This month, our meditation has been excerpted from the book entitled Extreme Devotion, compiled by Voice Of the Martyrs. In the following passage, the account of a prisoner in Peru and a young Shining Path recruit, and provides us with fodder for reflection and perhaps application:
But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. (Philippians 3:7)
Juan was sentenced to serve fifteen years in the Miguel Castro prison for his terrorist activities. Juan understood how terrorists think. He was a militiaman for the Communist group known as the "Shining Path." His Communist greatest commission was teaching others how to kill and destroy. He was a high-ranking official and an expert in dynamite, weapons, and annihilation. His job gave him a sense of inspiration and destiny.
Juan continued his work even in prison. As he worked to enlist a young man named Fernando into the militia, he found that many of his Marxist ideas were not working on him. In turn, Fernando asked Juan a penetrating question. "If you died tonight, my friend, where would you spend eternity?"
Juan had seen or orchestrated the countless deaths of others, but he had never considered his own death. Fernando's question began to bother him. Fernando continued to speak with him each day about the love of Christ and His sacrifice. Finally, Juan became a believer.
Fernando encouraged the new disciple: "As you gave your life to the revolution, today give it to Christ your Lord."
Eventually, Juan pastored a flock in prison. In his past, he enlisted people in the militia school; in prison he organized Sunday School. His mission of death changed to helping others find eternal life.
FURTHER: People's passions give them a sense of inspiration and destiny. Some people have a passion for their job. Others are passionate about their families. Still others are passionate about causes that directly oppose the cause of Christ. Those who persecute Christians cannot be accused of apathy. Their relentless determination would almost be admirable were it not misdirected. God is in the business of exchanging old lives for new ones, however. With the same passion he once felt for Marxism, Juan began to enlist others for Christ. God took his perverse passion and turned it into a passion for Christ. Pray for God to transform anything that competes for your spiritual devotion. Ask Him for a burning desire to further His Kingdom.
A moment of consideration: Passion usually describes a tender but intense and prolonged kiss. It is, the world tells us, a strictly human emotion. It may describe an affinity for fine art, as in "as a photographer or artist, she has a passion for beautiful landscapes or seascapes" or perhaps, "he has a passion for haute cuisine." Another example of a worldly, but productive, passion would be Thomas Edison.
In his 84 years, Thomas Edison patented over a thousand inventions. He is most famous for inventing the light bulb, but made more money off the alkaline battery.
Edison was a bulldog, unwilling to accept failure as a final outcome to his efforts. Before he successfully invented the alkaline battery, he failed 9000 times! Edison credited his success to hard work. "Genius is one percent inspiration," Edison said, "and 99 percent perspiration. " No one will debate the fact that Edison was a hard worker. He built a laboratory beside his vacation home in Fort Myers, FL and he is famous for sleeping very little. On his 80th birthday he announced the formation of a company to do research to develop rubber. He was relentless. --Smithsonian, Dec. 1999, p. 136-149
Why did he work so hard? Was it determination? Was it willpower? No. I believe the key to Edison's success was his passion to invent. Determination and willpower will only take a person so far, but passion is unstoppable!
Great people have passion. A force that consumes their lives and directs their energy. They are not always the strongest or the brightest of their peers, but they consistently outperform them. Their greatness cannot be explained by their education, privileges or talents, because their accomplishments always exceed their abilities. They are driven. Not by the spirit of competition or self-discipline, but by passion.
Edison's passion might teach us of our own Christian passion for Christ. We also might consider those who (like Thomas Edison) have a passion for their job and others are passionate about their families. In the Bible, the apostle Paul wrote to the believers in Colossae and Thessalonica, warning them not to engage in earthly passions as unbelievers do (Colossians 3:5; 1 Thessalonians 4:5) But we've a Heavenly Father who seeks passionate followers, Christians who hunger and thirst for God, as the Psalmist wrote for us:
As a deer pants for flowing streams,
so pants my soul for you, O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
When shall I come and appear before God? (Psalms 42:1-2)
Ian Stackhouse (Senior Pastor of Guildford Baptist Church, Millmead, Guildford, Surrey, GU2 4BE). Pastor Stackhouse has written a good ebook, entitled Primitive Piety: A Journey From Suburban Mediocrity To Passionate Christianity. In Primitive Piety, Ian Stackhouse takes us on a journey away from the safe world of suburban piety, with its stress on moderation and politeness, and into the extreme and paradoxical world of biblical faith. In God's Word, Jesus Christ challenges us to deepen our faith in God, to love the Lord our God with all our hearts and with all our souls and with all our minds and with all our strength. (Mark 12:30) Oh, that our passions might be applied to service to God and through Him to those around us. Oh, that we might turn our eyes on Jesus, that our passion for the Lord would not falter. (Hebrews 12:3)
Juan, in the account above, exchanged his old life with passions for Marxism, to be passions for bringing others to Christ. He fled his earthly passions to pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, calling on the Lord from a pure heart. (2 Timothy 2:22) His newly focused passions and ours reflect our depth of feeling for Christ, a feeling of constant regard for and dedication to Him. It is our passion for Christ that we work out in service to Christ and through Him to His church and our world. In our lives, we do all for Christ, holding nothing back in the use of our money, our time, and our purposes--for His purposes. Luke 6:38 states, "give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you."
In the Holy Scriptures, we read of Christ's own passion, which saw Him through pain and suffering, and death for the Father's sake--and the resurrection Christ knew because of His passion. Hebrews 12:1-3 recounts that "Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or fainthearted." In our passionate work for Christ, we wait for Him daily, allowing Him to renew our strength so that we may continue to serve and not be weary, continue on and not faint. (Isaiah 40:31)
Many believers today express their passion through their actions, through their lives, perhaps we might learn from the following.
One afternoon I was looking for my Dad after I finished mowing the church lawn. He wasn't in his office, but his car was in the parking lot, so I opened the Sanctuary door to see if he was in there. He was. To this day I don't think he knows I saw what he was doing. He was on his knees with his face buried in his hands on the front pew. Quietly, I backed out of the room and shut the door.
I also recall several times seeing my Mother sitting in her chair, wrapped in her quilted robe, sipping a cup of coffee and reading her devotional. To this day, she still has her devotional material and her Bible beside her chair, and when I visit, I can still "catch" her walking with the Lord.
We don't build "spiritual fires" with our words. We build them with our actions. Have your children caught you "walking with the Lord" lately?
Though we don't wear our passion for Christ" on our sleeves", there should be an indication to others that we "walk with the Lord" through life, that Christ would be glorified before men as we live our lives by His leading.
Surrounded by a cloud of witnesses, may our lives continue to be transparent to Christ and may our service (even as Juan's in Peru) be unstoppable and passionate, worthy of the One who gave His all for us--revealing Christ's glory each day to each person we meet.