“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” – Acts 1:8
Christian, wherever you go, near or far, you have a job to do: be a witness for Jesus Christ. It’s a deceptively simple task: speak the truth of what you know from Scripture and have seen in your own life. A witness tells facts without speculation, truth without opinion or preference. A witness stays focused on his or her responsibility.
This, of course, is where the challenge comes in. To be a faithful witness, we need to know the truth we’re speaking about – so we’re called to a lifetime of studying God’s Word, so that we may continually grow as witnesses. In an unreflective age, we’re called to reflect on what we’ve seen of God’s work in our lives so that we can share our eyewitness testimony. To be a faithful witness we must be willing to table whatever we want to talk about so we can talk about what Jesus asked us to talk about.
It’s increasingly hard to be a witness in our world. The noise level and hostility are increasing and it seems nobody “wants” to hear what we have to say. This is good, because it reminds us that we aren’t witnesses by our own strength, charming personality, wit, or wisdom. Our power to witness impactfully comes only from the Holy Spirit.
While there are things we should do to be more faithful witnesses (practice, prepare, read, and pray among them), it’s ultimately God’s Spirit Who empowers us, and we must learn to let Him, because this broken world needs to hear our testimony of the Living Christ!
#FOLLOWJESUS
NOTE: While Pastor Brian is on sabbatical, we offer this devotional which was originally published on June 2, 2020.