"KEEP THE SPIRITUAL FIRE BURNING!"
Lesson 2

In last week's article, I related a story that I saw about a man stepping outside with a pot of boiling water. Tossing the water into the air it instantly changed to snow. I mentioned that he was near the top of Mount Washington in New Hampshire and it was thirty-five degrees below zero. Considering that water boils at 212 degrees Fahrenheit, while it freezes at 32 degrees Fahrenheit; the air on Mt. Washington was so cold that the water cooled down 180+ degrees in less than a second. The water froze because of a failure to maintain the fire.

In Lesson 1 I wrote about the tremendous energy that is required to keep water boiling contrasted with the fact that almost no energy is required for it to cool. Therefore, activity (in the kingdom) will keep us warm but doing nothing will cause us to cool off.

Lesson 2 of this series has to do with the power of the fellowship. Water, like virtually everything else in our world is made up of molecules. As long as the molecules of water stayed close together they stayed warm. Separated, they became cold. Those trillions of water molecules in that boiling pot needed the close proximity of one another; they kept warm off each other's heat. However, once they dispersed they quickly cooled not having the company of their "brethren" to keep them warm. Ecclesiastes 4:11 says, "Again, if two lie together, then they have heat: but how can one be warm alone?"

The story is told of the preacher who visited a delinquent member and, without a word, while sitting in front of the fireplace, merely pulls a coal out of the fire to watch it slowly die. Yet, putting it back in, the coal warms to a soft red glow again. We need to exhort one another daily and not forsake our assembling together! (Hebrews 3:13, 10:25) Togetherness is important to maintaining our spiritual fire.

Lesson 3, next week...