Evil Appearances

Not too long ago, a lost gentleman came to me and said,

“Do you know who I saw having lunch together?”

Of course I replied by saying that I didn’t know. He named a certain man and woman. Both of these people profess to be Christians and are married to different individuals. Then this lost gentleman asked me,

“No one was there with them. Now how does that look?”

My mind immediately went to the verse, which says, “Avoid the very appearance of evil.” I did not want to concede to his point, so I tried to defend their reputation and morality by saying,

“I know… I’m absolutely sure that there is nothing going on.”

Then he replied to me by saying,

“And I agree! I would bet one million dollars that nothing is going on. But how does it look?”

I glanced down, nodded my head, and pressed my gently clenched fist against my lips. Then leaning back, I looked up and met his eyes and said,

“You’re right.” 

It does not take a follower of Christ to know what the appearance of evil is. The smallest of things (that could be perceived as evil) can have very detrimental effects on the testimony of a Christian. We must take care to guard ourselves. Sometimes it can be disturbing to know that the world is always watching for something with which to tear down a Christian’s reputation. I say this not only for you, but also myself. We must be mindful of our surroundings so that we are not placing ourselves in the very appearance of evil. More than just our reputation is on the line… it’s Christ’s.

This entry was posted on June 9, 2008 at 7:08 pm and is filed under Christian Living, Today's World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.