February 28: Things to Avoid
♫ Music:
Day 15 - Wednesday, February 28
Title: Things to Avoid
Scripture: James 4:1-10
What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture speaks to no purpose: “He jealously desires the Spirit which He has made to dwell in us”? But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, “God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” Submit 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. Be miserable and mourn and weep; let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you.
Poetry: The Lowest Place
By Christina Rossetti
Give me the lowest place: not that I dare
Ask for that lowest place, but Thou hast died
That I might live and share
Thy glory by Thy side.
Give me the lowest place: or if for me
That lowest place too high, make one more low
Where I may sit and see
My God and love Thee so.
HIS GIFT OF GRACE
Having a desire is not necessarily bad. Desires often point to the fact that we lack something, like food or water, and need satiation. There are some desires which rightly need to be fulfilled; other desires (and this is what James is calling us to) need to be rigorously examined in light of God’s standard. It is our wrong motives that lead to a pursuit of hedonistic pleasures, our friendship with the world that causes us to behave like traitors which lead to quarrels, conflicts, and lusts. These become the focal point of our pursuits to the point that we are willing to do something that is desperately wicked and diametrically opposed to God’s created order—that is murder in an attempt to obtain what we wrongly believe we need. This is seemingly unimaginable, but sin left unchecked leads us to do just that. No one gets up one morning and determines they are going to let their lustful desires destroy their life—self-destruction is a slow and steady process.
Yet, it does not have to be this way. The infection of the world can be overcome, but the cure pushes against every bit of our fallen selves—you must supplicate yourself before God, and in repeated acts of repentance, humbly ask for his gift of grace. This demand for humility presses against our culture which prizes self-reliance and determination. Yet, throughout the Old and New Testament it is clear that the only way to cleanse your hands, purify your heart and draw near to God is to do so on your knees.
It is from our knees that God lifts us up. It is from our knees that God gives us the power to resist the devil. It is from our knees that we see what true desires are supposed to be—what it means to actually flourish as a human being made in God’s image. It is from this vantage point that we are able to rightly seek after the desires of our heart.
Left to our own devices we pursue the junk food of human existence, deceived into thinking that we are partaking in a bounty. C.S. Lewis puts it this way in his book The Weight of Glory—
"It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”
Thankfully, God the Father, because of his love for us, sent his Son and his Spirit, graciously drawing us nearer to him and to life abundant.
Prayer:
God from a place of humility we come before you and ask for your help. Provide us with your grace so that we will be conformed according to your will and not live as double minded people. In Jesus’ name we ask this—Amen.
Dr. Paul Spears
Director of the Torrey Honors Institute
Biola University
About the Artwork:
Old Man Praying
Vincent Van Gogh
1882
Pencil and brush and ink on paper
66.1 x 52.9 cm
Strikingly executed in a monochrome palette, Old Man Praying, is Van Gogh at his most psychologically poignant. His expressive style is evident here, even at this early point in his career. Van Gogh’s subject kneels to pray at the most humble of altars. The result is an unflinchingly intimate and expressive portrait of an ordinary man in a moment of quiet solitude with faith. The thick application of ink and charcoal in broad, deliberate strokes perfectly expresses the hardship of this man’s daily life. These works may also be seen as a projection of the artist's own internal struggles, perhaps as a way for him to express his own personal solitude and loneliness.
About the Artist:
Vincent Willem Van Gogh (1853–1890) was a Post-Impressionist painter of Dutch origin whose work, notable for its rough beauty, emotional honesty, and bold color, had a far-reaching influence on 20th-century art. After years of painful anxiety and frequent bouts of mental illness, Van Gogh died aged 37 from a gunshot wound generally accepted to be self-inflicted. Van Gogh did not begin painting until his late twenties, completing many of his best-known works during the last two years of his life. In just over a decade, he produced more than 2,100 artworks, consisting of 860 oil paintings and more than 1,300 watercolors, drawings, sketches and prints. After discovering the French Impressionists, his work grew brighter in color and he developed his unique and highly recognizable style that became fully realized during his stay in Arles in 1888.
About the Music:
“I Have Made Mistakes” from the album Through the Deep, Dark Valley
Lyrics:
I have made mistakes, I continue to make them
The promises I've made, I continue to break them
And all the doubts I've faced, I continue to face them
But nothing is a waste if you learn from it
And the sun, it does not cause us to grow
It is the rain that will strengthen your soul
And it will make you whole
We have lived in fear, and our fear has betrayed us
But we will overcome the apathy that has made us
Because we are not alone in the dark with our demons
And we have made mistakes
But we've learned from them
And the sun, it does not cause us to grow
It is the rain that will strengthen your soul
And it will make you whole
About the Composers/Performers:
The Oh Hellos are an American folk rock duo formed in 2011 in San Marcos, Texas, consisting of siblings Tyler and Maggie Heath. They have released five albums. Initially finding success on music promotion website Bandcamp, the duo's music has since been featured on NBC's program Parenthood. When playing live, Maggie and Tyler are often joined by a large ensemble of musicians as their backing band. In the fall of 2012, the duo released their debut full-length record Through the Deep, Dark Valley, an album full of regret and redemption that they wrote, recorded, produced, mixed, and mastered themselves. Their 2015 full-length album, Dear Wormwood—a collection of songs inspired in part by C.S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters, Patrick Rothfuss' The Name of the Wind, mythology, folklore, and apocalyptic literature—tells the story of a protagonist trapped in an abusive relationship through a series of letters written to the antagonist. It is at times delicate, intimate and affectionate at others, soaring and joyfully explosive.
About the Poet:
Christina Rossetti (1830-1894) was a Victorian poet who is known for her simple, lyrical work. She published poems in the feminist periodicals The English Woman’s Journal and Victoria Magazine, and in various other anthologies. Today her poetry is regarded as some of the most beautiful and innovative of the period. Critical interest in Rossetti’s poetry was renewed in the last decades of the twentieth century, a resurgence largely generated by the emergence of feminist criticism. Her work strongly influenced the work of writers such as Ford Madox Ford, Virginia Woolf, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Elizabeth Jennings, and Philip Larkin. Critic Basil de Selincourt stated that she was "all but our greatest woman poet … incomparably our greatest craftswoman … probably in the first twelve of the masters of English verse." Rossetti's Christmas poem "In the Bleak Midwinter" became widely known after her death when set as a Christmas carol first by Gustav Holst and then by Harold Darke. Her poem "Love Came Down at Christmas" has also been widely arranged as a carol.
About the Devotional Writer:
Dr. Paul Spears has taught at the Torrey Honors Institute since 1998, and has been Director since 2012. He is an educator who is intensely interested in how foundational philosophical commitments drive educational theories. In his work, he investigates how educational history, philosophy, and learning theories combine to construct educational praxis. He also studies how philosophical and theological commitments shape the way teachers and students behave in the classroom. He has spoken all over the world, from Mongolia to Washington D.C., on apologetics, theology, and educational philosophy. He is married to Lisa and has two children, Ian and Lexi.