“Flee from youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, together with those who call on God out of a pure heart.”
(2 Timothy 2:22)
This is a great summary of what the Bible teaches. The whole idea is to prune old, self-centered ways from our lives and embrace a new way of living — the way of true love.
It’s been said that the person you’ll be in five years will be determined by the people you hang out with and the things you watch, listen to and read.
When we’re struggling and looking for real change, the first step is to get away from the things that are holding us back. Most of the time, the things that hold us back are things we won’t let go.
The Bible makes clear we are all born into sin. Left to our own devices, we tend to seek after things of the world, and we allow those things to become addictions of all kinds. Whether it’s food, lust, pride, wealth, or any of the earthly things we cling to, we often allow those to become so important they outweigh our calling to a higher purpose.
The direction is clear — we should flee from those things. We have to make an intentional decision to turn from them, and to pursue a more noble path. It doesn’t happen by accident.
One of the most important things we can do, in order to accomplish the goal of becoming a better person and living a better life, is to surround ourselves with others who are on a similar path.
We can’t spend our time pursuing our youthful passions and hanging out with people who are pursing their own youthful passions and expect we will somehow elevate beyond that.
It takes a conscious decision and affirmative action on our parts, to grow into spiritual maturity. Turn from the old ways and pursue the new way, together with people who are doing the same.
One step at a time, we march in a new and better direction.
Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels
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