Believing The Testimony About Christ Series

Do you really believe in God? If you do then you are saying that you believe that Jesus Christ is God’s Son. We have been talking about believing the testimony about Christ and that testimony is that He is the Son of God. There are too many people in this world who do not believe this fact.

Today we are going to talk a little bit about the testimony of God and the testimony of John as we take another test that proves that we really believe in God. How important is your testimony? What we believe and how we act on what we believe is our testimony to others. We’ve been in a series for a number of weeks now talking about how we should behave as a believer. Our behavior reveals our character. For instance,

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When it was time to name their firstborn son, the young parents argued over whose father to name him after. Finally they took the matter to their rabbi. Maybe he could settle the matter.

The rabbi asked the young dad: “what was your father’s name?” “Abijah,” he answered. He turned to the mother and said, “what was your father’s name?” “My father was also named Abijah,” the woman replied.

The rabbi was baffled. Throwing his hands in the air he said, “Then what’s the problem?” “The problem,” answered the mother, “is that my father was a scholar, while his father was a horse thief. How can I allow my son to be named after such a man?”

The rabbi sat silently, trying to come up with a solution to satisfy everyone. After a while he said, “I have a suggestion. Call the boy Abijah. In time you will see whether he becomes a scholar or a horse thief, and then you will know for whom he was named.”

You see, behavior reveals character. Those of us who bear the name of the Lord Jesus Christ should walk as he walked. Our walk is our testimony to the world. That’s why our testimony is so important.

First let’s look at the testimony of God. READ verses 9-12. Verse 9 tells us that God’s testimony is far greater than the testimony of men. Why, then, does the world have a tendency to believe the testimony of men and not of God?

• Spouses usually believe the testimony of one another.

• Children believe the word of parents and teachers.

• Businessmen believe the word of employers.

• We all accept the reports of the news media and of friends every day.

But think about it, men interpret the facts and sometimes they stretch and twist the facts. When you think about it, we are never completely free of personal opinion and interests when we listen to the testimony of men. And some even lie and try to deceive when they share with us. They stretch the truth. Yet we come more to believing man’s testimony than we do God’s.

But you see, God never exaggerates or twists the facts. He never lies or deceives. What God says is always true. It’s the plain and simple truth. So when God says that Jesus Christ is His Son we should believe Him.

Verse 10 tells us that God’s testimony lives within the heart of the believer. When a person believes in Jesus, God implants His testimony within that individual. What is that testimony? That testimony is that the Holy Spirit living within that person gives him the assurance that Jesus has saved him from sin. The HS is the One who assures you that you are saved.

But in the last part of verse 10 we are told that God’s testimony is rejected by unbelievers. And this verse uses some strong language when it says that if you don’t believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, then you are calling God a liar.

Here’s the point. Ask anyone, anywhere, if they think God is a liar and what will be their response? “I would never think that. I would never call God a liar.” Yet some of these same people cannot look you in the eye and profess that they believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah. Verse 10 says they are in effect calling God a liar.

Why? Because they are saying that they don’t believe God’s testimony through Jesus Christ. God has given us testimony after testimony that Jesus is His Son.

• The testimony of the life of Christ, His miracles and His words.

• The testimony of Jesus’ baptism

• The testimony of the blood, the cross, and death of Jesus.

• The testimony of the resurrection.

• The testimony of the Scriptures.

• The testimony of the Holy Spirit that convicts the human heart.

• The testimony of believers who have experienced the power of Christ in their lives.