151. Witnesses
Acts 1:8b And ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria and unto the uttermost part of the earth.
“Ye shall be witnesses” is a promise, not a command. Followers of Jesus will be witnesses to Jesus all over the world. This activity is not a choice; it is a promise that has been and will continually be fulfilled throughout the earth. We are witnesses of Jesus according to His promise, whether the witness is positive or negative, helpful or harmful. We can bear the name of Jesus into the world in vain. We can also bear the name for a positive and useful point. Witness to Jesus has actually gone out to almost all the uttermost part of the earth.
What the people of the earth think about Jesus, whether good or ill, true or false, accurate or distorted, depends on the witness His disciples have been. The reputation of Jesus Christ is limited and qualified by how the disciples live and talk and act.
The promise of being a witness places a privilege and a responsibility upon us. It is a joy to be a witness to Jesus because we know He loves us so much and we are excited when those who don’t know Him very well come to believe in Him. It is also a heavy responsibility when we realize that other people are watching the people of God, the church. The love of God is seen, or not seen, through the people of God. Others will respond to Jesus according to how they respond to my witness.
Certainly we fail in giving a clear and positive witness to the One we know and love. But we are forgiven and given another chance over and over again. The Holy Spirit takes frail and weak human beings and uses them for His purpose to bring attention to Christ. We daily repent and believe the Gospel and we encourage others to do the same thing by our words and deeds. We do not even know how the HS uses us as His witnesses, but we can be sure that we are witnesses.