One night, several years back a man stood in a congregation of Florida church members. The building was not pretty, it didn’t have a gable roof, nor a large sign out front bearing its name. The only hint that it was a church was the crowed that gathered every Sunday to worship. It time for the testimony service, so the aging Mexican began to speak. The man was not that tall so the shine of his jet black hair was all one could see from the seat where my uncle was sitting.
“I want to thank God,” he stammered, nervously leaning upon the pew before him. His speech was barely understandable yet, in his difficulty he spake on, “for my best friend Joe Hodges over there! If it hadn’t been for him I would not be here tonight.”
At this point my uncle, who was 16 at the time, was as red as a Road Island Rooster’s feathers. Still in his embarrassment he simply hung his head and nodded humbly with a big smile from ear to ear.
“I have worked with Joe for two years now and I’ve seen a lot of so-called-Christians come and go at the construction company where we work.” He shifted his feet from side to side. “Now at work,” he continued, “someone is always getting hurt or smashing their thumb, or something like that, and they all respond like I do. They cuss! But not Joe, if he ever hits his thumb, or tips, or anything he always says, ‘Praise the Lord!’ or ‘Thank you Jesus!’ He never says those words that us sinners do. He does not say the same things that me and those so-called-Christians say. Nope, even in pain he is a true Christian first.
Well I can tell you people that I don’t want to be like those false Christians, they don’t have the real thing. If they did, they would not act like us sinners do, they would act like Christ. I don’t want what they have, I want what Joe has because he has the real thing. So I thank God tonight and all day long, that I have a true Christian friend like Joe Hodges to show me that I need God in my life!”
So many Christian teens fail to realize the impact that our daily lives have on others around. Too often we justify the sinful deeds we allow our members to do by saying: “No one will ever see, and this one little thing doesn’t matter anyway.” We could not be more wrong. The eyes and ears of the world are upon us continually. Every day. Seeing, hearing, and taking to heart the things we do and say. Even beyond that, God is watching us too. When we think we are alone in our rooms, in our cars, or at school; God is always watching to see who is His and who is not. The Bible tells us that “The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous”(Ps 34:15) and “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God . . . And the Word was made flesh” (John 1:1, 14a). In another place, “The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart” (Rom. 10:8). Christ told us plainly to ”let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). Christ did not say to let our lights shine in church only, He said “before men.” In their sight.
Millions of people will never see the inside of a church building; millions more will never read a Bible. For some people, the only witness of Christianity that they will ever encounter, is the life that you and I live day by day. My Uncle Joe never thought his expressions of praise were noticed by any one. He had always just done it, taking no thought that God was using him to witness to the sinners and Christians alike. Uncle Joe since then has witnessed to many people in word and in deed, but he shall never forget the lesson that he learned from a poor speaking Mexican immigrant one star filled night in a ramshackle church in Florida. Where a sinner was brought to Christ by seeing a true Christian in action.
Therefore let us also take to heart the lesson of the watcher. Remembering always that on a planet with literally billions of people, someone is watching us all the time. They, like my uncle’s friend, are searching for the Real Thing, and in their journey they watch others to see who can show them the pathway to find it. Christ told us very plainly: “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” (St. John 14:6)
So to all those watching eyes and listing ears, whether they’re the person we meet but once in a life time, the relative that visits once a year, or the friend we meet every day at school; whoever they are, let us (through the way we act, talk, and look) “be thou an example of the believers, in word, in conversation, . . in purity” (I Tim 4:12). We must show forth Christ’s gospel, Christ’s message, and Christ’s word. That is the reason we are here on this earth in the first place, to give glory, honor, and praise continually to the only true and wise God, our High Priest Jesus Christ. |
