“O my Father, give me eyes to see, a heart to respond, and hands and feet to serve you wherever you encounter me! Make me a billboard of your grace, a living advertisement for the riches of your compassion. I long to hear you say to me one day, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.’ And I pray that today I would be that faithful servant who does well at doing good. In Jesus’ name I pray, amen” (Max Lucado).

That’s what I want to be. A billboard of God’s grace. I want people who see me to want to know God not because I have such a wealth of spiritual knowledge or am super holy and righteous but because I have known and experienced grace. I want people to look at me and say, “God did that.”

That’s how it should work. I heard a pastor say that we need to lead questionable lives. Not in the sense of being immoral or unethical but in the sense of living in a way that causes people to ask questions. Our lives should invite conversations about what they see in us that’s different. Those conversations then become gospel conversations because we tell them, “Not I but Christ in me.”

I still think a lot about the 3-open prayer I learned a while back. It goes something like open an opportunity to share my faith, open the other person’s heart to be receptive, and most importantly, open my mouth. It’s no good unless I speak the words. My lifestyle and actions won’t be enough.

I think so many people see Christians for what they’re against. But that’s not helpful. If my life is falling apart, I need to know what you’re for. I need to know you believe in something that can help me and make my life better. We sometimes forget that we have the greatest “for” in the fact that Jesus died on the cross and rose again so that anyone who asks can receive salvation and eternal life.

May we be billboards of grace in a world where people deserve it least but need it most, remembering that we were the very ones at one time who also deserved grace least but needed it the most.