Building The Fire

How do I keep my spiritual zeal? I thought about that verse last night, "never be lacking in zeal but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord." I met with a friend of mine last night and as we talked he told me about a human video his young adults group was planning. As he talked I recognized that spiritual flame in him, the desire to reach out and share the truth, and the spiritual fervor to never give up. How do we obtain that fire, the passion, and keep it there? Did my friend just one day wake up and have a burning passion for reaching the lost? No. It was a steady incline in his life, a gradual build-up of God-given passion to reach the goal of the Creator.

Let me tell you about chicken stock. This will be interesting, I promise, don't laugh at me! Hahaha! When you make any kind of stock you have to start with cold water and the bones of the animal. The temperature is slowly brought up and as the water and bones are warmed the "scum" from the bones surface. This is when you skim the scum, a term we enjoy using in school haha. When the desire of my heart became to just let God fill every room of my heart I had to start out cold. Many times people are kind of set on fire with passion for the Lord but I've realized in my life that when the passion is burning sometimes it doesn't stay. I like to approach it as a gradual increase in spiritual fervor, a zeal which continually rises through my life and never stops or cools down. In the process God has brought up the scum in my life. Fear, depression, anger, bitterness.....none of those are quick to leave when they've been planted for so long but when they come to the surface and I'm willing to let it go, that's when God has skimmed the scum of my heart.

After the scum is gone you add herbs and vegetables to flavor the stock. When the scum in our heart is gone Jesus fills those empty places with flavorful and beautiful things which sometimes we don't even realize how wonderful they are till the end! You see, a stock doesn't automatically taste amazing right after you add the herbs and veg. You have to let it simmer and develop for hours, letting the flavors mingle and compliment each other! Same with us, it takes time and even though we don't automatically see the blessings and wonderful things Jesus plants in our hearts, they come out in time, resulting in something amazing! A stunning taste on our spiritual palette. The result of a well-made stock brings out five things: color, clarity, flavor, body, and aroma. When our hearts are filled to the core with Jesus and we've allowed His love and character to simmer in our hearts we become more like Him. The color of our lives are vibrant and gold, our vision is clear and our integrity in tact, we give a pleasing taste to the hungry hearts of the lost, our overall aura is full of robust character which draws others in, and we offer up a pleasing aroma to the God who created us, the one who's sole desire is for us to obtain all these things.