There is … the very real possibility in every Christian that he will learn to live at a distance from the love of Christ. Our corruption works in us a constant tendency to withdraw from Christ into the shadows. Days and even months can go past in the experience of the Lord’s people in which they are virtual strangers to the inward enjoyment of the love of Christ in their hearts. The soul grows callous. Layers of worldliness or coldness, like coats of paint on an old door, overspread the soul till we become accustomed to feeling nothing, enjoying nothing, expecting nothing, knowing nothing of those heart-warmings which are all-important to spiritual well-being. The next step is that the believer falls into a dead formalism. Prayer is got through as mere duty and routine. The Bible is read either to keep up appearances or to salve the weak voice of conscience. But spiritual exercises are now no longer enjoyed. The soul has no relish for the things of the Spirit. The consequence is that new companions are sought who are unfriendly to heart-religion. Then corners are cut in obedience to the Word of God. Finally, offense is taken at the lives of those Christians in the fellowship who are walking with God in ‘the power of godliness’. These are now criticized by the cold Christian as ‘too narrow’, ‘too strict’, ‘carrying things too far’, ‘extremists’, ‘troublemakers’, and then, at last, ‘not really belonging to our church’ because they are ‘old fashioned’ or ‘bigoted’.
Countless believers have declined in this way. Part of the tragedy is that they have fallen into coldness while convincing themselves that they were serving God. The scholar at his books persuades himself that he is too busy to spend an hour each morning in secret devotions. The pastor feels he cannot devote time to the cultivation of his soul because he has too many letters to reply to or even sermons to prepare. The missionary cannot wait on the Lord as he used to because of the pressures of language-study, and later on still, because of deputation work in the home country.
In these crafty ways does the devil lead God’s people by a staircase which winds ever downwards. But let us recall in the midst of our busy life that we may do ourselves and the cause of God great harm by our neglect of the soul. Let us once lose the dew of our spiritual freshness and we are at once a ready prey to compromise. How have so many evils come into the church but through men’s neglecting to cultivate daily fellowship with Christ? Like the Ephesian church in the Book of Revelation, they have been busily engaged in their ‘works’ and ‘labor’ and ‘patience’ and even their zeal for orthodoxy. But in the eyes of the Saviour they have ‘left their first love’ (Rev. 2:2-4) and risk loosing the very ‘candlestick’ altogether.
We may conclude … with a concern to revive in ourselves and in our brethren far more emphasis on heart-religion. As we view the state of the churches, this is the great priority everywhere. Nothing must be permitted to weaken our cultivation of fellowship with Christ.
The overwhelming concern of the Christian’s life must surely be to live unto God, upon God and for God. What else can the familiar words mean where the apostle Paul tells us, ‘For to me to live is Christ’?
What a force for good even a handful of Christians would be who lived in near intimacy with the Lord Jesus Christ! What prayers would be heard again in the earth as believers took hold of the sleeve of Christ and drew down the blessings! What power and authority for our preaching would flow out of his glorious ‘fullness’ (John 1:16)! What new life would be breathed into all our meetings if an army of …(believers) …emerged from their closets melted with gospel-love! What new levels of excitement would there be in our services if preachers came into their pulpits clothed in the garments of visible holiness! In a word, what might not be done for God if only we were not so ignorant of him!
Maurice Roberts, The Thought of God, (Edinburgh:BPC Paperbacks, 1993) pg.63-66.