1 John 2:15 -17 (RSV) 15Do not love the world or the things in the world. If any one loves the world, love for the Father is not in him. 16For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, is not of the Father but is of the world. 17And the world passes away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides for ever.
Greetings, in the precious name of Jesus; he is the Christ, and is your savior and mine.
Only God knows what this day will hold for us as it unfolds before like a flower or a suspicious package <grin>. Perhaps it is enough that God knows what this day will bring and has provided for us sufficiently so we can meet it successfully.
The Apostle John writes a warning in the passage above. If word “world” means “terra firma” then we ought to despise even the hymn writer calls the “morning light, the lily bright.” Surely that is not what is meant. Indeed, the “earth pours forth its praise” to its Creator. Should we not join that happy chorus? The word, “cosmos” which is always translated “world” or, in one paraphrase, “the world’s ways” means just that and more.
Erwin Lutzer, pastor of Moody Church in Chicago, once said “If we are not nourished by the Bread from heaven, we will satiate ourselves with crumbs from the world.”
Maybe it is even the “morning light, and the lily bright” that produce the lust of the flesh and of the eye, which results in “the pride of life?” What is the answer to this spiritual danger? Surely it’s not looking away from the beauty of the earth. It is, John says, doing the will of God.
I pray today, our minds will be filling with an intense desire (lust) to do the will of God.
Have a great day.
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