A Collect to Lay Down our Lives

Lord Jesus, who laid down your life for the sake of many, teach us likewise to lay down our lives and to give up those things that serve only ourselves, that we might be free to follow you and thereby receive real life from your hands, through you who died and was raised again and ascended to the Father and Holy Spirit in glory. Amen. ‘Then Jesus told his disciples, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life?”‘ – Matthew 16:24-26