You hit Romans 12 and the focus of Paul’s letter changes dramatically. From doctrine to doing . . . from right teaching to right living . . . from the wonders of the mercies of God to the call to present our bodies as living sacrifices in view of those mercies. I look down at my Bible and count over 20 times were I have underlined a “command to obey” in chapter 12 alone . . . there’s more to come . . . and this in a letter concerned with righteousness by faith and the gospel of grace. And one of those commands has jumped off the page this morning . . . the command to “get warmer.”

“Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord.” (Romans 12:11 ESV)

Be fervent in spirit . . . that’s what caught my attention this morning. Fervent’s not a word I hear a lot . . . not a word I use in “normal conversation” a lot. The NIV says to “keep your spiritual fervor” . . . the NLT says to serve “enthusiastically” . . . Peterson says “keep yourselves fueled and aflame” in the Message. The Amplified Bible expands it this way: “Never lag in zeal and in earnest endeavor; be aglow and burning with the Spirit, serving the Lord.”

The original word for “be fervent” is the Greek verb zeo . . . “to be hot.” Be hot . . . be like boiling water . . . be glowing like fired metals . . . figuratively, be earnest . . . be passionate . . . be zealous . . . be on fire . . . get warmer!

By default, I probably tend to think of being passionate as something that is “hot-wired” into a person’s DNA . . . an inherited characteristic. But if I’m reading Paul’s exhortation here correctly, we’re not “born hot” but we are to “be hot” . . . an objective to pursue . . . a trait to cultivate. Don’t be slothful in zeal . . . don’t lag in diligence . . . don’t be lazy . . . but be hot. Passion is to be pursued . . .

And it’s not really clear as to whether we are to be “fervent in spirit” or be “fervent in the Spirit” . . . not sure it makes a lot of difference . . . because we are not going to self-manufacture zeal. A soul on fire for Christ is a soul infused by the Spirit living within it. Mine, I think, is to recognize the command and then, by His grace and through the Spirit’s power, to seek to obey it.

I need to reject being half-hearted in the things of the kingdom of heaven . . . being lukewarm should be as distasteful to me as it is to the Lord. By the way, that’s the other place where this word is found . . . in it’s adjective form (I think that’s right) . . . the Greek word zestos . . . aka “hot” . . .

“I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.” (Jesus, Revelation 3:15-16 ESV)

Paul says, “Be hot” . . . Jesus says He wants us “hot” . . . so, shouldn’t we pursue hot-ness . . . shouldn’t we seek to get warmer?

How? I’m thinking it starts first with desire . . . wanting to get in the game and break a sweat. Expressing, then, that desire through prayer . . . “Father, cultivate within me a passion for You and the things of Your kingdom!” And then pursuing . . . starts with the Word of God, I think . . . and the renewing of our minds which lead to the transforming of our lives. And then, it’s about caring less about what this world thinks and seeking to please only our “Audience of One”.

I recall a conversation I had with my brother many, many, many years ago. I had been saved barely a year . . . he had just come to Jesus only a few months prior . . . and I recall him saying to me, with passion in his voice and a glint in his eyes, “Pete, I don’t want to be a spark for Jesus . . . I want to be a flame!”

Oh, that I would seek to obey Paul’s command . . . that I would be fervent in spirit . . . that I would be boiling hot in THE SPIRIT . . . serving the Lord . . . for the glory of God. Oh, that I might be getting warmer . . .