"Passion for Jesus is not some phrase to be used lightly, or because it's popular. Phrases like this one can create a spiritual smoke screen which can fool us and others into thinking we are really spiritual people. But only God knows. He is not interested in what is popular or what has a good ring to it. He is, always was, and always will be, most interested in one thing -- that our entire lives be given over to Him. He doesn't just want our passion. He wants our ALL."
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We must die to our dreams, our desires for our own lives, or pursuits and ideas of what it means to be a Christian. We must truly surrender all, not just say it. Really, we must have a passion to die for Jesus, and to die for our brothers, to become a life dead to self but alive to God. It is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me. Then the passion for Jesus is not really my own but that of the Spirit of God within me, teaching me to love Abba Father.
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Have you ever heard the phrase "Passion for Jesus?" The first time I heard this it really stopped me right in my tracks. 'What does that mean?' I thought. Well, there are lots of "sayings" out there but there is only one Truth. That is Christ. Truth is Christ. My experience is you can say "Jesus" and you can say "Christ," and those two can mean something quite different. But that's a topic for another post.
Right now, I just want to address this "passion" for Jesus. Quite honestly I never thought of passion outside of a passion for my wife. I desire her presence and her person in every way; I am one with her and continue to grow in this one-ness the more we grow to know one another. When I think of “passion” I think of all four kinds of love – eros, storge, philoeo, and especially, agape. It’s a whole and complete love which is deep and full. This is the sort of love I long to have for my first love, God the Father, whom I often call Abba. I call Him Abba sometimes in prayer because His son and my Messiah also called Him Abba. By His example He showed me I too can know the creator of the universe with the same intimacy.
That's pretty passionate.
Passion for Jesus is not some phrase to be used lightly, or because it's popular. Phrases like this one can create a spiritual smoke screen which can fool us and others into thinking we are really spiritual people. But only God knows. He is not interested in what is popular or what has a good ring to it. He is, always was, and always will be, most interested in one thing -- that our entire lives be given over to Him. He doesn't want our passion. He wants our ALL. If I only give my feelings of love and passion to my wife our marriage still falls short of its true potential. But when I seek to die for my spouse, giving up everything in my life to make her happy, willing to change for her, lay down my dreams for her, and give her everything within me, my marriage goes deeper than mere passion.
The same is true of our relationship with God. Honestly, I don't even think we can have a passion for Jesus. I think it's impossible. "I" cannot have a passion for Jesus because "I" am a fleshly, weak, and fallen creature. If there is to be any passion within me that passion must come from God's Spirit, not from my own. There is only one job truly before me, that is, "I" must die. I need a "Passion for Death to Self." Then maybe there will be some shred of hope for love toward God.
We must die to our dreams, our desires for our own lives, or pursuits and ideas of what it means to be a Christian. We must truly surrender all, not just say it. Really, we must have a passion to die for Jesus, and to die for our brothers, to become a life dead to self but alive to God. It is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me. Then the passion for Jesus is not really my own but that of the Spirit of God within me, teaching me to love Abba Father.
I do not carry the capacity for such a deep love as this divine love. I only carry the flesh. So my flesh must die so that I might live a new life in Christ my Lord; that He might receive the glory and praise for the passion within me for it comes from His Spirit. The passion for Jesus is a new life, once distant and unknown to me, but now made real by the Spirit, and by the Church, which possesses His Spirit, and calls me even deeper into a love which goes beyond mere passion for Jesus. It goes to my very core; to the fabric of my being and it calls me to complete desolation of self. Then.....Once dead, now made alive.
That's pretty passionate.
