"The heart cannot rejoice in what the mind rejects as false."

Dennis Edwards

C.S. Lewis said, "The heart cannot rejoice in what the mind rejects as false." The disciple Thomas could not accept the resurrection of Christ because it was out side his personal experience and contrary to the normal limits of reason. He thought his friends were delusional. But Christ gave him the proof he needed with a physical appearance. Thomas' response was pure and simple as he fell at Jesus' feet imploring, "My Lord and my God."[1] Today we use the phrase "Doubting Thomas" to characterise someone prone to doubting. Yet after that experience Thomas never doubted Christ's Messiahship again, and went on to be a disciple to India where he met a cruel death for his faith. 

If your reasoning mind has been entertaining doubts about Jesus' Messiahship seek Him desperately and He promises to reveal Himself to you. "Draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to you."[2] "Ye shall seek Me and find Me when ye shall search for Me will all your heart!"[3] "Ask and ye shall receive, seek and ye shall find, knock and it shall be opened unto you."[4] God loves you and wants to reveal Himself to you, but He leaves a lot up to you. 

Blaise Pascal had a thought similar to Lewis's. He wrote, "Willing to appear to those who seek Him with all their heart, and to be hidden from those who flee from Him with all their heart. God so regulates the knowledge of Himself that He has given indications of Himself, which are visible to those that seek Him and not to those who do not seek Him. There is enough light for those to see who only desire to see, and enough obscurity for those who have a contrary disposition."

Pascal is saying that God will reveal Himself to those that seek Him and will stay hidden from those who don't seek Him or flee from Him.

In a similar train of thought, Apostle Paul also said that God was not far from us if we would just seek for Him. In a speech to the learned Athenians he said,

“The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’[5]

Paul is saying that God is not far from any of us if we will just seek for Him.

However, later in his letter to the new disciples in Corinth, Paul used a bit stronger language. In discussing the choice we make when we choose not to believe. Paul says that the Devil has blinded the minds of those that don't want to believe, and therefore the glorious gospel of Christ does not illuminate them.[6] They choose darkness over light, they choose to walk in darkness separated from God. Jesus had said the same thing about the unbeliever. 

"And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil."[7] "I am the light of the world: he that follows me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life."[8]

In clarifying what Jesus meant, Paul, in his letter to the new disciples in Rome writes that all men actually know the truth, because it is obvious to everyone through God's creation which we see all around us. But ungodly men suppress the truth, God's revelation through His creation, because they want their freedom to act and behave as they will. Paul says,

"The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened."[9]

Again we see that man’s mind becomes darkened because he does not want the truth. Paul continues,

“Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen. Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.”[10]

Not only is much of the world not rejoicing in God, but they are being affected by those who are in rebellion to God. The acceptance of abortion, gay-marriage, gender change for children, and other beliefs have invaded the world culture though many people are naturally opposed to these views. But these are the views espoused in our learned universities and "enlightened" nations.

The Apostle Peter, also weighed in on the question of those that do not want to accept the proof of the invisible God seen through His visible creation. In Peter's second espistle we read,

“Above all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens came into being and the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed.”[11]

Peter is saying that unbelievers will scoff at "the promise of His coming" or, in other words at the truth of Bible prophecy. They will also result to believing the uniforitarian idea that the way we see things today, is generally they way they were in the past. They believe that the natural forces that we see today changing the environment, their rates and methods, have been the same since the dawn of time. The acknowledgement of the universal flood, to the unbeliever, is not part of real history. We see that the scoffer has rejected both the creation event by God and the Flood event, God’s judgment on the wicked.

Apostle Peter predicted that in the future, in the last days, men will willingly refuse to believe God created the world and that God judged the world at the time of the Noah's Flood. In the above translation it says "they deliberatedly forget." In another translation it says men were "willingly ignorant," or in other words, ignorant on purpose, or as Apostle Paul said in Romans, "they did not like to retain God in their knowledge." 

Much of today's scientific community have followed the naturalistic reasoning of the scoffer. When they investigate and do research, they willingly ignore belief in God, that God created the universe, that God created life, and that 3,500 years ago a worldwide flood destroyed the pre-Flood civilization. Much of science rejects the physical evidence that is best explained by a supernatural God and scoff at their creationist colleagues. We see today scientists, thinkers, public figures, who "flee from Him with all their heart" and are "willingly ignorant," but others that "seek for Him with all their heart" coming to totally different conclusions. 

But thank God, we that believe can rejoice in His creation and His promised Coming, and His word of prophecy that gives us faith and hope. Our minds do not reject the truth and therefore our heart rejoices. “This is the day which the Lord has made; we will rejoice and be glad in it”[12]

If you would like to read my online book Where is America in Bible Prophecy? click on the title.

Notes:

[1] John 21:28
[2] James 4:8
[3] Jeremish 29:13
[4] Acts 7:7
[5] Acts 17:24-28
[6] 2 Corinthians 4:4
[7] John 3:19
[8] John 8:12
[9] Romans 1:18-21 NIV
[10] Romans 1:24-25, 28-32 NIV
[11] 2 Peter 3:3-6 NIV
[12] Psalm 119:24