The world is passing away...grab on to what is real.

A view of the Boulder Flat Irons in fall.

Don’t love the world’s ways. Don’t love the world’s goods. Love of the world squeezes out love for the Father. Practically everything that goes on in the world—wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important—has nothing to do with the Father. It just isolates you from him. The world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out—but whoever does what God wants is set for eternity.  1 John 2:15-17  Translation from The Message

 Plain talk from John as we end the year.  Do not be misled by what appears to be real.  The world is passing away, is on its way out; so don't cling to a sinking ship.  Play the long game and secure eternal life by doing what the Divine One calls us to do.  The world--or the "flesh" as Paul terms it--is about grasping, having, holding, possessing things, people and power.  While that may lead to success in the world--in fact, it most assuredly does--John, Paul, and Jesus ask us to consider a different way of life, one in which having is not as nearly important as being.  Who I am in my deepest self is more important than what I have in terms of things, success, power, or position.

In this new year I pray that I will live out this way of life more fully.  I pray that the value of my IRA will not consume as much of my energy as the good being done by my charitable contributions.  I pray that my various technologies will not be more important to me than my relationships with family and friends.  I pray that my spiritual life consumes more of my attention than my physical life.  I pray that I remember everyday that "the world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out."