Knowing how to accept the cross.

The short story is about a man who wanted to get rid of his shadow at any cost. Escape seemed to him the best method. But the shadow was always behind him, no matter how fast he ran. Finally, the person falls to the ground exhausted, and dies. At the end of the short story, there is a lesson that it was enough to stand in the shadow and your own shadow would disappear.

The philosopher Seneca was a pagan, and he taught his students: “If you don’t know which port you are heading for, no wind will be happy for you.”

Christians are aware of the cross’s importance, need, and value for our salvation. Jesus says: “Whoever wants to come after me, let him deny himself and follow me.” For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Mt 16:24-25). On the way to Jerusalem, Jesus begins preparing his disciples for the moment he came into the world. He speaks for the first time about his suffering, which he will undergo in Jerusalem under the leadership of the elders, high priests, and scribes. Jesus knows that torture and death await him in Jerusalem. But death will not end his mission on earth. He tells the disciples that he will rise from the dead on the third day. The apostles did not understand at that moment what Jesus was saying about the resurrection. They could imagine suffering and death quite well. Certainly, the apostles did not have the right idea about the mission of the Lord Jesus. In Jesus, Peter sees the Messiah. After all,

And the Messiah should die before their visions of the prophesied Messiah would come true? So it is hard to wonder at Peter’s behavior, that he takes Jesus aside and tells him: “Lord! This must not happen to you” (Mt 16, 24). Why did Peter say such a bad thing, one may ask, when Jesus tells him: “Get out of my way, Satan! You are an offense to me, because you have no sense of the things of God, only for men” (Mt 16:23)! This is what Jesus says to Peter, whom he praised when he confessed who he thought he was. Jesus calls Peter “Satan”. We are not surprised at Jesus, because Peter is still only thinking in terms of intentions relevant to their house. The Messiah was to free the nation from the yoke of the hated Romans. They only understood the expected and prophesied kingdom of the Messiah in earthly terms and did not understand that the Messiah, Jesus, came for something much more. He came to save and redeem all men,

Whoever goes against the will of God is an enemy of God. The devil by his disobedience and every man by his sin set himself against God. Whoever does not accept the will of God is an enemy of God. Peter discourages Jesus from the plans of God, and that is why he is so harshly rebuked by Jesus. Peter wanted to oppose God’s plan.