Billy and Ruth Graham both believed that it is important for Christians to continually fuel their fire for Christ. They both explain the challenge of becoming weak in the faith and choosing to overcome.

Watered Down Christians

Our notions of Christ have become watered down, says Billy Graham. We have failed to remember that He was a vigorously active man as well as a spiritual being.

We have limited Christ to the sanctuary, to the temple, to the religious area of our lives. We have not practiced applied Christianity. We have restricted it to a Sunday affair. We worship Him behind thick church walls. We tuck Him away in quiet little recesses. From Sunday to Sunday He is rarely mentioned. We spend very little time reading His Word or praying. We Christians act and live as though Christ were dead.

This kind of Christ will never make an impact on the revolutionary world in which we live. This is not the Christ of the Bible. He is too weal and small; He is irrelevant. The weak, emaciated, impotent Christ of the Church of today bears little resemblance to the Christ who is found in the early Church, which dared to challenge the world and turn it upside down.

from The Wit and Wisdom of Billy Graham

Clogged Pens

I shook it. I knocked it gently, sideways on the top of the desk. I licked a piece of paper and wrote carefully in the moisture (I can’t tell you why this works, but it usually does). I repeated each procedure without results. Then I carried the pen to the sink, took it apart, and carefully flushed out the point. Refilling it, I sat down to write.

How like me, I thought with exasperation.

I have mugs full of pens on my desk: ballpoints, felt tips, ink pens—even pencils. But for very fine writing, such as notes in the margin of my Bible, I need a Rapidograph pen. This pen has a needle-fine point and uses India ink, which will not seep through or smear on the thin India paper.

How often when God has needed me and I have been clogged up (too busy or inundated with things—the necessary giving way to the unnecessary). Or I’ve gone dry.

When that happens, I need a “shaking up,” or I need special cleansing. And I need to be filled and refilled and filled again.

There have been times when God has patiently and carefully done just that. There have been other times when He has had to pass me over and pick up a pen that was usable.

But unlike a pen, I do have a choice. I can decide whether or not I remain usable.

from Legacy of a Pack Rat by Ruth Bell Graham