As William Tyndale awaited execution for translating the Bible into English, he pleaded with his captors that he might be allowed to have his Hebrew Bible and translation materials, along with warmer clothes to sustain him in his frigid cell. His entreaties bear startling resemblance to those of the Apostle Paul who, while imprisoned in Rome, requested that Timothy “bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas, also the books, and above all the parchments” (2 Timothy 4:13).
More recently, men like Jim Elliot, Nate Saint, and the three others with them who were martyred by the spear, were characterized by their innovative attempts to share the gospel with natives in Ecuador. Elliot and Saint’s wives then carried on their legacy with a shocking commitment to spreading the good news to those same people, even living among them and building their lives alongside them.
What would make a man shivering in prison ask that he may spend his final days studying the Bible, or a woman share the gospel of Jesus with the man who killed her husband? We are motivated by what we believe. But what do you do when even the glorious gospel truths in which you once rejoiced fail even to catch your attention? How can sluggish believers hope to commit themselves fully to God when it is a struggle even to read his word?
We are motivated by what we believe
What is Apathy?
Despite the mystery and abundance that we have in Christ, this lack of passion is all too common among his followers. In his book Overcoming Apathy: Gospel Hope for Those Who Struggle to Care, Uche Anzior describes Christians slogging through the spiritual disciplines, hoping to be distracted by something that captures their more immediate attention. But Anzior writes to a specific audience: the Christian who is frustrated by his sluggishness, and desires to grow in passion for the things of God.
Apathy, in strictly literal terms, describes a lack of passion. The Greek prefix “a” negates the concept of “pathos,” or emotion and feeling. However, Anzior argues that “acedia” (a lack of care resulting in slothfulness or laziness) fits better with our modern struggle of apathy.
It is not a total lack of care that trips up many believers, Anzior notes, but a “selective” lack of passion for truths that matter most. After consulting historical, monastic, theological and psychiatric perspectives on the term, Anzior offers his own definition: “Apathy is a psychological and spiritual sickness in which we experience a prolonged dampening of motivation, effort, and emotion, as well as a resistance to the things that would bring flourishing in ourselves and others. It is a sin that expresses itself as restlessness, aimlessness, laziness, and joylessness toward the things of God.”
How Does It Manifest?
Apathetic Christians’ struggle to care about the things of God can be whole or partial. Perhaps they find some fulfillment in attending church, but their personal time with the Lord throughout the week languishes. Believers may find themselves promising that they will spend time in God’s word—just not right this second. Eventually, they may even quit making such resolutions toward faithfulness.
Anzior recounts C.S. Lewis’ depiction of apathy’s connection to distraction in Screwtape Letters. The senior demon, Screwtape, coaches the junior Wormwood in keeping his subject sufficiently distracted from his sin so that the nagging he feels will not be so great that he truly repents. The feeling (or, the Holy Spirit) continues to prod, but dedicated distraction makes it preferable to ignore.
Anzior lists “seven deadly causes of apathy,” which he says are doubt, grief, triviality, feelings of inadequacy, lack of discipline, and lack of purpose. At the end of the day, the believer who is a slave to any of these is deriving fulfillment from something other than God.
Is It a Sin?
Based on the definition above, it would seem that apathy is not merely a struggle but a sin. It appeals to and expands our sinful desires of laziness, and our worship of comfort at all costs. Anzior argues that sin has a three-fold nature as “a contagion to be cleansed, a captor from which we need release” and “a crime to be pardoned.”
Satan is not bothered if Christians profess Christ so long as they are not growing and enjoying and blessing others through him
Apathy for many Christians is not a sin entered into for its own sake. More often, it is embraced slowly by neglecting spiritual discipline when the immediate gratification of following the Lord is hard to see. Perhaps what was intended to be a season of rest blurs into a lifestyle of laziness and passivity before the Christian puts a finger on exactly what has changed. But as Screwtape explained above, this is exactly where Satan wants Christians to stay. It would seem he is not too bothered if they profess Christ so long as they are not growing and enjoying and blessing others through him. Thus, this somewhat passive sin and tool that the Enemy uses to keep Christians from vibrant fellowship with God must be actively battled against.
Is There Hope for Those Battling Apathy?
“The Gospel is the remedy,” Anzior says. He explains that “our affection for Christ can expel our affection for trivial things. One love replaces another. We defeat our selective apathy by cultivating stronger affections.”
The gospel of King Jesus is the most beautiful, earth-shattering truth—that God became man, and sacrificed himself in order to reconcile us back to relationship with him. This is a much deeper and more engaging fact than whatever trivial distractions we cede our attention to, but appreciating it rightly demands continuous refocusing. It is a task to uncover layer by layer the “depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God” (Romans 11:33)! The distracted, instant gratification-motivated culture around us is incompatible with the Christian life. It is a pattern of this world to which we must not be conformed (Romans 12:2).
The gospel of King Jesus is the most beautiful, earth-shattering truth—that God became man, and sacrificed himself in order to reconcile us back to relationship with him
We must cultivate the virtues of honesty, affection, meaning and mission, sacrificial generosity, and fortitude. Apathetic believers must put off the mindset that hard things are to be avoided, since we know that “suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame” (Romans 5:3b-5a).
Colossians 3 admonishes believers to “set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.” Right thinking, right doing, and right feeling are interconnected, but the thinking and doing must lead if passion is going to last.
Of course, none of this can ever be achieved through pure grit. Ephesians 2 demonstrates the paradox of sanctification. God works in us, refining us to be more like him. But we are called to take up our cross daily and follow him (Luke 9:23). “It is by grace you have been saved, through faith and this not of your own doing …” Paul writes, reminding the Ephesians that they were “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”
Think back to the first great heroes of the faith that we discussed. They did incredible things, and we ought to, in a real sense, follow them as they followed Christ (1 Corinthians 11). But becoming like these men and women who are marked by their service to the Lord is not the Christian’s ultimate goal. In every stage of life, for all Christians, the goal is to become like Christ.
We seek to be like him by walking in faithfulness—walking by faith, not by sight, or feelings. Christians should encourage each other that the truth and the glory of the good news of grace transcends our doubt, transcends our apathy, and transcends our own strivings to bolster our faith. God is committed to our sanctification (Philippians 1:6) far more even than we are.
When I fear my faith will fail, Christ will hold me fast
When the tempter would prevail, He will hold me fast
I could never keep my hold through life’s fearful path
For my love is often cold; He must hold me fast
-From the hymn He Will Hold Me Fast by Keith and Krystin Getty
By Catherine Gripp