Oswald Chambers' devotional kinda hit me this morning. "We are not commissioned to preach salvation or sanctification--we are commissioned to lift up Jesus Christ (see John 12:32)" Chambers writes. Yet, later on, he continues with, "When we finally touch the underlying foundation of the reality of the gospel of God, we never bother Him anymore with little personal complaints."
When most people, myself included, think about preaching the gospel, we initially think of reaching out to the lost and presenting them with the message of salvation; hoping that one day they receive the calling of the Holy Spirit of becoming a child of God. But, what would it look like with everyone going around converting people, yet there was no one willing to teach these new believers how to life in the new life that they have in Christ? (2 Corinthians 5:17) Everyone would have new life in Christ, but no idea what to do next. After we have become a new creation in Christ, it is our responsibility to use this new life to lift up the name of our Lord and glorify Him in everything that we do. Preaching the gospel is NOT just limited to a verbal expression of one's faith. Preaching the gospel includes, but is not limited to, what we do, hear, or say. The apostle Paul illustrates this well in James 2:14-26, showing that unless our actions reflect our faith in our God, our faith is useless. (v. 20)
I found this devotional to be Heavenly timed. As through conversation and a few events over the past few days, the Lord has been revealing to myself what preaching the gospel and being Christ to others around me really means. Has it put a knot in my stomach because I was apprehensive about other's reactions? Yes. Not only did my actions and words reveal the love of Christ to those people that I was in contact with, but also the Lord was speaking a lot to myself as well. I have a lot of learning and growing to do. By the grace of God, I will keep running the race according to His will for my life.
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