Actions Speak Louder Than Words; and Faith Speaks Louder Than Actions

I think one of the most controversial terms to me is the phrase, "actions speak louder than words". While this statement is true in most situations, there are some situations that will reveal that neither words nor actions speak louder than faith.

Actions Speak Louder Than Words
Now, I'm not denying that this statement is true, it's just not true in every scenario. I'm sure some of you have heard the comparison that you can put a person in a garage but that doesn't make them a car - just like how you can put a person in the Church, but that doesn't make them a Christian. This is because actions don't make you a Christian. Faith makes you a Christian.

With this being said, I'm just going to go ahead and state the obvious.

WE ARE IN NO POSITION TO JUDGE ANYONE.

Being a Christian isn't about what church you attend, how many Sunday school classes you're a part of, what youth groups you attend, how many mission trips you've been on, or what percentage of your tweets or Facebook status updates are Bible verses. Yet we still impose judgement on other Christians. For example, being head of a certain ministry or attending a certain function doesn't make you any more of a Christian than someone who has a serious relationship with Christ, even if they only attend the Sunday morning service. Our relationship with God should never be viewed as a competition.

Now, I'm NOT saying that the people who do run a ministry or attend a certain amount of church functions are pretentious or anything like that. All I'm saying is that intentions are important. Don't be involved in something because you feel like you have to or because you feel like it will move you up on the "spiritually social" scale. Be involved in something because you want to and because it makes you happy.

I personally have so much respect for people who can go out there and start their own ministry or be the leader of a major church function or group because those are things that require characteristics that I just don't obtain. And that's the thing, some people don't have those characteristics. Albert Einstein once said, "Everyone's a genius, but if you judge a fish by it's ability to climb a tree it will live it's whole life believing that it is stupid." Not everyone has the same gifts. Some people are meant to be more social and some people are meant to be more behind the scenes, but no one person is less than another because of their talents.

And on the other hand, I'm also not saying that we can just say we have faith and then continue living our lives as sinners. When we accept Christ, we make a commitment. The way we treat other people and the way we treat certain situations should glorify God. "Actions" doesn't solely mean how many times we attend a Sunday school class or how long we hold our hands in the air during Sunday morning worship. It can also be the way we treat each day, the way we treat each situation and the way we treat each other.

At the end of the day, we're all God's children. The way we worship is different. The way we connect and spend time with God is different, because He made us different; but the one thing we all have in common is a faith and trust in God, and that's the most important.

It doesn't matter what role we play, because in the end we all come together as God's children.

Definitions & Perspectives

I believe that you can either look at yourself as a victim, or you can look at yourself as a survivor. I believe that you can either wake up every morning and focus on the positive things in your life or you can focus on the negative. For the most part, the way you look at yourself is a choice, but it's also unfortunately impacted by the way you think other people look at you.

One of my favorite writers, Madisen Kuhn, said some things in her poem "Who are you, Really?" that have really stuck with me and have been a huge encouragement.

"you are a thousand things
but everyone chooses
to see the million things
you are not

you are not
where you are from
you are
where you're going."

Who Are You, Really? by Madisen Kuhn
Read the full poem here: (x)

At the end of the day, it is you that gets to decide your 'definition'. Sometimes you have to force yourself to see things from a different perspective in order to understand your own worth. Force yourself to look at yourself with positivity. You can't change your story, just change your perspective.

Are you a victim, or a survivor?