Risk Taking, part 4

It’s interesting how we tend to go from being saved by grace to thinking we need to maintain our salvation through works. Works do not save us, but we’ve somehow come to believe we stay saved by works, which develops into a “have to” frame of mind. Instead of doing the work just because we love Jesus, it seems we’re now doing them because we have to.

Jesus is not impressed at all with the “have to” spirit. Look at how He addressed the church in Ephesus. Revelation 2:2-3 “I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot endure evil men, and you put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and they are not, and you found them to be false; 3 and you have perseverance and have endured for My Name’s sake, and have not grown weary.” This is a picture of a “have to” church. They still did things for Jesus, but because they had forsaken their first love, Jesus, they no longer did things in the way they once did. Jesus even recognized their deeds, their toil, their perseverance, and the fact that they did not endure evil men. “But,” He says, “I have this against you, you have left your first love.”
 

I think each of us have a sense of what first love is. When you are first in love, you think of few other things than the one with whom you have fallen in love. You are taken up with the affections of the one you love. Listen to what Jesus tells them to do in verse 5: “Remember therefore from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first” Revelation 2:5.
 

“Repent and do the deeds you did at first.” They were already doing the deeds they did at first. They toiled, they persevered, they did not tolerate evil men – so it wasn’t exactly the things they were doing as much as it was the spirit in which they were doing things. When Jesus said, “Repent and do the things you did at first,” He could just as easily have said, “Repent and do things in the same way, or spirit, you did them at first.” They initially did things in the “want to” spirit; now it seems that have gone to a “have to” spirit. The “want to” spirit is the first love spirit. The “have to” spirit is a religious/legalistic spirit. 
 

Most congregations have three levels of experience with the Lord present within it. Suppose someone calls the church and asks if there are some people who can help them. So we make an announcement that someone needs some volunteers. The first level of experience is those with the “want to” spirit. They respond with, “Great! I have been waiting to be used by God.”
 

The second level of experience is those with the, “have to” spirit. Their response is something like this, “I suppose I’ll do it; I really don’t have any choice, do I? I’ll be there.” I think this is what Jesus was getting at concerning the church in Ephesus. They were busy with the work of the Kingdom, but not with a right spirit. Many times, the outward actions of those with the “want to” spirit and those with the “have to” spirit look exactly the same. The difference is the motivation behind their actions.
 

Then, there is the third level of experience, and it’s the most dangerous of them all. It’s the “I don’t have to” spirit. This is what, I think, often happens: after a person has been in the church for a while, they get a better understanding of grace and realize that there are many things they have been doing from a legalistic perspective, that they don’t really have to do anything (because they’ve already been saved and that’s good enough). Then they begin to realize the “freedom” they have in Christ – and claim for themselves a freedom from doing the work. Subsequently they are free to do nothing for the Lord, they’re just happy to be saved. Here you have gone from the “have to” spirit over to the “I don’t have to” spirit. 
 

My friend, the one I who spoke of putting the church before other activities when he was first saved, also said this as we talked through this study, “I was in my early twenties when I got saved. Shortly after my salvation, there was a state-wide retreat for college-aged people. It was held in the Black Hills at the lodge at Bethlehem Cave. It is really a beautiful setting. We had a great time there. It was the first time I’d ever gone to something like that.

When I got back I was telling my pastor about the retreat when he said something that set me back a bit. He said, “There was not any other college-aged people from our church was there?” I hadn’t really thought about that until he mentioned it. I said, “Now that you said that – you are right, there weren’t any others from our church there.” Then I asked, “Why is that?” He said, “Because they’ve all been in the church for a while, and you really can’t get them interested in spiritual things.”

That didn’t make any sense to me. Why wouldn’t those who had been in the church a lot longer than I had, not be interested in going to something that would help them grow spiritually. What I began to realize is that most of them had the “I don’t have to” spirit. And this is what I have regularly observed over the years.” 

Continued tomorrow