Christian Moderation

[Theogenes]

“The Christian does not consider the wealth and the honor and the pleasures of this world as destitute of value; but he sees that that value is by no means what the deluded worshippers of Mammon suppose it to be. He sees that the possession of them cannot make him happy, nor the want of them make him miserable. They cannot obtain for him the pardon of his sin, they cannot pacify his conscience, they cannot transform his character, they cannot give him life in death, they cannot secure him of happiness forever. They appear to him polluted with sin, replete with temptation, pregnant of danger.
With these views, he is moderate in his desires for them, moderate in his pursuit of them, moderate in his attachment to them while he enjoys them, moderate in his regrets for them when he is deprived of them. This is Christian sobriety.”

John Brown, from his commnetary on 1Peter

 

[discipulo]

But this I say, brethren, the time is short: it remaineth, that both they that have wives be as though they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as not abusing it: for the fashion of this world passeth away. 1 Corinthians 7:29-31