Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar? Not me! That’s a fun song for small children, but when the question is, “Who is a Christian?” how shall we answer? The answer is of paramount personal importance.
In John 18, Peter denies Jesus three times (vv. 17, 25, and 27). Peter was under a lot of stress; his Teacher had been arrested and on trial. Peter was alone, surrounded by strangers, and facing dangerous allegations. If we were in his position, would we do differently?
Today, we are not in that position, yet the temptation to deny Jesus is an everyday event. The truths of the Bible are unpopular and labeled as socially unacceptable. The Christian mindset doesn’t lend itself to material wealth or popularity. Many of the world’s “fun” activities lie outside the reach of someone following Jesus. A thousand times a day we have a choice to make about the Lord: deny Him or affirm Him.
When would-be disciples deny Jesus, others notice. This is called hypocrisy. While all Christians are, in a very limited sense, hypocrites, the question facing each would-be disciple of Christ is this, “How comfortable am I with my hypocrisy?” If our lips affirm Jesus on Sunday morning, but our lives deny Him the rest of the week, then we are very comfortable with that hypocrisy.
If you are uncomfortable with sin in your life, then let’s sit down over an open Bible and study how we can become more faithful to Jesus. We will never be sinless, but together we can encourage each other to sin less.
Photo by Luis Rivera on Unsplash
