I’m beginning the book “Crazy Love” by Francis Chan in preparation for a study this fall. Though I’ve wanted to read this particular book for a very long time, I’ve had other material that fought for priority and so this book resigned itself to being at the bottom of the pile…until now.
Now is the perfect time, I think. Just reading the forward by Chris Tomlin was inspiring enough to encourage my delving into Chapter 1, which I really hadn’t planned on doing last night. I was tired yesterday…and hot….and tired of being hot. At its worst, the temperature in our home yesterday was 90 degrees. Returning home from Key West to find that your AC fan motor has decided to retire with no advance notice was not exactly the plan we had in mind. I am happy to report that my resourceful husband and our neighbor (yes, we DO have a couple of great ones) labored over the unit most of the day yesterday and I have happily woken up to an indoor temperature of 76. We’re definitely getting there!
Back to the book. The abbreviated summation is this ~ lukewarm Christianity. I am sure I’ll talk more about what that means as I get chapters deep but it began an internal dialogue in me last night about how many things in my life…which means you may be the same…are lukewarm. By its very definition, that means I’m unenthusiastic and indifferent to certain things around me.
Believe me, I know the areas where my lukewarm demeanor has settled. For a person who is as passionate about things as I generally am, it’s definitely unsettling to put a label on it…but, yes, I’m unenthusiastic and indifferent to many situations going on around me at this very moment.
Possibly because I have no control over the outcomes or possibly because I have far less interest in repairing the holes, my intensity has stalled and sputtered. I believe this is why God led me to this book now ~ because my faith and my love for Him should never be in this condition. Many things in my midst can survive without me or with less of me, but this….well, this can never happen. I can never be a lukewarm Christian and if I have slipped into that drowning pool, I want the life preserver thrown immediately.
Maybe I’m supposed to be less committed to those other causes in my life right now; maybe that is God’s intentional plan for me? Maybe I need to refocus on Him and just find peace in that… He knows I can’t find peace in much else right now anyway.
I’m going to be more settled about detaching from those areas where I’m lukewarm. There are reasons why my attitudes and passion are waning, I’m sure. Rather than continuously wring my hands in defeat, I am resigned to become friendly with this new outlook for a season ~ it may be just what God has in mind.
My energy and passion are needed elsewhere right now.