Worship

A friend of mine will be presenting a philosophy paper on forgiveness soon. What a great idea, to reflect on such a virtue? action? Anyway, Paul instructed the church at Philippi to reflect on whatever is true, honorable, right: whatever is pure, lovely, of good repute; whatever is excellent or worthy of praise, think on these things.

So I began to think about gratitude. How great would it be to write a paper on gratitude? That's what keeps overwhelming me in life, gratitude for what God has given to me, and, thankfully, not given to me. So when I worship God I am overcome with gratitude. There's a link here with love. But I think gratitude is a response one has when they have been given that which they do not deserve. Maybe that's why I weep before the Lord every time I come to Him in worship. I am overcome by His magnificence, beauty, glory. I praise Him. I am thankful for His desperate love for me. I am grateful. I am grateful for the promises Christ has given me. I am thankful for the hope that "I Will Rise"

The Psychology of Love

Harry Frankfurt is an important voice in the philosophy of action, free will, and moral responsibility. I recently read one of his more significant essays titled "The Importance of What We Care About." He began to talk about love, its psychology, and the paradox that ensues. He speaks of love as a form of volitional necessity. That is, it's not even really up to us what we love. Somehow it captures us. And we make ourselves susceptible to the liabilities of the beloved object. And it is just beyond our control.

Then he writes on the constraining nature of love. "When we accede to being moved by logic or by love, the feeling with which we do so is not ordinarily of dispirited impotence. On the contrary, we characteristically experience in both cases - whether we are following reason or our hearts - a sense of liberation and enhancement. What accounts for this experience? It appears to have its source in the fact that when a person is responding to a perception of something...as beloved, his relationship to it tends toward selflessness. His attention is not merely concentrated upon the object; The object captivates him. He is guided by its characteristics rather than primarily by his own. Quite commonly, he feels that he is overcome - that his on direction of his thoughts and volitions has been superseded. How are we to understand the paradox that a person may be enhanced and liberated through being seized, made captive, and overcome?" (bold emphasis mine)

And then I am reminded of Paul's words "I am under compulsion; woe is me if I do not preach the gospel."

Jesus said:

"Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."

"So if the Son makes you free, you are free indeed."

I am captivated by Christ, set free, liberated by His constraint. I am my best as His bondservant. Praise God from whom all blessings flow.

Whoa people...what happened

I looked at my blog the other day just to see if anyone had commented on one of the posts. Up until then, I only had about 550 visits to the blog. A couple of days later I now see that I have almost 12000 hits. What is up with that. I really don't have anything that interesting to say. So either we have something truly bizare that's happened or my post counter got really messed up.