Our lives are examples

Titus 2:11-13 (NLT)

11 For the grace of God has been revealed, bringing salvation to all people. 12 And we are instructed to turn from godless living and sinful pleasures. We should live in this evil world with wisdom, righteousness, and devotion to God, 13 while we look forward with hope to that wonderful day when the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, will be revealed.

The grace of God has provided salivation to all people through repentance of sin and faith in Jesus. You see one must first know and admit to being a sinner before they can accept the salvation from sin. It is that understanding that motivates one to live righteously, to live as an example and to live as Jesus would desire them to live.

According to Open Doors Ministry, Chinese government officials became so fed up with sky-high rates of crime, drug addiction, and sickness in the county of Lancan Lahu, Yunnan province, that in the mid 1990s they turned for help to the only model citizens in the area: the Christians.

"We had to admit that the Lahu people were a dead loss because of their addiction to opium," confessed an official who did not want to be named. "Their addiction made them weak and sick. Then they would go to one of their "priests," who required animal sacrifices of such extravagance that the people became poor. And because they were so poor, they stole from each other, and law and order deteriorated. It was a vicious cycle that no amount of government propaganda could break.

"We noticed, however, that in some villages in the county, the Lahu were prosperous and peace loving. There was no drug problem, or any stealing or social order problems. Households had a plentiful supply of pigs, oxen, and chickens. So we commissioned a survey to find out why these villages were different. To our astonishment and embarrassment, we discovered the key factor was that these villages had a majority of Christians."

Officials launched a daring experiment in 1998, the likes of which would have been unthinkable in China 10 years previous—they sponsored Christians to go into the troublesome villages and share their faith.

They started by picking out the worst village, which had 240 people, 107 of which were hopelessly addicted to opium. Christian Lahus were bussed into the village at government expense, and the villagers were herded together by the police and made to listen to the testimonies of the Christians.

A year later, there were 17 converts in the village, and they began to grow rich because they stopped spending money on drugs. Eight of the 17 converts even had enough to own sewing machines and start small businesses.

By early 2002, 83 of the villagers were Christians and the prosperity had spread. The government official said, "We are delighted with the results and have been extending the tactic to many other villages since then." [The Pastors Connection (Open Doors USA e-mail, August 2002); corroborated by Kelly Callaghan, prayer and courier coordinator, Open Doors USA; OpenDoors serves the persecuted church worldwide.]

Our lives are examples to others; live them well for the one who lived and died for us!