Author and pastor Mark Clark tells the following story:
I started smoking when I was in the eighth grade. I stopped shortly after I got married when I was twenty-three years old. I smoked for ten years of my life, and I loved it. You could tell me daily I was going to die of cancer – but it didn’t matter. You could warn me, you could work on my behavior. The government puts pictures on cigarette packages of bleeding brains and rotting teeth. But that never deterred me. I would just go into the store and say, “Give me one pack of donkey teeth and one dead brain.”
You know how I quit? I fell in love with a girl who hated smoking. And over time my love for smoking was trumped by something stronger: my love for her.
So I quit.
That’s the expulsive power of a new affection in action. My tendency toward idolatry didn’t disappear, but the object of my affection shifted in priority. You can’t just tear down idols; you have to replace them with something you love more.
Praxis: Faith in Action 