacrifice of praise, it may be the most meaningful form of love because it means loving someone when you least feel like it.
Excerpted from Play the Man by Mark Batterson. Baker Books, a division of Baker Publishing Group, 2017. Used by permission. www.BakerPublishingGroup.com
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