How can I overcome spiritual apathy?

I would add, as a further help, that if there is heart indifference, or even sloth, it is not surprising that we do not find deliverance, or if there is a walk contrary to the mind of the Spirit, or what a Christian should seek, deliverance by the power of the Spirit is hardly to be looked for. But further, if a person who has found deliverance is so walking, though the soul may not get back into uncertainty as to its standing, or return into a state of Romans 7, yet the Spirit which is the power of this new state, being ever grieved, and so communion with the Father and the Son lost, though not the knowledge of the relationship, the affections not being filled with what belongs to this new position — all is confusion and obscurity in the soul. One is a child, but where is my father? I belong to heaven, but where for me is the heaven I belong to? What I know of both serves but to make me sensible of my actual loss of them. Hence, though it is not subjectively a question whether I am a son, it is objectively a failure of what a son enjoys, so that darkness is on the spirit. I hardly know whether I can call myself so, though I do not doubt it. For this the only remedy is humiliation, and drawing near to the Lord, and giving up the hindering idol.

Firstly. In the church in Ephesus the overcomer, judging the root of all failure, gets back to first love. May we not say that the only way to regain first love is to get a fresh sense of the love of Christ? "We love Him because He first loved us". We have not to be occupied with ourselves by looking within at our hearts in the effort to awaken love for Christ, but to look away to Christ to discern afresh in His heart His unchanging love for us, that enables faith to say "He loved me and gave Himself for me". To get back to first love, we may well pray the prayer of Ephesians 3 that the Father would grant us according to the riches of His glory to he strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man: that Christ may dwell In our hearts by faith, to know the love of Christ that passes knowing.

In chapter 2:9, you get a wonderful characteristic of those that are of God, “in Christ Jesus;” they “love Him.” In the cross the love has been expressed, and we have known and believed it, and love Him because He first loved us. Perhaps we are rather prone to think of our love to God, and may be often lamenting that we love Him so little; but it was His love to us expressed in the death of Christ that awoke love in our hearts to Him, and it is occupation with that great and blessed love of His that strengthens our poor, feeble love to Him, for feeble it is at beet. Perhaps you say, I enjoy His love to me but little, and I greatly grieve over it. But do you know that you may enjoy it a very great deal more if you go the right way about it. Do not imagine that you can work yourself up into any state of religious fervour which will make you more sensible of His love to you. No, let me say to you what I would say to my own heart as to this, “Get to the Lord about it.” Tell Him everything. All about your coldness and hardness of heart and want of interest in His things, and tell Him you want to know the love of God better, and do not say it all as a formal prayer, but let it be the cry of a heart yearning after Himself, and I know what He will do for you; He will take you by the hand and lead you into the warm sunshine of that love till its beams shall quicken that poor dead heart of yours into life and joy unspeakable. The apostle says, “The Lord direct your hearts into the love of God.” Who else could do it? You cannot command your heart’s affection. You cannot love anyone by force of will. You have not control of your love. It is only as you enjoy the love of God that you will love Him, and no one can lead you into the enjoyment of that love but the Lord, and He has the utmost delight in doing this for His own enjoyment. You say, I have been wishing my heart were not so hard, and I have been troubled about it. My only answer is, get into the Lord’s presence. Go direct to Himself. You will find Him gracious. Get into His company, leave man, leave earthly associations, get away from the presence even of the people of God for a little; go to your own room, anywhere, so you are alone, and have all out in His presence, and He will surprise you with what He will do for you.

If you are a backslider, and have become cold of heart; if divine things have lost their lustre and reality to you; if a distance has come in between your Lord and you. What do you need? You need to come afresh into the realisation of what Jesus suffered for you. You need to stretch forth your hand afresh and come into contact with His wounded hands and side. Say, The Son of God loved me, and gave Himself for me. It will bring you where it brought Thomas, prostrate on his face at the Master's feet. It will make you cry as he cried, "My Lord and my God."

The "mighty revival" for which your correspondent sighs must begin within himself, and in the rest of us who feel the "general dearth of spiritual life and blessing." It will commence when we say to the Lord, not with our lips only, but in the heart, "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?" If we do not place ourselves unreservedly at His disposal we become formal and dead. It is the bringing of "a certain part," and holding back the rest for SELF, while saying "Lord" to Him, that grieves the Holy Spirit, stops His gracious work within us, and makes all our efforts in service futile.

The “mighty revival” for which your correspondent sighs must begin within himself, and in the rest of us who feel the “general dearth of spiritual life and blessing.” It will commence when we say to the Lord, not with our lips only, but in the heart, “Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?” If we do not place ourselves unreservedly at His disposal we become formal and dead. It is the bringing of “a certain part,” and holding back the rest for SELF, while saying “Lord” to Him, that grieves the Holy Spirit, stops His gracious work within us, and makes all our efforts in service futile.

The expression of the apostle's heart to Timothy, as well as his longing desire to see him, is but preparatory to the appeal contained in verses 6-8. It is indeed the groundwork on which he builds up his exhortations. He thus drew the heart of Timothy to himself to prepare him to receive his message. "Wherefore," he says, "I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by the putting on of my hands." (v. 6.) By the light of the first epistle we may understand the whole history of Timothy's gift. In chap. 1 we find that he had been pointed out as a chosen vessel of gift by prophecies (of course, in the assembly), and that Paul accordingly committed to him a "charge." 1 Tim. 4:14 further teaches that the bestowment of the gift, "given thee by prophecy," was accompanied by "the laying on of the hands of the presbytery;" and now we learn that it was the apostle himself, "the presbytery being associated with him," who was the instrument or channel appointed by the Head of the Church for the actual communication of the gift to Timothy. It is the ascended Christ who, having led captivity captive, gave, and still gives, gifts to men, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. And Timothy was honoured, in the sovereign favour of God, in being made a vessel for the blessing of the saints. It is of this he is reminded by the apostle, and charged at the same time to "stir up" the gift of God. Previously he had been warned not to "neglect" it (1 Tim. 4:14); now he is more urgently exhorted on the same subject. This points to a common danger. When there is a real action of the Spirit of God among the saints, when His power is demonstrated in edification and restoration, or in conversion, the ministry of the Word is welcomed and appreciated; but in times of coldness, indifference, and apostasy, the saints will not endure sound teaching, but after their own lusts they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears, and they will turn away from the truth. (2 Tim. 4:3-4.) Then comes the danger to the servant of the Lord. Seeing that his ministry is no longer received, he is tempted to retire, to lapse into silence, or to resolve with Jeremiah not to speak any more in the Lord's name to the people. (Jer. 20:9.) As knowing the heart and the tendency of Timothy, Paul provides against this snare by urging him to rouse himself, and to stir up, by constant use, the gift he had received for the correction and edification of the Lord's people. The greater the confusion and departure from the truth, the greater the need for a real and living ministry; but in order to maintain this, the servant must learn to draw his strength and courage, not from the faces of the people, but from abiding and secret communion with the Lord.

Then comes the danger to the servant of the Lord. Seeing that his ministry is no longer received, he is tempted to retire, to lapse into silence, or to resolve with Jeremiah not to speak any more in the Lord's name to the people (Jer. 20:9). As knowing the heart and the tendency of Timothy, Paul provides against this snare by urging him to rouse himself, and to stir up by constant use the gift he had received for the correction and edification of the Lord's people. The greater the confusion and departure from the truth, the greater the need for a real and living ministry; but in order to maintain this, the servant must learn to draw his strength and courage, not from the faces of the people, but from abiding and secret communion with the Lord.

"Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up (stir up in a "flame" or "rekindle") the gift of God, which is in thee by the laying on of my hands." God had used Paul as the instrument in bestowing a gift upon Timothy. This gift needed rekindling. The danger of decline, which began even then to be manifested, is evident by this exhortation. The rekindling of a gift needs constant use of the Word of God and fellowship with the Lord, as well as a prayerful exercise of the gift itself. And the Spirit given of God to minister is not a spirit of fear, or cowardice, fearing men and conditions, but a spirit of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. Therefore he was not to be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, which men began to reject, nor of him, who was now the prisoner of the Lord. It was Timothy's blessed calling and privilege to be a partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God. He was not to shrink from the reproach and difficulties which then set in, but to endure it all, enabled by His gracious power.

Whatever was the nature of Timothy's special gift, he had evidently allowed some feeling of discouragement to hinder its proper exercise. The New Translation of J. N. Darby uses the word "rekindle" rather than "stir up." Whatever was to transpire - whether a general turning away from Paul and his doctrine, or even his being put to death - Timothy must not give in to all these pressures of the enemy! God's gift to him remained, and should be rekindled and used in a full and real way, for it surely was the more needed in times of departure. We learn here also that Timothy's gift was given in an exceptional way, by the putting on of Paul's hands. This is certainly extraordinary, for gift is normally given by the independent operation of the Spirit of God (1 Cor. 12:7-11). But the Spirit of God in Timothy's case used Paul as the instrument, while accompanied with "the laying on of the hands of the elderhood" (1 Tim. 4:14), that is, with their fully expressed fellowship.