The same theme comes out of our Collect for the day, which suggests that the highest pleasures  are from what God has prepared for us, rather than from breaking out of what He has prepared.  You may remember or be reminded from the pewsheet that it goes like this:- O God, who hast prepared for them that love thee such good things as pass man's understanding; Pour into our hearts such love toward thee, that we, loving thee above all things, may obtain thy promises, which exceed all that we can desire; through Jesus Christ our Lord. That Collect could have been written with the words for obey and obedience in the place of the words for love, and it would still have made perfect sense. [Show] Because the characteristically Christian understanding of loving God includes being obedient to God. In the Scriptures to love a course of action has the connotation of sticking to it, cleaving to it. Conversely, the highest expression of obedience is not a slavish obedience, but a loving obedience. The Collect might have the "good things" of heaven in mind when it speaks of what has been prepared as the "good things as pass man's understanding", but those good things of heaven are to be known by us in a foretaste of them here on earth; for we are not just heirs of the kingdom of heaven sometime in the future, but we are also inheritors of the kingdom already.

So St. Paul too prays for the Colossians that they be strengthened with all power, according to the Lord's glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. We might say that those who enjoy life in the fullest sense are those for whom God has answered this apostolic prayer.  Of course the prayer is not for an easy life or for a life free of the endurance of or patience through suffering. But it is a prayer to be granted power and joy. Such are the high pleasures that are in alignment with God's will and purpose.  The kite does best when it is guided by the string, even though that guidance is against the pull of the wind, and we humans obtain the highest pleasures from our lives not by giving in to the winds of the world, the flesh and the devil, no matter to what heights they might beckon us, but by seeking and receiving the Lord's strength  and power after the pattern of the gloriously resurrected and ascended Christ, to endure and to be patient with joy.

We probably need not have to ask therefore which of the three travellers on the Jerusalem-Jericho road, the priest, the Levite or the Samaritan, enjoyed his journey the best, or would have done if this story of Jesus was based on a real event. Perhaps the priest and the Levite were hurrying to perform their religious duties, but their failure to love their neighbour cannot have made them feel very good about themselves or their journey. They cannot have derived any pleasure from their recollection, even if perhaps they were pleasing themselves when they decided to ignore the wounded man in the road. The Samaritan who showed mercy would have been the one to derive some satisfaction about the event afterwards, in spite of having to be delayed on his journey. So I think St. Paul's apostolic prayer for the Colossians, whom he had not actually seen at that point, is a wonderful prayer for a pastor to have in his mind about his church people. May you too, then, all of you, be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, to lead a life worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to Him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. Unlike the kite with the broken string, you too will then derive the most pleasure from such a life, whatever endurance and patience will be required of you.