Philippians 1:18 But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice.

Philippians is so rich! Verse 21, the last in today’s reading, is one that I have loved for a long time and preached on more times than I can remember, but this one speaks to me right now. I haven’t been very active in personal evangelism for most of my life, despite being a missionary for well over half of it, but God has really been waking that in me of late, and I’m grateful. The thing is, Jesus directly connected the operation of the Holy Spirit in our lives to being His witnesses, as Acts 1:8 so famously proclaims. The question becomes, how open are we to the work of the Holy Spirit? Acts 4:31 says, “And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.” We depend on the Holy Spirit for many things, but we tend to focus on the ones that make us feel good, or important, or whatever, like the gifts mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12. However, what Jesus focused on was our being His witnesses. We do witness of Him in many ways, only some of them using words. As Francis of Assisi said, “Preach constantly. When necessary, use words.” However, some of us are scared witless of using words, and sometimes they are indeed necessary. We fear how our words will be received, and we are more concerned with what people think of us than what God thinks of us. That’s sad! There is a grave in northern Japan that is said to be that of Jesus. Of course, that’s not who’s buried there, but it seems very likely that it was a Nestorian missionary from China, who talked about Jesus so much that they associated the name with him. After all, that’s how the early believers started being called Christians, in Antioch of Syria, where the culture as a whole had no expectation of a Savior from God. (Acts 11:26) Would we be open to such a thing? As I heard said many years ago, “If you were put on trial for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?”

As I said, God’s been working on me about this recently. Just two days ago I took my wife to the doctor for a problem with her foot, and got into a conversation with two older ladies in the waiting room. In that I expressed the problem, for missionaries, that Japanese don’t have a clear understanding of sin, conflating it with crime, and so have no awareness of a personal need for salvation. I then went on to explain what the Bible calls sin, that is, anything that disagrees with God, starting with lying and giving a few more examples we can all relate to. The ladies seemed very struck by that, and I went on to tell them that God, though perfectly holy and unable to abide sin, loved us so much that He “divided His heart” and sent His Son to die to take the penalty for our sin, so that by faith we could become His children. I didn’t start our conversation with all of that, but it all flowed very naturally, and I’m very grateful. I’m not to make excuses about not being “gifted as an evangelist,” but rather seek to make full use of all the opportunities God provides to be Christ’s witness, for His glory.

Father, thank You for this reminder. Thank You for how You are indeed working in me, continuing to grow and shape me. May I be more and more effective as Your witness, making full use of every opportunity You give me, so that many will repent and believe, for their salvation and Your glory. Thank You. Hallelujah!