Do you need an antidote to grumbling and complaining? Look to the cross of Christ. The cross is a place where your wayward wants and selfish desires are put to death. So come to the cross, die to yourself, and embrace your new life in Christ!
Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada with an amazing testimony.
And I think you’ll find it amazing as well. It’s a witness shared by a man on kidney dialysis. When he wrote me about his experience, it so impressed my heart that I’ve never forgotten his words. And I don’t think you will, either. Here’s what he said in his letter: “Joni, I spent one-and-a-half years on a kidney machine before getting a transplant. At first I did a lot of complaining, but then I stopped when I read the account of the crucifixion. Because in the kidney center, they helped me get out of my coat; with Jesus, they stripped off his clothes. When entering the center, the nurses spoke a kind word; Jesus only heard ‘Crucify him!’
“On my kidney machine I would develop a headache, and they would bring me an ice pack and aspirin; but a crown of thorns was shoved on Jesus’ head. Sometimes I’d get thirsty, and they’d give me juice; Jesus got vinegar. I laid on a comfortable bed for five hours; Jesus hung on nails. I hardly felt the needle they inserted in my vein, but spikes were driven through Jesus’ hands and feet. My blood was cleansed; his blood was spilled on the ground. Joni, Jesus turned my days of complaining into days of praising when I took time to really look at the cross. A careful look into the events that took place that day on Calvary should stop all our complaining.”
Wow, I think you’d find that amazing, right? And if you want to hear his message again, just go to joniradio.org, and click on today’s program. There’s even a tab where you can see the transcript, or copy it. But let’s consider for a minute the words of this dialysis patient. He says that his days of complaining disappeared when he took time to look – I mean really look carefully – at the cross. Why the cross? Well, let’s look carefully and consider. The cross is a place where you die to yourself. At the cross you enjoy no rights; you have no rights; like Galatians says, you have been crucified with Christ. So there’s no room for an itchiness to get your way or demand things as you want them; there’s no room to insist on comfort or being understood by others. At the cross, you lay all that down. The cross is a place of humility. A place where you are nothing, and Christ is everything. It’s a life-transforming invitation to be crucified with Jesus; but God knows the cross is also a place of grace, and the nearer you draw to Calvary, the more abundant the grace, and the peace, and the power. So how could you complain? You’d be burnt toast, you’d be heading to hell, were it not for the cross.
When this man closed his letter – his wonderful letter – he penned Galatians 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” You know, I can see that man lying on the kidney dialysis table and thinking, “I no longer live to be comfortable or have things my way or to be understood. I’ve died to that, for I have been crucified with Christ.” Now that, my friend, is a power-packed way of looking at life. Powerful because 1 Corinthians 1 says that the word of the cross is to “those who are being saved, the power of God.” Friend, this is your hope in every hardship, so join me in praying today, “O blessed cross, crucify my complaining, mortify my grumbling, and so enliven my heartfelt praise to my Jesus Christ!”
© Joni and Friends