Many are affected by spiritual ventricular fibrillation

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I recently spoke at Sanctuary, Black Rock Congregational's Sunday evening service, about taking our faith and putting into action.  As the second speaker in a summer series on James, my sermon was based James 2.  "In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead" (James 2:17 NIV).  I used several different analogies to make the point that if our faith does not spur us onto action, then we ought to reexamine our faith and the motives of our hearts.  One of the illustrations that I used to make the point that faith without action is nonsense is a body with a heart that does not beat.  A body can be in perfect shape and can look really healthy, but if the heart inside the body is not beating then that body is dead.  In the same way, if we have a really nice looking faith but it is not alive and producing something, then what good is it?

So I spent some time with Jesus this morning because sometimes I feel like I am a walking cadaver.  Sometimes I feel like I am going through the motions, slowly watching my heart slip into ventricular fibrillation (VF).  Very simply, ventricular fibrillation occurs when the heart's electrical impulses have gone haywire and the heart can no longer effectively pump blood.  The heart quivers, almost as if it were having its own anxiety attack, and has become nearly useless.  Automated external defibrillators (AEDs) are used to shock the heart out of this electrifying pattern (or lack there of) into a useful rhythm, restoring its ability to pump blood.

I feel like so many of us are on our way to VF.  We are caught up in the problems of this world, lost in the adventure of protecting ourselves from others and even from God.  We have sacrificed vulnerability for security, exchanged loving sacrifice for selfish comfort, and have planned out the days our lives without once asking the Lord of the universe what He has in mind.  Or perhaps we have given up the idea that Jesus has anything in store but work, bills, and family life.  We have lost our hearts of adventure, believing that God stopped granting us the desires of our hearts a long time ago.  In fact, I would dare write that some of us look back on the days of our sin and ask, "Wasn't it easier then?"  Friend, no road that leads to hell is enjoyable or easy.  All of these things that I mention (and many more) indicate that our hearts are operating in this horrible condition of spiritual ventricular fibrillation (SVF).

In my time with Christ this morning, I asked Him to restore my heart.  I asked Him to make me the man He designed me to be.  I told Him that I am on a quest to find my heart and to discover the valiant warrior He has placed inside of it.  In this brief conversation with Him, the image of a human heart flashed across my mind.  The heart was in ventricular fibrillation and there were two hands adjusting the "wires" of the heart.  When the hands were done with their work, the heart was shocked, nearly jumping out of its place, and then the image disappeared from my mind.  I felt peace, knowing that Jesus is shocking my heart back into a rhythm that pumps His mercy, love, forgiveness, grace and compassion into me and in turn, the world.

He starts with out hearts.  We must lay the on operating table of the Lord and allow Him to shock our hearts into their original rhythm so we may enjoy the circulation of peace, love and mercy.  We ought to take the medication of God's word and worship, participate in the exercise of fellowship and Godly accountability, and remember that we do not live on bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.  True story.