Losing Yourself to Find Your Life: What Matthew 16 Taught Us About Surrender

Meta Description: Pastor Gary unpacked Matthew 16:24-26 and CS Lewis's Mere Christianity to show us why true surrender to Christ leads to the life we were always meant to live. URL Slug: losing-yourself-finding-life-matthew-16-surrender Featured Image: A single wooden cross silhouetted against a bright, open sky — evoking both the weight of surrender and the freedom it brings.

There's a phrase most of us have heard — and maybe even said — that Pastor Gary challenged us to rethink this Sunday: "I need me time." It sounds reasonable. It sounds healthy. But as he wrapped up our church's series on C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity, he helped us see that the "me first" instinct, however natural it feels, runs directly against the most clarifying words Jesus ever spoke.

The result was one of the most personally searching messages many of us have heard in a long time.

The Verse That Changed a 17-Year-Old's Life

Pastor Gary anchored the entire message in Matthew 16:24-26, a passage he shared holds deep personal significance — it was one of the first scriptures he ever memorized:

"If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?"

He walked us through the passage almost phrase by phrase, pausing at each major turn to let the weight of Jesus's words sink in. The structure of his teaching was simple but penetrating: three commands — deny yourself, take up your cross, follow me — and one stunning promise.

"Deny Yourself" Doesn't Mean Hate Yourself

Pastor Gary was careful to clarify what Jesus is not saying here. Denying yourself isn't about self-loathing or feeling inferior. It's about something more fundamental: giving up control over your own life and no longer making yourself the central authority.

He put it plainly — the real question for many of us isn't do I believe in Jesus? The question is who's in charge? Christ or self?

Drawing on C.S. Lewis, he shared that the more we get ourselves out of the way and let Christ take over, the more truly ourselves we actually become. It's counterintuitive, but it's the consistent testimony of everyone who has genuinely tried it.

The Cross Is About Putting Something to Death

Before Christ, Pastor Gary reminded us, the cross was simply an instrument of death and punishment — nothing symbolic, nothing redemptive. But now, connected to Christ, it carries a different meaning for his followers.

When Jesus calls us to take up our cross, he's calling us to put something specific to death: self-determination, self-protection, self-definition. He described it as the shift from being self-minded to Christ-minded.

He illustrated this vividly by referencing his daughter-in-law's parents, who were sheltering in place overseas amid real danger — not hiding in fear, but opening their home to neighbors who were scared and alone. In a moment when every instinct screams take care of yourself, they chose to be a light. That, Pastor Gary said, is what it looks like to take up your cross in real life.

Surrender Doesn't Erase You — It Reveals You

This may have been the most surprising turn in the message, and it landed with real force. Many of us quietly fear that fully surrendering to Christ means giving up the things that make us us — our dreams, our personality, our sense of direction.

Pastor Gary pushed back on that fear with both scripture and his own story. He grew up certain he'd become a police officer or firefighter. He had it all mapped out. Then, at 17, he gave his life to Christ and read Matthew 16:24 — and everything changed. Not because God stripped away who he was, but because God revealed something greater.

"I went from chasing my dreams to living out his dreams," he reflected. And what followed — the students he's poured into, the opportunities he never could have imagined, the life he's built — none of it would have happened if he'd stayed in the driver's seat.

The promise, as he framed it, is this: what is surrendered is not destroyed, but restored and fulfilled. God knows your desires. He also knows gifts in you that you haven't discovered yet. And he has people and purposes waiting for you that your own plans could never have arranged.

We Find Ourselves When We Stop Looking for Ourselves

Pastor Gary closed the message with what he called the final paragraph of Mere Christianity — a passage that served as the culmination of everything Lewis built across the book. The core idea: look for yourself, and you'll ultimately find only despair. Look for Christ, and you'll find him — and with him, everything else.

It's a truth that sounds like loss until you experience it. And Pastor Gary's honest, personal testimony made it feel not just theological, but livable.

He closed by turning the message into a quiet, honest question for each of us: Have I fully surrendered to Christ? Does he have all of my life?

A Word Worth Sitting With This Week

If you were in the room Sunday, you know the message didn't let you stay comfortable — and that's exactly what made it good. If you missed it, we'd encourage you to watch the full sermon on our church's YouTube channel.

And wherever you are this week, consider sitting with the question Pastor Gary left us with: Is there an area of your life where you're still holding the wheel? What would it look like to hand it over — not out of obligation, but out of trust that he knows the way better than you do?

That's the invitation of Matthew 16:24. And it's one worth accepting.

Social Media Excerpt (Facebook/Instagram): What if the life you've been searching for is on the other side of surrender? This Sunday, Pastor Gary unpacked Matthew 16:24-26 and reminded us that losing our life for Christ's sake isn't the end of the story — it's where the real story begins. Read the full recap at the link below.

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