Have You Ever Been a Witness?

We see many things in our daily lives, some minor and some major.  We get so complacent in our regular travels we sometime realize we don’t remember the last few miles we’ve driven, especially on Highway 5!  Our mind wanders and we relegate the task at hand – driving – to second-level cognitive processing because we’ve become too used to traveling a certain road it’s almost like muscle memory, or as some would say second nature.

At one point in our lives most of us have been a witness to an automobile accident at an intersection.  Even though we see the crash clearly, others standing on the adjacent and opposite corners see things differently.  They have a perspective different from ours. For this reason, those conducting the accident investigation try to keep all witnesses separated before the statements are collected.  It’s in this fashion the police can piece together the accident like pieces of a puzzle.

A courtroom is no different.  Witnesses are kept outside the proceedings so as not to hear the testimony of other witnesses.  They are brought in, one at a time, sworn in, and questions are then posed in a congenial way from counsel and a not so nice way from opposing counsel.  Suffice it to say the experience of being a witness in a courtroom can be a daunting and sometimes traumatic experience.

Sharing your faith or "witnessing" to another can sometimes be just as daunting, and sometimes traumatic!  The experience can be so unpleasant some have stopped sharing altogether. We’ve had doors slammed in our faces, been verbally rebuked, or had backs turned to us.  It is not the reaction we had hoped for. But when someone is eager to listen, things go miraculously smooth. Words and scriptures pop into our mind like a script in a well thought out play, like someone was speaking the words into our ears.  But just how can we determine beforehand how the encounter will go?

The sad thing is we can’t.  When things go bad, we feel alone and like we’ve said the wrong thing.  The opposite is true when things go well. Jesus called His disciples to do one thing above all others – witness.  When Jesus called His first two disciples, Peter and his brother Andrew, He told them He would teach them how to be "fishers of men."  Jesus spent many hours teaching His disciples how to spread the Good News. He allowed them to stumble and learn. At the end of His earthly travels, Jesus gave all of them this charge – "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

We are commanded to share our faith to others by Jesus.  So always be ready to share your faith so much so it becomes second nature to you.  Study the Word and God will train you to spread the Good News. Sometimes we will stumble just like the disciples.  But we can rest assured we can witness with authority, and we will never be alone; Christ is always with us when we spread HIS Good News!