My parents taught me that it is okay — important even — to make friends outside my denomination. Sometimes it’s hard to do, since they go to church on a different day than me and sometimes, they don’t understand our rules. And most of the time, my friends don’t get why Saturday can’t just be a “regular” day for me like it is for them.
But there are many good things that can happen when you make friends with people who don’t believe the same things as you. For instance, when I was younger, I had a friend who went to church on a different day than me. When she would come over to my house on Sabbath, she wanted to play games that I knew I couldn’t play, but we still had a lot of fun anyway. We walked my dog and played on the trampoline with the sprinkler system under it.
She ended up coming to church with me almost every Sabbath that she came over. This happened because I was friends with someone, despite us having different beliefs.
Jesus can use anyone, including you, to be a positive influence on someone today. Sometimes it can be hard to do His work, like it was for Jonah or Moses, but do it anyway. Because only God knows what effect it will have on that person. Who knows how big of an impact even smiling at someone you see, or waving at someone could make?
Because God can use anything, I challenge you to let God work through you and change someone’s life for the better. Remember that God can use the simplest things to tell anyone and everyone about Him and all He offers.
Written by: Lisette M., Student at College Park Christian Academy, Age 11
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We Christians face more challenges than you think. But being Christians is what sets us apart from the average person. We believe in a God that died for everyone and loves everyone.
One of the ways we show our love for God is setting apart a day in the week just to worship Him. Because of how we show our love to God, we miss out on activities or opportunities, but that doesn’t matter because we have a kind, loving God who will provide something better than what we missed out on.
Sometimes, we miss out on money because of the offering we give at church. But my mom always said that God will provide for us as a way of thanking us for giving back. We have to remember that everything we have is not because of us, but because of God. That’s why we give back to God what is His.
Another challenge we Christians face is temptation. Sometimes, we are tempted to sin or break God’s law. Yes, we are human, but we cannot use that as an excuse to fall into Satan’s temptation. In Matthew 4:1-11, we can see that the devil tries to tempt Jesus into falling, but He doesn’t. Jesus stayed strong during that temptation. He was a human as well. We need to use Jesus as an example to not fall into temptation.
In conclusion, Christians go through some challenges. We go through things other people can’t relate to. But we can pray and talk to Jesus about it because He went through the same things we did, some even harder. We need to stay faithful to our God despite the challenges we face in our world. I hope this encourages you to stay strong through the obstacles you face as a Christian.
Written by: Benjamin S., Student at College Park Christian Academy, Age 14
