The danger of spiritual inertia

Definition of inertia

As an engineering student many years ago I learned that there is a physical property called inertia.  It is well represented by this train pictured above.  It is very hard to stop a heavy moving locomotive once it is going at speed but also initially it is very difficult to get a heavy locomotive even moving at all and it takes incredible forces to do so.  Inertia is defined as the tendency of an object in motion to remain in motion, and an object at rest to stay at rest unless acted upon by an outside force.  In other words, it is the tendency for objects to remain in the state that they already exist in and resistance to change.  Inertia is correlated to the mass of an object – the heavier the object the greater the inertia.  So with our example of the heavy locomotive above it would have greater inertia to overcome to get it started from a standstill or to stop it from moving than it would be to start a bicycle or stop a bicycle.

Spiritual inertia

But the thing that I have been thinking about lately (because I feel that I myself suffer from a kind of spiritual inertia) is that this law not only applies to the physical engineering world but also spiritually.  Inertia can apply in two ways spiritually-it keeps us moving maybe in a wrong direction when we keep believing long-held beliefs that may in fact be erroneous and stop us from changing and growing.  But spiritual inertia also keeps us stuck from moving at all when we are comfortable with our old way of life.  In this latter sense, inertia may be manifesting itself in the form of spiritual laziness resulting in being idle and lazy in our walk with God.  “Laziness casts one into a deep sleep, and an idle person will suffer hunger. He who keeps the commandments keeps his soul, but he who is careless of his ways will die.”¹  It becomes too easy to just remain in our old routines and not even study the Word of God to see what it is actually saying.

I really believe that one of the greatest challenges that we all face in the last days before Christ returns is spiritual laziness being stuck in our ways and not willing to change and adapt.  The danger is that we are comfortable in the west and we are rarely challenged.  Now, of course, we never want to change the fundamentals of our faith but many beliefs that we hold onto simply are not fundamental and they are more cultural.  You see this when you travel to see how Christians in other parts of the world live and worship.  Exposure to cross-cultural missions opens one’s eyes.  I believe that we really have to battle against this tendency to keep in our set ways–spiritual inertia.

We need to take action

Spiritual inertia will have important and dangerous ramifications at the very end because Jesus in a way says watch out that you don’t become spiritually inert.  There will be a time that we will need to take action.  The trouble is that we don’t see how our own country has even changed.  We can see the errors of foreign countries easily enough but we tend to be xenophobic and see that we really do things the best in our own culture when push comes to shove.  At this present time in Australia, we are not even allowed to travel overseas and see that there are good places all over the world.  We don’t even need a passport at this time because we can’t travel anyway.  Hopefully, this will change next year so don’t give up your passport and get one if you don’t have one as yet.  Be ready to be nomads and travel and overcome inertia.  Overcoming inertia in the physical sense will help us overcome spiritual inertia because it will help us to experience different cultures, different expressions of Christianity.  The danger at this present time with the Covid-19 and the associated fear-mongering about getting a vaccine before we travel is that it gives us this mindset of inertia.  We have been scared to death to even venture outside of our homes let alone travel overseas.

Traveling light

Like Abraham, as Christians, the Bible tells us that we are sojourners and we are ambassadors.  Our home is not here on this present earth.  We are headed for something much greater and that is where our focus should be.  It is like we need to travel light and live in tents just like Abraham.  He even stayed “temporarily” for 5 years at Haran in Syria before reaching his final destination in the Promised Land.  God did not let him rest.  He forced him to fight against spiritual inertia.  Abraham was faced with numerous faith tests including having to sacrifice his own son–now that was an inertia test like no other and he passed that test.  But he failed other faith tests like telling Abimelech that Sarah was his sister instead of his wife.  Abraham and his sojourn is such a picture for us as Christians.

How does mass affect inertia in a spiritual sense using our initial example of the heavy locomotive?  “Lightweight” younger Christians are easier to move and easier to stop (teachable) as they don’t have too great a mass at the beginning.  They are more willing to be taught and so they will do all sorts of amazing things like go into missions etc.  Older more “mature” Christians who have been around a while can be harder to move and harder to change and redirect because they are more set in their ways.  In a sense, they have a greater spiritual mass which affects inertia.

We will need to be highly adaptable in the end

Spiritual inertia in the end times is going to be the biggest hurdle to not taking the devil’s mark because we will want to keep going the way we have always gone.  We are going to have to make some huge decisions and they will be a test.  When God says “move” make sure that we are listening and when God says “stop” make sure that we stop.  The secret is to walk closely with Him and listen and pray and watch.  As Christians we are going to need to be highly adaptable and flexible and these are qualities that we need to be working on right now because if we have the attitude that we will wait until the time comes it will be just too late.  By that time long held attitudes and habits will keep us inert and we won’t be able to move.  We will be set in our ways like as if our feet will be set in concrete!  Fire escape plans are always worked on and practiced before the fire happens so that we know what to do when the fire happens.  It is these fire plans that help us in the crisis and help us to overcome inertia.