Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up the cross, and follow me. Many admire Jesus. Many would want to do what Jesus did. But few dare go where Jesus dared to go. Most of us are labeled (or we label ourselves) as followers of Jesus, but in most cases, it remains just that: a label. We would want to be his followers, but we don’t want to follow him. And this is because in order for us to follow Jesus, we must deny ourselves and carry our crosses. Following Jesus has conditions, and they are not popular ones by any means. In a society that promotes individualistic tendencies and love for the self, who would deny him/herself? In a world where our energies are spent searching for ways of “easing” the world’s burdens, where does carrying one’s cross fit? Sometimes in our efforts to lessen the demands of Jesus’ teachings, we tend to “spiritualize” them. We end up talking about  spiritual denials of the self and  spiritual crosses. However, when we do so, we lose the urgency of Jesus’ teachings and end up inventing our own teachings. The demands about which we read in today’s Gospel reading are real: they are not  theorized demands but are as real as they can be. So Jesus meant that we deny ourselves and pick our crosses in our following of him. How should we understand this? Did he mean that we practice self-loathing? That we cease caring for our lives? That we go about looking for crosses to carry (whatever the crosses might be)?
A look at the context in which Jesus issued the teaching will help us understand the gist of the statement. In the beginning of the sixteenth chapter, the Pharisees demand a sign from Jesus. In order for them to “endorse” him as the Messiah, Jesus had to “prove” to them that he indeed was the one. This is followed by Jesus warning the people to be careful lest they be led astray by the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. And in the immediate episode preceding today’s Gospel reading, Jesus foretells for the first time the passion that awaits him in Jerusalem, something that Peter didn’t want to hear: “ Heaven preserve you Lord. This must not happen to you.” And of course we all share in the sentiments of Peter. Why should all the good Jesus was doing to the people be capped by a shameful death? Why should evil triumph? Bad things should happen to bad people, and good people should be rewarded, not condemned! This is what we would want, humanly speaking. But God’s ways are not our ways, Jesus reminds us. 
A follower of Jesus should be able to let go of any entitlement. As followers of Jesus, we will be spending our energies and resources doing good. But we should not be expecting rewards or pats on our backs. A follower of Jesus will understand when his/her good works are not reciprocated, when instead of smiles and handshakes, he/she is reviled, mocked and persecuted. And while a follower of Christ will not be taking pleasure in being rejected and persecuted, he/she will nonetheless not cease from doing good because he/she had let go. He/she had accepted to deny the self and carry the cross.