OVERCOMING SPIRITUAL LETHARGY – PART 1

The impetus behind all great art, all great music, all great literature, the driving force behind all great drama and all great architecture is passion. Passion is what makes things great, is what mobilizes armies to sacrifice themselves in battle, is what enables and drives scientists to find new cures to dreaded diseases, is what equips athletes to break records and get to the Olympics and is what sustains you in reaching your goals as you go through life. Nothing great is done without passion. Passion turns the impossible into the possible and it energizes life.

It Is All About Passion!

Passion is what makes your life alive and without passion your life is dull and boring. YHVH wants you to live a passionate life, He wants you to sense the passion that He put within you by His Nature. Yeshua said that the greatest Commandment was this: [Love Adonai YHVH with all your passion and prayer and intelligence and energy.] -- Mark 12:30. And that is what most of us really want to do but for some of us, we have gone into a state of spiritual lethargy and even though we still believe all the right things, the passion for Moshiach and our faith has somehow been drained away. So, what happened? After a while, that passion began to drain out of your life, the enthusiasm began to fade and your zest and your zip and the joy in your life began to go away. Life became so… daily, mundane, routine! Your dreams began to gather dust. It is a predictable pattern and it is something that happens to most of us at some point in our faith walk. First thing, you get the blows; then you begin to lower your expectations in life; then you begin to question things around you; then inevitably, if you let this spiral go on, you will find yourself going through the motions of faith, with no passion whatsoever to back them up. This results in guilt, a lack of desire to serve our Adonai and eventually, if something is not done about it, you will find yourself dropping out of the church altogether.

How Do I Get It Back?

If you are in this state of mind you do not get there overnight, so please be patient with the process.

1 – Rediscover Your Purpose

Living without purpose is the most common reason people lack passion. Without a purpose for living, why bother? Why put forth the effort? Why get out of bed in the morning? If you have no reason for using energy, why expend it? Why not just check in and say: [Been there, done that!] The fact is, life seems pretty futile, if you do not know your purpose. The longer you go through adult life without clarifying what YHVH’s purpose is for your life, the less passion you are going to have, because passion and purpose go together. Without purpose, life is passionless and there is no reason for enthusiasm over the long haul. On the other hand, a clear purpose creates passion. The greater your purpose in life, the more passionate you are going to be about living, the more fully alive you are going to be. If you have a little small purpose [I only live for myself], then you are not going to have much passion in life. If you have a medium sized purpose, then you will have a medium, moderate amount of passion. But if you get YHVH’s purpose for your life, which is huge, it is all that YHVH meant for you to be and you begin to see that you are a part of His Kingdom, and His plan and you commit yourself to His purpose for your life and sharing His news with other people, you have an enormous purpose and it creates significant passion in your life. There is nothing more significant than being what YHVH made you to be, doing what YHVH made you to do, thinking like YHVH made you to think, sharing in the greatest cause in the world; the advancement of His Kingdom. There is no greater cause and it creates the greatest amount of passion in life. [We know that YHVH causes everything to work together for the good of those who love YHVH and are called according to His Purpose for them. For YHVH knew His people in advance and He chose them to become like His Son, so that His Son would be the firstborn, with many brothers and sisters.] -- Romans 8:28-29. Verse 28 tells us that YHVH works for good in the lives of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose for them, but verse 29 explains what His purpose is; it is for us to [become like His Son] Yeshua Moshiach. We can come up with all kinds of individual purposes, but the one that we can say is true for every Moshiach follower is the main purpose we have in life, which is to live like Yeshua Moshiach. When we forget that purpose and begin following our own agendas, instead of the one YHVH has chosen for us, we go into a state of spiritual lethargy. The only way to come out of it is to rediscover, restate and begin living by the purpose YHVH has clearly given to us.

2 – Unwrap Your Spiritual Gift!

YHVH has given you certain Gifts and abilities and He gave them to you for a purpose. If you are stuck in a job or a career that ignores your talent, you are going to lose your passion for that job, because there is a boredom factor at work here. Studies have shown that a large percentage of all British people are in the wrong job. If you have a job that uses only 30% of your talent, abilities and brainpower, that leaves a 70% boredom factor. The same is true in the Kingdom of YHVH; if you are not using the Spiritual Gifts that YHVH has given to you, you will become bored with our faith, because you are not being used the way YHVH intended for you to be used. Now you are never going to find a job or career that uses 100% of your talents because YHVH never meant for you to find total fulfilment just in your career. That is why you need to have a testimony and ministry where you are doing something outside of your career, using talents that you are not using at work in ways that can be used to bless the Body of Moshiach, help the world and make it a better place. You do it just out of the sheer joy of using your talents. The Bible says that YHVH put you on this earth for a purpose and He has a role for you to play in the world, a niche for you. You discover that niche by discovering what you are good at, finding your talents. [A Spiritual Gift is given to each of us as a means of helping the entire church, the social media network, prayer groups and sessions] -- 1 Corinthians 12:7. Here we have both the fact that every believer is supernaturally given a Spiritual Gift and the truth that that Gift is supposed to be used to minister. Now, if you have not discovered what your Gift is or if you have discovered it, but are not using it, it is no wonder you are becoming bored in your faith walk. You need to discover what you are good at and then find the place where you can use it in that way. One of the purposes of your church is to help you find your niche in life. YHVH created His Church to help you discover your Talents and Gifts. Begin today using what you already know that you are gifted at and build from there.