Back on Dec 30 there was a post about Aristotle and the idea of happiness, and how it relates to virtue. I just received a monthly ministry update from a friend who is the western regional director for the Christian Medical and Dental Associations. He spends much of his time touring the western region of the US speaking to physicians, dentists, and students. Recently he spoke about 'The Counter-Intuitive Pursuit of Happiness," and he shared some of this in his letter:
"...And we had a wonderful interactive discussion trying to define and identify modern 'happiness,' it's fleeting yet addictive attributes that create a false self, nurtured only by self-indulging narcissism. Contrast this with classical 'happiness,' which is more enduring, liberating, completely integrated, produced only be self-denying apprenticeships. And you can see the attraction as they had never heard anything like it before.
...We are all so able and apt to justify our sin, not recognizing that our heavenly Father has our best interest at heart. Many resist his principles as they seem so difficult, yet we invite such pain, regret and heartache when we insist on finding 'happiness' in our own way. Fidelity, forgiveness, fortitude, and forthrightness keep us in good stead with each other and with God. Are you hiding and rationalizing something you know to be sin? Share it with a trusted friend who will help you make good choices: an unforgiving heart, constant negative thoughts toward someone, lustful thoughts, an ungrateful spirit, greed, lying or deceit?
The 'happiness' we seek is only to be found in following the principles written in the "operators manual...""
On our recent trip to Colorado, Michal and I listened in the car to a lecture we had heard before about virtue, happiness, and having an abundant life. (Perhaps we are odd, but that's a great way to pass the time.) The lecture, of course, leaned to a pre-modern vs a modern or post-modern perspective. The Greek myth about Ulysses was used as an example of how the ancients viewed life and happiness. At one point in the story Ulysses is trapped on an island by the goddess Calypso. In some ways he had it made. She offered him immortality if he would stay there on the island. He could live forever and have a beautiful goddess share her bed with him. To some people that would seem better than winning the lottery. What could make him 'happier.' Well, Ulysses couldn't stay there because it was killing him. If he could not be who is was, and if he could not fulfill his purpose, even if he lived forever it would be killing him. He was a king, a father, a husband, and a warrior. If he stayed there on the island with Calypso, the man could have lived there forever, but Ulysses would have died. He would not have had an 'abundant life.'
Michal made a great observation at that point. God told Adam to eat from any tree in the garden, except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, "for in the day that you eat from it you shall surely die." Adam and Eve ended up eating, and they died. Physically they were alive, but the relationship with God was broken. They couldn't live any longer the way they had been designed to live, they could not fulfill their purpose, and they died. Pursuit of their own definition of happiness had cost them their lives.
Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord, that now we can walk in the Spirit again, and wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. (Romans 7 and 8) We live!
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