Too often we Christians muddy up the Good News of Christ. We feel we have to drag someone to church service, we have to have a lesson ready, we have to be ready with a sermon and sometimes we are pretty judgmental of those who don't yet know Christ. All can be, and usually are, huge turn offs to those who don't even know Jesus.
Our family believes that everything begins with a hello.....a friendship. Every conversation we have has eternal consequences. We try, imperfectly, to live with this mindset.
We have a saying in our family to "choose the best over the good." What does that mean? Sometimes you have to say no to a very good thing in order to do the best. Benay and I have discovered this when we moved to Brasil. As a missionary you can literally do tons of "good things" and feel pretty productive but you will eventually kill yourself with "church work." But is that really what God wants? Does He want us to do lots of "good things" instead of focusing more time and energy on less "best things?" We decided a while back to say no to some "good things" and just try to do the "best things" that God asks of us.
One example happened this afternoon. The best soccer team in the world (that would be Internacional for those new to this blog) played a game today in a little stadium close to our house. Bronwyn, Garrett, Ansley and I had decided to go. Ansley then got a call from her friend whose grandfather had died yesterday. She asked Ansley to go with her family to the burial today (here people are typically buried in about 24 hours). Ansley didn't hesitate. She went with her friend. She was dying to go to the game and see her favorite player but she knew what God was asking of her. She chose the "best" over the "good." She understands how the love of Christ works and she was Christ to this family today. Benay and I could not be more proud of the way Ansley (and all of our kids) are Spirit led. Who knows what God will do with what Ansley did today?
What Ansley did reminded me of a story in Max Lucado's book entitled: Cast of Characters.
He says, Discipleship is sometimes defined by being normal.
A woman in a small Arkansas community was a single mom with a frail baby. Her neighbor would stop by every few days and keep the child so she could shop. After some weeks her neighbor shared more than time; she shared her faith, and the woman did what Matthew did. She followed Christ.
The friends of the young mother objected. "Do you know what those people teach?" they contested.
Here is what I know, she told them. "They held my baby."
I think Jesus likes that kind of answer, don't you?
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