"John Bunyan, the mightiest penman of his era in church history, whose 'Pilgrim's Progress' has stirred, shaped, and stabilized millions in the faith, distrusted the mind of man. His classic 'The Holy War' shows the conflict waged between Christ and Satan for the possession of the human soul. When Satan takes Mansoul (the city allegorically representative of you and me), that dragon assigns an aid to Mr. Understanding (whose castle of spiritual perception has been shadowed by a tower Satan erected to block its windows). 'To compensate for the darkness imposed on you, I will give you help,' promises the liar. That aid is introduced: Mr. Mind. Make no mistake, Bunyan is no anti-reason, anti-intellect, anti-learning bigot. He isn't. Nor am I. But I distrust the human mind, too. I'm not challenging its sincereity or intent, its brilliant potential, or its marvelous functioning. I just distrust its capacity to save us. Pool the resources of earth's intelligencia, but you won't produce salvation or a savior.
Frighteningly evident today is the increasing certainty in high circles that information is now our savior, and its strategic availibility and application holds the key to the race's survival, and possibly its glorious success. It is this unsound supposition, so confidently asserted by earth's brain trustees, that brings us closer and closer to becoming regimented robots ruled by one giant computer. (I have a hard time looking at those stripes and numbers on my cereal boxes and soup cans and not believing that 666 is hovering just beyond the immediate horizon of history.) The scriptures, however, record real saviors rising throughout history. The Bible is a chronicle of right-thinking men and women, doing some right things at right times and insuring the race's continuance.
1. Noah, against all reason, built an ark and mankind lived on
2. Joseph, by means of guidance received in a dream which God gave him, preserved an empire
3. Elijah prays and prophesies drought, and a revival staves off the fall of a nation victimized by degenerate leadership
4. The Savior of saviors, the Man above men, Jesus Christ, the Son of God and the Lord of glory, surrenders to death on a Roman cross. The result: resurrection possibilities for all mankind and life eternal.
Th Lord is insistent: 'My thoughts are not as your thoughts.' The report is in our headlines: we flounder in our think-tanks and never learn to swim. A thorough-going, thinking person learns, however slowly, that our upside-down-world mind-patterns can only be set right-side-up by backward thinking: back from trusting 'mind' to save us. The scriptures give sound words of admonition. Let me suggest several. (1) Romans 12:2. '...be transformed by the renewing of your mind'; (2) Phillipians 2:5, 'Let this mind be in you...' (3) Ephesians 4:23, 'And be renewed in the spirit of your mind.'
God never intended that we put our brain in a bag and never think anymore. He did, however, desire that our mind and spirit would cooperate in accomplishing His will and purpose, and He would help us think if we would be willing to listen to how He thinks.
Ron Mehl"