Keeping your spiritual pace
The main point of today's passage is that Christians must have spiritual consistency and pace in order to enjoy peace with God.
Through John’s vision, Jesus Christ has encouraged us to try not to separate from him. “Forsaking your first love means they thought they were independent being from Jesus. Especially They tended to reject the teachings of Jesus when they made important decisions. It brought them into a spiritual tension with Jesus Christ.
The definition of peace in the English Dictionary is to represent the absence of war or conflict. Or “a state of tranquility” is considered peace. However, peace in the Bible is a bit different. Biblical peace is not only talking about the absence of conflict or living a life without problems. In Greek words, peace means unity. The secular idea of peace is to be separated from conflicts and put the problems out of your life, but the biblical idea is to “tie together into a whole.” As Christians, unity in love is our duty to work together in peace with people around us.
Jesus and Peace
Jesus is our peace because He came and destroyed the barrier to reconcile all humanity to God through the cross. God sent Jesus Christ because he wanted make peace with us. He wanted to restore our broken relationship and united with troublemakers. Jesus Christ came to us to be peacemaker between God and us. He sacrificed his life to destroy the barrier and made the way. After that, we can get into the place where the tree of life is, the place in paradise where we will unite with God in Jesus Christ. To be united with God and eat from the tree of life are Christian perfect peace.
Main Message
The Church at Ephesus was established around AD 50. Around 15-20 years after the death of Jesus Christ on the cross, Apostle Paul visited the city and stayed in the city for three years. When Paul stayed and taught them, they had an inner passion for spiritual gifts, wisdom, and the power of the Holy Spirit. Under the Paul’s spiritual leadership, they were becoming intellectual people in philosophy, theology, and doctrine. They did not tolerate the men who teach them a false gospel. At the same time, a silversmith business to make silver craft for pagan temple was down because of the teaching of the Jesus Christ. As people came to Jesus, they naturally stopped worshiping idols and buying temple-related crafts.
A man called out people who were related the business to get together and said “Men, you know we received a good income from this business, but Paul’s teachings were danger to lose our income from our business.” For two hours they shouted, “Great is Diana of the Ephesians!” And they forced Paul out of the city of Ephesus. After that, Paul never came back to Ephesus Church.
It shows us that excessive passion to pursue the financial advantage can crowd out the spiritual rhythms from our Christian lives.
Because of Paul's absence from the Church, The Ephesians were in danger of falling away from the teaching of Christ. The church was “busy,” but their efforts were not for God, but they were pursuing personal interest, wealth and public events rather than seeking Christ's reward and praise. This is why Jesus warned them: “You have forsaken your first love.”
Churches in America
It sounds like a warning for American churches and Christians. We are one of the most well-developed and technologically advanced countries in the world, but unfortunately, we are one of the fastest countries losing our spiritual passion for Christ.
We should listen a spiritual warning.
In verse 5, if they continue to fall away from their spiritual life and passion, Jesus Christ will remove their lampstand from its place (Revelation 2:5). The meaning of the lampstand represents the Spirit of wisdom and revelation of God's word. If Lord is moving his lampstand from people, we should live in a place in darkness. In Amos 8:11, "when I will send a famine through the land-- not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the LORD”.
Christian Journey
In Verse 7, Jesus Christ promised to provide the paradise of God to those who is victorious.
Apostle Paul said, if we are Christians, we should run a spiritual race for the prize. The prize means eating the fruit of the tree of life in perfect peace in union with God.
To win our spiritual journey, we should maintain the spiritual rhythm and pace because Christian's spiritual journey is a race as a marathon, not a sprint.
To win a Boston marathon, a runner should keep his speed 5 minutes per mile if he is a man. If a runner failed to keep his pace, he would lose the game. So, professional marathoners hire multiple pacemakers to keep their pace to break the world's best record. They know to keep the pace is the key to win a marathon.
However, all people could not keep their speed as five minutes per mile like professional marathon runner does but should keep their own pace.
Linda Down was born with cerebral palsy. She completed New York City Marathon. She did the 26 miles of the marathon in 11 hours. President Ronald Reagan invited her at a White House on October 27, 1982 and said, “no one in that marathon showed more heart and more courage.
Conclusion
All Christian should keep their own spiritual pace but not the exact the same kind of speed because each one of us has its own talent and ability. Do not stop your spiritual habit or practice but keeping your spiritual pace in your daily life.
Practical applications
Richard Foster said, “The desperate need today is not for a greater number of intelligent people, or gifted people, but for deep people” He also said that inward spiritual disciplines are meditation, prayer, fasting, and study are good spiritual practices that help us keep spiritual retheme, pace, and consistency to finish the Christian race to win the prize of heaven.
Here is a biblical application of how to keep our spiritual rhythm in order to be victorious on the Christian spiritual journey.
Daily: Give your best time of the day to God. Whenever you feel most awake, alive, think about God and sing praise him and pray. In James 5: 13 says “Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise.” Be united with God in your prayer and your praise God.
Weekly: Make one day your Sabbath and keep it faithfully. In Hebrews 10:25 says “And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.” Be united with people as a one body of Christ, God can make peace in your soul.
Monthly: Show your gratitude for all that God has given us and return to Him a portion of what we have received. Matthew 6:20 says that offering is one of the ways to put your earthly value into heavenly storehouse. It is never devaluated and disappeared.
Take time to participate in the body of Christ and seek deeper spiritual fellowship with God through the bread and blood of Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit.
12.04.2022 Pastor Cloud Poy
@ Photo on Unsplash
