Contagious

Contagious

I want to speak today on being Contagious. This is a subject over the past 3 years that has received a lot of attention. The pandemic slapped us in the face with it. Think about this… our whole world changed over the fear of being contagious… sharing disease and getting disease. Schools closed down… Restaurants, movies, shopping centers, work places closed their doors. Before this took place it would have been hard to imagine that the world could come to a stop like it did over a fear of being contagious. That professional sports would not allow fans to come to a stadium. That family would have look into hospital windows to see love ones who were sick and dying. That the dead could not have a proper funeral.

Today’s message is not about covid… it is not about all we went through; but it is about being contagious and in what ways. You see with the pandemic it was not the actual disease that created the havoc as much as it was the fear. The fear was contagious… people were willing to do things they never thought they would of out of fear. And the fear spread… it spread faster and infected more people than covid ever did. You can look back and see how it spread. How the news reports would just increase the fear… so much that people would be willing to not see their family and friends out of fear. The fear was powerful and it spread with ease.

But we also saw other things become contagious… rebellion… conspiracy theories… defiance… These attitudes were contagious as well and they changed the make-up of the world around us. We can look back and we can see a variety of things that were contagious. Not all bad…

Some things and attitudes are contagious for the good. The way a neighborhood will rally around a neighbor in need as they face an illness or perhaps a house fire. Laughter is another thing that is contagious… Do you remember the video Coca-Cola put out of laughter on the subway… let’s look at this… (Coca Cola video on laughter in a subway on youtube)

Wow, isn’t that so much better than fear, anger, anxiety or so many other things that are contagious and spread without people intending to be impacted? The point of all of this is that our actions, our environments, attitudes are contagious to those around us and just as important… the attitudes, actions and so forth from those around us impact our lives as well… without you trying.

You live in the south long enough and you will develop an accent that gives away where you are from. You live in a foreign land and you may not learn the language but you will pick up a bit of their accent. So, what does this have to do with being a Christian? I hope it helps you to understand that who and what you have in your life will impact you whether you think so or not and vice versa understand that those around you will be impacted by your words, actions and deeds even if they did not intend for it to happen. Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians to encourage them about nay sayers around them and to be careful…

Don’t be fooled by those who say such things, for “bad company corrupts good character.” 1 Corinthians 15:33

He says to be not be fooled… if you are around people choosing the wrong things it will impact you. If you watch the wrong movies, with the wrong language it will impact you… do not say you tune them out and they do not bother you. The fact that it does not bother you should bother you.

It all starts out slowly and as time goes on you move your boundary of what is acceptable or not. Kind of like the metaphor of a frog in a pot of water. It says if you put him in boiling water he will jump out, but if you gradually heat the water; he will slowly cook himself to death. I am not saying how accurate that is but you do get the point from it. Nearly every bad situation we have found ourselves has evolved over time… from broken marriages, drug addictions, weight gain, etc… Over time these things took place slowly.

I am stressing this point in hopes that you will understand the effect that things have on us and get you excited about the effect you can have on others… but remember, it is slow in both ways. I am not talking years but just usually not in a minute either. Live your life in such a way that your life will be a positive influence on others to know Jesus the way you know Him. If you will make your life about spending time with God in the Word, in prayer and in service you will find that it continually changes you… makes you stronger… your light brighter. Live it on purpose and be aware of what makes you stronger and what has the potential to make you weaker.