bold in christ

this morning as i was reading God's Word, i read in one of the gospels where he called the pharisees' father, the devil.(pharisees: the highest esteemed religious men, leaders of the time) He stated that they lived and taught lies and since satan was the father of lies and they did not recognize Jesus as God's Son they must be children of the devil. he said all this within earshot of the jews and the jewish leaders. does this sound like a man who is "tolerant", not wanting to "upset the applecart", careful not to offend someone?? He is quite the opposite. My God is The Spirit of Truth, and His "yes" means "yes" and His "no" means "no", regardless of how much money, influence or fame one may possess. He is no respector of persons. He sees only the heart.

are you a jester for the people or a pleaser of God? i have always prided myself in my boldness and standing up for what was right even when it went against the popular thing to do. but as i've gotten older and less the rebel, i have found myself notably noncontroversial(which is the complete antithisis of Jesus). sadly, offending God rather than standing up for Truth. most of the time, the occassions to show my loyalty to Him would be in a bible study group, a group of believers, a christian environment, when either gossip was evident, an off color joke was presented, or even someone was off based Scripturally and in my pretense i stood silent. i rationalized my silence by reasoning, "it's none of my business" and went about my day. God has convicted me of my disloyalty to Him by showing me how much hurt occurs when others gossipped at my expense, especially when i knew i had close loved ones nearby who sat quietly allowing the slander. they behaved just like i did when my Lord and Savior was slandered(when we speak evil about any of his children we are cursing His kids). He wants us to stick up for what's right, not what' s popular.

ask yourself this: are you an extremist for God or an extremist for the world? if you are the latter, you are not pleasing God. now this is not to say you are to be a rebel and fight all the time, but have God's love always in your heart. whenever someone does or says something that Jesus would not approve of and you are privy to the conversation, i ask you to ask yourself, who are you more interested in pleasing...Him or them?