Lukewarm
For father’s day, my wife bought me the book Crazy Love by Francis Chan. I am not though with it yet, but wow is it a convicting book. He is in essence critiquing the American church and our “American” approach to Christianity. I just got through reading the chapter entitled “Profile of the Lukewarm.” He begins the chapter by retelling the parable of the sower (in which the seed lands on path, the rocks, the thorns or the good soil.) When I hear that passage, I of course know that I am the good soil. Don’t we all? Chan points out that we shouldn’t assume that we are the good soil. He writes:
“I think that most American churchgoers are the soil that chokes the seed because of all the thorns. Thorns are anything that distracts us from God. When we want God and a bunch of other stuff, then that means we have thorns in our soil. A relationship with God simply cannot grow when money, sins, activities, favorite sports teams, addictions or commitments are piled on top of it. … I will say it again: Do not assume you are good soil.”
He then goes on to list a lot of ways in which lukewarm people live. What I like best is that in the book, he follows each with a passage of scripture, not just a citation, but an actual passage. I found a place that has a .pdf of the full list (with just the citations) here: http://www.dublinvcc.org/Portals/0/Crazy%20Love.pdf
Probably the most convicting one of the list was this:
“Lukewarm people do not live by faith; their lives are structured so they never have to. They don’t have to trust God if something unexpected happens—they have their savings account. They don’t need God to help them—they have their retirement plan in place. They don’t genuinely seek out what life God would have them live—they have life figured and mapped out. They don’t depend on God on a daily basis—their refrigerators are full and, for the most part, they are in good health. The truth is, their lives wouldn’t look much different if they suddenly stopped believing in God.”
This is followed by Luke 12:16-21, the parable of the man who tore down his barns to store more of his goods, only to have his life demanded of him that very night.
When we look at this list, read the scripture and really examine ourselves, which of us can say that we burn for Christ? Who of us is salt and light for our Lord? Are we truly answering the call to love the Lord our God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind? I measure myself against what I am called to do by Christ and I find myself falling short. Not because of a lack of trying but a lack of love and obedience. Personally, I know that I hold too much back. Like so many other lukewarm people I want to make Jesus a part of my life instead giving Him all of my life. I have heard more than one preacher say that it is ok to have nice things. I think we need to reevaluate and learn that it is ok to have enough and no more. We need to accept the love of our Father and give all of our lives to Him and not just part. If we hold back from Him, then we are told that any of our righteousness is as filthy rags. I pray that I can be transformed by the love of Christ into the kind of servant that He desires.
I wonder if there is a relation between this and Jesus’ informing us how difficult it is for the rich to enter the kingdom. Compared to the rest of the world most of us here (in the US) would count as rich and being rich seems to lead to the distractions you mention.
yeah, I think that is a huge part of our problem. We are comfortable. And comfortable people don’t want to do anything that will rock the boat or jeopardize our comfort.
Scary. Especially looking at Rev 3:16 “So, because you are lukewarm–neither hot nor cold–I am about to spit you out of my mouth.”
I’m just going to leave it at scary.
I think one of the most convicting questions I read in that passage was “which of us can say that we burn for Christ?”
Problem with lukewarm Christianity seems to be that just when someone begins to burn for Christ, someone feels the need to be “helpful” with their own version of a “reality check” and put the fire out.
Example: Spark of a Fire Christian says, “Let’s go door to door to invite people to church!” Lukewarm Christian says, “Well, that just doesn’t work these days. There’s crime and the weather, and people just won’t respond the way they used to.”
When an effort is made anyway, they visit one person who they hope is not home, and after knocking once at the door and scurrying away they meet up with other lukewarm Christians to criticize the whole absurdity of door-to-door visitation, and how this was all a waste of time, and how it will not last, and how much longer will could they possibly be expected to keep this up because they have “so many other important things to do” as though the Great Commission was an afterthought of Christ as He ascended into heaven.
Weary, tired, beaten, and torn, He carried my cross anyway up a hill to be nailed to it. What have I done to reciprocate by comparison to that?
One of the anecdotes in “Crazy Love” details how the author decided to sell his house and move his family into a smaller one, in order to be able to give more away. The response he got was “How can you do that to your kids?” and “You’re doing it for show.”
The only thing we Christians seem to dislike more than the devil is a fellow Christian who is trying to live a radical gospel.