Text- Romans 10:2- “I can testify that they are zealous for the honor of God; but they are not guided by true insight [wisdom]”
Redemption from sin is a call into zeal for the things of God. Titus 2:14 says “Jesus gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works”.
Zeal means passion; energetic, resolute, persistent and determined pursuit of a cause (In this case, the things of God). Zeal, though good, becomes dangerous when it is exercised without wisdom.
Remember the ten virgins in the Bible (Matthew 25)
Verse 1 – “Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom”:
This is zeal! These virgins were all ready to go, and in fact, went all the way to meet the bridegroom, just like you may be willing to serve God, go all the way out for Him, and get seriously involved in His work.
Verse 2 – “And five of them were wise, and five were foolish”:
This was where five of them disqualified themselves… They had zeal (quite alright) but lacked wisdom, and that spoilt the show! Just like Paul said in our text about the Jews, “I can testify that they are zealous for the honor of God; but they are not guided by true wisdom”
I want to admonish you today to let your zeal be guided by wisdom. Zeal without wisdom will make you overload yourself unnecessarily with seemingly ‘religious’ activities.
Zeal and passion may make you want to pray as often as possible, but it takes wisdom to know that you should not get to your office, and abandon your work to pray for 5 hours!
Don’t get me wrong; it’s good to be zealous, but you need some wisdom to balance it out, if not you may become very sensational and emotional, while you think you are being spiritual.
It is zeal that keeps us excited about God’s work; zeal keeps our fire burning red-hot, and gives us the spiritual drive to dare all odds, do incredible things for God and believe him even for the seemingly impossible.
However, wisdom will help us to know the appropriate time, place, and actions necessary as we are driven by our zeal for the work of the Lord.
True wisdom that is from above is teachable, moving toward the goal of completeness through that which it learns. --E.D. Head
Publius Terentius Afer said “True wisdom consists not in seeing what is immediately before our eyes, but in foreseeing what is to come”
PRAYER
Lord, I repent of every form of folly that has driven me into sensationalism and emotionalism. Please grant me the wisdom to rightly appropriate my zeal for You, and for Your work in Jesus Name.
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