I get to have a unique perspective on daily life in the relatively small community I live in. It has always been interesting living in a town with a dynamic such as Henderson. It’s a good-sized town with 12,000+ people, but it has that feeling of Mayberry, where everyone knows everyone and everything. If they don’t know who you are, they know your parents or grandparents. You carry around this invisible label.
That’s an interesting concept that I’d like to take a look at today. However, not from the perspective that one usually looks at this subject from. I’d like to offer a different opinion, one that I’d not thought about until recently.
So, as a coach, I talk to my student-athletes a lot about who they are representing. I walk through the normal line-up. They represent themselves, their parents, their families, the athletic program, the school, and the town. If you have worn the Henderson H in middle school in the last seven years, you’ve heard me say that a dozen or more times per year. Students don’t usually think that way. They may realize they represent themselves and maybe their families, but come on, the average student in America doesn’t think in terms beyond either themself or their family unit. Some don’t get past themself.
From time to time, in that speech I’ve thrown out that students represented their church and God. I’ve always thought of that as the legit way to get them to commit to make right decisions. No one wants to disappoint God after all, right?
So, I’ve started really thinking about this. God’s really been pointing something out to me. There shouldn’t be anything beyond representing Him. Our job on this earth, as believers, is to do nothing else but represent God. We are citizens of the Kingdom of God. Philippians 3:20 tells us that “our citizenship is in Heaven.” So, as the Bible says, so we should act like, right?
We do our best to represent our parents well, usually. We try hard to represent our schools or workplaces. However, we rarely put it to mind that we represent the Lord. We worry so much about the parts of this life that are temporary, when we need to focus solely on the portion of this life that is eternal. The way that we represent God is eternally significant. We are called to imitate Him. He would be about His Kingdom business! We’ve got to be about His Kingdom business!
We have to be intentional in everything. It’s of the utmost importance. Our relationships must be authentic with the goal being nothing but displaying the love of God to the world around us. We must be the mirror reflecting God.
As I look around, however, we don’t do that. We fall into this category of chasing our desires until we’ve had our fill, then we go to church for our “fill up”. We treat our churches like gas stations and go once or twice a week to get filled. The funny thing is, God did not intend for our lives to be like that at all. He intended for us to reflect His glory. To be a beacon to show Himself to other people.
The problem becomes when we try to ride the fence. I do it from time to time too y’all. However, we’ve got to stop riding the fence. We’ve got to start being authentic. Be the person you are at church, at home. Be the person you are at home, at work. Be the person you are at work, in the community. Be a true Christ-follower. Chase after pleasing Christ rather than pleasing everyone else. Allow the Lord to prune away the parts of your life that are not going to point others to him. In 2 Corinthians chapter 3, Paul talks about how we are “being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” What he’s talking about there is us becoming more and more like our God.
We MUST stop living the two-faced life. Choose to follow Christ and follow Him! Don’t just follow him on Wednesday and Sunday. Love God and Love People. That’s the image. The do’s and don’ts fall into place! God will guide you, trust Him and stop trying to do it all alone. You will fail on your own! Chase Him!
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