31 Days toward Spiritual Maturity — Day 6
January 28th, 2008 Posted in 31 Days toward Spiritual Maturity, Growth
MEETING CHRIST – Helping Others Meet Jesus
The good news - that God has come to us and that He accepts us through what He had Jesus do for us - is too good to keep to ourselves! Imagine that you were at a convention where everyone came down with food poisoning and was going to die. Imagine that you happened to drink a beverage from the vending machine that, amazingly, was the perfect antidote. Wouldn’t you make a great effort to convince everyone else of your find? Wouldn’t you be morally obligated to do so? You might face some resistance by those who weren’t convinced: “You’re so narrow-minded,” some people might say; “You think you have the only way to get well.” However, if you knew that you had come upon the only way for people to get well, wouldn’t you continue to try to convince them? You wouldn’t cram it down their throats; you’d respect their right to reject the truth, but you’d do your best to convince them.
This is what we’re compelled to do with Jesus! If He’s truly the way to God, as individuals and as a church one of our major goals should be to convince others to turn to Him.
It’s not that followers of Jesus think we’re any better or smarter than anyone else. As someone has said, we’re just one beggar telling another beggar where to find food.
Remember the story about Jesus’ coming to Simon Peter, his brother Andrew, and their two fishermen friends and doing the miracle of the big catch of fish for them? That wasn’t the first time that Peter met Jesus. His brother Andrew had encountered Jesus on a previous occasion and had spent the day with Him. We read, “The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, ‘We have found the Messiah (that is the Christ).’ And he brought him to Jesus.” (John 1:41-42) Just as Jesus has come to us, sometimes through the witness of someone else, we can be used to bring Him to others!
The apostle Paul declared, “We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though Christ were making his appeal through us. . . .” (2 Corinthians 5:20) Jesus often talked about bringing His kingdom into this world. We even pray His prayer: “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” An ambassador is a person of one kingdom or nation who’s a representative in another country or kingdom. We’re part of God’s kingdom in this fallen world, and we’re supposed to be ambassadors for Christ here. It was said of Andrew, Peter’s brother, “And he brought him to Jesus.” Are we willing to bring people to Jesus?
The first step on our spiritual journey isn’t actually a step that we take. We simply ACCEPT. We need to accept what Christ has done for us. He comes to us to save us; He wants to be our Savior. He comes to us, meeting us where we are. Meeting Christ - accepting the fact that we can be accepted by Him - is the only way to begin our spiritual journey. We must be willing to be found by Him so that we can begin the journey with Him from where we are, and we’re supposed to help other people do the same thing!
Dave
