Have I Left My First Love?

Have I gone back to the world? 

• Have I lingered; 
• Have I looked back; 
• Have I returned; 
• Have I left my heart behind me?

Have I taken up the old man’s deeds once more?

• Have I left my first love? 
• Has my goodness proved like the morning clouds, 
• and as the early dew has it gone away?

Are my serious impressions fast dying off?

• Am I getting weaker and fainter every day? 

Are my convictions fast withering up? 

• are they changing color like leaves in autumn—
• Will they soon drop off and disappear? 

Are the gray hairs, which tell of decline, coming here and there upon me? 

• Does the preaching I once hung upon, now weary me? 
• Do the books I delighted in give pleasure no more? 
• Is the progress of Christ’s Gospel no longer interesting? 
• Is the company of God’s children no longer sought?

They or I must be changed.

Am I becoming shy of holy people, 

• impatient of rebuke and advice, 
• uncertain in my tempers, 
• careless about little sins, 
• not afraid of mixing with the world?

Once it was not so.—

I may keep up some form of Christianity perhaps, 

• but as to vital godliness, am I fast cooling down? 

Am I already lukewarm? 

• By-and-by I will be cold; 
• and before long I will be icy, faith-frozen, 
• and more dead than I was before. 

If I am grieving the Spirit, 

• will He soon leave me?

If I am tempting the devil, will he soon come to me? 

• If my heart is ready for him; 
• my last state will be worse than my first. 

Oh! Strengthen the things which remain 

• which are ready to die! 

Adapted Excerpt From

Startling Questions

J. C. Ryle