If your witness could be represented by a potato chip

In the faith lesson “Piercing the Darkness” from the That the World May Know video series, Ray Vander Laan makes the point that Jesus demonstrated God’s concern for all people when He first fed the Israelites (see Mark 6) then He fed the Gentiles across the sea (see Mark 8). The Lord seeks all people, but He also holds all people accountable—the focus of our lesson out of Ezekiel 25 and 26.

In Mark 5, Jesus commanded the demon(s) to come out of the Gadarene demon-possessed man. Then the man wanted to go with Jesus right then (like it would be great if the Lord translated us into heaven the moment we believed!), but the Lord sent him away on a mission to tell “how much the Lord has done for you and how he has had mercy on you.” What’s our response to this story?

Jesus sent the formerly demon-possessed man as a lone witness in a hostile culture and “all the people were amazed” (see Mark 5:20). If we are likewise to be salt in today’s culture, then how can we illustrate too little salt is ineffective and too much salt is bad?

Ask, “If your witness for Christ could be represented by a potato chip, which chip would you choose to be?” Lays? Ruffles? Pringles? Show the Visual Data chart from a test of saltiness of Potato Chips. Notice the correlation of saltiness to “good flavor” (representative of effectiveness of Christian witness in our illustration). Great Value and Mike’s Brand don’t come close to the rating of Lays and Ruffles in flavor according to the chart. But Pringles looks pretty good. Have some fun with this illustration and take some chips to class with you. They can’t eat just one!!