|
 There
is talk of reinstating the military draft, and the news media
says a party of "Libertines" on the U.T. campus will
mount a protest. One representative of the party had some strong
(perhaps threatening) things to say about a government that
would restrict their "liberties."
In
Roman antiquity a "libertine" was a manumitted slave
— one who had bought or been given his freedom. In
Ecclesiastical history, the Libertines were a political party in
Geneva (-1555) who protested the rigors of Calvinism. There was
also a pantheistic sect in France and Holland who denied the
difference in good and evil. The dictionary says a libertine is
one who is free from restraint; who acts according to impulse;
who gives rein to lust; and gives synonyms such as: dissolute,
licentious, profligate, loose in morals.
And,
on top of all this, a mother told me her college-age son admired
and perhaps envied me because I "did what I wanted to
do." I'm Libertine??
Well,
I hope not! Looking for some good in his comment (call an
optimist a "liar" and he thinks you are complimenting
his imagination) perhaps he liked my sunny disposition. Hmmm!
And regardless of what he meant, there is more than one way to
"do what one wants to do." There is such a
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thing as adjusting one's desires.
If
you are cold you can move about vigorously and thank God for
fresh, energizing circumstances. If hot, you have a marvelous
opportunity to sweat off some of that fat. O.K., I'm being a bit
facetious, but I'm very serious in urging you to develop a sense
of contentment with what you have — not a "do
nothing" contentment, but "use what I have"
contentment.
The
Libertine who makes self his life purpose contributes nothing of
good to the world, and loses his soul. He asks government to
"protect his rights" with never a thought of
obligation to government, or to the God-given sense of
"ought" that gave him certain "rights." (The
no-God, evolutionary man has no "rights" except those
he makes with his might.)
If
we would accept our life as having divine purpose, and train our
desires in keeping with that purpose, we can serve God in
prison, shipwrecked at sea, or in whatever circumstances we find
ourselves. "Troubled, yet not distressed..." (2 Cor.
4:8-18). "I have learned, in whatsoever state I am
therewith to be content" (Phil. 4:11). Wanting to be the
Lord's slave — this is the only true liberty.
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