This morning the news is not exactly joyful. There has been a series of terror attacks, one of which was clearly performed by a Persian man, against Israeli targets. In the Herald, there is an illiterate, entitled screed from Harawira — that most noxious of the treatifarians, which I will not link to. And while Europe freezes and Australia floods, NZ has just got dull weather.
Last night my son decided to tell a story about a camera I found second hand when on holiday. It was in very good order, cleaned and adjusted, and well priced. But the budget was straining, so I walked away. But son, every time I went past the shop, reminded me to go in and check it.
I’m paying the bills. It took some prayer not to get that toy, but the money was needed elsewhere. For school uniforms. Besides the score in this life is not the toys you get.
12I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven on account of his name. 13I am writing to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I am writing to you, young people, because you have conquered the evil one. 14I write to you, children, because you know the Father. I write to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young people, because you are strong and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one.
15Do not love the world or the things in the world. The love of the Father is not in those who love the world; 16for all that is in the world – the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eyes, the pride in riches – comes not from the Father but from the world. 17And the world and its desire are passing away, but those who do the will of God live forever.
The first thing that I find difficult in this passage is that John tells those who are of the faity — who are strong, and have the truth, and have overcome (in Christ) the evil one — not to love the world.
For we live in the world, and it is at times beautifully glorious. And there is nothing wrong with enjoying this. We are not ascetics. But neither are we Gnostics, believing that the spiritual is all that matters. But that of the world — pride of possession ( I memorized this years ago as pride of life which I think gives a sense that it is achievements and things — the desire (again, I memorized this as lust of the eyes) to have that which is new or shiny, or to live the secular ideal of gym. tailored suits, wine, women and a coop apartment on the Upper East Side expressed in most advertisements throughout our lives.
Some time ago. I wrote that we need to cone down what we listen to and look at when we are married. We need to be fundamentally about God, then our spouse, then our children. I haven’t changed my mind.
Hollywood tempts us with glitz, beauty, glamour Hermes Bags (for girls) and Mechanical watches (for boys). Men like their toys, women their clothes*. But they are immaterial. People matter. God matters. In the end our possessions will be like the toys of our childhood we put away.
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* Yes, I know not all women like clothes and shopping, and not all men like shiny pieces of optical equipment. But the pattern is that we are all, like magpies, attracted to the new, the shiny, and the sparkly