The Daily Word

 

My mother used to say, ‘If a job needs doing, it needs doing well’. Nothing original there, you may say. Over the years, to ‘do a job well’, I have learned covers many issues, particularly where people and change is involved. Early in my working career I learned that you could invent the best system of working that could be found, but if it didn’t have the support of the people who were going to run it, it would fail. On the other hand, a less-than-perfect system would succeed IF it had the support of the staff. But to implement anything new, you yourself had to believe in it.

The same principle applies to our Christian witness, walk and work. If we do not fully believe that following Jesus for life is the best thing for all people, then we will have a hard job to convince others. This is a major part of what the Bible calls ‘zeal’ and Romans 12 sums this up as Paul urges us to “Be never lacking in zeal”.

Zeal involves commitment and enthusiasm. Remember when the Apostle Paul, or Saul, as he was then known, demonstrated great zeal in persecuting the early Christians and he would go out of his way just to arrest even one of the ‘new religion’. He transferred that same zeal, after he was converted, in seeking to preach the Gospel to as many people as possible and traveling hundreds of miles to seek to win others for the Saviour. Read the life of Paul in Acts and see just how Paul put the Lord Jesus Christ as the only guiding light to his life.

His enthusiasm for preaching the gospel at one point, when he was putting his case to a Roman governor, caused the governor to say he was ‘beside himself’. If we want to see what constitutes ‘zeal’ compare our walk and commitment to that of Paul’s and indeed some of Paul’s colleagues who travelled with him on his missionary journeys.

God has saved us and placed us in a local church to serve Him through fellowship of our church, but our zeal can waver due to many conditions. But we go on in His strength, not our own. Let us pray for our commitment to be real and strong for our Saviour and to be filled with His Spirit, then we will be never lacking in zeal!

Article written by Brian Preston, Elder @SFGH Church