RADIO SERIES: "TH E SECRET OF SPIRITUAL BEAUTY"
HOW SHOULD WE ACT?
by Dr. Ralph L. Keiper
D O YOU LIKE TO WITNESS, Or is it something which bothers you ? Have you often thought about the subject in rather negative terms? Maybe you have felt that people don’t want to be bothered about religion. To ask another, “Are you born- again ?” may put you in the class with those of a lower mentality, or so it has seemed to you. But if you are a p p r o p r i a t e l y spiritually groomed, there is something else to do. We are not to be like the proverbial person who was all dressed but had no place to go. What Christ asks of us really isn’t complicated at all. We don’t have to know a lot of theology. We aren’t required to know every thing in the field of science and philos ophy. The only thing God does ask us to do is to be ourselves. But, of course, it all depends on what kind of “self” you are. You are certainly not to be your own sinful self. Other wise you will have nothing to “sell.” You are to be your new self, groomed in Christ Jesus, and filled with the Holy Spirit. This is Paul’s testimony as he pens, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all
things are become new” (II Corin thians 5:17). Witnessing consists of two things: what we are to do for God, and what God will do for us. The only thing We can do for God is to manifest, to give evidence of. to make known, His blessed name. The idea is that our entire being is to be flooded with the personality of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is at this point that we can safely be “ourselves.” No wonder we need so desperately to be conformed to the image of the Son, so that when peo ple meet us they will actually be meet ing the Lord Jesus Christ. But you may rightly ask, “This is a tough world. Do you think they will really take notice of my consideration or kindness in the name of Christ?” Naturally they may not; however, God can do something in their hearts which you cannot do. When I meet people, and especially those who do not know the Lord Jesus Christ, I don’t know whether my words, my in fluence, or my conduct are going to have any effect upon them. I know that “The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness unto him, neither
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