A good friend asked him why he kept writing and driving himself to the edge of exhaustion. He reminded him that he didn’t have to do that because he was a wealthy Russian count — his financial future was secure. Tolstoy answered that he kept writing because he was the slave of an inner compulsion — a consuming desire deep within his bones to keep writing or else he would go insane.
The apostle Paul experienced a similar compulsion, with the exception that his consuming desire was God-motivated. As he explained to the brethren at Corinth:
“For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again” (2 Corinthians 5:14-15 NIV).
His was a inward burning passion, an emotional fire, a spiritual force that motivated him share the good news of Jesus and His death, burial, and resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:1-4).
Such dedicated zeal has characterized many of the Lord’s followers recorded in the biblical record (cf. Jeremiah 20:9; Acts 4:13-20). A question we may ask ourselves is: “Do we have the same burning passion to share the good news of Jesus with others?” (cf. Acts 8:35; Acts 18:24-38)
Beloved, may a spark of the same fire that burned in the heart of Paul and of those named in the above passages of Scripture, burn in our own hearts (see here).
—Mike Riley, Gospel Snippets
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