Man, I love the apostle Paul. His New Testament letters are packed to the brim with a fierceness and intensity that now, even thousands of years later, my twenty-first century eleven year-old can pick up on.
What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means!1
Us?! Be joined with sin?! NEVER!! What an intense dude. And he had to be if he was going to hold the line of counter-cultural truth by which the early church walked. This wasn’t a job for some namby pamby softy. It required a man known for a relentless and zealous pursuit of passion — a passion transformed from suppression of the truth at all costs to dissemination of the truth at all costs.2 Talk about a turnaround.
As a passion-driven person, myself, I’ve come to appreciate the special brand of boldness exhibited in Paul’s writing. Such zealous passion is a gift with which we can call the Church onward toward holiness and the world toward reconciliation with its Maker. But it can just as easily be used to steamroll people in the name of truth and requires discernment to know the difference.
No matter how many times I learn this lesson, God is gracious to repeat it as needed — this time, through my husband, who is so often called into the role of reining in my rabid righteous indignationTM.
Ever so patiently, as he always does, my partner in life and crime sat with me for over an hour this weekend as we talked about the recent distance forming between us. It was only the slightest change in relational intimacy, barely detectable to the naked eye, yet palpable for us both.
These rifts are natural between partners when the mind of one or both is focused elsewhere, resisting the pull to be present. It’s a common occurrence for us when I take on a new writing project, work pursuit, or apologetics research topic. My mind latches onto the subject matter with pure adrenaline and can’t seem to think or talk about much else.
Lately, I’ve been diving deep into the subject of developing AI as it intersects with Christian ethical boundaries (more to come on that later). It has me concerned for our society, contemplative of how to best prepare my kids, and intensely concentrated on God’s unfolding plan. It is an absolutely weighty topic with countless ramifications for the Christian life. I could physically feel the heaviness of it.
But when I talked about it (for the five millionth time) with my husband, he wasn’t as jazzed. What gives? Where’s your school spirit, man? Where’s your passion?! Here I was seeking out ways to slay our modern giants…
Shall we bow to these imposing cultural gods of technology?! By no means!!!!!!
… where was my husband’s buy-in?
I took his lack of luster as a sign of his lack of zest for faith in general. I grew concerned. He is, after all, a baptized Christian now. He’s had all of two months to catch up on the lifetime of scripture study, private schooling, and trial-and-error bumblings I have enjoyed. Why hasn’t he “arrived?”
Yesterday, I asked him. He talked, I listened. Then, vice versa. Through this careful tete a tete, we unearthed at least one shared passion still standing: keeping our marriage together. He also happens to still desire a closer walk with God. But, as he gently reminded me, it is a walk — not a 1,000-mile sprint. He brought up how difficult it is to share life with me when I’m in my intensity zone. He’s not wrong.
As we talked, I checked in with my internal guide, the Holy Spirit. What do I do with this zeal? Do I quit these outside studies altogether? Are they making me a terrible mom, wife, and Christian? I felt so frustrated and defeated. I felt ashamed of where my intense personality had, once again, led me. Why am I made this way? What do I do with this weird quirk? At these moments, it’s easy for Satan to gain a foothold in piling on my sense of shame. You’ll never get this right. You’re just “too much,” as a person.
In the midst of the shame-swarm, the Holy Spirit was so faithful to remind me of Paul and his zeal for the faith-building of early believers. This trusted early church father goes so far as to extol the zeal of the Roman church, with a warning not to ground it in works-based righteousness.3
In Isaiah, we discover that zeal is an attribute of God, from whom we get our very likeness.4 It can’t be wrong, just wrongfully applied. In our human nature, this trait can become twisted into an attitude of “whipping others into shape” without thought to the impartial, gentle wisdom from above5 or the long-suffering patience of Godly love.6
Zeal is not a bad thing. In fact, it is a gift. We who bear this trait can bite into weighty matters of faith, carrying this burden of knowledge and using our discoveries to spur on those around us toward love and good deeds.7 Still, as with everything, we need to submit the gift to its Giver, allowing the Holy Spirit to shape it for its intended good purpose in building up the Church.8
When I consider my recent past, my zeal proved indispensable as I determined to model an open faith for my immediate family, which the Holy Spirit faithfully used to bring each of them to the Lord. Today, it remains a helpful tool in guiding my role as temporary spiritual leader in our household, even as I learn to lean back and let my husband take the reins as the Spirit empowers him toward greater knowledge and insight.9
And so, my prayer for those of us who feel a tad overzealous at times is that we will continue to submit this gift to our Creator, trusting the Holy Spirit to guide us into all truth as children of the living God.10 I pray that the enemy will not succeed in tempering or snuffing out this precious character trait by shaming or embarrassing us into silence.
I ask, too, that God would faithfully use the people in our immediate communities to help shape and sharpen our gift as iron sharpens iron,11 gently reminding us of its purpose and power when trained appropriately by His word. May we be zealous over the things for which He, Himself, is zealous, always eager to fan the flame of faith and do battle against the enemy’s schemes on behalf of our brothers and sisters. And may we understand how best to support and sharpen our children in whom we see this particular and meaningful gift.
the dirty laundry show 
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