Can Your Read My Sign?

This past Monday night, I had the awesome opportunity to take two of my kids to downtown Nashville to watch Monday Night Raw which is a live television wrestling event shown every week on tv. Some of you might say, that stuff is stupid, fake or whatever. The fact is that it is the #1 rated show every week since 1993 on all of television. It also sells out more arenas annually than any music star, act or sports team. With that being said, we had to be a part of this fun night.
We headed downtown ready for an exciting evening. Mollie and John Luke both had their wrestling shirts on. My shirt got lost in the mail so I just wore my favorite All Access shirt. When we arrived in the arena, we were greeted by so many different types of fans, young, old, black, white, male and female. Almost all of those fans were wearing apparel that showed who their favorite wrestler was. What caught my eye though was not what they were wearing but rather what these fans were carrying. Almost every fan was carrying a cardboard sign, a sign that they personally made. These signs were the fans way of saying what they really wanted to say without actually saying it. So as the cameras rolled, lights came on and wrestlers entered the arena, as if an orchestra conductor waved his magical music stick or whatever that thing is they hold, posters went up in unison...each expressing the feelings of the holder and vying for that national audience hoping to be seen.
As the evening went on, each time a wrestler made his entrance, up went the posters, including my kids and mine. What our posters said was not the problem. What they did, now that was a different issue. You see every time our posters went up, displaying our words, our agenda and our feelings, we blocked the view of what others around were trying to see which was the wrestlers. All those wrestling fans behind us came to see the wrestlers, not the scribbled words of a couple of kids and their dad!
As I thought about this blog, I thought about how in life at times, I am more concerned about people seeing me rather than seeing what they need to be seeing. I thought about how I want others at times to focus on my agenda and my words instead of giving their attention to the one who really deserves it.
The Bible says in John 3:30 that "He must increase and I must decrease". What is being said here is very simple...Jesus must be the focus, not you or I. When it becomes about us rather than Him, it is sin. Just like all of those people who were there to see their favorite wrestler, people in this world, knowingly or not are looking to see Jesus, not you or I or what we have to say or think. What we need to do is put our personal signs down and instead of our words, thoughts or desires, let Jesus be seen and heard living in and through us.

See You At The River...John