How does your belief in Jesus Christ make a difference in your life?

It’s a valid question being asked by seekers and skeptics alike.  When asked it provides an incredible opportunity to share of one’s personal experience with his/her creator.  However, more times than naught the Christian who is asked this question responds with vague or pat answers that do very little to answer the actual question.  The dialog may go something like this…

Inquirer:  So, I know you believe in all that God stuff and go to church regularly…but what difference does your belief in God make in your life?

Responder:  Well…(awkward and sometimes long pause)…for one I have hope because I know where I’m going when I die.

Inquirer:  But how does that hope make a difference in your life today?

Responder:  It gives me peace.

Inquirer:  How so?

Responder:  I know that no matter what happens to me today my eternal destination is secure.

Inquirer:  So if you were to die you are confident in where your going?

Responder:  Yes!

Inquirer:  Ok, but that all has to do with dying.  How does your belief in God make a difference in your life today, while you’re still alive?

Responder:  Well, I read the scriptures and it gives me perspective and insight into life.  I go to church and I feel the love and embrace of the community of believers.  I can pray and know that the creator of the universe hears me.

I’ll stop here.

In this dialog it appears that the responder is answering the inquirers questions quite well.  In fact, there is nothing inherently wrong with the replies of the responder.  They are sound, honest answers.  However, I propose that the responder is answering the right question in the wrong way.

At the onset of this dialog the responder explains how his/her belief gives them peace about their future, specifically after death.  Then the inquirer presses to know what difference their belief makes while they are alive.  Essentially, the inquirer is saying, “I get the future stuff, the living beyond death is nice, but how does a belief in God impact your living this side of death.”  When pushed for more information about how belief impacts daily life the responder goes straight into explaining spiritual disciplines:  read the Bible, go to church, and pray.

While the intent in this is solid, as revealed by the accompanying benefits of these practices (perspective and insight, a feeling of love and embrace, knowing you are heard), the message being conveyed to the inquirer is this:  what you get by believing in God is a new list of things to do with little to no new benefit.  That is to say, most of the world experiences these realities regularly apart from any connection to their creator.  Thus, being told of a new way to receive the same benefits doesn’t seem very impressive or noteworthy, especially when the new way requires a lot of work.

When someone comes to faith they have become a disciple of Christ and begin the journey of discipleship.  Central to discipleship is the process of learning to listen to and obey the Lord so that the disciple is becoming more and more like the discipler, Jesus.  The spiritual disciplines the responder mentioned in the above dialog aid us in this process of life transformation.  However, anyone who has been on this journey for a while knows that it is riddled with challenges.  The sheer fact that the world offers boundless alternatives to the ways of the Kingdom makes the journey of discipleship a battle of choice.  We want to choose the King and His Kingdom as opposed to the things of this world.  Spiritual disciplines do help us focus on living for the King but they fail to fully explain the difference that our belief in God makes in our daily life.  In truth, sharing about our belief in God through the lens of spiritual disciplines may be an unintentional way of veiling the Glory of God from those who are so eager to see it.  We need to move beyond what we do for Him and share what He is doing for us.

People desire to see how God is at work in their world.

People want to know what difference our belief in God is making in our daily life because they are longing to see the living God.  They want to see the evidence of God at work in our lives – how we experience God.  Sadly, we often do as the above dialog demonstrates and convey what we do to follow God, practice spiritual disciplines.

Could it be that we are answering the right question in the wrong way? I say yes.

In Part II, I will discuss how to respond to this question in a way that does not veil the Glory and Renown of God.