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By his grace, the Holy Spirit can make the lives of godly Christians contagious in families, the church, and the marketplace.
Contagious Christian living brings many blessings, but let us always remember that the Holy Spirit is absolutely essential not only in empowering us to live contagiously but also in making that contagiousness effective by blessing others through our lives. Many believers forget that today; they write entire books on how to become a contagious person or a contagious church without mentioning (or scarcely so) the Holy Spirit. We must avoid this error at all costs. Godly lives do not automatically change others. Without the Holy Spirit’s work in the hearts of those who come into contact with godly people, unbelievers may actually hate believers, finding them distasteful or even repulsive.
On the other hand, we must not negate the need for contagious Christian living. By his grace, the Holy Spirit can make the lives of godly Christians contagious in families, the church, and the marketplace. He does this not so much because of us, since we remain sinners and are not consistently godly, but he does this in spite of us. That is why the Belgic Confession says so powerfully and beautifully that God is not obliged to us for the good works that we do, but we are obliged to him (Art. 24). So the Holy Spirit is due all the glory for even the smallest degree of contagious Christian living. All such living is because of his abounding grace.
Are you living a contagious Christian life? Deep down, do you even want to become a contagious Christian? Do others look at you and say, “That’s the way I want to live”? How, in dependence on the Holy Spirit, can you live a contagious life? To answer that, let us look at four people in the Bible who lived contagious lives. Let us examine how they became God’s agents, how they were contagious, and what that contagious Christian living looks like. I pray God that the examination of their contagious lives may be used by the Spirit of God, if you are a Christian, to make your life more contagiously Christian, and if you are not yet saved, to move you to cry out to God for salvation and a truly contagious Christian life.
Excerpt from
Contagious Christian Living
By Joel Beeke
