Replacing Passions

This is a devotion that was so practical to me that I thought it worth sharing with others. It is from The Manhood of the Master by Harry Emerson Fosdick.

Only by a stronger passion can evil passions be expelled, and... a soul unoccupied by a positive devotion is sure to be occupied by spiritual demons. When Ulysses passed the Isle of Sirens, he had himself tied to the mast and had his ears stopped with wax, that he might not hear the sirens singing--a picture of many a man's pitiful attempts after negative goodness. But when Orpheus passed the Isle of Sirens, he sat on the deck, indifferent, for he too was a musician and could make melody so much more beautiful than the sirens, that their alluring songs were to him discords. Such is the Master's life of positive goodness, so full, so glad, so triumphant, that it is conquered sin by surpassing it. Have you such a saving positiveness of loyal devotion in your life?

Many of us who strive to live faithfully to the Lord Jesus Christ do so like Orpheus tried to overcome the allure of the Isle of Sirens. That is, by focusing on NOT doing bad (whatever the wrong may be). A slow road to defeat, that is. In Christ, however, we have seen such beauty that we need not simply chase negative goodness; we can become so consumed in our chase of him that sin will lose all of its allure.

Another way of saying it is:

Turn your eyes upon Jesus

Look full in His wonderful face,

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim

In the light of His glory and grace.