"He answered and said unto them,
Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites,
as it is written, This people honoureth me
with their lips, but their heart is far from me."
- Mark 7:6

He strolled into my business with an obvious confidence in his stride. 

I remember well the day that a man named Charles walked into my advertising business a few years ago.  We had gotten to know each other a bit over a period of several weeks.  And, on this particular day, he had one topic on his mind...

...tennis.

During our conversation, I mentioned that I enjoyed playing tennis.  This quickly brought a most pleasant response from Charles.  He told me that he was basically a semi-pro player.

Having originally came from the Northeast, he quickly informed me that he had played in a league in New York.  He went on and on for quite some time about the level of competition up there and all of his successes. 

We soon decided to play a match against each other.

Now, without sounding arrogant, I am a fairly decent tennis player.  But, I'll admit, I was a bit skeptical about playing this guy.  He had made a great presentation of how good a player he was and with the stuff he told me, I just wanted to make sure I didn't embarrass myself.

We walked out onto the court and begin warming up.  During the warm up, he had most of his shots wildly out of bounds.  Having heard all of his boasting, I thought perhaps he was just fooling around, perhaps to loosen me up a bit.

He wasn't fooling around.  And he wasn't hitting any shots in bound.  And he wasn't a semi-pro tennis player.

He didn't win a single game the entire afternoon.

When I think of Charles and his tennis antics, it reminds me, when it comes to "Christians" there are talkers...

...and there are players.

There are those, like Charles, who can talk the talk.  They can tell you all about how spiritual they are and all the things they know and how much they love Jesus.  They can talk about church and "religious stuff" and all that jazz...

...but when they walk out onto the courts of life, their actions tell a different story.  The live out of bounds.  And their movements just don't back up their words.

Jesus calls it hypocrisy.

What about you and I?  Do we "talk the talk" without "walking the walk"?  Or, do our lives do the talking for us?

I know this for certain, there are plenty of folks out there claiming to be committed to Christ, but there are very few who are following Him down the narrow road.

God doesn't want talkers...

...He wants players.

Have a "Wonderful DAY in Christ,"
Jimmy D. Brown
\o/ Praise Jesus!