Apathy: The Silent Faith Killer

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Start the Day Right

In the quiet of the morning I wipe the sleep from my eyes and greet my Father. “Good morning, Lord.” 

This may seem strange. To some, it may even be cause for a psychiatric evaluation, but I believe that God is there, listening, waiting, and longing for me to acknowledge Him in my life. 

Beyond this, I also believe that He is waiting for me to listen to Him and wants me to long for Him as He longs for me. This is my relationship with God. 

In the bad times I can call on Him and He gives me strength, but I need Him even more in the good times than in the bad. Why? Because in the good times I run the chance of forgetting; I run the chance of becoming apathetic. 

Apathy Leads to Hard Hearts

Apathy is a silent killer of faith. It allows us to ignore the obvious and dismiss the good things and special people in our lives without second thought. Apathy does not just happen. It builds slowly, like a scab across our consciousness. 

First, we forget to be thankful. Gratitude reminds us who we are in comparison to who God is. He is our savior, our healer, our friend, and our Holy Father. He has provided all we have need of and is the one who takes delight in actively blessing us. When we forget to be grateful we forget to acknowledge all God has done, all He is doing, and all He can do. 

Then, when there is no gratitude, we turn from compassion. We were once aware of the active grace of God in our lives, but since we have left our gratitude behind we now forget how far we have come. Now when we see someone who is desperate, lost, hurt, and in need of love, we are no longer moved. We do not feed the widow or the orphan any more. Instead we walk in our own righteousness, and say callous things like “get a job” or “it’s their own fault”. We feel superior to others and we lose the one thing that set us apart from everyone else: love. 

Finally, after the gratitude is gone, and the compassion of Christ is almost non-existent in our lives, then indifference to God begins. After all, we have relied on our good fortune and ourselves for so long, why do we need to acknowledge God at all? Perhaps, in our prosperity and wholeness we forget that we are truly poor in spirit and broken. We trade the truth of our need for God for a lie (that we are fine without Him). Apathy has set in and now only tragedy will shake us. 

We see it in the Bible over and over with the children of Israel. Recently we saw it in 9-11. For a moment we forgot our quarrels, we forgot our agendas, and we came together: grateful that we were still here, and we called on God for guidance and help. 

So I say “good morning, Lord” and I will be grateful every day because I can never go back to the way I was without God. I will strive to maintain an attitude of gratitude, a soft heart toward my fellow man, and a humble nature that says “there but for the grace of God go I”. I will personally and publically acknowledge the God of the Universe in every aspect of my life. I may sound crazy to some, but to God this is the sound of my worship. 

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