Your Witness Is Important

I’ve wrestled over the past few weeks with a question; “Should I write an article on Social Networking – Facebook?” My question was in response to another question asked a few months ago by someone on Facebook; “List five (5) things you don’t like about people on Facebook (paraphrased)”. Some responses were show boating, embellishing, too spiritual, I think that’s about all I could remember putting comments in a one word description to be brief in this article.

Well my wrestling has come to end and here’s the article.

I enjoy the avenue of social networking through Facebook. I’ve connected with many friends that I lost contact with. I enjoy status updates, photos, event announcements, videos, links, and notes. This past NBA season, I had a blast going back and forth with the Faker fans about their team. Ok, they won the championship, big deal! It was fun and people got to see me, a Christian who happens to be their pastor, as a person who likes to have fun. I enjoyed the drum off battle between Ethan and Jazz. It made me want to pick my sticks back up and join in on the battle. I haven’t forgotten how to play, either.

Point being, Facebook is a great place to meet new people and re-connect with family/friends.

However, I do want to challenge us to be conscious of who we are: Christians – God’s people. This is in no way my attempt to judge anyone or to be more spiritual than the other or anything like that. I do believe in being real and transparent. We are Christians living in a real world with real challenges and yet our reality is that we serve a real God.

Daniel Hill holds a steady part-time job working one or two shifts a week at Starbucks. It’s hardly a career-track position, and it’s not that he needs the extra cash or battles a secret caffeine addiction. It’s the people. Purple hair, belly-button rings, tattoos, black-painted fingernails—those people.

For Hill, whose day job is ministering on staff with Willow Creek Community Church’s Axis ministry, Starbucks provides a context to build meaningful relationships with postmodern, Gen-Next twenty-somethings who are far from God.

“Nothing has been more transforming for me than working at Starbucks,” says Hill. “These people matter to me.”

But the moonlighting gig isn’t a free pass to easy evangelism. His coffee colleagues are like a good cup of triple espresso—plenty of steam, a little bitter, and enough kick to knock you on your backside if you aren’t careful.

As Christians we serve a cynical generation where everything about Christianity is being questioned. One question that sticks out most to me is “What good is Christianity?” This is a question of relevance. Does your belief change lives? Does your religion work? Does it help me, whether I’m in your group or not? Or are you just another self-serving group of people tagged with Christians behind your name?

Many questions and accusations may and/or may not be warranted, yet the GenX of our day looks to other avenues for a community of belonging and not the church. Facebook, Twittering, and other social networking sites have, in many cases, taking the place of church community. Coming to a church event used to be pretty natural, but now it looks very different from the kind of community they are experiencing.

With this in mind, we need to be reminded of who we are to minimize, if not eliminate, cynical attitudes towards Christianity which ultimately questions God’s power to change lives.

Here’s the reminder, YOUR WITNESS IS IMPORTANT. We need to be careful of what we portray before others, especially before the unsaved, because your life maybe the only Bible people will read. Out of 100 people, one will read the Bible and the other 99 will read you. This may sound outrageous but the point is before a person accepts Christ they will judge His effectiveness in changing lives by watching how we conduct ourselves on a daily basis.

There were a many updates with cussing from Christians, picture post, and profile pictures that made me wonder, “Don’t they go to church?” or “Didn’t I just see them at church?” I understand that we all have our sinful struggles but those without the understanding, yet, will ask questions in skepticism trying to figure out how it is we can act one way in church but then be something totally different outside of church.

It was around prom time this year and I posted a few pictures of what not to wear to the prom but I failed right a caption on one of them. The picture was of a young lady with a cut basketball jersey that was a hot mess. "She wore that thing to a prom, unbelievably"; was my response. My friend Kyle commented on the post that I should explain the picture and he was right. People on the outside who do not know me personally but know me publically as a pastor would think I was trying to post porn on Facebook. That wasn’t the case at all. I wanted to make light of the fact that our appearance could be a determining factor as to how people judge and treat us. And that outfit was inappropriate for a prom and/or anything else.

One of my favorite verses is 1 Peter 3:15 which says; ““But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts and always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is within you with meekness and fear”.

The opening statement of this verse sets the standard for effective evangelism; “Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts…”
Peter encourages us to share the blessings of God with others. The “good life” is never to be kept for ourselves; it is to be shared with others. Peter suggests three steps we should follow in sharing the good life:

Step 1: “Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts”.
Step 2: “Always be ready to give a reason for the hope that lies within you.
Step 3: “Share it with meekness and fear”

To sanctify, hagiázō, is to “set apart.” The Christian faith makes no sense nor does Christian lifestyle ever work until and unless we “set apart” our lives to allow Jesus Christ to be Lord. The word “sanctify” comes from the same root word as holy (hágios)
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Peter writes a great deal about the life of holiness in his first letter. As we have seen, he instructs us to “be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, ‘Be holy, for I am holy” (1:15–16). Holy living is possible only as we “sanctify the Lord God in our hearts.”

Also, Peter refers to Christian believers as “a holy priesthood” (2:5) and as “a holy nation” (2:9). To be holy is to be different. It is to be like the Lord who is the personification of holiness. To sanctify Christ as Lord in our hearts enables us to live the life of holiness. In the truest sense, it allows Christ to live His life of holiness in us and through us.

Lordship is the key to godly living. Jesus asked the question, “But why do you call Me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and not do the things which I say?” (Luke 6:46). Authentic lordship must be lived out in obedience to Christ. If He is to be my Lord, He must control and rule my life. He must be at “master control.” He must “call the plays” of my life moment by moment.

Samuel Wilberforce once said that lordship could be defined in four words: admit, submit, commit, and transmit. Indeed, we must admit our sin and need of a savior; we must forsake sin and submit our lives to Christ as Lord; we must commit our way to the Lord day by day; and we must transmit or share His love and goodness with others. Peter proceeds to discuss the importance of transmitting our faith to a dying world without a Savior.

I believe, the effectiveness of our witness will be based on the life we live. In witnessing, your life matters! So here's the exhortation; protect your witness.