What were you made to do? What did God create you to do in this world? I hope you know you were created for a purpose. “For such a time as this,” like when Esther was placed in the royal palace in Esther 4:14. God has placed all of us where we are for a reason. Sometimes we look around us and think other people should be doing something about the homeless or the children or the elderly. Sometimes we hope someone else will talk to the people we see who need Jesus or that they will notice something different about us and ask us questions. If you are seeing the need, maybe God wants you to be doing something about it.
It can be too easy to tell God we will happily follow whatever He wants us to do, and then say, “I’ll just keep living my life this way while You get that plan together or until You lead me elsewhere.” He wants us to drop what we are doing right this minute and follow Him. The disciples who were fishermen dropped their nets and left. Right then and there. Are you prepared to take that leap? Because the first thing He asks us to do after following Him is to love people and draw them to Him.
No matter what God wants you to be doing right now, and please take the time to ask Him, I can guarantee that He does not want you “blending in.” If your life is no different than the people around you, if your posts on social media are the same as everyone else’s you need to stop and re-evaluate how you are living your life. As followers of Christ, we need to be different. (Romans 12:2) We need to show that we are marked by Him. Following what we have been taught in God’s Word, we need to be living our lives in grace and peace, loving the people around us. (Romans 12:10,13,18) We cannot draw people to Christ if we are not living our lives doing everything we can to reflect Him.
In everything we do, we must focus on Christ and His will for our lives. I don’t know about you, but I have to constantly check my attitude and remind myself to love others and be patient. Instead of rising above the anger and fear around me, I too often fall back into reacting and being judgmental. Christ has called me to be better than that. He wants me to shine His grace and love so much that when I talk to people they know my words about Christ are real and true in my life. Unfortunately the world has been looking at people who claim to be Christians, claim to belong to the Church, who do not live their lives as Christ followers. They see the people who claim to follow God, but then spout hatred and other speech that is contrary to God’s Word. We are not perfect, but we must continually be striving to be better with the help of the Holy Spirit, so the world can see we are different.
If we are kind when the world expects us to react negatively, if we are loving when the world expects us to be judgmental, if we are gracious when the world expects us to be demanding, we can show them Christ. And when we mess up, we must be people who humbly apologize and right the wrongs. They will hear our words if they can see the proof in our actions.