Turning on the Heating

I have a rule in my home: no heating until November. From All Saints’ Day, if the indoor temperature falls below 9 degrees, I may sit by the stove; if it falls below 5, I may light it. While jumpers and blankets are sufficient, sources of artificial heat remain switched off. Although I am rather more indulgent when guests are staying, I find that in autumn and winter, cold has one major advantage over the heat: it is free of charge.

Curiously, my mother, who emigrated to Australia in 1988 to escape the cold (one reason among several), refused to install an air conditioning unit in her house. As well as bemoaning the expense, she argued that there was no point relocating to a hot country in order to sit in a cold room. If she wanted to freeze, she could have remained in Lancashire and saved herself the trouble of buying a passport. Despite our very different world views, I guess that she and I were not too dissimilar after all. I would not be surprised if her partner installed AC the very moment she died, experiencing the benefits of cool air which he had not hitherto been allowed to enjoy.

I can think of two Biblical references which employ both concepts of heat and cold at the same time. The first is Genesis 8:22, a text we tend to trot out at harvest:

While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.

The cold winter and warm summer is a reminder that, contrary to the banging drums of the Climate Change industry, seasonal changes of temperature are evidence of our postdiluvian ‘normal’.  So if you are hot some of the year, and cold at some other point, do not fret about global existence- it is how God planned it. The next example is rather scarier and comes from Revelation 3:15-16:

I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth.

‘Lukewarm’ might be a pleasant level of temperature for a house or flat, neither roasting nor likely to set us all ashiver, but it is a poor assessment of a church. A religious body which is utterly heretical or rejecting of the Bible is less dangerous than one which is closer to the truth but still manages to deny Christ. A watered-down gospel is more lethal than overtly false religion. Bacteria and disease breed best on food left out at room temperature; in the freezer and the oven, they struggle to reproduce or even survive. So make warm your homes and make cosy your parlours, but may our churches be hot for the gospel; tepidity, sultriness and mildness just breed lethargy, stupor and death.