“Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me,” (Psalm 51:10-12).

I admit I have been suffering from a lack of motivation in a major area of my life. If you know me personally, you know the journey toward improving my physical health is prosperous, as I strive to stay in a daily routine with my diet and fitness activities. My work-life is successful as well, with my boss increasingly encouraging me to take on more leadership roles and responsibilities. My home life is great. I cherish all the time I’m able to spend with my kids and have come to accept the days they’re not with me as important occasions to enjoy time alone or cultivate other relationships with friends, family, and peers.

However, I have realized despite all these wins, I have become sluggish in my most significant role, that of Christ-follower. After contemplating my pastor’s sermon today about owning our faith and listening to one of our youth members discuss overcoming his recent struggles, I can humbly admit that over the last several months, I have lost my spark in serving my Lord.

It started subtly, occasionally staying home to watch our Sunday service online because I was too lazy and too peopled-out to make the ten-minute drive to worship in-person with my church family. Then, it turned into becoming unavailable when it was my turn for children’s church coverage. I was no longer making any effort to attend Wednesday night fellowship dinners or worship services. I’ve not been keeping up with my blog posts…you see the pattern. While I still do my daily Bible study, it has become more routine than something I get excited about and hunger for.

Often, I become so focused on other areas of my life that I put God on the backburner. Therefore, I need a spiritual renewal.

Lydia

(Acts 16:6-40)

Lydia was a biblical woman whom Paul encountered on one of his many missionary journeys. On his way to Asia, the Holy Spirit directed Paul to change course and go instead to Macedonia where he ended up in the city of Philippi. When Paul and his companions arrived, they found there wasn’t enough Jewish presence in the city to support a synagogue, so believers had begun worshipping at a spot along the river.

Lydia was a Gentile who came from Asia Minor to Philippi to live and work. We can infer through scripture that she was prosperous in many areas of her life. She was a businesswoman specializing in selling fine, purple cloth to those wealthy enough to afford such a luxury. She appears to have been head of her own household with servants, though whether she was single or widowed, we don’t know.

Though she wasn’t Jewish, Lydia still yearned to know God, as she was gathered by the river on the Sabbath in a prayer meeting with other women. Through the preaching of Paul and his companions, Lydia’s faith and that of her household members was bolstered, and she hospitably opened her home to them.

“She was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul’s message. When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. ‘If you consider me a believer in the Lord,’ she said, ‘come and stay at my house.’ And she persuaded us,” (Acts 16:14b-15).

While staying with Lydia, Paul and his companions began being harassed on their way to the place of prayer by a female slave who was demon-possessed. “She kept this up for many days. Finally Paul became so annoyed that he turned around and said to the spirit, ‘In the name of Jesus Christ I command you to come out of her!’ At that moment the spirit left her,” (Acts 16:18).

The slave’s owners, who made money off the spirit’s fortune-telling through the woman, were angry to have lost their means of income. Therefore, they took Paul and Silas to the authorities who flogged them and put them into jail where they were closely guarded.

Imagine Lydia’s and the other new believers’ reactions when they found out Paul and Silas had been imprisoned. They had just put their faith in God and were saved, and now the ones who brought them the salvation message had been beaten and put into chains. Not a very encouraging experience for a new converter of Christianity. While we’re not told so, I’m sure Lydia and the others were in constant prayer for their new brothers in Christ during that time.

Not ones to lose hope or faith in God, Paul and Silas prayed and sang hymns to God while the guard and other prisoners listened. Then, an earthquake came and opened the prison gates and broke all the prisoners’ chains. The guard, ready to kill himself because he thought all the prisoners had escaped, rushed in to find all the prisoners still there. Astonished, the jailer took Paul and Silas to his home and fed them, and he and all his household were saved and baptized.

That just goes to show that God can use bad circumstances in our lives to bring about good. The next morning, Paul and Silas were released and told to leave the city. However, they returned to Lydia’s house where they met with her and other brothers and sisters of Christ from the area. Paul and Silas helped renew their faith by encouraging each one before they left.

What’s interesting about Lydia is that she is the first recorded convert to Christianity in Europe and subsequently is considered the first known member of the church at Philippi, a community of believers that would later help renew Paul’s faith during his time of imprisonment as noted in his letters from the Book of Philippians.

Lydia’s story reveals God’s desire for relationship with His children. God changed Paul’s course because He knew there were people who needed Him in Philippi. Thankfully, Paul was obedient to allow God to lead him where he needed to go.

Although we can get distracted from our walk with Christ or the constraints of this world can pull us away from God at times, He’s always there waiting for us to turn back and be renewed through the Holy Spirit. “[God] saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit,whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life,” (Titus 3:5-7).

How do we fix our spiritual shortcomings? How do we renew our fire for Christ? The same way we do in other aspects of our lives. First, we recognize and admit our failures to ourselves and to the Lord, repenting and seeking forgiveness for them. “Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy,” (Proverbs 28:13). God already knows our deficiencies and sins. We need to examine ourselves and be honest about them.

Then, we aim to overcome our struggles, pursuing help from the only One who can renew us, our Savior. “Yes, my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from him. Truly he is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.My salvation and my honor depend on God; he is my mighty rock, my refuge. Trust in him at all times, you people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge,” (Psalm 62:5-8). Once we admit to ourselves that we are fallible, weak, and burdened individuals who need Jesus, we can seek Him out to help us conquer those heavy loads.

Next, we make the effort to set aside time daily to truly immerse ourselves in our walk with Christ and interact with Him on a personal, one-on-one level. “Come near to God and he will come near to you,” (James 4:8a). I need to schedule personal time with God every day, not just quickly read my Bible study passage and accompanying verses when I have a free ten to twenty minutes just to mentally check off that accomplished task for the day. That does nothing to build my relationship with Christ and makes time with Him feel like more of an obligation than a privilege.

Finally, we purposefully cultivate relationships with other believers who share a spark for Christ. They can help ignite spiritual renewal in you, and together your collective light can reach others struggling in the darkness. “…God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin,” (1 John 1:5b-7).

Despite my progressive lackluster attitude toward my faith and Christ’s callings for me, I have recently made a point to become more involved in discipleship and fellowship activities to get my spark for Christ back. I helped lead a station at Vacation Bible School. I joined a local women’s Bible study group. I’ll be attending a women’s conference next month, and, after a month and a half, I have finally written another blog post.

I’ve found that when you fall off your course, you need to stop, get your bearings, turn yourself around, and then start taking steps toward your destination. Slowly, but surely, with God’s help, you’ll find your way back.

Therefore, if you’re like me and you need renewal from a spiritual slump, refocus your efforts on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith.

“But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint,” (Isaiah 40:31).

Have a blessed week!

-Becky