Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works.

Revelation 2:4-5

For Meditation

Why has the brook dried? Where is my thirst for you oh God, like the deer panting for streams of water… (Ps. 42:1-2)? Where is the freshness of my spiritual life?

I fell in love with you the day I met you at that meeting in the hotel conference room. The story of that young Doctor was irresistible. So, I run into your long-waiting embrace.

No one had ever loved me that way. Truth be told; I never knew what real love was until I met you. Your hug was so warm – my first from a Father I never knew. Hot tears rolled down my cheeks. A casualty of childhood divorce, I never had a hug from my father. “Is that how love is?”

In the car with my wife, I tried some old songs. Oh, how cranky that voice was! The strange stares from my children around the house couldn’t stop me. “What happened to Daddy?”

I was in love.

The dusty Bible came alive at last. “Where is Genesis?” But the laughs didn’t stop me. Excellent support from my new friends – a fellowship so warm and refreshing.

A meeting here, a meeting there. Never ending. “Tell me. I want to know Him more … How do I pray?” Then, you touched those glaucoma eyes; and that expensive Timoptic drug lost its invasion on our finances. Oh, what a Healer you are, Lord Jesus!

You had me completely from that day. I couldn’t have enough of you. The long trips to be alone with you somewhere; the golden nuggets I never knew were imbedded in the Old Book, ready to mine with your searchlight that dispels the darkness. Your principles for my new life. And suddenly, I could see. I could understand. I was free – free to sing your praises.    

So, what happened to me? Where is the zeal and enthusiasm I had when I first met you? What changed? Why have I replaced that joy with this counterfeit happiness and deceptive spirituality?

Prayer:
Father, I am on my face before you. As you told the Ephesian congregation to consider how far they had fallen and repent, I fall before you with a contrite heart. Forgive me for turning your love into a child’s play – a pretentious love affair without substance. Forgive me, Lord Jesus, and restore me to the place where you found me. I want to do the things I did at first. As David prayed, “Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me” (Ps. 51:12). I pray this in the name of your precious Son, Jesus Christ, my Lord, and Savior. Amen!