PERSONS with poise and purpose, holding themselves well in hand, regard with some suspicion those who are unduly zealous. When zeal runs away with judgment, energy is wasted and confidence blasted. The fires of zeal are soon burned out and the cause of its champion may be slightingly referred to as "flashes in the pan." Nevertheless, zeal, intensity, enthusiasm, is essential to the achievement of any and every great purpose.
We usually judge zeal by the noise it makes. But noise is not characteristic of the zeal that overcomes seemingly insurmountable obstacles and wheels them into line with its quiet yet mighty energy of purpose. When you see men and women working steadily and unselfishly toward some cherished goal, do not conclude that they are moved by some selfish
motive, the attainment of which will give them personal pleasure. They are fired by an impulse of soul that boils with an inward flame and urges them onward, regardless of the outer mind of caution and conservatism.
The trait of man named variously zeal, enthusiasm, intensity of soul, is a prime faculty of spiritual man. It is found in one of the disciples of the type man Jesus, and its character is revealed in his name, Simon the Zealot.
Zeal's throne or center of activity in the body is at the base of the brain, in the medulla. It is the seat of the animal soul, and its office is to vaporize the fine nerve fluid and distribute it to the senses. The medulla performs in the body the work of the carburetor in a motorcar.
An intense desire to carry out some idea forces the nerve fluid into the medulla, where it is atomized with inspiration (air) and then flared through the optic nerve to the eye, where the Spirit ignites it, and it flashes into light. "It is the Spirit that giveth life."
When the Spirit moves a man from within to the accomplishment of some cherished ideal and the intellect steps in and says it can't be done, a conflict ensues and the natural flow of the volatile body is impeded. Congestions and clots form in the circulation, the man gradually slows down, and what are called the marks of old age appear. This is why man should never give up the quest for greater and better expression of God-given abilities.
The hop, skip, and jump, the buoyancy and joy of youth, should be cultivated and continued more enthusiastically as the years advance. The idea that man grows feeble with years is a foolish fallacy. The longer one lives the better one should know how to live.
The attention of the followers of Jesus in the regeneration is called to the many lessons and warnings that He gave regarding man's zeal for commercialism. He rebuked Satan, the adverse mind, for suggesting that He demonstrate how to turn stones into bread. He warned, "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the earth." One of His earliest works was putting the commercial activities out of His body temple. "Take these things hence; make not my Father's house a house of merchandise."
Then His disciples remembered that it was written, "Zeal for thy house shall eat me up." Jesus explained that the "house" He referred to was His body. He was cleansing His body of a dominant race thought, the desire to accumulate money.
The people of the world today are so zealous for the solution of economic problems that they have forgotten God. They do not ask for wisdom to guide them in the nation's industrial affairs, but they plan and scheme and wrangle and get deeper and deeper in debt; that is, into the clutches of the beast of greed that puts its mark of slavery upon all who worship it.
Be zealous for spiritual realities. Lay up for yourselves treasures in the heavens.
