“WHO’S WATCHING ?”

Philippians 4:9, “Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing.”

        Sometimes when our youngest daughter Kendall is sitting beside me on the couch I will notice that she begins to imitate me. Before long I will start to make funny faces, and it turns into a big game for us to where we both end up laughing like crazy. I love these precious moments in time, because I know it won’t be long before she is grown and not sitting beside me that much any longer. Yet, once the game is over it is always a vivid reminder of how much my actions and behavior count when it comes to other people in this life.

I want my life to be a testimony to my wife, my children, and all that are around me that I am a follower of Jesus Christ. I have found that both my words, and my actions count big time when it comes to me being a follower of Christ and trying to lead people to Him as well.

Paul, in this verse, as he was writing to the Philippians was not boasting about himself or even his behavior. If we read, in context Paul’s writings we know that as a follower of Christ he wanted to point people to Jesus. In this verse 9 of Philippians 4 he does show us though how important our lifestyle, words and actions are. He said to these people, “The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things”. Paul knew he was fully committed to Jesus, and following Jesus with the help of Jesus. He knew that God was helping Him and leading Him. He was again, fully 100% committed to Christ. Since this was the case, he said practice these things. These were the things they learned from Paul as he was following Christ. These were the things they received from Paul as he was following Christ. These were the things they heard from Paul as he was following Christ. These were the things they saw Paul do as he was following Christ.

We’ve all heard the saying, “Practice what you preach” (Source unknown). Well, these are good words for us to take in, because if we are going to claim we know Christ, we had better follow Him. If we say we know Him, and yet we live a different way, we are liars. We take the chance of being a stumbling block to someone coming to know Jesus because we say one thing and live another.

So, let’s be careful. We know we are not going to live perfectly, but let us strive, with the help of God, to live Christ-honoring lives today.

Sincerely,

Pastor Bryan