The slowest process for success
Greetings in the name of Jesus:
We have all heard in one way or another that we need to have a personal stake placed in our Christian witness to the world around us. I don't believe however that we really understand the process that God is intended for us to use in dealing with our witness to the world. It seems to me as though we have taken the concept of simply telling the truth to people as being the only part of our responsibility in witness. I think however that there is a second part of that that we tend to leave blank in our life.
We have been exposed to Scripture like that of the book of James that tells us faith without deeds is dead, I would like to put it a slightly different way by saying"what you do speak so loudly that it's hard for people to hear what you say". For a very long time now within the body of Christ there has been a tendency to speak out for Christ, and yet to live for ourselves. The world around us has seen this tendency and has come to the conclusion that our life in Christ is more of an ideal than a lifestyle and then makes our witness to them a moot point.
When the general public hears us say something one of the first responses to what we say is to look at what we do in life. It is one of the only natural ways that people have to sort out the truth someone is in the intent of their heart as compared to what they say they are. This makes the concept of what we do in life even more important than ever before. In fact the word of God tells us that if we have no intention of living out what we say we believe we should probably never speak in public about what we believe. The word of God tells us to let our yes be yes, and are no be no. Understanding the true meaning of that is difficult for many people. In its purest form that simply says don't say something that you don't live out, which is just a repeat of what we have been saying this paragraph. Jesus himself taught that we should not give witness of a second hand that count of a relationship with God because it is not a true experience for us, even though it does make a good story. People today tend to use words instead of action in their life as a tool to prove a theory or an idea, but in truth that becomes what the Bible says is lip service. With the idea of lip service we also find a multitude of varying degrees of following Christ. Let me give you an example: Jesus had many different kinds of followers, he had admirers; those who said good things about him, but stated good distance away so that they would have an excuse to never get involved. Christ also had followers who actually physically followed him from place to place, but who did so only as long as they benefited from it. In most cases as in the feeding the 5000 masses of people would gather around him either to see a miracle or to receive a free meal of some kind. In all cases they were coming to Jesus to receive something free. They were not interested at all in giving of themselves to what he was saying but they were only interested in what they received. Among all of these followers there were also those who were disciples. These were people who were genuinely interested in finding out more about God, and it is this type of follower that Satan works on the most.
Even though these people have come to Christ for the right reasons they will still be noneffective in their witness if they are taught to use only words and not their actions as a tool to show their faith to the world around them. I personally look for the fruit of the spirit in someone through the actions they take toward others, and I rarely am swayed by the words people use to express their faith. It may seem that the title I have given this particular blog does not fit, and yet this is only an introduction to what really needs to be dealt with concerning mentoring. It will be the meat within the next posting I make because mentoring is a slow process of living out Christ in front of someone else. It is our example of what Christ means to us. Be thinking about what I have said today"faith without works is indeed dead"may you richly bless God through your life in him.
THE UNWORTHY SERVANT
We have all heard in one way or another that we need to have a personal stake placed in our Christian witness to the world around us. I don't believe however that we really understand the process that God is intended for us to use in dealing with our witness to the world. It seems to me as though we have taken the concept of simply telling the truth to people as being the only part of our responsibility in witness. I think however that there is a second part of that that we tend to leave blank in our life.
We have been exposed to Scripture like that of the book of James that tells us faith without deeds is dead, I would like to put it a slightly different way by saying"what you do speak so loudly that it's hard for people to hear what you say". For a very long time now within the body of Christ there has been a tendency to speak out for Christ, and yet to live for ourselves. The world around us has seen this tendency and has come to the conclusion that our life in Christ is more of an ideal than a lifestyle and then makes our witness to them a moot point.
When the general public hears us say something one of the first responses to what we say is to look at what we do in life. It is one of the only natural ways that people have to sort out the truth someone is in the intent of their heart as compared to what they say they are. This makes the concept of what we do in life even more important than ever before. In fact the word of God tells us that if we have no intention of living out what we say we believe we should probably never speak in public about what we believe. The word of God tells us to let our yes be yes, and are no be no. Understanding the true meaning of that is difficult for many people. In its purest form that simply says don't say something that you don't live out, which is just a repeat of what we have been saying this paragraph. Jesus himself taught that we should not give witness of a second hand that count of a relationship with God because it is not a true experience for us, even though it does make a good story. People today tend to use words instead of action in their life as a tool to prove a theory or an idea, but in truth that becomes what the Bible says is lip service. With the idea of lip service we also find a multitude of varying degrees of following Christ. Let me give you an example: Jesus had many different kinds of followers, he had admirers; those who said good things about him, but stated good distance away so that they would have an excuse to never get involved. Christ also had followers who actually physically followed him from place to place, but who did so only as long as they benefited from it. In most cases as in the feeding the 5000 masses of people would gather around him either to see a miracle or to receive a free meal of some kind. In all cases they were coming to Jesus to receive something free. They were not interested at all in giving of themselves to what he was saying but they were only interested in what they received. Among all of these followers there were also those who were disciples. These were people who were genuinely interested in finding out more about God, and it is this type of follower that Satan works on the most.
Even though these people have come to Christ for the right reasons they will still be noneffective in their witness if they are taught to use only words and not their actions as a tool to show their faith to the world around them. I personally look for the fruit of the spirit in someone through the actions they take toward others, and I rarely am swayed by the words people use to express their faith. It may seem that the title I have given this particular blog does not fit, and yet this is only an introduction to what really needs to be dealt with concerning mentoring. It will be the meat within the next posting I make because mentoring is a slow process of living out Christ in front of someone else. It is our example of what Christ means to us. Be thinking about what I have said today"faith without works is indeed dead"may you richly bless God through your life in him.
THE UNWORTHY SERVANT
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