You Here For The Fishing Expo?

Matthew 5:16
Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

I can't help but laugh when I read the title the Lord gave me for this devotion. A few years ago some friends of ours went on a vacation trip with us to the mountains of Tennessee. On the first day of our trip we stopped at this gas station to get a snack and some drinks. When I walked up to the counter to pay the cashier, he asked me, "You here for the fishing expo?" To which my wife and friends busted out laughing. I should have said, "Yep, you going?"

The reason this so funny is because of the shirt I had on. It was a yellow fishing style shirt. I wore this shirt many, many times. You see I used to wear this shirt so much because it was comfortable and when a big guy finds something comfortable he will wear it out. This cashier had never seen me before and so he didn't know that I just liked the shirt. My friends on the other hand knew that I wore it, and wore it often. So automatically he tied me together with fishing and the expo that was in town.

The beauty of it all is that I would have loved to go to the expo. I love fishing. But what if this shirt would have had skulls, death, blood, cursing, profanity, naked people on it? I would have tied myself to the shirt. The Bible tells us to let our lights shine before men that they can see our good works. I was taken as a fisherman because of what I wore.

What would you be taken as if people were to evaluate your clothing? What if they understood who you were by what your conversation was about? Last of all, who would get the glory of your good works? It should be that we shine, but that we shine for Jesus and not ourselves. So where are you headed today? You here for the fishing expo? You here for the Lord Jesus Christ? Would people look at you and tie you with Jesus and His church? I understand totally coming as you are in your sins to a Savior who can and will save you. But after you have been saved you become new and you are now a representative of Jesus. The way people see Christ is through Christians (who are imitations of Christ)