Blind Minds

2 Corinthians 4:4 (NIV) “The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.”

A blinded mind can often be hard to detect. People do good things, people do evil things, but to actually be able to detect blindness of the mind can be very difficult.

This type of blindness actually has little to do with intellectual prowess or the lack thereof. As a matter of fact, the more one implicates depth of intellect with the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ the greater the enigma becomes. That’s where the principle of the foolish shaming the wise comes into play.

Don’t get me wrong, God is a thinking god, but His thinking is never or will ever be of necessity for Himself, like ours is. We have deliberate thoughts as well as autonomic systems that support our lives and existence. And you may argue that those types of systems are not thoughts per se, but they are without question, decisions within a system that are made without conscious consult of the system operator or the system itself. The peristalsis waves that move food through your body do not ask you if it’s okay to do so, nor do you consciously tell them to do their job. It just happens.

Thinking about God is a good thing. Talking about God is a good thing. Even debate and reasoning over His purposes and or existence are good. But, knowing Him personally is even better, but virtually impossible to prove, notwithstanding a Mount Carmel maelstrom experience, of which few of us can replicate. The psalmist tells us one of the best ways for us to expose or prove our personal relationship with God, is a changed life. So that many people will see and fear and put their trust in God, because if He was able to bring about such a change in this person or that person, and put a new song in their heart, He must surely exist. Get it?

Malachi 3:16 (NLT) “Then those who feared the Lord spoke with each other, and the Lord listened to what they said. In his presence, a scroll of remembrance was written to record the names of those who feared him and always thought about the honor of his name.”

God is always looking for those who are engaged in discussion about Him. He’s not troubled by our doubts. As a matter of fact, we can be out right disrespectful toward Him and He still loves us, because unlike other gods, He is love.

Can you imagine, on the night in which you were betrayed unto death, by a so called friend, that you would turn right around and offer a covenant of forgiveness? On the very night! It is so amazing that He would do that for us, but He did. I sure don’t think that would be my reaction.

So how does this blindness of mind come about? Simply put, it was a lie. That’s right, a lie.

Oh I can’t tell you what the lie is, but somewhere in the economy of each of our lives, experiences that we go through are interpreted and many times wrongly; and it’s at that immediate point where a lie is summoned to our soul as a coping mechanism for the pain the experience produces and voila, partial blindness of the mind occurs. If this cycle continues unabated, lies and pain accumulate to the point where total blindness of the mind occurs.

That is what Paul was describing in 2 Corinthians 4:4.

I sure don’t know how many life experiences I’ve misinterpreted, but for each one, a small seemingly harmless piece of data, called a lie, will eventually produce so much pain and blindness that all I’m focusing on is me; all the while feigning love and benevolent interest in others, until I’m stretched to my breaking point. Then things go ugly real fast. Is that just me in the mirror or are you looking over my shoulder? Back up okay, I can get the log out of my own eye. How about you?

Anyway, here we are at the end of day 3 of a new decade and I’m blogging again; and about what? Blindness of the mind and it’s a terrible condition and I would wish it on no one.

So the next time you feel like someone is being antagonistic toward the gospel of Jesus Christ, just reflect upon the Apostle Paul’s words and this blog and realize; most blind people really don’t want to be blind. Do they?