1John 5:3-4 says; 3For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome.
4For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world--our faith.
Being an effective witness for Christ in the workplace certainly means that the believer must first be sure of him/herself in Christ. 1John 5 gives us a beautiful exhortation to encourage us in our faith and give us confidence in that born again believers are overcomers of the world.
Three key words in this passage strike us as we read; Overcomes, victory and burdensome. Burdensome is a word used to describe some one who is shamed or pushed into something they don't want to do like doing our taxes. True believers don't find God's commandments "taxing" because we find it a privilege to be used of God rather than finding it to be a chore. Victory in this context is in conjuction with overcoming a massive hurdle "The World". So what is the word "World" refering to here? The World is the worldwide system that Satin has set up in order to decieve the nations and promote wickedness; 2 Corinthians 4:3-4 (New American Standard Bible)
3And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing,
4in whose case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
Through trust in Christ the believer wins victory over this system and is able to in faith destroy the works of Satin and his demonic influence to try to drag God's ellect to hell.
It is not burdensome for us as Slaves for Christ to understand that we have been given the awesome privilege to be used of God to shine the light of His Glorious Gospel into this dark "World" and when we do God bears fruit through us.
Today was a prime example of God's power and the display of His love to the world, as I was made able to share the Gospel with two oilmen in my place of work.
The first man, Dean, took my coworker & I to lunch at which time the subject of the afterlife came up. Being a Catholic, Dean confessed to know God, believe in God and also profess to be morally good. It was then that I was able to show him his sin by going through the law & then present the Gospel. Self righteouness kept rearing it's ugly head along with questions like; What about other religions? And, what about all the remote places in the world? This of course just allowed me to once again focus on the conscience and be faithful to the word by proclaiming it in truth & love. Please pray for Dean as well as all the people that were sitting at the table behind us! The second oportunity was with an owner of an Earth moving company. You see, my job is to manage vendors for the task of building roads and pads for drilling, as well as support 32 supervisors in the areas that my company drills & produces wells. So this man, Jim, is among a croud of rough and tough men who are known to partake in everything under the sun. It just so happened however, that Jim has had several encounters with christians this past year, which gave me the oportunity to be used of God to water.
So today was a success in overcoming by letting love swallow my fears which gave God the Glory. Glory in that His Gospel went out today in the workplace.
Please pray for Doug & Jim.
Kevin
