Be loud, but do it quietly!

You can usually find my fellow Christian blogger Andy B. at a computer editing video. Andy loves helping children and families get to know Jesus. He and his family can be found blogging and sharing the love of Christ through multiple platforms. You can learn more about them here.

“We’re blessed to be a family who all love Jesus and we want to inspire and encourage other families to do the same. Our shared delight and passion is to see children introduced to their own relationship with Jesus, so they can take the gospel where adults can’t!”

Andy B.

Please go check out his family’s blog, written across the pond, and be sure to watch their videos, too.

I hope you are enjoying these #Blogtober posts. 

Happy #Blogtober! Keep on blogging!

The Devotional Guy™

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Be loud, but do it quietly!

By Andy B.

An often misquoted ‘quote’ is this: ‘wherever we go we don’t need to use words to tell people that we are Christians’. A closer rendering to the original might read ‘Preach the Gospel; if necessary, use words.’

My wife – Jo – works in a difficult sphere of life. In fact, the work she does necessitates us living a quiet life in certain respects. For example, we never talk about where we live, orwhat her job is. It isn’t some form of super, top secret, spy stuff. It simply means that we never talk about what she does, or where we live: we stay silent about it because that is the wise thing to do.

Everything she does can point back to Jesus, whether that’s the way she walks, sits down, opens a door, speaks on the phone, it can all point right back to Jesus!

As Christians we are not supposed to stay silent about our love for Jesus Christ. It is not supposed to remain hidden! And yet, the butchered quote above – from St Francis of Assisi – is often used as an excuse by, well, all of us – to simply ‘tuck and roll’ away from mentioning our faith, because it might get a bit uncomfortable.

We may quote a little scripture to justify our actions, such as 1 Thessalonians 4:11:

Make it your goal to live a quiet life, minding your own business and working with your hands, just as we instructed you before. (New Living Translation)

We might argue that “minding your own business” means not upsetting the apple cart by mentioning Jesus to the people we meet.

Or we consider these words from 1 Timothy 2:2:

Pray this way for kings and all who are in authority so that we can live peaceful and quiet lives marked by godliness and dignity. (New Living Translation)

Surely these verses are saying that we should become a lot more invisible in order to influence people? Doesn’t this justify not speaking out at work?

People see our actions more easily than they hear our words.But it isn’t enough to simply say that because Jesus is with meI don’t, therefore, need to talk about Jesus. Our actions and words both matter, and both need to point to Jesus.

A favourite quote of mine is that we need to “Win the right to speak [to others]”. And that takes time – which we like very little in our same-day-delivery world.

But people see what we do, far more easily than they hear what we say. So, let your actions shout about your love for Jesus! And, WHEN you need to speak out, you’ll already be in a stronger place to have that right to speak to others.

In other words: “Be loud, [about the faith you have in Jesus Christ] but do it quietly [ensuring that people witness your love for Jesus Christ, more than you tell them about it]”

It’s worth noting as I finish that God has had no issue making our [private] lives quite public as we are now regular presenters on a Radio Station, which goes out all around the world! We were God-randomly found, and love working for a mixed format Christian Radio Station, Konnect Radio (www.konnectradio.com), which is a fantastic evangelistic tool playing the best of clean mainstream, and Christian, music!

And, despite our operating in the shadows as a family at one level, God can still open doors, as He sees fit – and especially when we’re not looking for such a door to open!

Andy B

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