Hast Thou Not Known?
FROM time to time, among the many letters I receive, I come across phrases like this: “I know now that thought is an important thing, but up to a year or so ago I didn’t think thoughts mattered at all.” Or: ” My faith in the power of thought is beginning to grow, so that now I believe that what I think, makes some difference to my life.” Another Student wrote: “I once went to ask a clergyman for advice because of the unhappy, hopeless thoughts that I had. He told me that we couldn’t help our thoughts and so there was nothing that could be done.”
I could not help wondering what that clergyman imagined Paul meant when he gave this very clear advice to his disciples: “Therefore, my brethren, dearly beloved and longed for, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord . . . Rejoice in the Lord aiway . . . Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue and if there be any praise, think on these things.” (Phil. 4, 18.)
Here is psychology in a nutshell Paul tells us to “stand fast “or have complete confidence in the Lord; to rejoice in the Lord, too. Not to be anxious or “careful” in our thoughts, but just ask God for what we want and then thank Him for those needs, knowing we will soon be receiving them; and then the peace of God would take possession of our hearts and minds through the Christ in whom we will abide; and that we must think only of lovely and true things, just, pure and praiseworthy things. What would be the good of all this if our thoughts didn’t matter one jot or we couldn’t help what we thought?
Let us get it all straight once and for all. First we are told by the apostle Paul: ” Know ye not that ye are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwelleth within you?” (I Cor. 3, 16.) Who, then, is this God who gives us of His spirit and indwells us? “Hast thou not known? Hast thou not heard? That the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth fainteth not, neither is weary? … He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might, He increaseth strength … They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk; and not faint.” (Isa. 40, 283 1.)
He that indwells us is the Creator of the ends of the earth!
How is a thing created? It must first be thought or conceived in the mind. Nothing was ever made that was not first shaped within somebody’s mind. God, the Creator, then, operates or creates by thought. (” 0 Lord, how great are Thy works And Thy thoughts are very deep.”) (Ps. 92, 5.) As His Spirit dwells within us we create by our thoughts. (” For as He thinketh in his heart, so is he.”) (Prov. 23, 7.) This, then, is the Truth. God, the Creator, dwelling in His Spirit within the temple of our bodies, passes on to us the creative power of thought. That is why the Master said that ” all things are possible to him that believcth “or thinks it is possible. And He warned us that even if we had a doubt buried deep in our hearts and we asked for something we needed, the doubt would create and not the weak petition of mere words. And so we would get what we doubted and feared and not what we weakly asked for. “Whosoever shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that whatsoever he saith shall come to pass, he shall have whatsoever he saith.”
Once more, then, I will repeat the truth: God, the Creator, dwelling in His Spirit within the temple of our bodies, passes on to us the creative power of thought. (” And hereby we know that He abideth in us, by the Spirit which He bath given us.”) (1 John, 3, 24.)
–Bernard