Use Your Voice

1 John 5:6
And Jesus Christ was revealed as God's Son by his baptism in water and by shedding his blood on the cross-not by water only, but by water and blood. And the Spirit, who is truth, confirms it with his testimony. (NLT)

When Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist it fulfilled prophecy bringing Him to the next place in His life on earth. It was His rite of passage to begin His ministry on earth on the way to fulfilling His purpose. If destiny was to come to pass, He would have to go from baptism to ministry to the cross.

After the fulfilling of all prophecy about Him, Jesus Christ was ultimately revealed to the world as the Son of God.

When we are baptized in the tradition of John by being dunked in water, or sprinkled, or whatever your tradition is, we are publicly exclaiming our belief that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. We are declaring our faith in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

When I was growing in my faith I experienced many who proclaimed to believe, but told me their faith was a private thing. Attending church was their pronouncement of their belief. Beyond that they did not wish to say.

I do not believe our faith is so personal that we are to keep it to ourselves. We are to share it with others everywhere our feet tread. If we do not, then we are not obeying the commission Jesus gave to each of us.

We have become complacent in our churches depending on the latest marketing program to entice the lost to come through our doors. We may even have programs that take a few of our members and place them out in society in various ways to reach the lost and get them to come to church Sunday.

Have we lost the voice? We tell about out latest adventures in this life. We are excited about our great new vacation, our big screen TV, the latest deal we got at Wal-Mart, the game our son won on the weekend, etc. What about our excitement about our Lord and Savior and what He has been doing in our lives?

Perhaps we are not talking because we have not been listening to the Holy Spirit and letting Him guide us in all things. Perhaps our communion with God starts and stops with passing the bread and grape juice on Sunday morning in church.

I hope this is not true and that we truly are excited about Jesus Christ, His life and death on the cross for our sins, and His daily work in our lives. As we use our voice to tell others about what the Godhead does in and for our lives others will be touched. They will see the light of Christ shining in our lives and seek Him out.