PASSIVE PASSION

                                                  PASSIVE PASSION
Deuteronomy 6:5 says "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength." In Romans, the apostle Paul calls it "zeal", not a word we use much today, but a word that we do understand. We might call it passion, though with less of an emotional emphasis. When Paul says zeal, he goes on to give a list of actions, not emotions. "With all of your heart, soul and strength" doesn't bring to mind the word passive. I think most would agree that passive passion is an oxymoron. (Don't you just love that word?) So what is passion? Let's start with what it is not. It's not emotion, at least not all of the time. It's not determination. It's not something we can work up, or create on our own. It's not gritting my teeth and forcing myself to live a certain way.Though the Israelites were often described as "zealous for the Lord", the Old Testament is a litany of how their determination to live for God was an abject failure. Over and over again, they failed to live up to God's standards. And so will we.  Yet we are commanded to live with zeal and with all of our strength.
    I believe that our passion will only come from an increasing recognition of His grace to us. That abundance of grace should leave us with an open-mouthed, wide-eyed, shaking our head kind of disbelief that He could love us in spite of our sin and failures. Like Davids cry of "Who am I?", it should lead to a humility beyond words. That sense of wonder at His grace should lead to a very deep passion in us. It should lead to service, sharing, and grace to others who may fail or hurt us. 
    Can you imagine the apostle Paul saying “I need to speak to the Corinthians about love, but after all, it is time for Monday night football. I’ll do that tomorrow.” Some nights I sit at home and think, shouldn’t I be reading about great men of faith, or books that would inspire or challenge me? And then I don’t. And I have no excuse, except that I’m tired and need to “unwind”. Is that valid? Sometimes it probably is. But I need to be careful about being too passive about my faith, about what stirs me to think, contemplate, and most of all motivates me to act.  Instead I am only passively passionate at best, maybe passionately passive at worst.
    Keith Green wrote a song that says in part, "Nothing lasts, except the grace of God, by which I stand, in Jesus. I know that I would surely fall away, except for grace, by which I'm saved." Nothing lasts but grace. Nothing. I should have, with every passing year, a little more awareness of my own sinfulness, and of the undeserved favor He has shown not only to draw me to Himself, but also to give me the strength and desire to live for Him.
    While we can't create or force passion in ourselves, we can pray that God would help us to see his grace to us. I believe that will lead to a deep and lasting passion for the things of God. I love the prayer of Moses. "If I have found favor in your eyes, teach me your ways, so I may know you, and continue to find favor with you."  That cycle gives me hope that I can ask God for His continued grace to create passion in me, to more deeply "know you".
    May passivity die a quick, merciless death in my life.