Tell Others About Him
10 Practical Ways to Show Your Love for Jesus — Devotion 8 of 10
2 Corinthians 5:14 — “For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died.”
Opening Reflection
Love that stays permanently silent is suspect. Those truly compelled by love for someone find it hard not to speak of them, to bring them up naturally in conversation, to want others to know them too. Paul describes his own witness this way: he is "controlled" by the love of Christ.
Witness, in Paul's account, is not rooted primarily in obligation or guilt. It flows from being controlled by love. Once a person truly grasps what Christ has done - that one died for all - silence about Him begins to feel strange, even impossible to sustain.
Taking a Devotional View
The word Paul uses for "controls" (synecho) carries the sense of being hemmed in, compelled, left with no other course. Love for Christ, when it is real, does not merely permit witness as an option among others. It presses toward it, the way any deep love presses toward speaking of the one loved.
Fear, more than anything else, is usually what silences believers who otherwise love Jesus deeply. But John writes that "perfect love casts out fear" (1 John 4:18). Telling others about Jesus is not, at its root, a duty forced upon reluctant hearts. It is love finding its most natural voice.
Key Thoughts & Takeaways
Key Thoughts
- Paul says he is "controlled" by the love of Christ - love compels witness, not mere obligation (2 Corinthians 5:14).
- Grasping what Christ has done for us makes silence about Him increasingly strange.
- Perfect love casts out the fear that often silences our witness (1 John 4:18).
- Telling others about Jesus is love finding its natural voice.
Ask Yourself
- Is fear or love the stronger force shaping how often I speak about Jesus?
- Who in my life have I been silent with about Christ, and why?
- What would it look like for the love of Christ to "control" my conversations this week?
- How does remembering what Christ has done for me change my willingness to speak?
Lord, let the love of Christ control me the way it controlled Paul - not guilt, not obligation, but love that cannot stay silent. Cast out whatever fear keeps me quiet, and give me natural, willing words to speak of what You have done. Let my witness flow from love, not duty. In Jesus' name, amen.