These Two Thinkers Made Your World — Descartes and Pascal

Read More

September 5 Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)

 

"Willing to appear plainly to those who seek Him with all their heart and conceal from those who flee from Him with all their heart. God tempers the knowledge of Himself in such a manner as to give signs of Himself visible to those who seek Him, but not to those who seek Him not. There is light enough for those who only want to seek Him, and darkness enough for those of a contrary disposition. There is clearness enough to see for enlightening the elect and obscurity sufficient to humilitate. There is obscurity enough to blind the reprobate and clearness enough or sufficient to condemn them and render them inexcusable." - "Penses"

Read More

Have You Found God?

Dennis Edwards

Are you wandering in darkness and can’t seem to find the light? Are you confused and don’t seem to know what to believe? Does it really matter? Can you truly know? Is there really any truth? Is it worth it to even bother with such questions? Isn’t it all just meaningless? Hasn’t science proved there is no God? 

God’s word tells us that if we really seek desparately we will find.[1] The Lord says, “Ye shall seek Me and find Me when ye shall search for Me with all your heart.”[2] Jesus said, “Those that hunger and thirst after righteousness shall be filled.”[3] In other words, it takes a considerable effort. Any thing worth something cost us something in its conquest. That’s why Jesus said, “Enter ye at the straight (or narrow) gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many there be that go in there at. Because straight is the gait and narrow is the way that leads to life and few there be that find it.”[4]

Are we really seeking God, seeking truth, seeking goodness with all our heart and mind and strength? Maybe that’s why His first commandment was to love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength, and with all our mind.[5] If we are not desparate in our search, we will miss it. The enemy of our soul will deceive us into believing something less than the truth. But it is only the truth, and nothing but the truth, that will set us free in heart and in mind and bring us the peace of heart and mind that we seek. 

Saint Teresa of Avila said, “God never withholds Himself from them who pay the price and preserve in seeking Him. He will, little by little, and now and then strengthen and restore that soul, until it is at last victorious.”[6]

Apostle Peter tells us that if we only with a desparate and open heart will read and seek in God Word, as we would seek after a light in a place of complete darkness, that God will come to us and eventually His Spirit will touch us like the light of the morning sunrise. All at once the light will break in and we will understand.[7]

However, the enemy of our soul will try to get us to doubt. Pascal said, “Willing to appear to those who seek 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 visable to those who seek Him and not to those who do not seek Him. There is enough light for those to see who only (really) desire to see, and enough obscurity for those who have a contrary disposition (and prefer not to believe).”[8]

Apostle Paul tells us he counts everything he had in life before he met Jesus, his position in the Sandhedrin, his power, his good education under one of the most learned Rabbis, Paul counted it all rubbish in comparison with the infinite worth of knowing Jesus.[9]

Please don’t let the things of this world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life keep you from finding God.[10] The Catholic mystic Thomas Merton said, “If you found God with great ease, perhaps it’s not God that you found.” Break out of those false concepts. Break free by calling upon the Lord with all your heart.[11] Break loose by seeking with all your heart for the truth that will make you free in heart and mind and body. “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”[12]

---

[1] Matthew 7:7 “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”

[2] Jeremiah 29:13

[3] Matthew 5:6

[4] Matthew 7:13-14

[5] Mark 12:30 “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.”

[6] Teresa of Avila, as cited by Andrew Murray in “The School of Obedience,” The Essential Works of Andrew Murray, Barbour Publishing, 2008, p.720.

[7] 2 Peter 1:19 “We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts.”

[8] Blaise Pascal, Pensées cited by Tim Barnett in “Belief in God, Evidence, and the Human Heart,” https://www.str.org > articles > belief-god-evidence-and-the-human-heart#.XeO_qB5Uk0M

[9] Philippians 3:8 “Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excllency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ.”

[10] 1 John 2:16 “For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.”

[11] Romans 10:13 “For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord (Jesus) shall be saved.”

[12] John 8:32

Read More

"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 epistle 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 uniformitarian 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 deliberately 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] Jeremiah 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

Read More