When writing to the church in Laodicea, John said: ‘You’re not cold, you’re not hot – far better to be either cold or hot! You’re stale. You’re stagnant’ (Revelation 3:16-17 MSG). These seem like harsh words, but they can often apply to us too. We can become lukewarm in our faith, we lose our passion for God and our spiritual life becomes mundane and stationary. That’s not how God wants us to be. We need to be growing our faith and moving forward. The Bible says: ‘Exercise daily in God – no spiritual flabbiness, please! Workouts in the gym are useful, but a disciplined life in God is far more so, making you fit both today and forever’ (1 Timothy 4:7-8 MSG). Just as athletes need to keep training to stay fit and healthy, we need to keep training ourselves to be spiritually fit and healthy, so when we recognise that we’ve let our faith become lukewarm, we need to take action. Spiritual growth is about progress, not perfection. We can work on it bit by bit. God doesn’t expect us to be able to have strong and passionate faith immediately. He’s willing to work with us as we begin to exercise it again. So, we need to stop procrastinating and avoid perfectionism. But how can we exercise in God? We can devote more time to building our relationship with Him through prayer, reading the Bible, worshipping and spending time with other Christians. When we come to Him, He comes to us. ‘Come near to God and he will come near to you’ (James 4:8 NIV). And He can take our cold hearts and set them on fire for Him again.
