Day Seven: The Extraordinary becomes Ordinary
Revelation 2:4,
Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love.
I think we can all relate to the church of Ephesus mentioned in Revelation 2, when Christ commends them on their theology but condemns them for forsaking their “first love.”
Remember that love between you and your spouse when you were first dating or, for those who are single, that first love? You read every word of every letter or every text over and over. Time was fleeting and a precious commodity with which you couldn’t get enough of it together. Then over time a relationship builds and that excitement changes. That newness wears off but the devotion deepens; however, it can become very easy to take for granted. Or, heaven forbid, what you thought was extraordinary becomes ordinary. I can’t think of anyone who wants to be in that kind of relationship but that’s exactly what happened to the Church of Ephesus. They were hard working, perseverant, would not tolerate wickedness and did not grow weary but they forgot why. They were just going through the motions.
Ephesus had forgotten it’s first love. They had forgotten how they were made alive in Christ. Extraordinary, because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in our transgressions (Ephesians 2:4).
Remember this moment in your life? Extraordinary!
Without this realization in our life, how can we expect to worship God extraordinarily, when our relationship with God has become ordinary? Just like with Ephesus, God wants to have a deep relationship with us, not just going through the motions.
Reading: Revelation 2:1-7, Ephesians 2:1-10