It is difficult to be a Christian. If you are a Christian and you find following your faith easy, maybe it is time to take a closer look at whether you are truly following the Christian life, or only believing Christ died for you. What many fail to realize is that a true Christian is more than just a believer. A true Christian is a doer.
We are called to minister in different ways according to the gifts God gives us and the situations God puts us in (Romans 12:6a). We are called to turn from the tides of the world that pull us into a selfish and meaningless existence. Christians who do not struggle against these tides become like fish that fervently believe there is a shark in the direction they are going but would rather go to their doom as part of the school of fish they are in than try to escape by attempting to swim against them.
We live in a culture that strives to live by a phrase that threatens to tear any moral society apart: “Do what makes you happy, so long as it doesn’t hurt anybody.” This phrase leaves the door open for dangerous interpretation. In today’s culture, anyone who tells another person they should not do something that makes them happy is considered “hateful and discriminatory.” Does that make God hateful and discriminatory when he tells us to follow His laws, whether they make us happy or not? The Evil One would love for God’s people to believe that.
It is difficult to be a Christian because we are called by God to read His Word and glorify Him by obeying Him and telling others about Him and His path to eternal life. By nature, God’s laws go against the sinfulness of the world and the temporary gratifications that come with that sin.
As God’s creations, we are to reject this temporary gratification and lead others to reject this as well. Not only must Christians struggle against the world and its path, but they must have the courage to tell others the truth in hopes God will use them to pull others off that path as well. Wouldn’t refusing to do this be both hateful and discriminatory, since, as a Christian, you know the path they are on leads only to suffering in the end?
Christians must reject the phrase, “Do what makes you happy, so long as it doesn’t hurt anybody,” and replace it with this: “Do what is righteous at the expense of an easy, temporarily gratifying life.”
Titus 2:10 says, “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age.”
As Christians, we must turn against the tide and be open about our faith and beliefs, without fear of what the world will accuse us of or do to us. In today’s culture, many Christians are afraid of appearing hateful or judgmental, so they support sin in their silence. Christians must learn to minister in love for those they minister to and with hate for the sin that binds.
Satan would have Christians silenced; let’s not do it for him.
