The World & Our Witness

Our study in I Peter has been challenging, the call to not just share the gospel, but to live it so that our lives speak to others about who Christ is to us.  I mentioned Sunday in light of the Supreme Court decision on gay marriage, that Peter’s call to not only speak Christ to our society but to live Christ to those around us, is more important than ever.  We have to realize that more and more we live in a secular society that has a history of being established in a Christian heritage.  That is very different than living in a country that primarily sees itself as a Christian society and I think represents a fundamental change in the mentality of our nation.  It would be easy as the church to sit back and decry this change and simply long for the good ol’ days.  However, our witness is not lessened by the recent events.  If anything it is now more important than ever to understand Peter’s message and for us to live out Christ to those around us.  When you look at church history the paradox seems to be that when the church is the most popular is also when it is weakest and when the church is at odds with society that is when our message is most heard.  As Peter says we need to live in such a way that when others see our lives, and ask us for a reason for the hope that we have, we are ready to respond with the gospel message of what Christ has done for us.  The world doesn’t want to know what we hate, they want to know why we love.