In the colder months of the winter, we all appreciate a good fire. I love sitting by a fire on a cold night and feeling its warmth; there’s just something so peaceful about it. In the cold temperatures, we long for the warmth of a fire. If you sit by a fire long enough, your body absorbs its warmth. Eventually you get warmed up and you can leave the fire for a little bit and still feel warm from the time you spent in front of the fire. Then eventually you feel the cold coming in again and you feel the need to go back to the source of the warmth once more. But just looking at the light of the fire does not warm your body. In order to get warm you have to be in close proximity for a sustained period of time. If someone just walked by the fire without even stopping and thought that would be enough to keep him warm, we’d call him crazy. 

But all too often, that is what we try to do with God. Sometimes we act as if we can just walk by God briefly on a Sunday morning and stay warm all week from that one brief encounter. We live busy lives, crammed to the max, but we squeeze in a little ‘God-time’ once a week and wrongly expect that we can run off of that for the other 167 hours in the week. Brothers and sisters, the reality is that we must stay near God. You know that life is hard. All week you’ll be facing difficulties and decisions and temptations and just walking by the fire once per week is not enough. We need more time daily in God’s presence in order to keep the spark of faith alive inside of us. Hear the words of Asaph:

So this week, I just want to exhort you to stay near God. Spend time in his presence each and every day by reading his word and by praying. Get close to his throne every single day and let your soul be warmed so that you live each day with his strength, not yours. In the presence of the Lord there is peace, there is hope, there is true life. Each day the world tries to throw water on the fires of your devotion. So each day, draw close to God and refuse to let anything else pull you away from him. He is honored—and we are safe—when we are with him.