A Thought on Passion

Have you ever had so much on your heart and mind that you just didn’t know what to do with it all? When you tried to express what you were thinking and feeling that it just came out all garbled and nonsensical, and the more you tried to be clear the more obvious it became that you were being anything but “clear?” Have you ever been so excited, so filled with enthusiasm that you just couldn’t hardly contain yourself, and you just had to share it? When was the last time you really felt passionate about something. I’m talking about the kind of passion that’s defined as “boundless enthusiasm.”

When you read the word “passion” what comes to mind? A person, an idea, a thing? When was the last time you felt “boundless enthusiasm” for someone or something? Do you still have it? If not, why not?

It’s amazing the variety of things people can be passionate about. You name it, and there’s probably someone somewhere who’s passionate about it. What is it that ignites passion? Why do some things hold our passion for a lifetime, and some only for a little while? Why is it that some passions die? Why is it that some people go from being passionate about one thing to being passionate about something else, and why is it that some people can’t find anything to be passionate about?

Passions can lead people to other people, places, things, and ideas; some of which are good, and some bad. Passion can make all the difference between those who accomplish little and those who accomplish a lot, and often it’s what we’re passionate about that defines who we are, what we become, and most importantly what we do, and why we do it.

It’s easy to recognize passionate people. You can see it written all over them. Passion shows itself. It moves people to action. Passionate people are difference makers, risk takers, go-getters. They’re the kind of people who would pursue their passion in the dark, who would do it regardless of the outcome, who would sacrifice time, money, effort, whatever it took to do it, and not regret a moment spent in their pursuit of it. Passionate people are fighters, and they’re lovers, and they have no idea what the word “quit” means. Passionate people are above all people of determination and perseverance.

So, who or what are you passionate about, and why? And, when you think of people who are passionate who comes to mind? Now, think about this… “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

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From “Morning Thoughts” by Winslow

“And do not be conformed to this world: but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.” Romans 12:2

THE world, and the love of it, and conformity to it, may please and assist the life of sense, but it is opposed to, and will retard, the life of faith. Not more opposed in their natures are the flesh and the Spirit, darkness and light, sin and holiness, than are a vigorous life of faith and a sinful love of the world. Professor of the gospel! guard against the world; it is your great bane: watch against conformity to it in your dress, in your mode of living, in the education of your children, in the principles, motives, and policy that govern you. Grieve not, then, the Holy Spirit of God by any known inconsistency of conduct, any sinful conformity to the world, any inordinate pursuit of its wealth, its honors, its pleasures, its friendships, and its great things. Pray against the sin of covetousness, that canker-worm that feeds at the root of so many souls; pray against the love of dress, that sin that diverts the mind of so many professors from the simplicity of Christ, and takes the eye off from the true adornment; pray against a thirst for light and trifling reading, that strange and sinful inconsistency of so many, the certain tendency of which is to starve the life of God in the soul, to engender a distaste for spiritual aliment, for the word of God, for holy meditation, and for Divine communion and fellowship-yes, pray against the spirit of worldly, sinful conformity in everything, that the Holy Spirit do not be grieved, and that Christ do not be dishonored and crucified afresh in and through you. It is to be feared that much of the professed Christianity of the day is of a compromising character. The spirit that marks so many is, “What will you give me, and I will deliver him unto you?” There is a betraying of Christ before the world-a bartering of Christianity for its good opinion, its places of honor, and influence, and emolument. The world, the flesh, and Satan are ever on the alert to frame a bargain with a Christian professor for his religion. “What will you give me in return?” is the eager inquiry of many. Oh, awful state! oh, fearful deception! oh, fatal delusion! Reader! are you a professing Christian? Then guard against the least compromise of your principles, the least betrayal of Jesus, the first step in an inconsistency of walk; above all, pray and watch against a worldly Christianity-a Christianity that wears a fair exterior, so far as it is composed of attendance upon sanctuary services and sacraments and religious institutions, but which excludes from it the cross of the meek and lowly Lamb of God-a Christianity which loves the world and the things of the world, “makes a fair show in the flesh,” speaks well of Christ, and yet betrays Him with a kiss. Let not this be the model of your religion. The world is the sworn enemy of your Savior; let it not be your friend. No; come out of it, and be you separate.

 

From “Morning Thoughts” by Winslow

“That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters into that within the veil; where the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus.” Hebrews 6:17-19

THE hope of heaven fostered by an unrenewed mind is baseless and illusory. There exists not a single element of goodness in its nature. It is the conception of a mind at enmity with God. It is the delusion of a heart in covenant with death, and in agreement with hell. It is the treacherous beacon that decoys the too confiding but deluded voyager to the rock-bound shore. Unscriptural, unreal, and baseless, it must eventually cover its possessor with shame and confusion of face. But not such is the believer’s hope. Begotten with his second nature-the in-breathing of the Spirit of God-an element of renewed mind, and based upon the atonement of the Savior, it must be essentially a good hope. Cleansed from moral impurity, not in the laver of baptism, but with the blood of Christ; justified, not by the ritual of Moses, but by the righteousness of the incarnate God; sanctified, not by sacramental grace, falsely so called, but by the in-being of the Holy Spirit-the believer’s hope of heaven is as well founded as the throne of the Eternal. Moreover it is “a good hope through grace.” The first and the last lesson we learn in our Christian course is, that “by grace we are saved.” Lord! do You require of me one thought of stainless purity, one throb of perfect love, one deed of unsullied holiness, upon which shall hinge my everlasting happiness? Then am I lost forever! But since You have provided a righteousness that justifies me from all things, that frees me from all condemnation-and since this righteousness is Your free, unpurchased gift, the bestowment of sovereign grace-I clasp to my trembling yet believing heart the joyous hope this truth inspires. It is a blessed hope. “Looking for that blessed hope.” Its object is most blessed. The heaven it compasses is that blissful place where the holy ones who have fled from our embrace are reposing in the bosom of the Savior. They are the blessed dead. The day of their death was to them better than the day of their birth. The one was the introduction to all sorrow, the other is a translation to all joy. Blessed hope! the hope of being forever with the Lord. No more to grieve the Spirit that so often and so soothingly comforted our hearts; no more to wound the gentle bosom that so often pillowed our head. No more to journey in darkness, nor bend as a bruised reed before each blast of temptation. To be a pillar in the temple of God, to go no more out forever. And what a sanctifying hope is it! This, to the spiritual mind, is its most acceptable and elevating feature. “Every man that has this hope in him purifies himself even as He is pure.” It detaches from earth, and allures to heaven. Never does it glow more brightly in the soul, nor kindle around the path a luster more heavenly, than when it strengthens in the believer a growing conformity of character to that heaven towards which it soars. It is, in a word, a sure hope. Shall the worm undermine it? shall the tempest shake it? shall the waters extinguish it? Never. It saves us. It keeps, preserves, and sustains us amid the perils and depressions of our earthly pilgrimage. And having borne us through the flood, it will not fail us when the last surge lands us upon the shore of eternity.