What sets you apart from the world?
Updated: Jun 6, 2022
Introduction
I was a “Christian” girl. I grew up in a Christian family in a small town out west. My family are Christians. As long as I can ever remember, my family had always attended church. But, I had never seen things in my life like what we read about in the Bible. Why was that? Why did it seem like other people would hear from God, but I didn’t?
When I got married, my husband and I would occasionally attend church. But I just didn’t quite “get it”. I didn’t understand the “need” or the “importance” for going to church. My life seemed to be the same whether I went or not. I knew God was real, but I didn’t really understand what living for God meant. I had believed that I was saved because I was baptized when I was about nine years old and had said “the sinner’s” prayer a dozen times throughout my life.
(Before I had really began living for God) I had never really seen God move in my life. I had never seen the things in my life like what we read about in the Bible. Why was that? Why did it seem like other people could hear from God, but I didn’t? They would talk about what God was doing in their life and they seemed like they just knew what God was telling them. I didn’t understand how they “knew“ when God even spoke to them or how they knew it was even God. I had wondered what was it like to hear from God? What did they have that I didn't? Growing up I had seen the power of God move, but I didn’t really see God move in my life as I became an adult.
One day I began to really reflect deep within myself. I began asking myself these things, How am I set apart from the rest of the world? What makes me a follower of Jesus? What makes me a Christian? Because if I am not doing anything differently than my atheist neighbor next door, am I really even a Christian, am I really even saved? Who do my peers say I am? Do I even reflect Jesus? Because if the people around me don’t even know me by Jesus, am I really a Christian, living for Jesus?
I began to realize that I had never obeyed what the Bible, the word of God, really says. In fact I never really opened the Bible to even read it. You could have said I was like an arrogant teenager, who thought she knew it all. One who thought that because she was baptized as a kid, she was exempt from ever having to read the Bible because she was already "saved" and could go on doing whatever she wanted in her life.
I begin digging deeper into myself and questioning myself, who am I? And how do I become that better person that I had already thought I was?
I knew as I began pealing back these layers in myself that I really wasn't who I said I was. I became so honest with myself that I didn't like who I really was.
How could I call myself a Christian, I was not living any different than the rest of the world?
That's when I began to realize that what was woven in my life, is what flowed from me. That who I really am would flow fluently from my life. And that if I wanted to change that, I had do something differently. And that’s when I began to find a life in Jesus, a life worth living.
Self Reflection
Ask yourself today, "Who am I?".
What sets you apart from the person who is not a Christian?
If you were to match your daily life next to the man who is an atheist, are you in fact any different? (Besides what your beliefs are). The person who is an atheist might think he's a good person too. In fact he might be apart of a community, giving food to a food bank, and helping at the local shelter. Imagine him as a kind hearted person.
What sets you apart? If a complete stranger was to spend a week with you and then a week with the man who's an atheist, what would they say sets you apart? Who would they say you are?
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