A Contrarian Optimist
This is another post relating to George Gilder’s encouraging explanation of how economies work–described as “A New Economics.” I will try to show how his positive ideas about economics suggest a helpful way to look at overcoming lust as well.
I suppose that makes me a contrarian optimist as well.
Gilder’s Insight
Gilder demonstrates that Capitalism is based on creative surprises. These surprises—the accumulation of them increasing our knowledge—are the driving force behind our relentlessly improving standard of living. This upsurge is not explained by other conventional economic theories.
A surprise—consisting of a new idea or innovative information—is loaded with highly volatile elements. However, surprises do not do much good by themselves. Each needs a “carrier.”
Here is how it works. When a surprise is created it is cradled within our modern technological and economic environment. This is the carrier. The less “surprising,” more stable and predictable this carrier behaves—maintaining things like property rights, the rule of law, sound money, predictable regulations and taxation—the more we profit from creative surprises.
More than ever, the surprises that are erupting around us now are not bound geographically. Instead, because they are rooted in the information sciences, they are highly mobile. As a result, an innovator can easily move to Texas or Israel instead of staying in CA when things get squirrely. That is why maintaining and protecting a no surprise environment is critical to economic prosperity. Why foolishly cook the goose that lays gold eggs?
The importance of a “no surprise” carrier can be illustrated by a Super Bowl broadcast, containing innumerable bits of unexpected information. Bringing all of this information to your living room in close to real time and In HD quality is a stunning technological achievement. All the cameras, transmission lines and even the HD cable to your TV act as the carrier. This carrier must be finely purified and smoothed out all along the way or else the end result is spoiled.
So what does any of this have to do with overcoming lust?
There is nothing happening on this planet right now that is more surprising or exciting than what God is doing through those who are fully committed to doing His will. How could it be otherwise if the Creator of all things dwells in us?
As God’s child, you are the carrier of the effective, surprising and transformative message of the Gospel—Good News.
You are like the fiber optic cable carrying the Super Bowl broadcast into your home. God intends for you to be a pure carrier whose sins do not get in the way of the message. You are called to “rise and shine” (Isaiah 60:1-3).
Consider the horror of your life if you are being overcome by lust. Your noisy, messy life is obscuring and misrepresenting what God is intending to communicate and accomplish.
That is reason enough for you to let your lust go. Get rid of it. Lay it “aside.”
“….let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us….” (Hebrews 12:1)
In a recent article Gilder describes his view as “contrarian optimism.” I like that.
No matter what you believe or what others are may be telling you, I am convinced that you too can overcome lust and effectively demonstrate freedom from sin. I suppose that makes me a contrarian optimist as well.
