Coconut
Member
- Joined
- Feb 17, 2005
- Messages
- 4,663
An Eye-Opening Encounter - by John Fischer
Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to tell anyone who is interested how you came to know Jesus. It`s all about a personal encounter. Once you know Christ you introduce Him to others through your own story. This notion that so many Christians and non-Christians have that our mission is to dazzle folks with how much better we are is not only ineffective, it is untrue!
This is precisely the kind of wrong thinking that keeps people from telling their story. Who am I to tell someone about Jesus, the rationale goes, when my own life is in such a mess?
The absurdity in this kind of thinking is the fact that no one, especially Christians, will ever have it all together in this life. The fact that we are not good enough should be the whole point of our message. We tell people about Jesus because we know, better than anyone, how much we need Him. When people throw our own inconsistencies up in front of our faces, that is just another opportunity to tell our own story of how Christ has forgiven us on the cross and how much we need His salvation every day. So instead of being a threat to our witness, our faults and shortcomings are the very things upon which our witness hangs. If we were perfect, we wouldn`t need Jesus.
When I think of the essence of our statement as Christians to those who haven`t come to know Christ yet, I always think of the blind man that Jesus healed by covering his eyes with mud and telling him to go wash in the pool of Siloam (John 9:1-34). When the religious leaders got wind of it, they started to question the man extensively, wanting to know who healed him, how it happened, where the man who healed him was now, and even asking his parents to verify whether their son was in fact born blind. When they came back to the man and pressed him with questions a second time, accusing Jesus of being a sinner for doing work on the Sabbath, the man replied, I don`t know whether he is a sinner, but I know this: I was blind, and now I can see!
That`s the essence of the message: I was blind, and now I can see; I was lost and now I am found; I was guilty and now I am forgiven; I was alone and now I have a friend. It doesn`t take a perfect life to spread that message, just someone who has had an eye-opening encounter with the living Christ. Regardless of intellect, position, status or wealth, the message for everyone will come down to this: I was blind, and now I can see.
Praise God!
Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to tell anyone who is interested how you came to know Jesus. It`s all about a personal encounter. Once you know Christ you introduce Him to others through your own story. This notion that so many Christians and non-Christians have that our mission is to dazzle folks with how much better we are is not only ineffective, it is untrue!
This is precisely the kind of wrong thinking that keeps people from telling their story. Who am I to tell someone about Jesus, the rationale goes, when my own life is in such a mess?
The absurdity in this kind of thinking is the fact that no one, especially Christians, will ever have it all together in this life. The fact that we are not good enough should be the whole point of our message. We tell people about Jesus because we know, better than anyone, how much we need Him. When people throw our own inconsistencies up in front of our faces, that is just another opportunity to tell our own story of how Christ has forgiven us on the cross and how much we need His salvation every day. So instead of being a threat to our witness, our faults and shortcomings are the very things upon which our witness hangs. If we were perfect, we wouldn`t need Jesus.
When I think of the essence of our statement as Christians to those who haven`t come to know Christ yet, I always think of the blind man that Jesus healed by covering his eyes with mud and telling him to go wash in the pool of Siloam (John 9:1-34). When the religious leaders got wind of it, they started to question the man extensively, wanting to know who healed him, how it happened, where the man who healed him was now, and even asking his parents to verify whether their son was in fact born blind. When they came back to the man and pressed him with questions a second time, accusing Jesus of being a sinner for doing work on the Sabbath, the man replied, I don`t know whether he is a sinner, but I know this: I was blind, and now I can see!
That`s the essence of the message: I was blind, and now I can see; I was lost and now I am found; I was guilty and now I am forgiven; I was alone and now I have a friend. It doesn`t take a perfect life to spread that message, just someone who has had an eye-opening encounter with the living Christ. Regardless of intellect, position, status or wealth, the message for everyone will come down to this: I was blind, and now I can see.
Praise God!
Been there the whole time
