But when you are arrested and stand trial, don’t worry in advance about what to say. Just say what God tells you at that time, for it is not you who will be speaking, but the Holy Spirit. “A brother will betray his brother to death, a father will betray his own child, and children will rebel against their parents and cause them to be killed. And everyone will hate you because you are my followers. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. – Mark 13:11-13
I wonder how many of us at times stand ready to provide evidence against the very ones that we are supposed to love?
Have we ever been upset enough at our “loved ones” to keep a record of their wrongs (contrary to 1 Corinthians 13:4-8)?
Or complain to others about our spouse like a dripping faucet in Proverbs 27:15-17?(Husbands, don’t be tempted to use it as a weapon, or you will see yourself emasculated. Wives, don’t be tempted to not believe it is truth.)
I wonder how many pretend to love us to our faces, but underneath the mask hate us, and hate everything that is truth and light?
I wonder how many are right in their demanding something from us because they feel we have wronged them in some way – that we have not given them their due – that we have short changed them from what they deserve?
And I wonder how many might be deceived and how many might be right in their accusations that we have wronged them?
But haven’t we all wronged someone at some point? I don’t say that to justify the wrong doing, but to point out that if we cannot forgive others, then how can we expect to be forgiven ourselves?
Or are you (in your own eyes) in the right and standing high enough by your own loving service to others that you can accuse another? If so, how deep does the darkness of your emptiness go?
So if you see me standing ready to speak against anything other than sin and death — if you see me testifying against a brother or sister, pray that I will remember who is the accuser of the brethren and how slippery his ways truly are to trick us into division instead of unity. And pray that I will forgive my brother and sister and that they will turn from their wicked ways and I from mine to see the enemy defeated and powerless against Christ who is in us.
We are a witness to His glory, to His grace, to His mercy, to His love, to His righteousness, to His holiness — not witnesses against the flesh of pour brothers and sisters. Lift your eyes up, children of God, lift your eyes up, and be in awe of perfect God who has washed you clean and restored you to fellowship with a heavenly family of saints. Rejoice! Sing His praises! Amen.
Harold J. Ballinger 