When the Fire of Faith Feels Like It’s Gone – Highlight Episode 383

Spiritual apathy often develops quietly, gradually dulling conviction and weakening a believer’s witness. Ray, E.Z., Mark, and Oscar explore how comfort, distraction, and self-sufficiency can cause hearts to drift from zeal for God’s glory into lukewarm indifference. They clarify that apathy isn't always open rebellion but a slow forgetfulness of eternal realities, the urgency of the gospel, and the call to obedience. Using Scripture, they show how comfort can lead to spiritual numbness and emphasize that repentance, humility, and honest self-assessment are vital for renewal. The discussion encourages believers to reject sentimental views of Jesus, submit to His authority, and diligently pursue Him through prayer and the Word. Ultimately, the gospel not only saves but also sustains, and renewed zeal arises from remembering our dependence on Christ, setting aside distractions, and responding promptly to God’s voice with courageous obedience.

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Learn more about the hosts of this podcast.
Ray Comfort
Emeal (“E.Z.”) Zwayne
Mark Spence
Oscar Navarro

Transcript

Zeal Versus Apathy

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Well apathy is the is is a camouflaged enemy, and we should shoot it down, it'll kill us. And uh it and we're gonna kill it before it kills us. And I uh one portion of scripture that thrills me like 10,000 other portions of scripture is where Jesus cleared the temple. The zeal of his house ate him up. What does that mean?

Jesus Clears The Temple

SPEAKER_03 0:19

It means that he was zealous to a point of violence in his seeking for the Father's glory. And if you can get that zeal, which is the opposite of apathy, um, you'll do things that you weren't wouldn't think possible in your life, if you can get that zeal. What criticism of me is I don't think of consequences. But sometimes that's good when when you're zealous for God. Jesus didn't think of Jesus didn't think of consequences. When he cleared the temple, he knew what the consequences would be. They wanted his death. Straight after that, they said, they conspired to kill him, but he didn't care because the zeal of God's house had eaten him up.

Defining The Slow Drift

SPEAKER_03 0:56

Wow. How do you define apathy?

SPEAKER_00 0:58

Maybe uh it's a slow drift. You know, we we we we talk about slow drifting. No, nobody. If somebody comes knocking on your door and it's a woman not fully clothed, you're not answering the door. Right. It doesn't start like that. It doesn't work like that. You know, if somebody offers you cocaine, you've never done drugs, you're never gonna take cocaine. Nobody, it doesn't start like that, right? There's always this um this progression uh downward of just avoiding certain things, avoiding certain people, unfortunately, and sadly. Um that slow drift is what we need to really uh be careful with. Where, hey, I'm gonna skip a family devo. I'm gonna skip going to church on Sunday because my team is playing and they're on television this week. You know, so we think that that that fire, it it once burned bright, and then it just begins to flicker. And before you realize that flickering becomes obnoxious. That's good, right? And so you don't fan it, what happens? It goes out, and you'd much rather have it out than have it begin to flicker. You you want that commotion, that noise of uh the spirit, and then we look at it like that the spirit begins to just be noisy and nosy, perhaps, even inside of our lives. You know, just give me a break, give me give me a moment. And there's this slow drift, and before we realize and recognize we're apathetic, we're we're numb to conviction. Oh, there's only there's only one F-word inside there. I I could go with that in that movie. I could, I could watch that doesn't this doesn't need vid angel or clear play. And then we begin to rationalize maybe two or three or whatever, and it just it's progressive.

Guarding Against Compromise

SPEAKER_00 2:44

You must always be on your guard, always putting on the full armor of God, always be alert, always be aware of your situation, your circumstance, having those bouncing eyes as Steve Arderburn talks about. Bouncing eyes in the midst of our circumstance, always wanting to say, search me and try me, see if there be any wicked way in me, lead me in the way everlasting. Because if you don't, there is a danger attached to that. So rebellion isn't necessarily completely outward, it's there's just a drifting.

SPEAKER_02 3:14

Yeah, yeah. And I I like that you highlighted that, Mark. It's not always overt, it's not always this, you know, expression of like, I don't care, I don't, but that slow drift, little by little, and you just get to a place where you you you say, How did I get here? It's it's almost like this wonder, but small degrees.

Comfort And Lukewarm Faith

SPEAKER_01 3:34

Ultimately, what we're talking about is what Revelation calls a lukewarmness. And lukewarmness is often misunderstood. We think, like when we hear it say, you know, it says you're neither hot nor cold, like certainly, certainly the scriptures aren't saying you need to be absolutely emotionally on fire or freezing cold, don't care. What that lukewarmness means, it means ineffective. You are ineffective for what God means to do through you in this world because you have an apathy. And as it pertains to the church, that letter was written to, their ineffectiveness and their apathy came from comfort. Like we are that comfortable city. If you have more than one pair of shoes, if you if your household has more than one car, you are in the top 1% of the world, and comfort will make you ineffective. It will grow your apathy for the gospel. When you are uncomfortable, when you are in deep need and deep pain, you your your your your mission in life, your call, the great commission is so much more clear. And more importantly, your dependency on God is so much more obvious. And that's the scary thing is that comfort makes us feel self-sufficient. And when we forget our dependency on God, we grow apathetic to God's will.

SPEAKER_03 5:04

Boy, that's really, really good. Because I was having similar thoughts. How can I bring this back to evangelism? And and uh and you did

Evangelism And Holy Urgency

SPEAKER_03 5:13

it. Um apathy is a numbness. What's the question? It's a numbness about what? It's a it's a numbness about the fate of the lost. This is what I think. Um it's a bedfellow of discouragement. When you get discouraged, you tend to become numb and apathetic about the Great Commission. And so what I've got to do as a Christian is saying no matter what life throws at me, um, the lost are still lost. Sinners are still going to hell. And so what we should be saying is, I have no rights as a Christian, I'm not my own. My commitment to the Great Commission is ironclad. I've set my face as a flint toward Jerusalem. I'm stubborn for the gospel. I I love that word flint because a flint is such a hard stone. If you hit it, you get sparks. And that's the attitude of mind, that's the attitude of mind that we should have to the Great Commission, to the last. Okay. Um So what does it look like? It apathy is camouflaged. I said that earlier, it's an enemy that comes camouflaged. What does it look like? It wakes up in the morning and thinks about itself. How can I make myself most happy today? It's self-centered, self-absorbed, and self-indulgent. But a life that's fueled by zeal for God's will is a life of self-denial. It wakes up in the morning and says, How can I serve God today? And from my understanding of scripture, to do that means to joyfully follow in the footsteps of Jesus, who said he was here to seek and save that which is lost. So nothing in this world matters for me. It's transient, it's chasing the wind, but most importantly, it's evil. You know, we said, Oh, life is vanity, this world's vain, but no, it's evil in God's eyes. Everything about it is like Lazarus after four days. It should stink in our nostrils because we want to do God's will. And so the Christian says with Jesus, let the dead bury the dead, we have something infinitely more important to do, and that's to seek and save that which is lost.

SPEAKER_02 7:05

So good.

Self-Denial And Daily Focus

SPEAKER_02 7:06

You know, I think one of the main causes of apathy and numbness is forgetfulness. You know, you think about like one of the beautiful days we experience here in California, which is close to every day. You know, there are days where I'll I'll walk outside and I live in a very, very quiet neighborhood. It'll be like one of those clear blue sky days. You can't hear any noise of cars, traffic, the weather is perfect, and there's a calmness. It's so hard at that moment to remember that the wrath of God is burning hot against evil, wicked sinners. I mean, that's not on my mind at that moment, right? So if I see my neighbor, hey Tom, how you doing? Hey, good. I'm not thinking if he doesn't know the Lord, like he is a breath away from sealing his fate to be consumed in the eternal lake of fire forever. And guys, look, I can't tell you how

Fighting Forgetfulness With Reminders

SPEAKER_02 8:06

many times I've praised God that I wrote something down on a sticky note because it was massively important. I was about to walk out the door, whatever, and I didn't, I was gonna take that thing with me or do that thing or whatever. And I'm like, oh, I'm so glad. It was a reminder. And I think what we need in our lives are constant reminders before our eyes because we know we're prone to wander and forget. The wrath of God is burning hot. Sinners are on their way to hell. There are believers that need encouragement who are broken right now and disheartened. When's the last time I picked up the phone and called that brother or sister, reached out to them? You know, there are there are people right now in convalescent homes rotting away with no family members witness uh visiting them or anyone sharing the gospel with them. There are people in prison right now that I could write to and reach. I mean, that's what I'm talking about, like being mindful of all that's happening when we're not aware that it's happening, but it's happening constantly.

SPEAKER_01 9:00

In our lives, are we attentive to God's calling? No matter what room we are in, no matter what situation are we in, are we listening for the Lord's calling on our lives? Or are we so busy and so distracted that we cannot hear his booming voice?

SPEAKER_02 9:18

Or we don't want to hear it because we have our own agenda. Yeah. That terrifies

Closing And Full Episode Invite

SPEAKER_02 9:22

me. Thank you for tuning in to this week's highlights from the Living Waters podcast, friends. We value your time. So we've created a bite-sized version of our podcast for listeners who want to get equipped without the jokes and fellowship. Be sure to check out the full episode every Thursday where we dive deeper into the topic. Until then, you can watch the full podcast episode available now on livingwaters.tv.