Feed that Fire

At some point, possibly at Timothy's baptism, Paul was praying for Timothy and committing him to God's work. As Paul stood there with his hands on Timothy, it became clear to both of them (and likely the Christians gathered around at the time) that God was calling Timothy to the work of preaching the gospel. (A little further on in this letter, Paul reminds Timothy to do the work of an evangelist).

The point is this: Paul urges Timothy to fan into a flame the gift of God. That gift is the faith that makes a decisive commitment of itself to the calling of God. In other words God had work for Timothy to do. To do that work required faith, because without faith it is impossible to please God and everything that is not of faith is sin. Timothy's faith was not to remain a heritage or a credential to hang onto. Paul said, Timothy's faith in Christ was to be the method by which he got stuck into the life's work that God was giving him. You must feed the spark of your faith so that you have the fire and energy at work in you – the filling of the Holy Spirit – that will drive you and sustain you in your service of God. What is that service? What is that work you are supposed to be doing for God?

There are two parts to it. There is the common part and the specific part. The common part of the work you are supposed to be doing for God is common because it is the same for every Christian. It is not hard to find out. It is written. It is here in the Bible. It is things such as:

• being an obedient, respectful child to your parents

• working diligently at school, showing respect to teachers and resisting peer pressure to be rebellious

• looking out for the downcast and troubled and helping them as you are able

• acting in a pure manner in the matter of sex – keeping it within the safe and delightful boundaries of marriage

• living as the light in your workplace, being honest, helpful, kind and hard-working

• regularly reading, thinking about and living out the Bible

• meeting often with Christians to learn together, serve together and especially to worship and prayer

• always being ready to explain to people the reason for the hope you have

• killing sin in your life (because if you are not killing sin it will be killing you)

• building the Church

You don't need to wait for a calling to do those things. They are mandatory. They are the normal Christian life. They are what you do because they are the way Christ expresses his life in and through you. This basic Christian work for all disciples of Jesus is to keep in step with the Spirit and grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ – as Peter put it.

But there is also a You-specific part of your service for God. This is the particular Christian work he prepares you to do and the particular people he calls you to do that work for and with. This is usually something that becomes clearer and clearer as you get serious about the common part of your Christian calling. You have to fan it into a flame. Sadly, many Christians never occupy that specific calling God has for them. Their work lies like an abandoned patch of ground, covered in weeds. Jesus taught us the parable of the talents so we would be stirred up to avoid this dangerous failure. Some managers are given some money to invest while the business owner is away. Two of the three set the money to work and show a good return for the owner when he comes back. The third put the money aside (actually he buried it). He got into very serious trouble when the business owner came back to discover that the man hadn't even put the money in the bank to earn interest. It was taken from him and given to the man who had earned a large return. And he was sacked.

Fan into a flame the gift of God. Use what God has already given you. Share with others what you are learning from the Bible (start with your children, your brother or sister, your best friend, or your homegroup). Feed your faith. Get the spark into a flame. If there is an opening to do some kind thing for someone, do it and build on it so that it leads to more good works. If you have some success in praying for something, build on that and bring more things to God in prayer. If you find that someone you asked to come to a home group or church meeting comes, then ask some more people. If one of your children comes and asks an important question about life and about God, then turn off the TV and look for some more opportunities to talk about serious things. If someone is willing to come and study the Bible with you, then grab the opportunity and be sure that you pass on what you learned from it to others. Fan into a flame the gift of God. Add fuel to the fire. Go from small things to bigger things.

Now, when you are building a fire, you start with those fine fibres and you move on to slightly thicker sticks until you are putting on large logs because you have a bonfire going! This is exactly how it works spiritually. You have to keep upping the ante! You have to keep building the capacity of the fire to burn. You need to increase your hunger for righteousness by feeding it with bigger challenges and greater issues. The bigger the challenges that your faith in Christ overcomes – the more ready you are for even bigger ones.