I'm a horrible Lukewarm person.

I have been reading Francis Chan's book Crazy Love lately since coming home for summer break & I must say that my heart is heavy with what I have learned about myself from the past two chapters I have read.

Chapter Four talks about being lukewarm & what that looks like. A characteristic of being a lukewarm "Christian" is that they assume they are good soil. And this past year at college, that is exactly what I thought of myself. I realized that I compared myself to my friends who are not as "godly" as I am. What a horrible person I am! I thought during the past couple of weeks that since I am stronger than some of my other friends, I must be a pretty good Christian girl. I deserve a slap in the face for thinking this for so long. I could not honestly say that I want to share with Christ; in the power of His resurrection, in His sufferings, and becoming like Him in His death. (Philippians 3:10)

The chapter went on talking about how lukewarm people do not want to be saved from their sin, just from the penalty of their sin. Chan started comparing lukewarm to Pharisees, how we compare ourselves to the secular world saying we are grateful that even though we are not radical for Jesus, we are better than the guy who is down our street. Lukewarm people's lives wouldn't look much different if they stopped believing in God. They are not that much different from the unbeliever. Wow.

Then I got to chapter five today, "Serving Leftovers to a Holy God". Chan immediately said after opening up the chapter, "Churchgoers who are 'lukewarm' are not Christians. We will not see them in heaven." This might be stupid of me to just now realize this but I did always wonder what would happen to those who were lukewarm & the end of time came for them. But now I get it. The verse in Revelation where it says that God is going to spit those out who are in the middle of hot & cold.Lukewarm 'Christians' are not going to be saved when the day of judgement comes. If I say I love Him but don't do what He commands, I do not truly love Him. Scary to even think about, isn't it? Of course the beauty of God's grace covers our mistakes & attempts, if it didn't, we wouldn't called it amazing grace. God is a forgiving God, He wants us to succeed & wants us to actively pursue Him. To say that if we mess up that we were never truly a Christian is untrue because then no one would enter the Kingdom. God knows that we mess up, even as His children who have been cleansed by His blood because we are still, sadly, human.

What should really matter to a believer of Christ is their relationship with God. Not the major we are working towards, not our summer job, not even our future spouse, but actively pursuing the Creator. Because He is what matters in the end, He is eternal. God commands us to love, to put the 1 Corinthians version of love in practice every day when it comes to Him and our relation to others.

What I have come to realize is this. I believe my first year of college, I was not actively pursuing the Lord. I did not swim up the stream daily, and because of that, I have slowly started to drift downstream. Its not like I have done anything wrong in the eyes of the world. I haven't used foul language, started to drink or smoke, or anything BIG like that. But my heart was not completely focused on God, I didn't meet with Him daily as I use to. Probably not alot of other people recognize it, but I know where my heart is & how much it needs to be centered more on God's love.

Not sure why I wanted to share this but if I could say anything to you guys as my siblings in Christ, it would be Don't assume you are good soil. We should never compare ourselves to others when it comes to who is godlier than the other. Pride comes before the fall. We should always look to God when we measure ourselves.