Live It Loud

What does it truly mean to live out the Gospel?

In this episode, we dive into how our actions reflect our faith—not just what we say, but how we live every day. From showing love and grace to choosing obedience and humility, we explore what it looks like to be a living representation of Christ in a broken world.

Faith isn’t just spoken—it’s demonstrated. Are your actions pointing others to Jesus?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:32

Hey guys, you're listening to our Rebel No More podcast with your host, Jane Fearstock. In today's podcast episode, I'm going to discuss our actions reflecting the gospel. What that means is doing things that we don't want to do. And as I navigate my life now with uh scripture in the center of it, with God in the center of it, I'm at the point now in my walk where my actions should be lining up with what scripture says. So I should be behaving essentially the way Jesus would behave if Jesus was like in that situation. And you know, it's very difficult to navigate this sometimes, especially in situations where we feel that we were wronged, or um there was a double standard, or uh you just don't agree with that person. There is a way to behave and there's a way not to behave. And the way we are called to be behave to behave, sorry, I got tongue-tied there. The way that we're called to behave is in a way that is going to be difficult because I'm speaking for myself here. I'm 45 and I'm about two years into my walk. So that means I've spent roughly 43 years of responding the way I want to respond, or behaving in the way I want to behave, and not behaving in the way that Jesus would behave in a situation, or at least making some sort of attempt, because um we're all sinners, it's in our nature to sin. We don't need to learn how to sin, we just do it. And so when we die to ourselves and we pick up our cross and we say we're gonna live our life for Jesus and the way Jesus did, that means we're gonna make sure our actions model exactly what we say we're doing. And a lot of times I think that this can give um Christianity a bad name because you know, when we say that prayer and we accept Jesus Christ into our hearts, we still sin. It's still in our beings to sin. The difference is is how do we recover from that sin? Do we repent? Do we change our behavior? And so, you know, that's really what it is. It's like when we when when a believer or, you know, I don't know how to put that out there. So like when a Christian is like, I, you know, I know I did whatever it was was wrong, I need to go into prayer, I need to for, you know, ask for forgiveness. And hopefully the next time I'm in this situation, I'm gonna have my heart open, my eyes open, my ears open, and my mind open to allow the Holy Spirit to navigate me to not put myself in that position again. And so when we're on this walk, people do watch and they like to point out all of the things that we fall short of. And I'm not saying that like in a negative way, and and I guess I'm really kind of just bringing light to it because people who don't identify as a Christian, or if they're like torn with Christianity, they are watching us and how we navigate life, and that's gonna ultimately help make a decision if they want to give their life to Jesus and believe that Jesus is the Son of God. Um, I did a podcast last week on submission, and it was mostly for married Christian women. You know, we're called to submit to our spouses, and uh when we are obedient to God, you know, we do get, I don't want to say rewarded. I don't, I don't really know the right word to describe that as. But if we're allowing our actions to reflect the gospel and we're in a situation where we're not being treated nicely for whatever reason, we're called to do what Jesus would do, and that would be to love that person. That would be to be uh slow to anger. We're gonna listen. We're going to um, you know, kind of figure out what's going on here, and we're gonna try and figure out all right, how can I act biblically and not with my actions? Because I'm still a I'm still a person. I'm not God, I'm not half God, I'm not anything of that. So I've I'm made up of the flesh, which means I need Jesus to help me get rid of these old behaviors where the flesh would want to respond instead of responding biblically, where now it's kind of, well, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna lie. I think I'm still pretty 50-50. I I don't always respond biblically. I will when it's someone, when someone else is in the hot seat, I can tell you where you fell short of responding biblically. But when I'm in the hot seat, my flesh just uh all of our flesh loves law and we like uh order. And if someone does do something to us and we don't like it, we are quick to judge, we are quick to respond, we are quick to um act out of our emotion. And um, you know, Proverbs 3, 5 through 6 tells us to trust the Lord with all your heart and not to rely on our own understanding. You know, we can't rely on our own, on our own, we just we need God to to guide us. We can't go off of what we think or what we feel we're we're wrong. A lot of the times we're wrong. The only time we're really not wrong is if it aligns with with what you know scripture tells us to do. And you know, we do want to re we do want to react out of our flesh, just especially someone like me, I'm I'm still very new at this. So, you know, my close friends and family, I'm sure, are watching to see my actions. Are they reflecting what I'm doing? I go to church, you know. I'm I'm not saying I'm just checking off boxes. I'm just saying, like, if I was outside looking in at somebody and I'm kind of questioning my faith, like, you know, I do, I do believe this, I do think this, you know, and I'm starting to piece things. I'm going to watch people in that particular group, I'm gonna watch how they navigate things because that's my future. Like, I'm gonna watch what you're doing, and that's gonna help me make a decision based on what I see, you know, with with us submitting to our husbands. Part part of the reason we're called to submit is because if they're not acting godly and we're and we can still put our aside of our flesh and that desire to want to be right or to be heard, and we can just be quiet and still and be obedient in that moment, um, you know, God's going to see that. He's gonna see you're being obedient to him in that rough situation, but you're also showing your spouse, ladies, you're also showing your spouse through being quiet and gentle God through your behavior. Because I don't care who you are in that hot seat, it's still gonna be hard to quiet that flesh to want to respond when someone's doing something that you don't necessarily like or agree with, or you know, whatever causes that little internal stir. I do think that, you know, those moments are hard to be slow to anger, at least for me. I'm not speaking on everybody. And so it's like you have to, for me, I have to actively be like, okay, don't get angry, listen, just listen to what's going on. And then when we gauge what's going on, and we can kind of, you know, figure out the situation, and then we can speak. We're not gonna, at least I'm not gonna rely on my emotions or my actions because scripture tells us don't lean on your own understanding. We we don't, we're not God, we're not, we're just people, and we just we we have we tend to look at things in not the greatest ways. Like we just look at them in the worldly ways. We look at them from our flesh standpoint instead of a biblical standpoint. We think just because someone hurt us or wronged us that we have to go back and take care of it. But the truth in the matter is God's gonna take care of that. And we just have to sit back and, you know, love them, respect them, and and let God take care of what God needs to take care of because you know, He's He's gonna take care of those that do us wrong or you know, put us in these positions. But God's also gonna see that you were obedient, that you kept your mouth shut, and you know, you were putting your your partner first. So, you know, you weren't putting your actions or not your actions, but your emotions and saying, hey, you know, when you said this, this was wrong, and I'm gonna show you how, and you know, you're just you know, gonna be quiet and and slow to speak. Just listen. Um faith shows up externally, and so I'm out here, I've publicly professed that I'm a Christian. I publicly put publicly put out there that I'm following scripture, and so I need to make sure that my actions align with that. I went to lunch or not one, well, I guess lunch. I went to lunch and spent the day with with a friend, and uh, she's not a Christian, but she knows that I am, and she knows that I'm new to this. And something I struggle with is being the same all the time. For some reason, when I'm around people that aren't either as embedded in the faith as I am or just not in the faith, I find some swear words tend to sneak out. But then when I'm around godly people, I don't have a problem saying bad words. It's like when I was younger, I'd say bad words in school, but I never would say them around my parents. And I know that we're supposed to be the same everywhere. Like, if I'm gonna get on all my socials, put out a podcast, a blog, share this on Facebook and all my social medias, I feel like it'd be pretty hypocritical to put out this stuff and then not go live your life like that and then turn around and get upset that the world rejects God. Well, we can't be surprised when the when the world rejects God because look how some of us behave. We don't we don't love people the way Jesus loved people. We look down on people, we pick and choose who we want to share Jesus with. We don't, I don't think that some of us do what we're supposed to be doing. And you know, in I want to say it's in James 1.22, he tells us to be. Yeah, that was it James 1.22. I thought I wrote it down. Uh, but anyway, we're called to be doers of the word. We're called to be not just hearers. Yeah, it is James 1.22. Don't just listen, do what it says. So, like, that'd be like me coming out here, putting out these podcasts, publicly putting this out here, and then I'm just, you know, being just gross with my words, my actions. Um, I'm just not doing the things that you'd see Jesus do would not reflect my actions. I I just think that's kind of foolish to put yourself out there and then not do what you're called to do. Like we're called to be like Jesus all the time. God never changes, God is always the same, but we change all the time. Like, I I'm not gonna lie, I will, I'll be a chameleon. Like, and I've you know, I know that there are situations and there are some people that would agree that my foul mouth has gotten better, and then there's some people that would probably disagree, but you know, that's I spent 43 years, well, I wasn't swearing 43 years, but you know, you get the picture. It's like it's hard to stop doing these things, and you know, even though you pray for them to get fixed and let Jesus take them, it's still a process, and it's still, you know, your sanctification is a long, a long walk. And sometimes I find myself getting a little frustrated that I've heard stories where they became a Christian and you know, God just cleaned up their mouth right away. And sometimes I still sound like a truck driver. It's just for me, sometimes it's it's hard to, it's frustrating, but I know that I'm a work in progress and Jesus is doing what he needs to do on the back scenes of it. So another good thing for me to look at too is like where are we spending our time? Where are we spending our money? You can always look at your bank accounts. That'll that'll reflect your your money will reflect your actions. Are you tithing? Are you giving your 10%? Are you um are you spending it on worldly um things? Are you are you using, are you being a good steward of your money that God gives you? Are you being selfish with it? You know, look at where you're spending your time. Are you being selfish with time? Are you scrolling countless hours on social media? Are you getting in with scripture? All of these things are a good way to to kind of gauge where our actions are and if they're lining up with scripture. Those are just some of the areas that will kind of help you visually see. All right, well, all of these things in my bank account are all going out to eat. There's no um donations, there's no um, I bought some person random food, you know, just doing doing things to help other people. Let's just let's just say you go through your account and you don't see any of that. That'd be a good, you know, a good idea to say, okay, well, my bank account does not reflect scripture at all. Okay, I need to focus. God, you need to help me focus on this. We need to clean this up. And so, you know, look at your time, look at what you're doing, look at, you know, I'm not saying you have to live and breathe God 24-7. You know, we have jobs, we have children, we have activities, but those are just physical ways you can kind of gauge where your time is reflecting, you know, the gospel, where your bank account is reflecting the gospel. You know, what does that look like for you? What is that, you know, that's gonna tell you where your heart is. So that's what, you know, I'm not saying like we're the best at these things. These are just some of the things that my husband and I have, you know, talked about fairly recent too, is like we don't feel like we're stewarding, you know, we own our own business. And sometimes, you know, we're just are we giving enough? Are we doing enough? How can we, you know, our hands are up, like you know, John in um 1 John 3 18. Love is an action. Love with action and truth. So love is an action. Love is you show love through your actions. You can tell someone, you can tell a homeless person you care about them all you want. You can donate whatever to whatever organizations, but to that person on the corner, if you're not meeting a need, if you're not helping them, your work is kind of like they don't see it. They don't that's not that's not gonna help them. You know? So it's like we gotta be mindful about love. Like our church just gave out, we put together, well, I didn't, but the kids put together blessing bags, and so we have some in our cars and everything, and it's like you pass someone that obviously needs more than just a bag of personal care items, which are great, don't get me wrong. But sometimes they just need more than that. Sometimes they just need someone to talk to. Sometimes, you know, we get so caught up in what we need to do in our lives that we forget that Jesus went to those that didn't look like you or I. He didn't go to the wealthy, he didn't go to the righteous, he went to the sinners, he went to the people in like in the streets, like he didn't go down the fancy places, you know. He spent time with the lonely, the the tax collectors, the uh drunkards, the prostitutes, the demon-possessed. I mean, he went and hung out with like people who I mean, he obviously knew who needed help. He's Jesus. But you and I, we can, you know, tell if someone needs help. You know, you can hold the door open for somebody, you can buy somebody a meal. We went to bowling, uh, we bowl on some two bowling, well, yeah, two bowling leagues. Um, I don't know how long ago this was. But my I think my husband was bowling. Anyway, long story short, he comes rushing in towards me asking for his wallet. I I don't even, I don't remember. He asked for his wallet, comes back and tells me, you know, we bought, you know, some people some food, get whatever, whatever. And the fact that like he just my husband a few years ago, I my husband has always had a really good heart, always a good heart. And I think that even if he didn't have God at the time back then, he would have done the same thing. But watching him do those little acts of just going out of his way to go feed two people, like he was, if I'm not mistaken, he was getting ready, they were getting ready to bowl. Like, I don't know. I I to this day, I don't really know how that story came about. I should probably ask him. I just know that there were two people that needed food. He ran in, grabbed, you know. His wallet grabbed it from me, whatever, and told me to go do what needed to be done to feed these people. But like that was an action. Dallas went out of his way, got some, you know, two people food. He met a need. That's you know, that's what we I'm not saying you need to go out and spend all your money on people if you don't have it. Like, I I understand that. I totally get that. But there's always something we can do to help someone. Love looks and comes in so many ways. It's a gesture, you know, it's spending time with somebody, it's meeting a need. Maybe it's helping around someone's house. Maybe it's helping your actual neighbor that, you know, is in your vicinity. Maybe someone needs help financially. Maybe they need help with a vehicle. You know, God gives us these wonderful gifts that, you know, if we steward them well, you know, some of us can fix vehicles. And so, you know, maybe you can go love on a neighbor who needs help with auto auto repairs. Or, you know, you know, what whatever it whatever it looks like to you, or whatever you feel um your action, what your love action would be like. Um I I do think that because people are always watching us Christians, you know, you do this, you do that. I think that showing people who we are, who God called us to be through our actions will also help others who are questioning, you know, one like what is what's to this Jesus stuff? Because when I do have conversations with people, and it, you know, it could be just the people I've just been had the opportunity to talk to, but they seem to have a general understanding of, you know, the this the story of scripture and whatnot. It's just a lot of time people get get caught up in, you know, you can't do this, you can't live like this, and I can't live for me, and you know, you know, it just it's a process. It's not like you give yourself to Jesus and all of a sudden you're serving meals at the um homeless shelter and donating all your time. I mean, God's, you know, if your heart's open, you're listening, you're gonna hear what God wants you to do, where he wants you to serve, and where he wants you to feed his sheep. He's he's going to give you something to do, and it's gonna look different. It might look like a podcast, it might look like street preaching, it might look like, you know, just posting daily prayers. It it just looks so different for everybody because all of our walks are so different. We're all called to do, you know, we're all called to bring, you know, to spread the gospel, but we also have unique gifts that will allow our actions to reflect the gospel. We all have a different style of explaining things, we all have a um different learning process. And, you know, I think that these types of outlets kind of help some of us understand things. Um, our actions reflecting the gospel is it is tricky. I don't um I don't know if there's anybody out there that's necessarily mastered this art of this all the time, but you know, I do want to be a doer of the word. I do want my actions to lead others to Jesus. I would love for that. I would feel horrible if I did something that would make someone turn their head to God. That definitely would be horrible. And so when I do hang out with my friends that haven't accepted Jesus, or you know, I do have some pretty close friends that want nothing to do with Jesus, and that's okay. But I'm still gonna allow my actions to reflect the gospel. I'm still going to do my best to lead by example, and I do tell them I'm I'll give you a full disclaimer. Look, I am new in this walk with Jesus. I have absolutely nothing figured out, and I fall short every time. But you know what? I'm trying. Every day is better than you know, the last day, and um, you know, living in the moment. I can't live in the past, I can't change anything in the past, and I can't see in the future, I don't need to worry about that. God has that, so all I've got is right now, and I know that my actions need to reflect the gospel because I love Jesus, I love my relationship with him, and I want anybody and everybody who wants to hear about Jesus to want the same thing. And I I know that's not realistic, but you know what a girl can can uh hope, right? And so, you know, while we're on this journey, I just I just really want to do the best I can so that when people see me, they can see Jesus. They can see the love is in action, they can see me needing me meeting their needs, whether it's a meal, whether it's taking their trash out, whether it's helping with an electric bill, whatever your whatever it looks like for you. You know, I want to be able to serve and not worry about being recognized. I don't care about that stuff. I just care that God sees me helping where he tells me to help out. And I think that the the most difficult yet most rewarding piece of this is loving people who are difficult. People are difficult in general, but loving people when they are unlovable, unlikable, you don't want to be around them, that's what Jesus would do. Jesus wouldn't. I don't think he would dislike anybody. I just don't think that's in his nature. But if it was, even if he didn't this even if he disliked you, I don't think you'd ever even know it. I just I think Jesus was straight up classy. You know, we should all be more like him. It's hard though. It's definitely hard, but Jesus knew the condition of the heart. He knew it was already messed up. He knew we were pe He knew humans were already no bueno. We he knew that we we needed him and we needed God and he still loved us, he still went on that cross for us, so thank you, Jesus. Anyways, I hope that this helped anybody who struggled with how we should behave. People are watching, Christians and non-Christians. And I don't know who is watching you. I don't know what the situation is, but if you are a Christian and you are a believer, which means you are actively trying to all right, I'm in this situation. How would Jesus navigate this? Like that sounds so cheesy. Remember those bracelets that WWJD? Well, we know Jesus would always act out of love. So if you're not gonna act out of love in any way, then Jesus probably wouldn't behave that like that. I think the only way Jesus would ever, ever, ever behave, and the only emotion he would ever behave would be love. And I think that's what we need to do, even when we're upset, when we're hurt, when we're offended, when a double standard happened. And it's just we're people, and you know what you guys, our emotions, they're real, our feelings are real, but you know what? That doesn't make them where we need to respond on them. It doesn't make them something you need to go validate. You go to God for that, take it to him, give it to him, and you let your actions reflect the gospel. You keep your eyes on Jesus because at the end of the day, when it's when everything is all said and done, it's just you and God on that judgment day. Not me. No one else is with you. Just you and God. You have to account for these things, not not me. I'm responsible for me, what I take, you know. And you know, we've as believers we really need to allow our actions to reflect the gospel in any situation we can. And yes, we will fall short, yes, we will miss it, yes, we will mess it up, but you repent, you do better next time, and we grow from there. That that's what we do, and I will tell you this, and I don't know, I really don't know if my friends listen to this, but I will tell them like I'm struggling with this, so like please don't allow my inability to control myself reflect what Jesus is about, because in this moment where I'm a hot mess and I am saying a bad word because I'm frustrated and I'm just falling short, and I'm just allowing the world to get to me because I've allowed my emotions to um cloud my judgment because I'm now in, I now need control instead of giving it to Jesus and letting him control it. I am not being slow to speak, I'm I'm just being angry. Those are the moments where it's just like I'm still Jane, I'm still learning. And it's so important to me that my friends know that yes, I'm a Christian. Yes, I do want to act and behave like Jesus does at all times. I'm going to fall short a lot of those times. But please don't allow my mess up when I say a bad word or don't act exactly like God. Please don't let me in my actions and my inability to fall short, please don't let that make that decision to follow God or to accept Jesus Christ. Be patient with me. I am learning this too. This is not an easy process. Like nowhere in that in the Bible did this say this is gonna be super duper easy. Like that, that is not in there. And so I just I want to be as raw as I can to be on my blogs, on my podcasts, and in person. So I really do pray, I do pray this, that when I am out and about with my friends that haven't accepted Jesus Christ or want nothing to do with him, I really do pray that and they hear me when I say, please don't let my behavior right now reflect Jesus. Because Jesus would 100% not behave this way. Just full disclosure. I am not acting, and it's important for me because I just I love God and I and I love Jesus and I want them to have this incredible relationship with him. So if they can see me fall apart and be honest and real with them, like I'm being like I'm being for real about this. Like this is this is my heart now. This is where where where it is. It's it's with Jesus, and I want your guys' hearts to be there too. And so for those of you that do believe and that you um try to represent God the best that you can, and you know, we just gotta keep keep doing what we're doing and keep letting our actions reflect the gospel because people do watch, people do listen, and people will make a decision, and our and that decision can. I'm not saying we're gonna be the end-all-be-all decision for somebody accepting Jesus. That please don't hear what I'm not saying, but I do need you to hear this, and I also am talking to myself too. People are watching, and they are watching our behavior, they're watching our mannerisms. I know that's all behavior, but they are watching every little detail on how we choose to respond in situations, whether they're positive, whether they're negative, whether they're parenting, business, whatever the decision is, people are watching and they're taking notes. So it's always best for us to allow our actions to reflect the gospel because ultimately our actions can lead someone to salvation, and ultimately that would be fantastic, that'd be awesome. But we don't want to. You know, I don't want to, you guys to get up, you know, on judgment day and say, Jane said this. Jane, Jane's not in the the Holy Bible, Jane's just Jane. Don't don't listen to me. You know, take what I've said or put out there and just, you know, get in scripture and and read it for yourself. See, see how you can implement it. If you can, if you can't, I don't know. But I hope that this helps somebody out there if they needed it. I know I needed it. I know I constantly need a reminder to allow my actions to reflect the gospel. I really do. And it's hard, but it can be done. Trust me. If you'd like to contact me, you guys can contact me on Facebook at um a rebel no more, TikTok, Jane F like Frank, A Z seventeen. You can also email me JC Krim eight one at gmail dot com. Thank you guys for listening. I hope you have a blessed day.