FEBRUARY • 2013
•
C VC ADMINISTRATIVE PERSPEC TIVE
– by Doug Vander Schaaf Schaaf, CVC CVC CMS MS teacher/principal
Misplaced Passions
I
Homecoming Savanah Garbani was crowned Homecoming Queen and Rhett Anderson was chosen Homecoming King during the annual festivities this past October. •
•
▲
•
•
In This Issue CVC School Board . . . . . . . Day 100 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Annual School Sale . . . . . . Sports Shorts . . . . . . . . . . Eighth Grade Science . . . . Chess Club . . . . . . . . . . . . . High School Musical . . . . . Stewardship Corner . . . . . Looking Ahead . . . . . . . . . Of Note . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Alumni News . . . . . . . . . . .
2 3 3 3 4 4 5 5 5 6 6
t is curious that in recent years the term ”passion” has taken on a new and positive connotation. I can remember a time (and perhaps this is the inner adolescent in me) when the mention of “passion” brought on snide snickers and “ooh la laas” because of the association with mushy, uncontrollable, romantic feelings. Passion or “being passionate” was not viewed as a particularly good thing because it indicated a weakness in falling subject to uncontrollable and overwhelming emotions. In fact, a definition of passion could be, “an intense, overmastering feeling or conviction.” People are sometimes described as attacking, or even killing, in “fits of passion.” Now it appears the term “passion,” when slapped on to virtually any interest or activity, justifies the pursuit or behavior. A recent television commercial encourages senior citizens to share their passions of fishing and cooking with their grandchildren. College and career counselors sometimes ask their advisees what their passions are in pursuit of education and employment. A while back I heard a parent say, rather proudly, that his family was passionate about a particular sport. There is another word that is very similar in meaning to passion, but has a rather negative connotation: “obsession.” I dare venture that most of us would rather be referred to as passionate rather than obsessive. Passion is positive, but obsession is negative. Grandparents would probably not want to hand their obsessions down to future generations and most parents might not consider it healthy for their family to be obsessed with baseball, volleyball, soccer or football. A passionate musician would be a sincere and dedicated minstrel, whereas the obsessive one would be the ranting, raving, wild-eyed loon in the attic pounding on the piano into the wee hours. In his book Crazy Love,, Francis Chan defines obsession as, “to have the mind excessively preoccupied with a single emotion or topic.” Chan then goes on to encourage his readers to be obsessed with following Jesus. It sounds a little strange. I would have expected him to use the term passion because it seems to be the popular term du jour. He does not explain why he chose the seemingly negative over the positive. This is pure speculation on my part, but I wonder if Mr. Chan chose his terminology because of his careful reading of God’s word. Consider that the Bible does not have one positive thing to say about passion or being passionate. In fact, Scripture repeatedly encourages us to control our passions (Galatians 5:24) and to avoid being enslaved by worldly passions (Titus 3:3). Nowhere is there any (“Misplaced Passions” continues on page 2)