Happy Saturday and happy July! If you’re in the US, I hope you enjoyed a lovely 4th of July celebration. We went to our community’s fireworks show the night before. Then on the 4th, we had our usual Friday night family movie night, followed by a few firecrackers and sparklers we had left over from last year. Except, well . . . it turns out that year-old sparklers don’t so much sparkle as fizzle. Most of them had no interest in lighting at all, and even the ones that did light shot off a few half-hearted sparks before smoldering like a plain old stick. Lesson learned. Fireworks that are tucked away in a cupboard for a year don’t have much life left in them.

Thinking about the way our fireworks fizzled made me think of God’s reprimand to the church in Laodicea: “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth. You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked” (Revelation 3:15-17).

Ouch. The faith of the Laodiceans had become like hot cocoa that had cooled, soup that had lost its heat, a firework that didn’t sparkle. It just sort of sat there, smoldering lamely. Not hot. Not cold. Just blah. And the reason is telling; they didn’t think they needed God anymore. They had every material blessing they needed, and they gave themselves credit for acquiring it. That sounds a little too close to home. We live in a world where we have material blessings that the people of Laodicea couldn’t even have imagined. It can be easy to give ourselves credit for earning those blessings. We can start to trust in those blessings or in ourselves rather than in our God.

When we do that we may be tempted to sort of tuck our faith away in a cupboard. We think we don’t have time for it, that we don’t need it right now, that we already know everything there is to know about God. Or we think we’re doing pretty well on our own. Before you know it that faith grows musty, and it fizzles.

Thankfully, unlike a firework that has lost its spark, it is never too late for God to restore the fire of our faith. He works in hearts and in lives every day doing just that—calling his lost children back to faith in him. It never fails to amaze me how God can take “wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked” sinners like us (Revelation 3:17) and open our eyes to the salvation he has won for us, clothe us with his righteousness, and give us the greatest riches we could ever imagine—eternal life with him in heaven.

In the same letter where the Laodiceans are reprimanded, they (and we) are also reminded, “To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne” (Revelation 3:21). We are the ones who are victorious. Not because we are such great fighters or even because our faith is so on fire. No, we are victorious because of Jesus. He fought for us. He died for us. He won salvation for us.

Knowing that, we can shine like fireworks, or if you prefer, “like stars in the sky” (Philippians 2:15). We can let the light of our faith point to God and shine his love on the people in our lives.