Spiritual
Hypothermia
By Don Campbell
Hypothermia results from the sudden loss of body temperature. While those dying from it are often said to have frozen to death, death from hypothermia can take place at temperatures far above freezing, especially in the very young or the very old. The symptoms of the condition are mild depression and fatigue. If these are not recognized as danger signals, one may decide to lie down and rest, believing that sleep will be good. However, one goes gently to sleep, never to wake up.
Spiritual hypothermia works much the same way. Jesus said, "And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold" (Matthew 24:12). The most common cause of spiritual death is not being flash-frozen by some sudden trial or temptation, but by allowing the temperature of our love to drop to the point that we become spiritually tired and listless. We then lie down to rest—and you know the rest of the story.
Huddling together to share body heat is one way to fight hypothermia—notice how animals in the fields huddle together to fight the cold. This is, perhaps, the best defense against spiritual hypothermia also. When we separate ourselves from the body of Christ, we lose the benefit of its spiritual warmth.
One may feel cold and uncomfortable before hypothermia sets in; but when the body responds to the threat by restricting the flow of blood to the outer parts of the body, one actually begins to have a sense of warmness and comfort. So it is spiritually. When we first separate ourselves from the body of Christ, we are uncomfortable; but, as our love grows colder, we find a new warmness, a new peace. If the emotional and spiritual separation took place long before the physical one, there may be no discomfort when the physical separation comes.
Sometimes people abandon the church because it isn’t a perfect church. If my life were threatened by hypothermia, I would accept the warmth of another’s body regardless of what the person looked like or even what they smelled like. After all, ugliness is not contagious. And if I survived the ordeal, I could always take a good hot bath to wash away the lingering odor.
The church has its problems—and it always has—but one is much safer huddled together with smelly, imperfect Christians than to die of spiritual hypothermia and then be thawed out in hell by the fire of burning sinners.