(September 12, 2014)
I had
two thoughts as I read through these chapters. The first was on Joash turning away from the
Lord after Jehoiada died. This is
something that I have seen a few times in my life – a truly righteous man or
women who acts as an anchor to those around him or her in the Gospel, and yet
when this person dies many of the people who anchored themselves to him or her
spiral out of control or out of the Church. As I ponder how best to serve my children and
teach them the Gospel, this is something that is important for me to consider –
I want their testimonies to be personal and to the Lord, rather than trying to
build them around me.
Secondly,
I was struck by the language that they sought after gods that could not even
deliver their own people. We do that in
our day – we seek after a lifestyle that we want to emulate, whether from Hollywood or the
scientific community or any other subculture. We adopt many of these ideas, assumptions, and
lifestyle choices uncritically without even bothering to ask whether they serve
to make the people who practice them happy. The Hollywood
actor or starlet who is miserable, abused, or drug-addicted is almost cliché. The miserable curmudgeon of an atheistic,
materialistic scientist is all to common.
Why would we look to either example for ways to live? Instead, let us look to the lifestyle that
brings genuine happiness even in times of adversity.
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