Cold, calculating people may have other good qualities, but there is no room for coldness or even luke-warmness on the part of those who have once tasted that the Lord is gracious. With such, the love enkindled should lead to a consuming zeal. It was thus with our Lord Jesus, and this was one of the reasons why He was beloved of the Father. Let all who desire to be pleasing in the Lord's sight become so filled with the same spirit of zeal for righteousness and truth that it will consume them as sacrifices upon the Lord's altar. Thus they will be most pleasing and acceptable to Him through Jesus our Lord.
Zeal is an energetic devotion to, and lively activity in, a cause. Properly developed in a child of God, it is a combination of a number of qualities, prominent among which are faith, hope, love, activity, enthusiasm and obedience. In God's children, zeal is directed to the furtherance of God's Plan, and it acts toward principles and persons, varying as their attitude and relation to God's Plan varies. Accordingly, it acts favorably toward some principles and persons and unfavorably toward other principles and persons. The zeal of God's house, i.e., both the zeal that is for and peculiar to the Lord's house, implies an energetic devotion to, and activity for the Church according to the Word. As with Jesus, so with us, such a zeal is self-sacrificial, consuming us and all that we have and hope to be and to have as human beings.
REPRINTS
Josh. 24:15, 16; 1 Chron. 29:17; 2 Chron. 15:15; Ezra 7:23; Psa. 119:139; Eccles. 9:10; Isa. 62:6, 7; Matt. 5:13-16; John 9:4; Rom. 12:11; 1 Cor. 13:3; 15:58; 2 Cor. 4:8-10, 13, 16-18; Gal. 4:18; 6:9; Titus 2:14; 2 Pet. 3:14; Jude 1:3; Rev. 3:19.
