A Powerful Testimony

A personal testimony is a useful witness for believers of the transforming and saving power of Jesus Christ through the Gospel.  The impact can be lessened when the focus is primarily on the sinful season of life before Christ or a conversion experience itself.  This leads to people thinking their "testimony" is boring or ordinary if they were raised in a Christian home and did not have a dynamic shift from drug-dealing pimp to pastor.  Those who glamorise a sensational conversion can potentially encourage people to seek a feeling or moment comparable to what they have heard to affirm the reality of God's work within them.  If a testimony stops at conversion, it isn't much of one.  A testimony without the Gospel lacks the power to save.  As a child of God in relationship with Jesus Christ there is much more to say with Him as the primary focus.

A testimony does not need to be long to have great impact.  I remember asking a friend how his wife changed after trusting in Jesus.  After a brief pause he said, "When she became a Christian she became a totally different person.  It was a good change."  It was not the person she was previously which impacted him but the loving person she became and continued to be day after day.  I like what pastor McGee said about the witness of a changed life:  "Note that Zacchaeus did not come to the door and say, "I want to give my testimony:  Jesus saves and keeps and satisfies."  Rather he said, "Half my goods I will give to the poor, and I will make right the things that have been wrong."  By this I know he has been converted.  And, friend, this is the only way the world will know that you are converted.  They do not know it by testimony; they know it only by what they see in your life.  If it were not for his changed life, I would never know that this old publican got converted." (Thru the Bible, Vol. IV, pg. 333)

When a person is born again through faith in Jesus, there will be a contrast inside and out compared to how we used to be.  Focusing on what we used to do or how much better off we are now misses the point entirely:  a testimony isn't so much about how we have changed but Who has transformed us by grace through faith!  The Pharisees grilled the man born blind Jesus miraculously healed so he could see clearly.  They asked, "Give glory to God, for we know this Man is a sinner."  The man answered in John 9:25, "Whether He is a sinner or not I do not know. One thing I know: that though I was blind, now I see."  The difference between this man's testimony and ours is at this point he had never seen Jesus, for he had been sent to wash in the pool of Siloam and came away seeing.  The Pharisees were hung up on how Jesus did miracles rather than the signs He did leading them to rejoice, believe, and follow the Saviour Jesus.  They cast the man out of the synagogue for his impertinence to suggest Jesus was of God because of the miracle He had done.

John 9:35-38 reads, "Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when He had found him, He said to him, "Do you believe in the Son of God?" ³⁶ He answered and said, "Who is He, Lord, that I may believe in Him?" ³⁷ And Jesus said to him, "You have both seen Him and it is He who is talking with you." ³⁸ Then he said, "Lord, I believe!" And he worshiped Him."  The man had been cast out of the synagogue, but he was not alone because Jesus sought and found him.  How different life would be for a person who had been born blind who suddenly could see perfectly, and even more profound is the difference in a person who has passed from life to death through faith in Jesus, knows God who speaks with him, worships His Creator and follows Him every day.  Now that is a testimony worth sharing that brings honour and glory to God!