Living in the Light of Jesus

October 5, 2025

One of the online blogs I read regularly has been reviewing how God assigned the twelve tribes their inheritance when the Israelites took possession of the promised land. Before the Israelites began their conquest of Canaan, God told them to totally displace the Canaanites who were presently living in the land. He also warned them that if they disobeyed this command and allowed the Canaanites to remain in the land, these very same Canaanites would prove to be a thorn in their side (Numbers 33:55). Sure enough, several of the tribes did not completely drive out the Canaanites and allowed some of them to stay in the land. Later, many of these Canaanites would become slaves to the Israelites. On the surface, it must have seemed like a good idea to Israel’s leaders to let these non-Israelite people stay. After all, free labor is free labor. Unfortunately, as time progressed, these non-Israelite people became a snare to God’s people, leading them into idolatry and immorality. You might be asking yourself, “Now, brother Andy, this might be interesting to you preacher types, but what in the world does this have to do with me, today, in 2025?” I’m glad you asked. As Christ followers, we have been commanded to be holy because God is holy (1 Peter 1:15-17). A huge part of living holy lives is separating ourselves and living differently from the world. Unlike the Israelites, God doesn’t call on us to drive out non-believers. On the contrary, we are to be the light of Jesus, providing a clear path for non-believers to see the better way in Jesus. Many Christ-followers spend part of their time talking about Christian topics, listening to Christian music, reading Christian books, watching Christian movies, and hanging out with Christian friends. Then those same Christians spend the same amount of time, or even more time, living, dressing, and talking like the world. In other words, many Christ-followers act like Christians around Christians, and then when the crowd changes and they are in the company of non-believers, they are totally different people. While we are not to intentionally alienate our non-Christian friends, we are to live in such a way that the light of Jesus is shining brightly through us. If our unbelieving friends don’t see Jesus shining in us, where else are they going to see it?  Let’s set an example for our non-Christian friends. Let’s let the light of Jesus shine so brightly that our friends have to pull out sunglasses. When the sunglasses come out, let’s tell our friends about Jesus, the source of the Light! Let’s make it hard for our non-believing friends and family to go to hell. Because without Jesus, that is where they are going.

Be blessed and go be a blessing . . . Bro. Andy