Passion and Perseverance
July 24th 2008 00:35
I haven’t written in this blog for awhile. I never made the conscious decision to stop writing. I didn’t wake up one morning and go I don’t think I’ll write in my blog for awhile. I guess I just lost the passion for it.
When I first started, I was full of passion. I was like a young girl who has just fallen in love. All I could think about was my blog. Every television show I watched, newspaper article I read, sermon I listened to, person I talked to seemed to give me ideas for my blog. I would mentally compose blog posts while taking the kids to school, making dinner, doing the housework. I lived for my blog.
But passion like that is rarely long-lived. One of my failings is that I usually heaps of enthusiasm and passion when I start something, but I have no perseverance. The passion dies down just as quickly as it started. My writing progress is more like a series of short-term love affairs, rather than a marriage. I prefer short stories and blogs to longer works. Although I would dearly love to write a novel one day, it worries me that I may never have the commitment to do so.
I doubt that I’m alone in this. In fact, I would hazard a guess that today’s Gen-Xers and Gen-Yers tend to pay more attention to initial passion, than they do to long-term perseverance. Past generations made life-long commitments to jobs and marriages. Today’s generation will usually have numerous jobs and romantic partners. When the passion dies down, we go looking for something new.
Now I’m not suggesting that commitment is the be all and end all. I’d be the last person to recommend a lifetime of misery in a job or marriage you despise. But the fact remains that life is more than just initial passion. Initial passion always dies down. In order to make a success of anything, you have to stick with something even after it does. Losing your initial passion for something is not always a reason for giving it up.
I think the churches that most appeal to younger people today – most noticeably the Pentecostal churches – appeal to this idea of passion. Their worships sounds like a series of love songs. People jump up and down like they’re at a Beatles concert. Words and phrases like “passion” and “on fire” and “in love with Jesus” are used often.
I don’t think this is necessarily bad. I love for people to have passion for God. But passion of that kind is usually a fleeting thing. There are some people who apparently seem to keep that kind of passion for their entire lives. However, for most people, this kind of passion doesn’t last. It’s like the initial stages of a romance. One of the things that makes it so wonderful is that it doesn’t happen very often and it doesn’t last very long.
Although Pentecostal churches attract a large number of new members, they also lose quite a bit too. The average length of stay in a Pentecostal church is shorter than that of mainstream churches. I’ve seen people myself who start going to church and seem to be so full of passion for God and for Jesus. Six months later, they’re not even going to church. So what happened?
I believe one of the reasons for this is the church’s focus on appealing to those kind of passionate feelings. We are taught that Christians should be passionate about God and about Jesus. This is usually pretty easy in the beginning of our Christian walk. But it becomes harder when the initial thrill wears off. And when it does, what do we do? Do we try to get it back? Do we lose interest? Do we perhaps even think that there’s something wrong with us because we don’t feel the way we used to?
In Hebrews 12:1 it says “and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” I like that, because as someone who is good with the initial passion, but not so good at the commitment thing, it’s a good reminder for me. Being a Christian is not just about wonderful feelings and passion. These are good things. But it’s also about perseverance. It’s about sticking with something because you know it deserves your commitment, not just because of the way you feel.
When I first started, I was full of passion. I was like a young girl who has just fallen in love. All I could think about was my blog. Every television show I watched, newspaper article I read, sermon I listened to, person I talked to seemed to give me ideas for my blog. I would mentally compose blog posts while taking the kids to school, making dinner, doing the housework. I lived for my blog.
But passion like that is rarely long-lived. One of my failings is that I usually heaps of enthusiasm and passion when I start something, but I have no perseverance. The passion dies down just as quickly as it started. My writing progress is more like a series of short-term love affairs, rather than a marriage. I prefer short stories and blogs to longer works. Although I would dearly love to write a novel one day, it worries me that I may never have the commitment to do so.
I doubt that I’m alone in this. In fact, I would hazard a guess that today’s Gen-Xers and Gen-Yers tend to pay more attention to initial passion, than they do to long-term perseverance. Past generations made life-long commitments to jobs and marriages. Today’s generation will usually have numerous jobs and romantic partners. When the passion dies down, we go looking for something new.
Now I’m not suggesting that commitment is the be all and end all. I’d be the last person to recommend a lifetime of misery in a job or marriage you despise. But the fact remains that life is more than just initial passion. Initial passion always dies down. In order to make a success of anything, you have to stick with something even after it does. Losing your initial passion for something is not always a reason for giving it up.
I think the churches that most appeal to younger people today – most noticeably the Pentecostal churches – appeal to this idea of passion. Their worships sounds like a series of love songs. People jump up and down like they’re at a Beatles concert. Words and phrases like “passion” and “on fire” and “in love with Jesus” are used often.
I don’t think this is necessarily bad. I love for people to have passion for God. But passion of that kind is usually a fleeting thing. There are some people who apparently seem to keep that kind of passion for their entire lives. However, for most people, this kind of passion doesn’t last. It’s like the initial stages of a romance. One of the things that makes it so wonderful is that it doesn’t happen very often and it doesn’t last very long.
Although Pentecostal churches attract a large number of new members, they also lose quite a bit too. The average length of stay in a Pentecostal church is shorter than that of mainstream churches. I’ve seen people myself who start going to church and seem to be so full of passion for God and for Jesus. Six months later, they’re not even going to church. So what happened?
I believe one of the reasons for this is the church’s focus on appealing to those kind of passionate feelings. We are taught that Christians should be passionate about God and about Jesus. This is usually pretty easy in the beginning of our Christian walk. But it becomes harder when the initial thrill wears off. And when it does, what do we do? Do we try to get it back? Do we lose interest? Do we perhaps even think that there’s something wrong with us because we don’t feel the way we used to?
In Hebrews 12:1 it says “and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” I like that, because as someone who is good with the initial passion, but not so good at the commitment thing, it’s a good reminder for me. Being a Christian is not just about wonderful feelings and passion. These are good things. But it’s also about perseverance. It’s about sticking with something because you know it deserves your commitment, not just because of the way you feel.
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