The ultimate pursuit of pleasure!

This article was rather refreshing for me: Boldly Seek Joy!  I was raised in a home where the best I could hope for was not to be yelled at, criticized, shamed, or scorned for the indecent act of living, my mere existence was an offense to my mother and she could never see me enjoying anything without finding some fault, some chore, taking the object of my transitory happiness and giving it to another or destroying it, or otherwise raining on my pathetic attempt at a parade.  That is the biggest struggle I've had with this thing called Christianity: a big, bold, impossible God who actually loves and blesses His children.  I just don't get it!

There's that passage about 'as one escaping through fire,' the guy who just barely sneaks into heaven with his burned and ragged clothes and nothing else, yeah, that's me, or what I've always assumed.  Me, the kid who feels guilty for having a birthday and necessitating a present (socially required else she wouldn't bother) from my begrudging mother.  Then there's the greater cultural mentality of 'pulling oneself up by one's own bootstraps' and 'the self-made man,' at least for those of us who aren't waiting for Uncle Sam to bail us out.  My family isn't going to do anything for me, everything depends on my own effort, and how good can that be, if my own mother can't love me?  So I hide in the bushes, waiting for everyone else to go on ahead, and then at the last possible moment slink forward to the next place of concealment, waiting for all my betters to have their turn and chance, picking up the crumbs and bits of trash discarded along the way to survive.

And into this wretched little life came a rather impertinent proposition: you have value, you are loved, you are not outcast or forgotten, you can't earn love, you don't need to be ashamed!  Paul says we of all men are most wretched if Christ is not risen, so why do we intentionally live like that?  Either He's risen or He isn't, and if He is, death, sorrow, darkness, evil and all those horrid things have no claim on our immortal souls, we should live lives of Joy, not slink about like a defeated and scattered army.  Why can't I get that through my ridiculous head?  If I believe what I believe, why don't I live like it's true?

The path is difficult, fraught with shadows and trouble, but we walk it not alone, and He Himself has promised us Joy upon the journey, a down payment for that waiting at its end.  C.S. Lewis calls the little pleasures of this life comfortable and refreshing inns along life's often weary journey, to be enjoyed in their turn, but not an end of themselves.  Just because some people live for nothing but pleasure, does not mean the things in themselves are to be utterly scorned, rather don't let them become gods, for jumping off one side of the bridge is little better than falling off the other, rather walk down the middle as was intended!  And everyone is welcome to walk that path, even me!