George Zimmer’s gravelly voice closes every commercial with a promise: “You’re going to like the way you look. I guarantee it.” The owner of the men’s apparel company goes straight to the basics. If a man is spending money on clothing, he wants to know that when he puts on that suit, it will look good on him. Using great business sense and straight forward appeal, Zimmer has turned a little business that started in his dorm room in college into a chain of stores doing more than a billion dollars of sales every year!
Do you have an real idea why you’re a Christian and why anyone else would want to be? Can you state, in a line or two, why discipleship is a choice worth making? Perhaps that line of thinking strikes you as offensive. You perhaps are thinking, what’s he doing, selling Jesus? Simply put, nobody is born a Christian! God has no grandchildren, so each generation must be brought into the Kingdom of God by our witness. “Because I said so,” isn’t a very compelling reason to embrace a life that demands self-sacrifice. So, I ask again, can you tell your family, your kids, yourself… why following Christ is the right choice?
Peter could and he did. "There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12, NLT) Salvation is not just about eternity and Heaven. We are saved, right here, right now. In Christ we are delivered from fear, kept from destruction, and given wholeness; all that and Heaven, too. That is salvation. Jesus promises that in Him we will find "life, and have it to the full." (John 10:10, NIV)
Last week, the path of my life traveled some dark valleys. My heart was broken by the suffering of others, by the deceit of sin that visited terrible things on those I love, by disappointment that came from people who failed to respond in ways I hoped for. I am not an exception. But, I have an exceptional Savior. Where some might have felt they had no place to turn for help, or felt that their only escape was in some diversion; I knew that I could take that heavy load to One who would share it with me. I poured my heart out to Him, often with silent prayer. He saw my tears and heard my cries. Because of Christ, I have hope for my future, hope for my children’s future, hope for the people of this planet. There is no other Name!
Here’s the word from the Word. I pray it is your conviction and from it you will find every reason to take the News of Jesus and share it with those who need to hear it.
"None of this fazes us because Jesus loves us. I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us." (Romans 8:37-39, The Message)
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In Christ Alone
In Christ alone my hope is found
He is my light my strength my song
This Cornerstone this solid Ground
Firm through the fiercest drought and storm
What heights of love what depths of peace
When fears are stilled when strivings cease
My Comforter my All in All
Here in the love of Christ I stand
No guilt in life no fear in death
This is the power of Christ in me
From life's first cry to final breath
Jesus commands my destiny
No power of hell no scheme of man
Can ever pluck me from His hand
Till He returns or calls me home
Here in the power of Christ I'll stand
© 2001 Thankyou Music (Admin. by EMI Christian Music Publishing)
Keith Getty | Stuart Townend
CCLI License No. 810055
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