I have often been asked what being a Christian means to me. I believe that as I continue to mature and grow in Christ, this answer or parts of it may change, but for today, here are my thoughts…
Being a Christian always begins with Jesus and His saving grace, and the free gift of salvation only He can provide! There is no greater love than this.
But if I say, “I will not mention him or speak any more in his name,” his word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in, indeed, I cannot. ~ Jeremiah 20:9 NIV
In the record above, Jeremiah speaks of how he tries not to talkabout his God, but then it builds up like a fire within him. He cannot hold it in, no matter what the costs. I have been there, I understand what Jeremiah is talking about in this passage. We are so “on fire” for God, we have to tell anyone and everyone, we have to get our hands on everything that we can to learn more and more about our God!! It’s a great feeling, and experience, and often times that fire slowly burns to a smolder all too quickly.
He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation.” ~ Mark 16:15 NIV
So, the above passage of scripture tells me that we are not to hold our feelings and truths about God inside us, we are to let it out and share that fire and knowledge we have within us ~ to all of creation. This isn’t always an easy thing to do, is it? In fact, it can be downright impossible!! I think that alot of times, our lives, and the way we live it, can tell more than our words. We have all heard the saying “action speak louder than words”, or maybe “preach less with your words and more with your life”. How true those are! The key is to talk with God about it, bathe it in prayer. If we are faithful to ask the Lord to lead us, and we allow Him to, we will be begin to notice those opportunities and be able to act upon them. If we have the Lord in our hearts, and are living our lives according to His will, then people will notice a difference in us that maybe they don’t see in themselves. I have seen it happen, to me even. I had a friend of mine who would always ask me why I was so happy and positive all the time. I would say to her, “I don’t know…I guess it’s just my “cheery dispostion”!! It took me a long time to realize that it was God’s love she was seeing in me. So the next time we talked about it, I told her about Jesus, as best as I could at that point in time, and she accepted Jesus later that week. It was so awesome to be a part of that.
So, what does being a Christian mean to me? It means striving to be the kind of Christian where my faith, hope and love shine through. To get to a point where I cannot escape it…even if I wanted to! Being a Christian means getting to the point where it is no longer an important part of my life…it’s not even the most important part of my life…it IS what makes every part of my life important!!! It infuses a sort of meaning to everything that didn’t exist before. My life changes, I am preaching less with my words and more with my life…and not even on purpose! People begin to ask for prayer, and counsel. They even come to me when someone they know needs God in their lives; and then I realize in a moment of pure fright…God is going to use me to help change someones life!!! My eternal hope is putting His hope in me, and I do it! Not to score points with “the” Big Guy, not so He will love me more (because he can’t love me anymore than he already does), but because I can’t help it, it just happens. A heart filled with gratitude, responding to the love it has been given , with love, I believe is the heart of Christianity.
