Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions. 1 John 3:18 (NLT)
Recently in Bible Study we were doing a topical study on what the Bible says about our witness. What are we supposed to do? How we are supposed to do it?
During the conversation it became really clear that God says our witness is our life. People see Jesus by our actions (or non-actions). We share Jesus by living a life of love, acceptance, with the fruits of the Spirit alive and well in our every day. We talked about how witnessing wasn’t just about sharing Biblical facts but about sharing your personal story of Jesus.
I’m going to tell on myself a little here. During the time I shared a story about “how not to witness.” It was something I saw once that I didn’t like. That took us down the path of how God can use any efforts, even if they are misguided and how what I may think is a good witness may not be a good witness to someone else. He uses us all where we are to meet the needs of others where they are.
As we were praying at the end, I heard God say “if your witness is your life and your actions, how were you witnessing when you were sharing that story?” BAM! God’s lightbulb highlighted the error of my ways. You see, here I was talking about how I didn’t think you should witness and criticizing someone else’s witness...which caused me to wreck my own witness.
If my witness is my actions, the way I live my life and show love to others, criticizing someone else does not highlight Jesus. It highlights my opinion. The lesson I learned? It’s really easy to think we have it all figured out when in fact, we don’t. We are all in this together doing the best that we can. We should respect each other and see each other through the lens of Jesus’ heart. The only witness I need to worry about is my own and obviously, I need Jesus to help me with that every day.