The end of Human Zeal
The End Of Human Zeal There comes a time when your zeal for the Lord just doesn’t cut it. I know this is a hard phrase to read and believe, a phrase maybe that offends our heart. Good, our zeal needs to be offended. Not because Zeal is a bad thing. Jesus Himself was consumed by zeal (Jn :17). What I am highlighting here is the place of human zeal, the place in our lives where we believe that it depends on us, that it depends on our desire. That if we muster up enough strength then we can be consumed by zeal for the Lord. The Lord wants you to know this, that your zeal is not enough! I am not saying that you are not enough, but I am saying that your zeal is not the answer for a burning heart; His is! Let’s look at Peter, he had zeal. When Jesus walked on the water towards the disciples in the night; Peter was the only one driven to step out of the boat and walk on the water (Matt 14:28-29). Ultimately he took his eyes of Jesus and began to sink, but more than likely he is the only man besides Jesus who walked on top of water. Peter had zeal, when they came to arrest Jesus in the night Peter drew his sword and cut off the ear of one of the guards. he was willing to fight for Jesus. But ultimately, we see just hours later Peter denying that he even knew Jesus during the Lord’s darkest earthly hours. Human zeal isn’t the answer and it will fail you. I even found myself in a period of my life where I had lived “on fire” for the Lord. Pursuing holiness in all areas of life, which we should do so “without which no one will see the Lord”. But eventually when the trials of life came my way, when people in the church hurt me and used me to their own advantage and then cast me aside; my zeal ran out. I was hurting, I was confused and I didn’t feel like loving God. But, this was a glorious intervention of God that He allowed me to come to the end of my own zeal. At the end of our zeal we find the endless burning zeal of God. It’s him who yearns jealously for us(James 4:5). It is He who desires us (John 17:24). As the scriptures declare to us “We love Him because He first loved us” (1 Jn 4:19). His zeal is the answer, His desire for us is the answer. When you finally get to the place where you realize your zeal isn’t it, but that it is His zeal that will sustain you; this is when you can live with a burning heart because you have stepped into His burning heart. Look back at Peter again, even after he denied Jesus 3 times, Jesus shows up on the shore while Peter is returning from a night of fishing in his boat and he sees that it is Jesus on the shore, so he jumps out and swims back to the shore. There was Peter with his zeal trying to show the Lord his devotion. But he didn’t understand the Lord’s devotion and commitment to him. So here is where Jesus delivered the final blow to Peter’s false perception of zeal and devotion; and He asks Peter a piercing question “Simon, son of John do you love me?”. Imagine the memory still fresh in Peter’s mind that just days before he had denied even knowing Jesus at Jesus’ greatest time of need. And here he had jumped out of a boat to swim to the shore to be with Jesus, to show Jesus that he was devoted and that he loved Jesus, that he would do the hard things to prove his devotion; and here Jesus asks him “do you love me?”. What piercing blow to Peter’s zeal. The scripture says here that Peter was grieved because Jesus said this to him. This is what Peter needed, a death blow to his own grip of devotion. Jesus then tells Peter how he will die and then simply says to him “follow me” (Jn 21:4-19) Jesus knew that as Peter followed Him and saw the burning heart of zeal and desire that He had, that this would free Peter from his own human efforts, his own reliance on his own zeal and devotion for the Lord. Jesus knew that as Peter answered those words to follow Him yet again, even after Peter’s own zeal had failed him miserably; that Peter’s heart would burn with zeal and love and desire of the Lord as He grew in understanding the heart of Jesus. Friends I want to invite you today to let go of your zeal, to let go of your devotion, to let go of your human effort to show the Lord how strong you can be and just fall into a place of dependency. The place of dependency where you are fueled by His desire for you, where you are fueled by his zeal to have mankind restored to Him to behold His beauty. That His heart burns so jealously with fiery love that there is not one thing, “life nor death, things present nor things to come” that can stop Him from desiring you and loving you. That is the place of freedom that will take you from striving and struggling and take you to the place where your heart burns because His burning heart has set you ablaze.
-Michael Woodward
