Reformation of Our Desires

I'm still thinking about the previous post, in part, because I've been living out of the book James.  In my last reflection, I talked about Evagrius Ponticus.  I find his teaching very helpful and challenging and something that fits well with the book of James.  

In speaking about wisdom, for instance, James states wisdom produces a good life with works done "with gentleness born of wisdom" (James 3.13).  This is the wisdom that comes from above--it is "Pure, then peacable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without an trace of partiality or hypocrisy"  (3.17).  No surprise here, except for the religious blinded by their own principles:  James in the tradition of the prophets and Jesus, believes that wisdom has everything to with how treat others.    

Then James goes on the offensive by asking, What about those conflicts among you, where do they come from?  His answer is not easy to swallow.  James does not go into a lengthy sociological or psychological explanation.  Instead he says, they come from "your cravings that are at war within you."  The problem is . . . say it with me . . . malformed desires.  We want what we cannot have.  We ask with the wrong motives.  We are friends with the world. "Adulterers!" James thunders, "Do you not know that friendship with world is enmity toward god.  Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God" (vs. 4).  As I've said before, it's what we love more than God that makes us so violent.  It's what we place above God that needs to be defended and fought over--our pride, our security, our success, etc. etc.  So you see it's not that we want a conflict, but it's what we want that makes a conflict inevitable.  

Ouch!  We're in some hot water today.  Where do we turn now?  

The answer is simple, at least according to James:  Get right with God.  He states, "Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.  Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.  Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded."  

Now we come full circle.  If we respond to God by drawing near to him, we will discover the wisdom that produces peace and gentleness and justice, the wisdom that comes from above.  We will have new set of desires.  Our hearts will be directed toward God and not toward the things that make fights inevitable.   

Peace! 

Faith and Generosity

Recently, I have been intrigued with a relatively unknown Christian writer, Evagrius Ponticus (A.D. 345-399).  What he teaches applies to the theme I was trying--operative word--to communicate this morning.  Evagrius argues that agape love (self-sacrificial and forgiving love) is the progeny of apatheia (rightly ordered passions and emotions).  

It sounds strange, in part, because it's not the way we think about things.  We usually assume that love comes to us without much work or effort.  Evagrius believes that agape love will be present mostly in people whose passions and desires are properly ordered. 

It's something to consider, even if you're not ready to agree with him.  If our desires are disordered, our love will be stunted.  If we're focused on the wrong things--money, comfort, or sensuality--above all else, we will be controlled by other forces that we can't manage.  Love of pleasure often leads to anger.  Love of pride often leads to hostility.  Love of money often leads to neglect--of our loved ones and of our soul.  Lust, in all of its forms, objectifies others, believing, like a consummate consumer, that everyone exists for my own pleasure.  Our malformed desires and passions will make it very difficult to love.   

But for the person with an active faith in God everything changes.  With faith, we start to want the right things rightly.  Trusting now in God, we believe he will provide for us.  We no longer have to grasp and pursue things unrighteously.  We can rest and witness.  

We can be peacemakers, in other words, like Abraham.  In Genesis 13, Abraham did not grasp.  He trusted that the Promise-maker would be a Promise-keeper.  It's out of Abraham's daring faith that peace, between family members, is maintained.  

Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me . . . by learning to want the right things rightly.

David S.