Acknowledgement

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Matt 10:32-33

32 "Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. 33 But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven.

NIV

What do we supposed Peter thought when he heard these words? We know, and we also know how rash of a fellow he was. He insisted he would follow Jesus forever.

Luke 22:33

33 But he replied, "Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death."

NIV

And we know what happened, even Jesus knew what would happen and told him so.

Luke 22:34

34 Jesus answered, "I tell you, Peter, before the rooster crows today, you will deny three times that you know me." 

NIV

Is this the kind of one who disowns Jesus before men? Then Peter would not be acknowledged before the Father in Heaven, but we know that is not the case. Peter must have repented of these three times he denied knowing Jesus. After he did deny him those three times, on the third denial the rooster crowed and he remembered what Jesus had said.

Luke 22:61-62

61 The Lord turned and looked straight at Peter. Then Peter remembered the word the Lord had spoken to him: "Before the rooster crows today, you will disown me three times."  62 And he went outside and wept bitterly.

NIV

So he did repent, he wept bitterly, knowing his mistake, his error, his sin and we know Peter went on to be one of the founding fathers of the early church. It would seem that whenever we fall to temptation, we in some sense deny Jesus. But that is not disowning him before men. What this disowning might look like could be in various ways. Could we be disowning Jesus with our silence? When someone says something that is not appropriate, such as extreme vulgarity or uses our Lords name in vain, do we stand up for Jesus, or do we just leave the person be? Would they think we were being rude by telling them, or asking them not to say those things? When someone says something about a topic which the scriptures speak to, do we speak up with our opinion based on what Jesus said, or do we just remain silent and not offer some truth on the subject? Do our co-workers know not to speak or swear in our presence because they know it would offend us because we are religious, that we are Christians, God fearing people? Now that does not mean we have to be solemn and gloomy all the time either. In fact one of the fruit of the Spirit is joy. We can be joyful, light hearted, merry people, bringing smiles and even laughter into the hearts of people. But at the same time we need to let them know we love Jesus, we love God, we love that which is upright and honest, and we work as onto the Lord. This means we are the best we can be at whatever we do in our labor for our employers. Is it possible if we were slothful in regards to our labor for our employers that it would be a form of denying Jesus? Maybe not, but did we confess our faith out loud before our employer? They might think we are not living according to the fact we told them we love Jesus. The fact is we do need to love Jesus and we need to tell people we do. We cannot just go about loving Jesus only on the inside while living in a similar manner as those who do not love him. We cannot isolate ourselves from them either, we need to mingle with those who may not love him as we do, so we can acknowledge him before them, showing them his love, his grace, his compassion, his mercy, his character. This is living our faith out loud in the world of those who need to meet him. Sure it is good to fellowship with like believers, but we all know and love Jesus. It is easy to acknowledge him before each other, even if we do so in a façade sort of way, not being as transparent as we should be. But when we are out in the world among those who need Jesus, do we acknowledge him then or do we remind silent? Is our silence a denial? We need to make sure we do not have to go somewhere and weep bitterly because we were afraid to stand up and say we love Jesus. Doing our acts of righteousness before men might bring us some praise, but we are supposed to bring glory and praise to our Father in heaven. In fact we were already warned by Jesus not to do acts of righteousness before men, for if we do, we have already received our reward. They praise us because of them. Good deeds as it were, are only good if people know we acknowledge Jesus as the author of those deeds. All that we are, all that we say, all that we do should be in acknowledgement of Jesus.