Our Opportunity to Bear Witness

“Then he said to them, ‘Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and pestilences. And there will be terrors and great signs from heaven. But before all this they will lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors for my name's sake. 

“’This will be your opportunity to bear witness. Settle it therefore in your minds not to meditate beforehand how to answer, for I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict. You will be delivered up even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and some of you they will put to death. You will be hated by all for my name's sake. But not a hair of your head will perish. By your endurance you will gain your lives.’” (Luke 21:10-19 ESV)

This is what we can anticipate will happen to us if we follow Jesus Christ with our lives in walks of obedience to his commands and in holy living, and if we serve him with our lives in doing his will and in sharing the truth of the gospel and in refuting the lies of the enemy. And I am speaking about the section here which specifically mentions how we will be treated. We will be persecuted, falsely accused, rejected, cast aside, abandoned, forgotten, betrayed, and opposed, even by others who call themselves Christians.

And some of us will be brought before religious “Sanhedrins” within the gatherings of the institutional church where we will be falsely accused of wrongs we did not commit and where we may be encouraged to “go someplace else where you will be a better fit” because they were warned about people like us, people with “strong convictions.” And we may indeed be brought before kings and governors, too, for the sake of the name of Jesus. But this will be our opportunity to bear witness to Christ and to his gospel message. So, we are not to fear what others might do to us.

Now this is not likely to happen to us if we are living worldly carefree lives lacking in genuine commitment to the Lord Jesus and to his service. For if we are like the world, the world is not going to be against us. There is nothing to persecute if we are not standing for truth and righteousness and moral purity and honesty and faithfulness and obedience to our Lord, at least not from the perspective of Christian persecution. But if we are following our Lord in walking in his footsteps, we will be hated and persecuted as he was, for we represent him with our lives.

But we are not to worry ahead of time how we will answer our persecutors. If we trust in the Lord with our circumstances to give us guidance in what to say and in what not to say, he will provide us with the words that we need to say when we need them. We just have to trust the Lord. And then we just need to trust him with the results. And we have to guard against responding in anger or without thought to what we should say. But we should seek the counsel of the Lord so that we say what he wants said, not necessarily what we think should be said. For he obviously knows better than we do.

But it isn’t just strangers who will come against us, and it won’t be just our neighbors and friends and others who profess the name of Jesus, but it will be our own family members, too. It could even be those who share the same household as we do. And they could be the ones to betray us and to turn us over to the authorities on false charges. Or they could be the ones telling lies about us to others to turn others against us. Or they could be our direct opposition who are attacking us verbally and/or who are sinning against us as a way of opposing us because we are following the Lord with our lives.

But if our lives are given over to the Lord, and if we are following him in his ways and in his truth, even if they should put us to death in this life, we will live on for eternity with our Lord in heaven. But we must remain faithful to our Lord and endure hardship and persecution for his name’s sake, and keep on walking in obedience to him in holy living, and not revert back to living in sin, and we will gain eternal life with God. And this is not trying to earn our own salvation, but it is walking in the salvation already provided for us. For if we do not, and sin is still our practice, we will not have eternal life with God.

[Matt 7:21-23; Lu 9:23-26; Jn 6:35-58; Jn 15:1-11; Rom 1:18-32; Rom 2:6-8; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-14; 1 Co 6:9-10,19-20; 2 Co 5:10,15,21; Gal 5:16-21; Gal 6:7-8; Eph 2:8-10; Eph 4:17-24; Eph 5:3-6; Col 1:21-23; Col 3:1-11; Titus 2:11-14; 1 Jn 1:5-10; 1 Jn 2:3-6; 1 Jn 3:4-10; Heb 10:23-31; 1 Co 10:1-22; Heb 3:1-19; Heb 4:1-13; Rev 21:8,27; Rev 22:14-15]

For Our Nation  

An Original Work / September 11, 2012

Bombs are bursting. Night is falling.

Jesus Christ is gently calling

You to follow Him in all ways.

Trust Him with your life today.

Make Him your Lord and your Savior.

Turn from your sin. Follow Jesus.

He will forgive you of your sin;

Cleanse your heart, made new within.

Men betraying: Our trust fraying.

On our knees to God we’re praying,

Seeking God to give us answers

That are only found in Him.

God is sovereign over all things.

Nothing from His mind escaping.

He has all things under His command,

And will work all for good.

Jesus Christ is gently calling

You to follow Him in all ways.

Men deceiving: We’re believing

In our Lord, and interceding

For our nation and its people

To obey their God today.

He is our hope for our future.

For our wounds He offers suture.

He is all we need for this life.

Trust Him with your life today.

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