Day 12: Has Your Love Grown Cold?

Today, on Day 12 of our New Season fast, I have a vital question for you. It’s something I challenge you to ask yourself before the Lord, and to really be willing to accept whatever He shows you–and work to change it if something needs changing.

That vital question is this:

Has your love for Jesus grown cold? Have you abandoned your first love?

Or, is your first love for the Lord still burning brighter and stronger than ever?

Look at what Jesus said about people’s love growing cold in the last days:

“And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold” (Matthew 24:12 NKJV).

And look at what Jesus visited the apostle John in person to say about believers who have become lukewarm toward Him:

So, beloved, I ask you today: has your love grown cold? Have you become lukewarm? Have you lost your first love?

You can tell by your actions. For example:

• Matthew 6:21 says, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Do you still tithe and offer to the Lord? Even if times are unspeakably hard financially? Or have you given up on that, showing that your heart is no longer with Him?
• Do you still rise early to seek Him? Or are other things more important?
• Do you still slip away on your lunch break to pray and read your Bible alone, as well as eating?
• Do you still do what you do as unto the Lord, doing your very best in everything as service to Him?
• Are you still faithful in church attendance, or can you not be bothered much of the time?
• Do you seek GOD first thing in the morning? Or do you seek your phone, computer, TV, or coffee first, and end up squeezing God out of your schedule?
• Are you actively memorizing and meditating on Scripture, hiding God’s Word in your heart, that you might not sin against Him?
• Are you still walking in a habit of routine fasting and prayer, so you can seek God closer and know Him more?

O beloved. I tremble for the people of God. So many are being shaken, myself included. 

But we have to hang on, knowing that the Word of God says:

“And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart” (Galatians 6:9 NKJV).

Friend, let God be true and every man a liar. 

God’s Word is true; He is not a man, that He should lie. What He has spoken, He will make good for you. Even if we don’t understand the how and why and when and why not yet, God is still true and we have no right to doubt Him or dispute His goodness. 

He is literally holding the atoms and protons and neutrons and electrons of your body together by the word of His power, and He has promised that He will never leave you nor forsake you.

But so many people are mad at God. 

So many people are prioritizing their zoning-out, trying to escape or not feel their problems, instead of prioritizing God; and so God gets squeezed out of their schedule, out of first place in their lives, and out of their finances …

… when He **SHOULD** be first.

O help us, Jesus!

None of us are immune to losing our first love, beloved. 

Every single one of us has to work diligently to ​keep​ our first love, and to move forward with God when life threatens to knock us off the path. Every single one of us has to ​individually​ decide to keep on keeping on, and to be faithful to Him, whether we see or understand or know what He is doing or not.

Even if you’re mad at God, you still have to be faithful. (And ask Him to change your heart, and humbly acknowledging that He is perfect in all of His ways, and that the lack of understanding is on your part, not on His.)

Even if times are difficult.

Hey, I’m preaching to myself here, just as much as to anyone else. Things have been so difficult for me of late that there have been times that, as the apostle Paul wrote, I despaired even of life. BUT GOD … He is still faithful, and He still requires us to obey Him in all things.

Like seeking Him first.

Like tithing and offering financial gifts to His name, whether we feel like it or not (and even if it looks like the math isn’t mathing).

Like continuing to acknowledge His goodness, when your flesh (and that’s what it is: flesh) screams out that He is not doing what He should be doing.

Related: Prayer for Recalibration in Your New Season

Because He IS. He IS being faithful to you. 

He is ALWAYS faithful and good and merciful, and He can’t take those things off and exchange them for unfaithfulness like we take off a coat and put on another one.

God is true. He is faithful. But has your love for Him grown cold?

Selah. Stop, and think about it.

And then do what it takes to change what needs to be changed.

I love you in the Lord, and I am praying for you. Leave a comment below if this speaks to your heart today, will you? Blessings, and thank you!