All morning he was busy in the cornyard - preparing new stances for ricks with his hands, while with his heart he tried to content himself beforehand with whatever fate the Lord might intend for him. As yet he was more of a Christian philosopher than a philosophical Christian. He was working in the region of his imagination rather than the revealed will of God. If this should not be the will of God concerning him, then he was spending his strength for nothing. There is something in the very presence and actuality of a thing to make one able to bear it; but a man may weaken himself for bearing what God intends him to bear. The chief was being anxious about the morrow like an unbeliever - not without some moral advantage, I daresay, but with spiritual loss. We have no right to school ourselves concerning an imaginary duty. When we do not know, then what He lays upon us is not to know and to be content not to know. The philosopher lives in the thought of things, the Christian lives in the things themselves. The philosopher occupies himself with God's decree, the Christian with God's will; the philosopher with what God may intend, the Christian with what God wants him to do.
The Highlander's Last Song
George MacDonald
1 comment:
That's a profound excerpt - I can't get enough of it. I've read it like five times and it's slowly beginning to soak in. Thank you.
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