How to Stay Spiritually Active Over Summer Break

Finals are a stressful time. There are the semester or quarter-long assignments that you completely forgot to even start, the inevitable all-nighters that ensue, and the impending doom of grades being given back.

I remember a time during  my freshman year of college when I pulled my first all-nighter writing a research paper, and had an 8:00am final the next morning. When my friend and I went to get a much needed coffee before going into the final, I grabbed a sugar packet, opened it, and then poured it straight into the trash. Laughing at my sleep-deprived mistake, I grabbed one more sugar packet, opened it, and poured it straight into the trash again. It took me three tries to finally get the sugar into the coffee. Needless to say, finals week had wiped me out.

Once we survive all the stress and mayhem of finals week, it can be easy to want to check out and coast through the rest of the summer. While it is important we rest and catch up on sleep on our break, summertime is the perfect opportunity to be connected to and make an impact on our friends that we don’t want to miss.

Apathy Makes Us Miss the Opportunity

I’m not just talking theory. There is urgency in all this. If you’re apathetic and complacent, then you’ll miss the moment of opportunity. You should be wide awake and on your toes like servants who are waiting for their master to return from a big wedding reception. They’ll have their shoes on and their lamps lit so they can open the door for him as soon as he arrives home.

Luke 12:35-36 Voice

Apathy can be defined as a “lack of interest, enthusiasm, or concern,” and complacency can be defined as “a feeling of smug or uncritical satisfaction with oneself or one’s achievements.” When we are tired and wiped out from the stress of school, the anxiety of the future, and the strain of relationship issues, it is easy to become apathetic and complacent. When I am in this spot, I feel like I am at my cap emotionally and don’t want to do anything that makes me feel any sort of discomfort. I would rather watch Netflix than address how I feel about my future, and would rather browse Twitter than deal with the sin and guilt that I haven’t been honest about. But when I stay in this spot of constantly avoiding, I end up stagnant and miserable, feeling like I’m going nowhere with my life.

Before I confessed my sins, I kept it all inside; my dishonesty devastated my inner life, causing my life to be filled with frustration, irrepressible anguish, and misery. The pain never let up, for your hand of conviction was heavy on my heart. My strength was sapped, my inner life dried up like a spiritual drought within my soul.

Psalm 32:3-4 TPT

This Scripture says that if we keep everything inside, whatever strength we had is sapped, where any semblance of emotional distress is too much to bear, and we harden our hearts. This “spiritual drought” in our souls leads us to become apathetic, unwilling and unable to care about the lives of those around us. In order to have a summer that is impactful and enjoyable, the Bible says we must deal with the guilt and emotions that we have refused to address.

Honesty Restores Our Passion

Let my passion for life be restored, tasting joy in every breakthrough you bring to me. Hold me close to you with a willing spirit that obeys whatever you say. Then I can show to other guilty ones how loving and merciful you are. They will find their way back home to you, knowing that you will forgive them.

Psalm 51:12-13 TPT

This Scripture explains that once we finally acknowledge our sin and address uncovered emotions, we can have the breakthrough needed to restore our passion for God. We actually enjoy letting down and being honest with others, because it brings us closer to them. When I decide to be honest with God and friends, I can feel my heart soften. I refuse to be complacent because there is so much to grow in, so many things I can do, so many people to help. I become passionate about living for a purpose beyond myself.

Now, because of your obedience to the truth, you have purified your very souls, and this empowers you to be full of love for your fellow believers. So express this sincere love toward one another passionately and with a pure heart.

1 Peter 1:22 TPT

In this Scripture, Peter explains that the only way to become people who passionately love others is to purify our souls and obey the truth. This means that once we dig up all the guilt and emotions we have allowed to harden our hearts, we must turn to God and the Bible to truly satisfy us. This empowers us to pour ourselves into passionately loving and caring for others.

So don’t you see that we don’t owe this old do-it-yourself life one red cent. There’s nothing in it for us, nothing at all. The best thing to do is give it a decent burial and get on with your new life. God’s Spirit beckons. There are things to do and places to go!

Romans 8:12-14 MSG

God wants to give us a summer that is powerful and purposeful. We have things to do and places to go! What sins and emotions do you need to address in order to have an impactful summer? What purpose is God’s Spirit beckoning you toward?

Read Mark 7:21-23 and Galatians 5:19-21 to get a better understanding of what sins are affecting your life and relationships.

To learn more about how to have God’s powerful purpose in your life, register for our 2018 Expo on August 17-18, titled “Purpose”!