Keep Your Balance
Now regarding your question about food that has been offered to idols. Yes, we know that “we all have knowledge” about this issue. But while knowledge makes us feel important, it is love that strengthens the church. (1 Corinthians 8:1)
This is a good time for me to pause and mention three basic warnings so that our flying closer to the flame will take place without fear of getting our wings singed.
Intellectualism
Intellectualism is not reserved for seminary students. It can occur whenever we refuse to allow our emotions to serve their proper function. By holding them in constant check, by restraining the natural flow of our feelings, we can begin to rely strictly on the intellect for our walk with Christ.
In schools or churches where the Bible becomes a textbook for learning facts to the exclusion of having one’s heart warmed and one’s life changed, intellectualism crouches at the door, ready to seize its victims. If we hope to counteract intellectualism, there must always be Spirit-filled warmth and a climate of devotion to the person of Christ. Staying real helps.
Emotionalism
This occurs when we go to the other extreme, making emotions the heart and center of life. Emotionalism results when one builds one’s faith on the sands of experience rather than on the solid, reliable rock of faith based on facts. A life of solid faith starts with a clear understanding of biblical doctrine. Balance calls for both mind and heart . . . in that order. They need to be woven together carefully, slowly, and correctly like a God-given tapestry.
Fanaticism
Fanaticism occurs in a context of excessive and intense devotion to information that lacks balance, discernment, and wisdom. Fanatics become so enthralled with a teaching that the mind focuses solely on that while the emotions take control and one’s actions become bizarre and unhealthy.
There is an unwholesome lack of balance—including the absence of a healthy sense of humor— and the inability to enter into a broad spectrum of interests and activities. Any one of us is able to fall into extremes and become fanatical, losing ourselves in certain intense pursuits.
The subjects can be (and usually are) religious or doctrinal in nature, such as prophecy, the gifts of the Spirit, witnessing, prayer, legalism, freedom, some social concern, and a hundred other possibilities.
Be warned! When the Spirit of God is not in full control, there is the tendency in all of us—and that includes you—to go haywire emotionally. Wise are those who keep their balance . . . even when flying closer to the flame. Correction: especially when flying closer to the flame.
Taken from Flying Closer to the Flame by Charles R. Swindoll. Copyright © 1993 by Charles R. Swindoll, Inc. All rights reserved worldwide.
