Christian Living
The Truth Is Costly
Michael Youssef, Ph.D.
Feb 12, 2018
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FOR YOUR GIFT OF ANY AMOUNT

Truth always provokes hostility. The Truth can cost you your career. A day is coming when it may cost you your life. Don't let threats or intimidation silence you. Speak the Truth. Provoke a confrontation. Lay out your evidence and demand a verdict.

Don't accept the nonsense that Jesus was a "good moral teacher." C. S. Lewis observed that by claiming to be God, Jesus made it clear that He was either a liar, a lunatic, or the Lord God. Jesus has not left any other option open to us.

It is a message the Holy Spirit will guide us in sharing, and one He will quicken hearts to receive.

I once heard an English bishop say, "When the apostle Paul came into a town, he either incited a riot or triggered a revival. When I go into a town, they give me a high tea. In all truthfulness, I don't want high tea. I would settle for either revival or a riot. At least the riot would prove I had proclaimed God's truth without compromise."

If you compromise the message of Jesus, the world will love you. But if you proclaim Jesus and His Gospel without compromise, the world will hate you. Proclaim it anyway, just as the witnesses in Revelation 11 proclaimed the Gospel. For when we do, we share the saving grace and love of Christ. It is a message everyone needs to hear. It is a message the Holy Spirit will guide us in sharing, and one He will quicken hearts to receive. 

Prayer: Father, help me boldly and lovingly proclaim Your Truth both to bring salvation to the lost and to encourage my brothers and sisters in Christ. Holy Spirit, go before me and prepare the way for Your Word to make the spiritually dead alive again and grant me courage to obey Your Great Commission. I pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.

"It is written: ‘I believed; therefore I have spoken.' Since we have that same spirit of faith, we also believe and therefore speak, because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you to himself" (2 Corinthians 4:13-14).