A Wrap Up to Bad Rap

Last week I wrote a post entitled Bad Rap in which I talked about the harmful effects that having a bad understanding of what witnessing for Christ means can bring.

Witnessing for Christ is not about arguing, or proof texting, or showing that you can win a debate, and it is certainly not about putting yourself in His judgement seat and condemning people when they don’t respond the way you want.

If you are trying to breathe, something is wrong, you need to go see a doctor. I am bold to assert that the same holds for witnessing. Witnessing is not something that you try to do, it is something that you just do.

Let me give you an illustration of what I mean.

I have two good friends who read this blog, Michelle and Sarah Styles. Michelle has been taking guitar and voice lessons for…it’s going on three years now I think (she will correct me if I am wrong). She is really talented! It is hard to believe that she has only been learning to sing for such a short time. So it is no surprise that Sarah got to the point that she couldn’t contain herself and shared a private recording of Michelle singing (and playing guitar for) Jay Hawkins’ 1956 classic I Put a Spell on You on Facebook. Sarah couldn’t keep quiet about Michelle’s gift for music. She was far too impressed, proud, and blown away by her talent. I have made it available (with her permission) below.

Some context is in order here to fully understand the awesomeness of the recording: Michelle was born totally deaf. About three years ago, Michelle got Cochlear implants that have enabled her to hear. It was not a one-and-done event though. She has had to learn to hear. It has been a long, strenuous, and sometimes frustrating process (we hearing folk take so much for granted). Voice lessons are one of the ways in which she is learning to hear and to speak with her voice.

So, when you put all that together and listen to her sing, it is hard not to share it with others. When I heard the recording, I posted it on my own Facebook page as well….it was too good not to share.

Too good not to share. That is really what witnessing is. If you have experienced God’s amazing grace and love in your life, it is just too good not to share! It will just bubble out in how you talk, how you carry yourself, how you love others, how you live your life. It is too good not to share.

Again, going back to my illustration, when Sarah and I shared that recording we were witnessing to Michelle’s talent and ability to sing and play, and to our love and pride, and appreciation of her for all her hard work. Sarah did not need to be asked or trained or pushed to witness in that way about Michelle. It was natural. Honestly, she didn’t even try to get permission. When you love someone, when you are proud of them, or when they do something you love, you talk about it. You share it. You witness to it. What is true with our friends and family is no less true for Jesus.

When it comes to God and Jesus, the question isn’t do you witness. After all we are always witnessing. How we live, talk, work, love, play, spend our time, use our money; how we deal with problems, questions, challenges, and disappointments all are ways that we witness. Witnessing isn’t only about people seeing us at church, or praying at the dinner table, or sitting and talking about Jesus to people. And to be honest, how we witness when we are not talking about Jesus is going to color how people hear you when you do talk about Jesus. Your life is a witness!

The real question is are you a winsome witness? His Father’s love and glory were too good for Jesus not to share. Jesus’ life…the way He carried Himself, the way He loved people, showed grace to them, gave to them, forgave them, and cared for them was just as much a witness to His Father as when He shared the truth about who He was. It was the grace of His life that led people to inquire of the truth about His life.

Jesus has sung an incredible song of love and grace and forgiveness for us. Once that song enters your heart, you will start singing that song too. The more we listen to it, the more our lives move to its rhythms and reflect its music back out in how we live and move. Our heart and mind get caught up in the song of heaven. Once that happens, witnessing begins. When the victory horns of the Gospel are joined with the strings of grace, the drums of hope, and the woodwinds of faith, your life will resound in a symphony of love that will fill the air wherever you are. That is witnessing.