For a lot of people there comes a time in their lives when they make a decision to give their lives to Jesus Christ, to become a Christian. For me it happened about 12 years ago. It was an amazing experience the day I did that, I was over the moon. But I remember thinking, “Well, so now what? I mean, what happens next? All these other Christians, they seem to know what’s going on but I don’t. Do I have to do anything differently? What’s going to happen to me?” And to tell you the truth no-body ever really answered that question “so now what?” I just kind of started going along to a Church and picked it up by osmosis. No matter where we are, whether we’re someone who has just given our life to Jesus or whether we haven’t done that yet or whether it maybe happened 50 years ago, it turns out “so now what?” Is not a bad question.

So this week and next week on the program we’re going to explore that very question. Ten programs, they’re really simple and really straight forward. Now let me make this point, I’m not doing a ten steps thing, I’m not into that, it’s not some rigid formula or some set of rules, “Well you know, you’ve just become a Christian and these are the first ten steps!” No, no, just a plain simple look at what happens and the sorts of choices we’re going to face and in making a decision to give our lives to Jesus Christ.

Today, we’re going to look at making sure that we made that decision truly in our hearts and then we’ll look at what we can expect and what we need to do to decide to put first things first, establishing a regular quiet time with God, doing a little stock take of the company we keep with other people, becoming part of Gods family, what’s this baptism thing all about, taking the dunk and the dip, becoming a giver, letting God speak to us and hanging in there for the long haul. I wish someone had done this with me. Whether you haven’t made up your mind about Jesus yet or whether you recently gave your life to Him or even if it happened a long time ago, my prayer is that over these next couple of weeks, we’ll all be blessed as we take a look at the simple basics, the pillars.

I remember when I first saw my wife Jacqui, I’d never set eyes on her before, I was preaching at a little Baptist Church that I’d first started attending and she walked in and sat down and mid sermon, mid sentence I looked out at her and I just knew in my heart this was the woman that God wanted me to marry. I hadn’t been a Christian for all that long and over the coming weeks and months we came to know each other. We had a courtship and then it became time to propose.

Well proposing is a big decision and I’m kind of a shy guy when it comes to proposing. Proposal is a life long commitment not just about some romance and courtship. It’s about becoming soul mates through thick and thin, for better or for worse, in sickness and in health. And the decision to propose to Jacqui was not one that I took lightly and the same is true in her saying yes. When you think about it, it’s a decision of faith in one another. Here’s my life partner and I’m going to put my trust in her and she in me. I thought about it a lot and ultimately it was a decision of the heart, yes I engaged my mind, I thought “Are we compatible? Are we a good match? Is this right?” But at the end of the day it was a decision of the heart, it was a deep decision.

Two thousand years ago a prison guard in the Greek city of Philippi asked a couple of his prisoners, “What do I have to do to be saved?” The prisoners were the apostle Paul and his friend Silas; they knew the answer to that. They said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.” You can read about it in Acts, chapter 16, verse 31 and that’s exactly what happened. That’s it, only one requirement, to believe in Jesus.

You don’t come into eternal life; you don’t come into a relationship with God by attending a particular Church. It doesn’t happen by following a particular set of rules. It’s not about dressing a certain way, talking in a certain way, it’s nothing like that. It’s believing in Jesus, who He is, what He did, the Son of God and that He died on that cross to pay for our rejection of God, our weaknesses, our failures, our blind spots, all that stuff and believing that He rose again and He’s alive today. Being saved means having the free gift of eternal life by believing in this Jesus.

The apostle Paul put it this way; you again can read about it in his letter to the Ephesians, chapter 2, verse 8. He said this, “It’s by grace that you have been saved through your faith and that’s not of your own doing, it’s a gift from God.” The decision of the heart is a personal step of faith. We can weigh it up in our heads but can I tell you something? I’m a pretty sort of a head guy, you know, I like to think things through a lot but I didn’t know everything when I gave my life to Christ. Ultimately it was a deep, personal decision I made in my heart. It’s like marriage, not just a head decision, it’s choosing a life partner, an eternal life partner and putting Him in charge of our lives, God intimately involved in every aspect of our lives.

Now there is a price to pay, there is a cost and we’re going to look at that tomorrow on the program. The decision is, do we want God to walk with us? Do we want Him to relate to us? Do we want Him to guide us? Do we want to follow Him? Yes, sometimes do we want let Him direct us? You know some people want an insurance policy kind of relationship with God just in case there might be a heaven and a hell down the track. That’s not it, it’s a deep, abiding, for always decision to make Jesus the centre of our lives.

People come up to Jesus and they said, “What do we have to do? What do we have to do? What do we have to do to get into heaven?” It’s always what we think, what do we have to do? And Jesus said, “The work of God is to believe in Me whom God sent.” It’s in John, chapter 6, verses 28 and 29.

Have you made that decision yet? I mean really deep down. I’d like to give you the opportunity to do that right now. If you want to give your life to Jesus Christ and to make that step and that hard decision, why don’t you pray this prayer with me now?

“Father God, you know each of us. You know our hearts, You know all the things we’ve done wrong, You know all our inadequacies and failures, none of that is a surprise to You God and we come to You just as we are and we put all those things at your feet and we say, Lord God we are sorry for the things we have done wrong and we want to turn away from them now and we believe that because of what Jesus Christ did on the cross, in paying for all of those things that we can have your forgiveness. We put our faith completely in Him because we know we can’t come to You in and of ourselves and Lord God, we believe that Jesus Christ rose again from the dead to give us victory, to give us eternal life. Father, I’m sorry for all the things I’ve done wrong, please forgive me in Jesus name. I want to have a new and eternal life with You for ever and ever and ever. Now Lord God, show me, show me how, show me where I need to go, lead me, be the Lord and the King of my life in Jesus Christs name I pray. Amen.”

If you’ve just prayed that prayer with me, you’ve just given your life to Jesus Christ. I really encourage you to stick with us over these next two weeks as we look at this question, ‘well, so now what?’

It’s funny how we walk into a new relationship and expect it’s going to be a bed of roses. People who go through the romance of courtship and expect the rest of their marriage to be like that end up being pretty sadly disappointed or we establish a friendship and then we’re surprised when we don’t see eye to eye with our new friend down the track. The reality is that any relationship is going to have it’s ups and downs. Relationships, well they require sacrifice and understanding and a preparedness to see the other persons point of view. If that’s true of our relationship with other people, it’s also true of our relationship with Jesus. So often someone gives their life to Jesus and they expect the band to play oompah, oompah and for the world to applaud. Yet so often that is not what happens, why is that? And what can we expect when we give our lives over to Jesus?

I remember that time in my life when I gave my life to Jesus, I went and did that. Look, Berni was this tough hard nosed, super critical, super perfectionist businessman. I was successful, I was wealthy, I didn’t care who I hurt and I was going through a personal crisis in my life, really tough times.

I had a couple of friends, a couple, they were both Christians who opened their home to me and showed me the most amazing kindness and they invited me to their Church one Sunday morning, it was the 15th of October, 1995 and afterwards I went out and sat under a big eucalypt tree in the sunshine and I gave my life to Jesus, lock, stock and barrel. Everything, every hope, every dream, everything I had. It was the most amazing feeling; I was like a helium balloon bouncing around in the back of their car on the way home.

It’s a decision I look back on with great fondness, it’s the best thing I ever, ever did. But that decision, it didn’t change everything in my life over night. I still had a life to live and there were things going on, there was lots of pain to travel through and uncertainty and loss before I healed inside. And you know what else? Not everybody around me was that pleased with the decision I had taken, some people thought ‘Berni’s got religion, you know, he’s gone weird, he’s joined a cult, the Moonies got him,’ and at the same time it seemed like the forces of hell were mustering against me.

It was like what felt like spiritual attacks, things were going wrong and one after the other, I thought ‘this just can’t be a coincidence; it’s not what I expect. I expected everything to be a bed of roses and it’s not like that. I had to come to grips with the fact that the devil is alive and well and he wasn’t at all pleased about the decision I’d taken.

The devils quite pleased for us to have this kind of, sort of, maybe something belief in God, vague, at a distance. Why? Because that’s not what it means to be saved, that’s not what it is to have the free gift of eternal life but the moment we take a decision to follow Jesus, he’ll oppose that, he doesn’t want it to happen, he’s like a thief who comes to steal, kill and destroy. Now you might say, “Berni, surely you do not believe in this myth the devil,” and I’m going to tell you, “Absolutely I do”. You know why? Because Jesus did.

At the beginning of His public ministry, He went down to the Jordan River to be baptised by John the Baptist and He came out of the water and a dove came down from heaven and a voice came from heaven and said, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” WOW! Isn’t that amazing? Can I ask you a question? If you’ve given your life to Jesus, when you did that, did the heavens open and a dove come down and God speak audibly to all the people around you and say, ‘this is my beloved child’? No, didn’t happen to me.

This is an amazing thing, I mean it must have been wonderful for Jesus to hear that. But immediately following this amazing event, God took Jesus out into the desert where He fasted for 40 days and 40 nights and it says at the end He was pretty hungry. In fact, if you read the version in Marks gospel, chapter 1, verse 12, it literally says that, “The Holy Spirit drove or threw Him out into the desert.” And there, the devil tempted Jesus after those 40 days. It’s a good story to read, I believe this truly happened because it’s in the Bible.

Go to Luke, chapter 4 and you see that the devil did 3 things. Firstly he said to Jesus, “If you’re the Son of God, turn the stones into bread?” See how the devil wants to put doubt into Jesus’ head. If? He does the same with us. Are you really saved? Did you really give your life to Jesus? Did He really accept you? When the devil tried to sow a seed of doubt in Jesus head, Jesus said, “We don’t live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.” He quoted the Old Testament, Deuteronomy, chapter 8, verse 3.

Then the devil took Jesus up on a mountain top and showed Him all the kingdoms and said, “If you worship me, I’ll give all this to you.” He does the same with us, ‘you don’t want Jesus; you don’t want God. Come on; look at the good time I can show you, look at all the glitz and glamour I can give you in this world.’ Jesus’ answer, “It is written, Worship the Lord God and serve Him alone.” Again He quoted the Old Testament, Deuteronomy 6, verse 13.

And finally the devil took Him to the top of the temple, “If you’re the Son of God, throw yourself off the temple.” He even quotes some scripture back at Jesus to prove that God will protect Him. He does the same with us, ‘okay, if you gave your life to Jesus, if this is true, put God to the test, ask Him to fix something immediately or ask Him to pay off your credit cards or ask Him some other ridiculous thing.’ You know what Jesus said? “It is written, do not put the Lord your God to the test.” Deuteronomy 6, verse 16.

You see, when we take a stand for God, when we go and get baptised like Jesus did and we’ll be talking about baptism next week, when we do that the devil comes against us and he wants to throw seeds of doubt in, he wants to try and drag us back to our old ways. He wants to try and get us to put God to some ridiculous test. Jesus stood firm in what He knew was right and when the devil had finished every test, he departed from Jesus until another opportune time, that’s what it says in Luke, chapter 4, verse 13.

He just doesn’t do it at the beginning; he tries to attack us all along the way. Can I tell you? That is going to be a reality, when we make a decision to follow Jesus with our lives, with everything we are, with everything we have, with every hope and every dream, we are stepping onto a spiritual battlefield and at the same time the world’s not going to be happy with us either.

In John, chapter 15, verse 20 Jesus said this to His disciples, “Remember the words I spoke to you. No servant is greater than his master. If they persecuted Me they will also persecute you.” When we give our lives to Jesus, some of the people around us are not going to be delighted, they may well come against us, the devil will come against us. So is it all doom and gloom? No! Jesus also said to His disciples, “In this world you will have tribulations but be of good cheer, I’ve overcome the world.” John, chapter 16, verse 33.

Some days will be wonderful but other days it will feel like all the forces of darkness are mustered against us and on those days, amidst the spiritual battlefield, we need only remember one thing, Jesus is in that place with us, that’s His promise. Jesus!

I don’t know what your life is like but in my life well, it’s jammed packed full of stuff. Ministry and work and family, and Church and friends and reading and keeping up to date and on and on and on and what ends up happening if we’re not careful is that the rest of the world dictates our agenda. We end up running after other peoples priorities and you do all the urgent things yet the important ones end up at the bottom of the list.

You know, each year I write and record almost 450 separate radio programs not to mention being asked to speak here and there, and write this article for this magazine and finishing off the latest book and that’s great but can I tell you the truth? I can end up getting so busy doing all of those things that I don’t find the time to spend with God or with my wife. We can become so busy with what’s going on, on the outside, that on the inside we end up falling apart.

This week and next week on the program we’re looking at what it means to give our lives to Christ because so many people do that, they give their lives to Jesus and they go, “Well okay, I’ve taken that step, I believe in Jesus so now what? What happens? What changes?” Well if Jesus is going to be part of our lives we have to decide something, where does He fit in?

I remember going from being a single man to being married to my wife Jacqui, BJ before Jacqui I could come and go as I pleased. Stay at work late, catch up with friends afterwards, go away for the weekend, I was a free agent. Now that I’m married I can’t do all of those things, I have a wife and a family to consider. I still do some things but I’m not the free agent I once was. But far from feeling constrained, I feel liberated, I am delighted to be married to Jacqui. Yet when two people come from being separate entities to being a team, there are changes and actually they are good changes.

The same is true when we give our lives to Jesus, we need to adjust. Where is He going to fit in? And here’s where so many people get it wrong, this is one of the most common mistakes that we make. We live in a pretty self centred world, that’s where we come from. Me, I am at the centre of the universe and the rest of the world revolves around me okay? So where does Jesus fit in? Well, He can have this bit and that bit, maybe every second Sunday but Jesus has to fit in with me on my terms. I’ll pull Him out of a box when I need some help, the rest of the time He just has to sit and wait because you know something, I’m busy, I have priorities.

So many people think that this is what it means to believe in Jesus. But if we went to Jesus and asked Him, ‘Lord, what’s the most important thing I have to do in my life?’ What do you think He’d answer? If He had complete sway in our lives, what would He put at the very top of our ‘to do’ lists? Well actually we know exactly how He would answer because a clever young lawyer asked Him that very same question. He saw how well Jesus handled the tough questions that the religious leaders threw up at Him to try and trip Him up.

So this lawyer goes to Him and decides to have a go as well and if I were to paraphrase the lawyers question it would come out something like this. “Jesus, we both know that the Law handed down through Moses well it has 613 commandments and prohibitions. That’s kind of an awful lot; I mean day to day that’s a lot of things to remember to do or not to do. So how would you sum it all up? I mean, if I’m trying to prioritise these things in my life, which one of all of those commandments is the most important one?”

It’s not a bad question when you think about it. You can read exactly his words in Matthew’s gospel, chapter 22, verses 34-40 and Mark’s gospel, chapter 12, verses 28-34 and if I had to paraphrase Jesus’ reply in kind of here and now speak, it would run something like this. “I know that you have lots of things to do, lots of rules, do this, don’t do that. They’re all good things but for me, you can sum up the whole Law in just two commandments. Firstly, love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. That is the most important one and the second one is pretty much like the first. Love other people as much as you love yourself. That’s the whole Law in a nutshell.”

“Now hang on Jesus” say you and I. “I have so much to do and so many of them are for you, I’m busy, I mean really, really busy and what do you actually mean? How do I love the Lord my God?” This is a ‘Jesus comes first’ position. Jesus is the Lord of my life not number 22 and 23 on the priority list. First, you know some people call Jesus Lord but actually He’s not first, He’s not the Lord of their lives.

Jesus said, “Why do you people call me Lord, Lord but you don’t do what I say? I’ll show you what he’s like who comes to Me and hears My words and puts them into practice. That person is like a man building a house, who dug deep down and laid his foundations on the rock. You see when the flood came the torrents struck the house but it couldn’t shake it because it was well built but the person who hears My words but doesn’t put them into practice is like the man who built his house on the ground without a foundation, the moment the torrent struck the house it collapsed and it’s destruction was complete.”

You see, Jesus is saying, “You make Me number 22 and 23 and 24 on your priority list and, quite simply, you’re not going to put who I am and what I’ve said into practice.” You are still going to be doing all that other stuff because it suits you and you are like a person who builds a house without any foundations. When the storm comes which it inevitably does in life, you know, life is not just a bed of roses, life just doesn’t go along wonderfully, some days are good and some days are bad and on those bad days we need to have a solid foundation. You know where that foundation is? That foundation is when we put Jesus Christ first.

Jesus turns a few things upside down; you can go and read about Him in the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke or John. Just pick one of them and read about who Jesus is and He turns the world upside down. He’s the God who comes along and says, “Love your enemy.” He’s the one who comes along and says, “Turn the other cheek.” He’s the one that comes along and says, “If you want to gain your life, you’ll lose it but if you lose your life for my sake, you’ll gain it.” And it turns out that Jesus turning these things upside down, we think that we’re going to lose but actually we end up winning. When we put Jesus first, when we turn the other cheek, when we bless those who curse us, it changes us and it sets us free and we have this new life that we could never have imagined. That’s what it’s like but it only happens when we put first things first. Believing in Jesus is not having a ‘sugar daddy’; He is not a pet dog that performs tricks. God comes to us on His terms and says, “Either I’m the Lord of you life or I’m not. Either you put me first or you don’t.” And the sooner we make the decision that He will be exalted above everything else in our lives, the sooner things start falling into place.

Have you ever sat around and watched a group of people talking. You know, you just stand back and watch the dynamics. Some people don’t participate. Maybe they lack confidence. Others spend their whole time talking. Even when others are talking you can see them thinking about what they are going to say or trying to interject. Very few people seem to strike a good balance between listening and speaking. And fewer still really try to understand what the other person’s saying. We’re social creatures and so effective communication between us is really important. You tend not to do that on though the fly. Good communication needs time. Some people call it quality time. Time we deliberately set aside for building relationships It’s true in our relationships with other people, so why wouldn’t it be true in our relationship with God.

Sometimes at the end of the day I have to tell you, I get pretty tired. My day tends to start fairly early 4 or 5 am because I’m just an early starter. And it’s busy and there’s lots to do. I love what I do . It’s exhilarating. But at the end of the day, I can be pretty tired. I come home and my wife Jacqui works in the ministry too. She answers many of the emails and phone calls we receive, so she works really hard too. So she gets home and she’s tired too. Maybe we’ve both had a great day. But you know what the risk is at this point. The risk is that we don’t sit and talk together. We’re so exhausted you plonk yourself in front of the television and watch some mindless sitcom. Now that’s OK if its one day. But in many marriages it happens day after day. Night after night.

How often do you hear husband and wife saying, , “I don’t know, we’ve just sort of grown apart.” And they end up living separate lives. That doesn’t happen over night. It doesn’t happen in a week. It happens over months and years. The two can end up being alienated from one another. And so many, many marriages aren’t the enriching and satisfying relationships that they should be. Conflict creeps in and ultimately almost half of all marriages these days end in divorce.

You know what I’m talking about. You know where I’m headed. Effective communication is pivotal if a relationship is going to be a relationship at all. If we want it to be satisfying, if we want it to be enriching, if we want it to be comforting, if we want to carry each other’s loads and burdens, if we want to know how each other feels and thinks and wants and dreams and hurts – communication is so important.

And it’s not just about talking, it’s about listening and understanding. So Jaqui and I, because we can fall into this trap just like anyone else, have decided we are going to deliberately take the time to talk and communicate at the end of the day. Frankly, I’m a typical boy. When I’m tired my natural instinct is to clam up and veg out. But we need to establish time to be in each other’s presence, to rest in one another, to share with one another.

Well, you know something, the same is true of God. You wouldn’t believe the number of people who I know who believe in Jesus, whether they gave their lives to Him last Thursday or thirty years ago, but whose lives are in turmoil. In a mess. They’re like a little tin boat bobbing around in a huge stormy ocean. Can I tell you something, it ain’t meant to be like that!

Jesus was talking to His disciples just before His crucifixion. He knew they were all about to sail through some really stormy waters. Scary times. What did He say to them? “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you. I don’t give it to you the way the world does. Don’t let your hearts be troubled and don’t let them be afraid.” Comes from Johns Gospel 14, verse 27. Life gets awfully stormy some days. And Jesus’ plan is for us to have peace in the eye of the storm.

There’s this beautiful Psalm I’d like to share with you today, it’s Psalm 46 and it goes like this. “God is our refuge and our strength. An ever present help in time of trouble. Therefore we won’t be afraid. Even if the earth gives way, even if the mountains fall into the heart of the sea. Even if the waters roar and foam and the mountains quake and they’re surging. Because there’s this river whose streams make glad the people of God. The holy place where God dwells. God is in that place and the city won’t fall. God will help us at the break of day. The nations are in uproar, kingdoms are falling all over the place but He lifts His voice and the earth melts. The Lord almighty is with us, God is our fortress, come, see what God’s doing. He makes wars come to an end, He breaks the bow and shatters the spear, He burns the shields with fire, Be still and know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations. I will be exalted in the earth. The Lord almighty is with us. God is our fortress.”

This fabulous picture of a storm and an earthquake, the mountains falling into the sea and trouble and turmoil and war, but in the middle of it all God is still God and He wants to communicate with us. He wants us to know who He is. He wants us to experience His peace. And He gives us this advice. He tells us exactly how to do it in this psalm. Be still and know I am God. Amid all the hurley burley be still. Deliberately carve out a time of the day. For me that’s early in the morning, for you it might be on the bus on the way to work, it might be after dinner in the evening, whatever works.
Carve out a time to be on your own with God. To pray, to talk with Him. Just to sit and rest in His presence. To be still. To open His word, the bible. To read a Psalm or read the next chapter in whatever book in the Old Testament or New Testament whichever book you happen to be reading. To hear His voice. Drink in His Joy and peace. Can I tell you something, I can’t count how often He’s spoken to me throughout those quiet times and He’s stilled my nervous heart. Or He’s given me an insight or a wisdom that I’ve really needed for today.

When we ignore this we ignore it at our own peril. It’s just like a husband and wife. You end up feeling that God is a million miles away. Well, God didn’t go anywhere. In fact God’s promise is that He makes His home with us. But when we stop spending that time with God the problems of the world seem bigger than God. All the troubles and the pressures and the tensions, they get to us.

When we take that time with the door closed, with the Bible open, with our eyes lifted up to Him, when we take the time to be still amidst the storm, then we know that He is God. And He gives us the peace and the calm and the quiet gentle delight to make such a difference to our lives. Whenever someone comes to me whose lives are in turmoil and their spirit, their soul is in turmoil, I ask, “How much time are you spending with God?” and the answer is invariably “Little” or “None”.

Be still and know that I am God.

I remember when I was growing up, particularly my teenage years, my parents used to harp on about the friends that I had. I used to think, “Oh its none of your business. Who do you think you are. I can have whatever friends I want.” But they kept on about it. They even put some restrictions on me going out with some of these people. I thought it was so unfair. Of course now I look back on it with a mature head on my shoulders and I realize what that’s all about. I’m just as concerned with the company my 16 year old daughter Melissa keeps. Because the wrong friends, the wrong relationships, can have such an incredibly damaging effect on us. And that damage, for some people, lasts a lifetime. So we’re looking at some godly guidance for someone whose given their life to Jesus. For the company we keep is an incredibly important area we have to think about.

I want to share with you a true story. This is a phone message that was left late one evening just recently on our answering service from a young man who’d listened to one of our radio programs. I listened several times and wrote down what he said.

This is what he said. “I’m only a new Christian and been with the Lord probably for about 10 weeks. I was going great guns. Then I had a night when I went out drinking with my friends. And I told my friend I wasn’t sure if I was a Christian anymore. I felt terrible about it and felt I had really blown the whole thing with God. It was only when you came onto the radio tonight that I realised that that’s why Jesus died for me. I want to say God bless you guys and thank God for His grace. God bless you man.”

See, the company we keep can end up leaving us astray. As I said the other day on the program, when we give our lives to Jesus not everybody’s going to be pleased. Use me as an example. Before I became a Christian 12 years ago I was the king of dirty jokes. I even had a data base of dirty jokes in our consulting company. Now I had a pretty dramatic change in my life when I met Jesus. I was going through a difficult time and I gave my life completely to Him. You know, it’s the best thing I ever did, lock stock and barrel. But it required a few serious changes. And the dirty jokes data base was one of those areas.

Now you know some people think when you become a Christian you have to lose your sense of humour, you have to stop having fun. Yet that’s not it. I haven’t lost my sense of humour. I really love a good laugh. And it’s not that I became a prude. But the instant I gave my life to Jesus it was pretty clear to me that this was an area that I had to step out of. I had to resign from my position as the king of dirty jokes. Now it was interesting the reaction from some of my peers. The name calling, the “what’s the matter with you?” Have you got religion?”

I can’t tell you. I was a brand new Christian. I had just given my life to God and this was hard. It was a hard choice to make. I either had to step out of that group of people and risk their rejection, or compromise my relationship with God. Pretty stark choice. Not an easy choice to make. We’re social creatures. Now I’m not someone who dances to other people’s tunes, but you know kind of making that break and stepping back was not easy. Because I knew that compromising relationships ends up compromising our relationship with Jesus.

So I decided to delete the data base and not be involved in dirty jokes anymore. So when we’d be in the tea room at the office someone would start with the dirty joke, I decided just to leave the room. I didn’t make a big thing about it, didn’t criticise people, didn’t point my fingers at them. Just kind of pushed back and said I’m not participating in this any more. I refuse. I decided to take seriously what God said about this stuff. And He does say stuff.

Like, in the Bible, Ephesians chapter 4, verse 29 says “Don’t let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth but only what’s helpful to build others up according to their need”. And again in the next chapter, Ephesians chapter 5, verse 4: “Nor should there be any obscenity or foolish talk or course joking which are out of place but rather thanksgiving. Because you can be sure of this no immoral or impure or greedy person has any inheritance in the Kingdom of God. Don’t be deceived with empty words because such things are not from God, and His wrath comes on those who are disobedient. Therefore do not be partners with them.”

See, very specifically God was saying to me, “You’ve got to step back from this. If your serious about having a relationship with Me you have to step back.” You don’t have to think about those things too long to realise this is good advice. You know something, my work colleagues pretty quickly accepted the fact that I’d changed. Especially can I say, when they saw some of the kindness and gentleness and forbearance and generosity that had never shown before. Someone said, “What’s happened to Berni, he’s become human all of a sudden?” God knows, some of the relationships are going to be destructive.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing in the Bible that says “Don’t drink”. In fact Jesus turned water into wine. He handed a glass to of shiraz around to the disciples at the last supper. In fact Psalm 104, verse 15 says that God made wine to gladden the human heart. But if you have a problem with that before you became a Christian If you were someone like this young man I was talking about before, he used to go out and get drunk, and then you give your life to Jesus, well that’s going to be an area of weakness in your life. Its going to be an area where the devil attacks you. It’s going to be an area where your friends of old want to drag you back down. And that means stepping back from some of those relationships. Or if you had friends you used to gossip with. “Did you hear about so and so? I can’t believe it. I mean, how could she do that? She should be shot for that.” Some people, all they want to do is drag us down with gossip. Or maybe it’s sexual immorality. Whatever it is.

You know that there are not many things that God says don’t do. In fact there are very few. By and large, He wants us to enjoy life. Jesus says that the thief comes only come to steal, cheat and destroy (talking about the devil) but I have come that you might have life in all it’s abundance. And that stuff, the junk I was talking about, you know, going out and getting drunk, or doing the dirty jokes, or doing the gossiping, whatever it is, that junk, you don’t have to look at it for too long that it’s the stuff that ruins our lives. It’s the stuff that steals, kills, and destroys. And sometimes the relationships we had with those people who were once in that space with us are powerful influences in our lives that can drag us back down.

Does that mean, Berni, that when I become a Christian I have to cut ties with everyone. Absolutely not. Jesus wants us to show them His love. To be his light in the darkness. To add flavour by being salt in their blandness. But you know something, truly, some relationships are destructive. You know which ones they are. The company that we keep is so important. And right now, right now you might know that Jesus is putting His finger on the particular situation or a particular relationship and He’s calling you to step back from that. I really encourage you to pray it through with Him. And if you feel Him calling you to step back then do that. It turns out that the company we keep can make a big impact on our lives and on our walk with Jesus.