It’s been more than a week now since that eventful cookout, but I noticed something that has stayed with me. To get charcoal to light, you put it in a pile, douse it in lighter fluid, and toss on a match. Burn! Burn!

Then you let it sit for ten or fifteen minutes to get hot. When you come back, you’ve got a beautiful pile of gray charcoal briquets, radiating delicious heat from a piping hot, glowing red center. I don’t understand quite how this works, but it seems that one piece of charcoal won’t stay lit by itself. It needs the heat of the other bits of charcoal to generate that red hot glow. In fact, when I came back to the grill with the meat, I noticed that one of the pieces of charcoal had rolled off the pile, and sat by itself off to the side: still black, cold, and useless.

So what’s the lesson here? Just this: the church is like a pile of charcoal. If you want to burn hot with passion for Jesus, you have to find a way to be near other people who are hot with passion for Jesus. God has given us that way: the church. A Christian who separates himself or herself from the church will not stay lit for long. The flame goes out, the center grows cold. It’s a sad thing to watch.

The scary thing is that with the church, it isn’t the physical proximity that makes the difference. Some people come to church, but their hearts aren’t in it. They’d rather be somewhere else.  In their hearts, they’ve rolled off the pile.

So here’s the point: If you want to burn with passion for Jesus, get on the pile.  Throw yourself into serving the church and getting to know people who are passionate for Jesus.  The fire of love for the Savior that is in them will spread to you, and warm your soul as well.

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