THE RELIGION OF IMAGINATION
I am thankful to be able to share this little blurb from one of Charles Finney's books, Crystal Christianity.
"An individual can never know the true state of his heart unless he is active in the Church. [I am almost convinced that Sir Charles was pointing out the bankrupt state of the individual who thinks "finding the right church and becoming a member" has something more to do with God's perfect will than seeking to please God in whatever circumstance he may find himself]. How can he ever know his real feeling toward outsiders or sinners if he never brings his mind in actual contact with them? His imagination may make him feel, but his feelings are not based on reality.
Individuals shut out from the world of reality and living in worlds of imagination become perfect creatures of imagination. A similiar thing happens in Christianity with those who don't bring their mind in contact with reality. They think they love mankind yet do them no good. They imagine they abhor sin but do nothing to destroy it. How many people deceive themselves by exciting their imagination about missions but do nothing to save souls? Women will spend a whole day at a prayer meeting for the conversion of the world, while their impenitent servant in the kitchen is not spoken to all day.
If they loved God and man, the pictures drawn by the imagination about the unsaved in other countries would not create any more feeling than the reality around them. They are surrounded by sinners, and they hear profane oaths and see vices as a naked reality every day. If these produce no feeling, it is a vain thing to pretend that they feel what God feels for sinners in foreign lands or anywhere.
If you want to be holy, do not withdraw yourself from mankind. If the Lord had thought such circumstances would be favorable to piety, He would have directed them so. But He knew better. He has, therefore, appointed circumstances as they are so that His people may have a thousand objects of benevolence and a thousand opportunities to do good. If they deny themselves and turn their hearts upon these things, they cannot fail to grow in holiness and have increasing evidence."
JAMES 4:17
"So any person who knows what is right to do but does not do it, to him it is sin."
"An individual can never know the true state of his heart unless he is active in the Church. [I am almost convinced that Sir Charles was pointing out the bankrupt state of the individual who thinks "finding the right church and becoming a member" has something more to do with God's perfect will than seeking to please God in whatever circumstance he may find himself]. How can he ever know his real feeling toward outsiders or sinners if he never brings his mind in actual contact with them? His imagination may make him feel, but his feelings are not based on reality.
Individuals shut out from the world of reality and living in worlds of imagination become perfect creatures of imagination. A similiar thing happens in Christianity with those who don't bring their mind in contact with reality. They think they love mankind yet do them no good. They imagine they abhor sin but do nothing to destroy it. How many people deceive themselves by exciting their imagination about missions but do nothing to save souls? Women will spend a whole day at a prayer meeting for the conversion of the world, while their impenitent servant in the kitchen is not spoken to all day.
If they loved God and man, the pictures drawn by the imagination about the unsaved in other countries would not create any more feeling than the reality around them. They are surrounded by sinners, and they hear profane oaths and see vices as a naked reality every day. If these produce no feeling, it is a vain thing to pretend that they feel what God feels for sinners in foreign lands or anywhere.
If you want to be holy, do not withdraw yourself from mankind. If the Lord had thought such circumstances would be favorable to piety, He would have directed them so. But He knew better. He has, therefore, appointed circumstances as they are so that His people may have a thousand objects of benevolence and a thousand opportunities to do good. If they deny themselves and turn their hearts upon these things, they cannot fail to grow in holiness and have increasing evidence."
JAMES 4:17
"So any person who knows what is right to do but does not do it, to him it is sin."
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