Chapter 9: Freedom in the Thought-Life
Chapter 9
Freedom in the Thought-Life
The next step is to discuss true spirituality in relation to separation from ourselves in the internal world of thought.
In Romans 1:22-29, we find an order established. Introductory to this passage we notice in verse 21: “Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.”
Here are those who knew God. We can think of it in terms of the original fall of Adam and Eve, or we can think of it in terms of those many, many times when a culture has known the true God and has deliberately turned away, as is the case in our own post-Christian world. We see that they knew God, but they became vain in their reasoning. This is the world of their thoughts. Then, in verse 22: “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.” This is an internal thing; the external is in verse 24: “Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves.” This is the result. Thus we see the order: first there was an idea in their thought-life, and then came the outward result of the idea.
In verse 25 we are told that they “changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature [created thing] more than the Creator.” Here is the inward rebellion, and immediately this brought external results as we saw in verse 24.
Look now at verse 28: “And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind [that is, a mind void of judgment], to do those things which are not convenient [becoming].” Here again is the same order. Beginning with the twenty-ninth verse, we go through an awful list of the outward things.
We can say two things about the external act: the external follows the internal, and the external is a product of the internal. Thoughts are first, and they produce the external. This is the order.
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. (Romans 12:1)
Now this is in the external world. But notice this cannot be separated from verse 2:
And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.
There is indeed to be a presenting of our bodies, but this has meaning only on the basis of the understanding of the internal.
Paul speaks here of not being conformed to this world. But that is not simply externally. In contrast to this, we are to be transformed by the renewing of our mind, and that is internal.
In Ephesians 4:17 Paul writes: “This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind.” Here is the Gentile world, the lost world. They are walking “in the vanity of their mind.” Surely this sounds like Romans 1: “They became vain in their reasonings.” This is an inward thing. This is what is wrong with the Gentile world: the vanity of its mind.
In Ephesians 4:18 we are given the reason for this: “Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness [or hardness] of their hearts.” So we are told that their understanding is darkened; that is an internal thing. All of this flows from the basis of their rebellion against God. It is exactly as Romans 1 explains it. But after showing where “the Gentiles” stand, there comes verse 19, with its picture of men “past feeling,” giving themselves over to “lasciviousness [licentiousness], to work all uncleanness and greediness.” So again the order is the same: the internal, then the external.
Now we are brought sharply to a contrast in verse 20: “But ye have not so learned Christ.” The word “learned,” let us notice, is again an internal thing.
This is exactly parallel to Romans 12, where in verse 2 we read “by the renewing of your mind.” That is an internal thing, and so is this. But Ephesians 4:22 is the outward: “That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts.”
The “conversation” here encompasses the whole set of life. It is in itself an internal aspect. Then it flows over into the external. So this all rests upon verse 20, “Ye have not so learned Christ,” which is an internal thing. The internal thing has internal motion from it: first to internal results, and then to external results.
Now you will notice here another element in this that is most important in the twentieth century, and in the midst of twentieth-century thinking. In verse 18 it speaks of ignorance. Ignorance is in relationship to content; it is not just a spirit of ignorance. In verse 21 it speaks of “the truth in Jesus.” Truth is content, truth has something to do with reason. Truth has something to do with the rational creature that God has made us. The dilemma here in the internal world is not just some sort of gray fog, it is in relationship to content.
“Be renewed in the spirit of your mind” (verse 23). This again is not simply a feeling. It is a matter of thoughts in a rational sense, and with content. “That ye put on the new man which after God is created in righteousness and [the best translation here is] holiness of truth” (Ephesians 4:24).
This is not just an emotional holiness but holiness in relationship to content, holiness in relationship to thought and a set of things that can be stated as true, in contrast to that which is false. What is being dealt with here is the problem of internal ignorance in the sense of rebellion, turning from those things that are truth.
Here are inward thoughts: thoughts in relationship to specific content, leading on to the external. In Ephesians 5:15-16 there is a parallel passage: “See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.”
The word “wise” here conveys the same message. It has to do with the thought-world, but in contact with that which can be stated as true: “Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is” (verse 17). “Unwise” is in contrast to “wise” and “understanding.” “Understanding” is again in the thought-world, in relationship to what the will of the Lord is. The “will of the Lord” here is not an existential notion in the twentieth-century sense. It is concerned with content again, in relationship to what we would speak of as propositional or objective truth. In contrast to “walking foolishly” there is verse 18: “And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit.”
Verses 19-21 begin to set out some of the external results of this: “Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord; giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ; submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.”
These are external results of a previously adopted position in the thought-world. There is an additional element here which is most important in our thinking. The work of the Holy Spirit, as the agent of the Trinity, is not a coat we put on. It is not an external thing at all, but internal, bringing, in turn, something external.
So here we move on in our understanding of true spirituality in the Christian life. Basically it is a matter of our thoughts. The external is the expression, the results. Moral battles are not won in the external world first. They are always a result flowing naturally from a cause, and the cause is in the internal world of one’s thoughts. In fact, Jesus emphasized this with great force: “O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh” (Matthew 12:34).
There are those who would make a distinction here and regard “the heart” as more than just thoughts, but even if one held this view, the important fact is simply that here we are dealing with the internal world. What Jesus is saying is that if the internal condition is not right, one cannot bring forth proper results.
“Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man” (Matthew 15:11). Jesus is talking about the question put to him earlier: “Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread.” This kind of question is very important to the externalist. But Jesus says: Don’t you understand something? It is what comes out of a man, this is what defiles a man.
“Do not ye yet understand, that whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth into the belly, and is cast out into the draught? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: these are the things which defile a man: but to eat with unwashen hands defileth not a man.” (Matthew 15:17-20)
Again, it is the internal that Jesus stresses. The internal comes before the external, and the internal produces the external. It is a matter of cause and effect.
In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus deals with this, too. “Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment: but I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment” (Matthew 5:21-22).
Compare this with 1 John 3:15: “Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer.” Now we have come a step further. The thought-world is still first, but here we are told something else. In relation to morals, the thought is the thing. Hate does not just lead to murder; morally, it is murder. Now I am stressing “morally,” because that is different from murder in the external world. Nevertheless, morally, the hate is the murder.
So far we have taken three steps: first, the internal is first; second, the internal causes the external; third, morally, the internal is central. You will remember that in chapter 1 we saw that any time we break one of the other commandments we have already broken the internal commandment not to covet.
In the story of Joseph, in Genesis 37:4, we have a perfect example of this. “They [Joseph’s brothers] hated him and could not speak peaceably unto him.” It is the internal hate that is the root of the whole thing. Then: “They hated him yet the more for his dreams, and for his words” (34:8). The hate is piling up, and the hate is an internal thing. Indeed, it has already produced its fruit, in that they cannot speak peaceably with him. And now it is just piling up, like a great wave ready to break. Then: “And his brethren envied him” (34:11).
Here we have the breaking of the commandment not to covet. This is broken now, and internally, the thing is past. As far as the moral situation is concerned, although the total external result has yet to come, the reality of it is already upon them. “And they conspired against him to slay him. . . . Come now therefore, and let us slay him, and cast him into some pit, and we will say, Some evil beast hath devoured him: and we shall see what will become of his dreams” (34:18, 20). They are perfectly willing to kill their brother and break their father’s heart. All these things arose in the internal world of their thoughts—in their hatred, in their envy—not in the external world. The sin of the brothers was not when they sold Joseph to Egypt, but in the reality of the internal world. It is the internal world of thought that distinguishes man as man. In the introduction to The Epic of Man, Loren Eisley, an anthropologist at the University of Pennsylvania, said this about man: “Ancestral man has entered his own head, and he has been adapting ever since to what he finds there.”
This is a most amazing statement, because it is as clear and as sharp as a diamond. It is perfectly true in one portion of it, and perfectly untrue in what he makes of it.
Eisley made this statement into an evolutionary proposition, and here he is wrong, but he is completely right in observing that man, whether one finds him in a more primitive state or in a sophisticated and culturally civilized state, is distinguished as man by the fact that in a very real way he lives inside his own head. He has an internal world of thought that is unique. The modern depth-psychology has the same comprehension. The modern depth-psychology says the thing that distinguishes man from animals is that man—strangely enough for them, for they do not know where this came from—has a fear of non-being. Something “in his head” distinguishes man, not something external. He has a thought-life that is different from anything else we observe in our world. Man lives in his head; this (with verbalization) is the uniqueness of man.
In the account of the fall of man in Genesis 3:6 we read: “And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise. . . .” Here is the realization that sin is first internal where moral things are concerned. But it has an external result: “She took the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.” The Fall runs from the internal to the external.
But we discover a startling thing in Isaiah 14:13-14—the fall of Satan, prior to the fall of man: “For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the most High.”
Where did all this take place? First of all, we must realize that Satan is not pictured in the Bible as having a corporeal body such as we have, nor a corporeal heart. This Scripture is talking about things which are internal. Where is the sin of Satan, Lucifer, as he fell? “Thou hast said in thine heart.” The rebellion of Lucifer, and then of Eve as it followed, is first internal, and then the external flows from it.
But let us come back to Adam and Eve for a moment, in the Fall and in their rebellion. What do we find here? We find Adam—and I speak only of him because it is easier to speak of one—operating as a unit of personality. His thoughts, his will, and his emotions are all involved as a unit. He is not just a collection of parts. There is a unit that is the individual man, the individual personality, and that is what is in operation here: somebody we can call Adam, or Eve. In each case, we are dealing with a unit of personality.
Now as we deal with the fall of Satan and then with the fall of Adam and Eve, in one sense we must think of them unitedly, for Satan has rebelled before he leads Eve into temptation, and before she in turn gives the fruit to Adam. In terms of what I call “the theology of the Fall,” the really vital factor is that there was no prior conditioning. What we have is the unit of personality making an absolutely unconditional choice in the thought-world. And thus there is here a true first cause. The whole of Christian theology and every Christian answer falls to the ground if we allow previous conditioning to enter in at this point. There is a unit of personality which makes in the thought-world a true choice, which is a true first cause of an external result. It produces something that did not exist before, something terrible, something that has led us to all our tears and all our sorrows: evil. God, being infinite, knows all things without experimentation with them. God, being infinite, knows not only all that shall be, but all that could be. He does not need to experiment in order to know the possibilities. He has made man and angels and there is a possibility for evil in the universe because God has made them truly moral and really rational. He has made them so that they can love or can say no to love, even against God himself. And here, at the Fall, we have the unit of personality making a true choice in the world of thought, with a true first cause that produced something that flashed like lightning over all the world of man: evil, black, and dark, with a vast sea of tears. They have thought—as a unit of personality—they have chosen, and they have brought forth into the external world.
So here is our next point: from the inside outward they have made something. From the inside outward they have truly made sin.
Now let us think of this in relationship to God. God is spirit. Therefore, he is not corporeal, but he is personal. We see this in Hebrews 11:6, where it says that God “is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.” That which distinguishes the Judeo-Christian God is the concept of God as personal yet infinite. And as a personal God, he thinks, he acts, and he feels. And in the area of creation, God thought, God spoke, and it was: a real external world. This is wonderful beyond words. Christian Science is wrong when it makes everything only a thought-world. Eastern thinking is wrong, which very often would reduce everything eventually to a dream of God. The external world is not an extension of God’s essence. The universe is not God; it has a real objective existence. There is a real external existence outside of God, because he made it outside of himself. It is not a part of himself. He spoke and it was, externally and really. Let us notice the Bible’s statement that after creation “all things by him consist” (Colossians 1:17), all things by him “hang together.” The external world which he made is now not a rival center in the universe. By him all things hang together, and yet the Bible itself insists that because God made it, it is a real, objective, external world.
But we must not forget the other side, or we forget part of the wonder of what we should know about the world as it is and God as he is. And that is that the thought of the Trinity came first. God said, “Let us make man in our image” (Genesis 1:26). We are swept back into the Trinity before the creation of the world. Here is thought, because God is a personal God, who thinks, who acts, and who feels in his love. The balances here are most delicate, and we must hold both sides or we lose the wealth of the Christian position. There is an external world; it is not the extension of God’s essence. But while there is a true external world which is not the extension of God’s essence, God thought first. These realities were in the thought of God before they were brought forth by his power, his creative fiat as the objective and external world.
On the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome, there are the tremendous frescoes by Michelangelo. Among them is that magnificent picture of the creation of man. God is reaching out his finger, and man, having just been created, reaches to him as well. But their fingers do not touch. This is a true Christian insight. Man is not an extension of God, cut off like a reproducing amoeba. God created man external to himself, and they must not touch in the picture. Whatever Michelangelo had in mind, surely those who formulated the Chalcedonian Christology in the early creeds of the church had this sharply in mind when they said that even in the one person of Jesus Christ there is no commingling of the human and the divine natures. But there is another part of this fresco of Michelangelo that I would use as an illustration at this present point. The arm of God is thrown backwards and there are two kinds of figures under his arm. There are some little cherub figures that one would take as the Renaissance idea of the representation of angels. But there is another person under his arm: a beautiful girl. Her face is startled, but she is magnificent. And most people have felt that this is a representation of Eve. She is not yet created, but she is in the mind of God.
At this point one must say what would be a wrong interpretation of Michelangelo’s painting and what would be right. If he were saying that she was just as “real” in the mind of God as she would be later after he had created her, then that is a non-Christian concept. It is Eastern. Eve became externally, objectively real at that great moment when God put Adam to sleep and made the female from the male. But if Michelangelo meant that before God created Eve he had already thought about her, then this is flamingly true. The thought of God preceded his creative acts.
However, we must make a second point, and it teaches us something about ourselves as well. It is this: That which was created out of nothing and now has objective, external reality does show forth the thought of God, and it is therefore an exhibition of who and what he is. The external world is not an extension of the essence of God; nevertheless, the external world does reveal and exhibit who and what God is. We must hold both sides. There has been a fall, which has marred the created world; nevertheless, Paul reminds us in Romans 1 that man is condemned against the backdrop of the Creation, which, in spite of the Fall, still speaks of God. The external created world is a revelation of God. In theology this is spoken of as the general revelation of God, which surrounds man in the external world, exhibiting God’s deity both in the internal nature of man himself, which speaks of God as personal, and in the evidence of the thought of God expressed in the external, created universe.
“General revelation” and “special revelation” are theological terms which deserve some analysis. The Bible is the special revelation. We need the Bible for the message of salvation and for the knowledge it gives that is the “key” to general revelation. But the general revelation—that which God has made and that which we are and that which surrounds us—shows forth the existence of God and gives a true revelation of him. General revelation and special revelation constitute a unified revelation.
Now let us move back to man. All of this is parallel to what the Bible says about us as made in the image of God. The internal thought-world is first, and the internal thought-world causes the external. This should not surprise us, because we have been made in the image of God, and thus are rational and moral. Putting these elements together, we find: God thinks, and then God brings forth into the external world that he had originally created out of nothing; we think, and we bring forth into the external world. God’s creation was not an extension of his essence but it does exhibit what he truly is. Equally, our acts in the external world, which spring from our thoughts, are not an extension of our essence, but they do exhibit what we are. The table that is shaped by the carpenter is not an extension of the essence of the carpenter, but it does show something of the essence of the carpenter, out of his thought-world. Satan, Adam, and Eve brought forth evil and brought it forth as a true first cause, each one in his personality, each one acting as a unit. And each one of us, too, created in the image of God, is a true first cause. We are finite, so we cannot create out of nothing; only God creates out of nothing. I am limited, but out of my thought-world I can bring forth, through my body, into the true external world. My body is the bridge into the external world.
Let us notice that this is exactly the reverse of how we are affected by the external world. Something occurs in the outward, external world. I come into contact with this through my senses. It feeds back, through my senses, my body, into my thought-world, and affects me. My senses are the bridge between what happens in the external world and the affecting of the unit that I am, a personality. My body is the bridge. Now it is exactly the same in the opposite direction. My body is the bridge. I think, but when I think, I am able to bring forth, flowing through my fingertips into a true, objective, external world, and I am able to influence and make in that external world. How great is man! We think, and through our bodies the reality flows out into the external world. We do not create out of nothing, as God creates, but in the sense of which we are speaking here it is proper to say that the artist does create and each of us creates. I remember that when I was younger, I was always greatly distressed at the use of the word “create” where the artist, the poet, and the composer are concerned. I thought this word ought to be saved for God. But now that I have thought it through more and have struggled more, I am glad that the word “create” is used. It is perfectly accurate. God’s creation and mine differ, of course. God can create out of nothing, by fiat. I cannot, because only he is infinite. In creation, he is limited only by his own character. I am limited not only by my character, but also by my finiteness. When I create, I bring forth in the external universe that he has created. But nevertheless, understanding the limitations and differences, it is perfectly proper to say God creates, and we create.
It can be said that it is impossible for men not to create things constantly and truly. Even if I wished to stop I could not. It is impossible not to be creating things truly and constantly out of my thought-world into the external world and giving them permanent expression. The artist thinks, and he brings his picture forth into the external world. But it was first of all in his mind. It is the same for the engineer, for the arranger of flowers, for me writing this book. When we find the creation of a personal being, it has the marks of thought upon it, in contrast to that which pure chance brings forth. There are some borderline cases, of course, such as a stalactite or a piece of driftwood into which we “read” shapes, but almost always when I look at that which I see, I can tell whether it has the mark of personality and thought behind it, or whether it is just a product of mechanical forces. In spite of his theories of chance, we may be sure that when Jacques Monod looks at that which surrounds him, he makes exactly this same kind of judgment in the everyday things of life.
Christian Science and Eastern thinking and philosophical idealism are counterfeits rather than total lies. These philosophies are totally wrong in their system and in their direction, but they are not stupid. The reason they trap man is not that they say nothing, but that they are perversions, they are counterfeits. Although we do not produce an extension of our essence, there is a revelation of ourselves, just as God did not create by an extension of his essence, but what he has created is a revelation of himself. Concerning man there is a body, and there is a real, external world. But the thoughts are first, and they are central. So this is where true spirituality in the Christian life rests: in the realm of my thought-life.
With this perspective, I would like to reexamine various elements of the Christian life, or true spirituality, as we have seen them in the earlier chapters.
First, we have said that in the true Christian life, or true spirituality, we are to be dead to all things, both good and bad, in order that we should be alive to God. This is always inward; it cannot be outward. Then we are to be as though we have been raised from death back into the external world. This is no longer internal, but external: the flow is from the internal to the external.
Second, we have spoken of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, which is in the inward man. The very word “indwell” signifies that it is internal. Then comes the fruit of the crucified, risen, glorified Lord, which flows into the external world through my body, whether it be the lips, speaking a word, or whether it be my hand with a hammer, building a shelter for someone who needs it.
Third, love is inward. We say we are to love God enough to be contented. We are to love man enough not to envy. Those are internal, but they flow out into the external world in action.
Fourth, the reverse of all this. The blows of the battle from the external world of man fall upon me outwardly. The blows fall in many ways—severe ostracism, the locking of a door, the burning of a book, a sharp word or a frown. All of them come upon me in the external world, but if they stayed in the external world of my body, as though it were a machine, they would bring no tears to me. Instead they flow through my sense, my body, into that which I am in my thought-world. And as these blows come to my thought-world, I either say “Thank you” to God, as we have already considered, or I rebel against him. In either case, the result is soon seen in the external world.
Fifth, we have spoken of active passivity, and as such we have spoken of Mary in the birth of Christ. Here is what Mary Baker Eddy says in Science and Health about the virgin birth: “Those interested in Christian Science have reached the glorious perception that God is the only author of man. The virgin mother conceived this idea of God and gave to her ideal the name of Jesus. That is, Joshua, or Savior. The illumination of Mary’s spiritual sense put to silence material law and its order of generation, and brought forth her child by the revelation of truth.” That is horrible, absolutely horrible. Mary thought of the idea, it argues, and she brought it forth. But nothing could be further from the truth. That is simply not what occurred. What occurred is that the angel came to Mary and told her that she was going to bring forth, not something showing the immateriality of the material world, but the opposite. The Holy Spirit conceived in the womb of the virgin Mary the baby Jesus Christ—including his very real body. But while Mary Baker Eddy is wrong, let us not forget the other aspect, that of active passivity. The first word that came from the angel reached Mary, and in the thought-world she made a decision. She did not say, “I want” or “I demand my own will”; she raised herself to God and gave her body to God as the handmaiden of the Lord.
“Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word ” (Luke 2:38). Mary first of all faced these things in her mind. If she had said no, there is no reason whatsoever to think that the Holy Spirit would have brought forth physically—truly physically, in her womb—the body of Jesus Christ. Now this is absolutely, totally unique: there is only one space-time virgin birth. But in another sense, as we pointed out, this active passivity is our place. In our thought-world, we are to bow under the work of the Holy Spirit internally, and then as we, in active passivity, give up ourselves to him, the fruit of the resurrected and glorified Christ flows forth through our bodies into the external world.
Now let us notice two things concerning ourselves—two things in answer to Eastern thinking, whether it has Western names or not, and to purposeless modern thinking. The first of these is that we are created within a finite limit; we cannot create as God created, yet it is wonderful beyond words that I, with all my limitations, am able to bring forth truly into the external world; that I am influencing, from my thought-world, as a true first cause, something that then stands here in stone or paint or steel or wood or in the lives of other men. However, the second thing must equally be said. That is, even after I am a Christian, I can be a death-producing machine; though I have life, eternal life, if I yield myself to Satan instead of to Christ, I can be an instrument of death to this external world. How sublime to be a man, made in the image of God! But how sobering, that I can bring forth out of my thought-world into the external world either that which leads to life or that which produces death in other men.
Here, then, are three conclusions:
First of all, we must understand that the reality of communion with God, and loving God, must take place in the inward self. There is no use talking about loving God except to understand that it takes place in the inward world of our thoughts. Even communication with men and women must be through the body into the area of the thought-world. If a man and a woman have only an external contact, this cannot be called communication. It is only mechanical. But a real, personal communication never remains external. It always goes back into the personality. This is true in the area of married life, the man-woman relationship as God meant it to be. Merely to have physical contact is not communication on a personal level. This must flow back into the area of personality. Only then it can be called communication. Thus real communication with man and love of man centers in our thought-world. The results may be external and the expression is external, but the love is internal. The same is true in our love for God. The result can be external, but love itself is always internal. If Christians can only learn this, very many problems concerning the Christian life would assume a different perspective. Let us understand how important is the world of thoughts. It is this that distinguishes me as a man, in contrast to machines. This is what I am, and my calling is to love God with all my heart and soul and mind.
The second conclusion is that the real battle for men is in the world of ideas, rather than in that which is outward. All heresy, for example, begins in the world of ideas. That is why, when new workers come to L’Abri, we always stress to them that we are interested in ideas rather than personalities or organizations. Ideas are to be discussed, not personalities or organizations. Ideas are the stock of the thought-world, and from the ideas burst forth all the external things: painting, music, buildings, the love and the hating of men in practice, and equally the results of loving God or rebellion against God, in the external world. Where a man will spend eternity depends on his reading or hearing the ideas, the propositional truth, the facts of the gospel in the external world, and these being carried through the medium of his body into the inner world of his thoughts, and there, inside himself, in his thought-world, either his believing God on the basis of the content of the gospel or his calling God a liar. This is not merely a mystical, existentialist experience. It is not the “final experience” of a man like Carl Jaspers put in religious terms; it is not the hallucinatory drug experience, without content. It can be expressed rationally. It is ideas; it is the content of the good news. But as far as what it means to a man is concerned, it is whether he accepts it or rejects it in the thought-world that makes the difference: if he believes God, or if he calls him a liar.
It is for this reason that the preaching of the gospel can never be primarily a matter of organization. The preaching of the gospel is ideas, flaming ideas brought to men, as God has revealed them to us in Scripture. It is not a contentless experience internally received, but it is contentful ideas internally acted upon that make the difference. So when we state our doctrines, they must be ideas and not just phrases. We cannot use doctrines as though they were mechanical pieces to a puzzle. True doctrine is an idea revealed by God in the Bible and an idea that fits properly into the external world as it is, and as God made it, and to man as he is, as God made him, and can be fed back through man’s body into his thought-world and there acted upon. The battle for man is centrally in the world of thought.
The third conclusion, and the shortest of the three, is that the Christian life, true spirituality, always begins inside, in our thought-world. All that has been said in our earlier study of being free in the present life from the results of the bonds of sin is meaningless jargon, no more than a psychological pill, without the reality that God thinks and we think, and that at each step the internal is central and first. The spiritual battle, the loss of victory, is always in the thought-world.