What Comes First: Belief/Faith or Every day Living?

For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory" (Col 3:2-4).

Os Hillman with www.marketplaceleaders.org shared a story at biblestudy.crosswalk.com called, "Masquerading as a dentist."  This was quite an interesting story and it was also a blessing in understanding what our lives as Christians are all about.  What was being said in this story was that a dentist by the name of Bengel introduced himself as a Christian masquerading as a dentist.  What does that mean masquerading?

We look at the word masquerade as either a costume or a costume party.  We can also look at it as being something that we truly are not.  Spies are one example.  They have a tendency to hide behind something that they are not to complete a mission.  So, as Christians, we are completing a mission. We need to let people know who we are.  

So, in every day living, which is taken care of through Jesus as long as we believe in Him, is one that we should introduce ourselves not as what we do, but who we are.  We are Christians, we are believers in Christ.  This should come first.  What we do in life as is mentioned here is taken care of through the Father.

Here is some scripture that was used in the story that I would like to summarize here:

• God Himself has created a world which is time-bound and temporary (2 Pet. 3:10-11).  Does this not say it all?  We have a short time on this earth.  The clock is ticking, so whatever it is that we want to accomplish in our lives, we better do it quickly.  All that we do in this earth is temporary and not eternal.  Only living in Christ is eternal in His Father's Kingdom.

• God promises rewards to people in everyday jobs, based on their attitude and conduct (Eph. 6:7, 9; Col. 3:23, 4:1).  Attitude and conduct.  Whatever it is that we do we have to do as Christ would.  This means that we have to include Christ-like thinking in our every day jobs.  Can this be accomplished in such a diverse world of thinkers?  Can it be accomplished as we have such a hurry up world.  We want the people in front of us to move faster because we have someplace to be.  We do not say the things we should be saying to them even if we they do not hear us.  Yet, God hears us and He tries to set us straight.  So do what God wants us to do and do it the way He wants us to do it and He will reward us in our everyday jobs.

Just wanted to share this story with you as I received it in my email.  What is interesting is that it appeared in my every day email, not the missionlighthousehouseministry email.  So, the way that I see it is that this story is a good one.  My name is David Brown and I am a Christian masquerading as a free lance writer/photographer.

God Bless and Have a Happy Weekend!

David