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42 - Wandering Thoughts - Sermons on Several Occasions · Sacred Texts Archive

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  Wandering thoughts, bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. Second
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  Corinthians ten five. But will God so bring every thought into captivity to the
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  obedience of Christ, that no wandering thought will find a place in the mind,
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  even while we remain in the body. So some have vehemently maintained,
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  YEA, have affirmed that none are perfected in love, lest they are so
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  far perfected in understanding, that all wandering thoughts are done away, unless not
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  only every affection and temper be wholly and just and good, but every individual
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  thought which arises in the mind be wise and regular. This is a question
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  of no small importance. For how many of those who fear God YEA,
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  and love Him perhaps with all their heart, have been greatly distressed on this
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  account? How many, by not understanding it right, have not only been
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  distressed, but greatly hurt in their souls, cast into unprofitable YEA. Mischievous
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  reasonings thatch as slacken their moste towards God and weaken them in running the race
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  set before them. Nay, many, through misapprehensions of this very thing,
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  have cast away the precious gift of God. They have been induced first to
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  doubt of and then to deny the work God had wrought in their souls,
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  and hereby have grieved the spirit of God till he withdrew and left them in
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  utter darkness. How is it, then, that, admits the abundance of
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  books which have been lately published almost on all subjects, we should have none
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  upon wandering thoughts, at least none that will all satisfy a calm and serious
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  mind. In order to do this, in some degree, I purpose to
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  inquire, what are the several sorts of wandering thoughts? What are the general
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  occasions of them? Which of them are sinful? And which not? Which
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  of them we may expect and pray to be delivered? From my purpose to
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  inquire, first, what are the several sorts of wandering thoughts? The particular
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  sorts are innumerable, But in general they are of two sorts. Thoughts that
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  wander from God, and thoughts wander from the particular point we have in hand.
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  With regard to the former, all our thoughts are naturally of this kind,
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  for they are continually wandering from God. We think nothing about him.
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  God is not in all our thoughts. We are one and all, as
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  the apostle observes, without God in the world we think of what we love,
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  but we do not love God. Therefore we think not of Him.
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  Or if we are now and then constrained to think of Him for a time,
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  yet as we have not pleasure therein, and nay, rather, as
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  these thoughts are not only insipid, but distasteful and irksome to us, we
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  drive them out as soon as we can, and return to what we love
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  to think of, so that the world and the things of the world,
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  what we shall eat, what we shall drink, what we shall put on,
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  what we shall see, what we shall hear, what we shall gain,
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  how we shall please our senses of our imagination takes up all our time
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  and engrosses all our thoughts. So long therefore, as we love the world,
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  that is, so long as we are in our natural state, all
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  our thoughts from morning to evening, and from evening to morning are no other
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  than wandering thoughts. But many times we are not only without God in the
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  world, but also fighting against Him, as there is in every man by
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  nature a carnal mind, which is an enmity against God. No wonder,
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  therefore the men abound with unbelieving thoughts, either saying in their hearts. There
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  is no God or questioning, if not denying his power or wisdom, his
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  mercy, or justice or holiness. No wonder that they so often doubt of
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  His providence, at least of its extending to all events, or that even
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  though they allow it, they still entertain murmuring or repining thoughts. Nearly related
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  to these, and frequently connected with them, are proud and vain imaginations.
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  Again, sometimes they are taken up with angry, malicious, or revengeful thoughts,
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  at other times with airy scenes of pleasure, whether of sense or imagination,
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  whereby the earthly sensual mind becomes more earthy and sensual. Still, now,
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  by all these they make flat war with God. These are wandering thoughts
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  of the highest kind. Widely different from these are the other sort of wandering
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  thoughts, which the heart does not wander from God, but the understanding wanders
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  from the particular point it had then in view. For instance, I sit
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  down to consider those words in the verse preceding the text. The weapons of
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  our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God. I think this ought
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  to be the case with all that are called Christians. But how far it
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  is that otherwise? Look round into almost every part of what is termed the
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  Christian world. What manner of weapons are these using? And what kind of
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  warfare are they engaged? While men like fiends each other terror in all the
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  hellss rage of war? See how these Christians love one another? Wherein are
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  they preferable to Turks and Pagans? What abomination can be found among Omedans or
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  Heathens which is not found among Christians? Also? And thus my mind runs
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  off before I am aware one circumstances to another. Now, all these are
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  in some sense wandering thoughts. For although they do not wander from God,
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  much less fight against Him, yet they do wander from the particular point I
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  had in view. Such is the nature. Such are the sorts, to
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  speak rather usefully than philosophically, of wandering thoughts. What are the general occasions
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  of them? This we are in the second place to consider. And it
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  is easy to observe the occasion of the wandering sort of thoughts which oppose or
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  wander from God are in general sinful tempers. For instance, why is not
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  God in all the thoughts in any of the thoughts of a natural man?
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  For a plain reason, be he rich or poor, learned, or unlearned.
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  He is an atheist, though not vulgarly so called. He neither knows
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  nor loves God. Why are his thoughts continually wandering after the world? Because
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  he is an idolater. He does not indeed worship an image or bout down
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  to the stock of a tree. Yet is he sunk into equally damnable idolatry.
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  He loves, that is, worships of the world. He seeks happiness
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  in the things that are seen, in the pleasures that perish in the using.
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  Why is it that his thoughts perpetually wandering from the very end of his
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  being, the knowledge of God in Christ. Because he is an unbeliever,
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  because he has no faith, or at least no more than a devil.
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  So all these wandering thoughts easily and naturally spring from that evil root of unbelief.
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  The case is the same in other instances. Pride, anger, revenge,
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  vanity, lust, covetousness. Every one of them occasions thoughts suitable to
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  its own nature, And so does every sinful temper which the human mind is
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  capable. The particular as it is hardly possible, nor is it needful to
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  enumerate, it suffices to observe that as many evil tempers as find a place
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  in any soul, so many ways that soul will depart from God by the
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  worst kind of wandering thoughts. The occasions of the latter kind of wandering thoughts
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  are exceeding. Various multitudes of them are occasioned by the natural union between the
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  soul and body. How immediately and how deeply is understand affected by a diseased
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  body. Let but the blood move irregularly in the brain, and all regular
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  thinking is at an end, raging madness ensues, and then farewell to all
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  evenness of thought. Yea, let only the spirits be hurried or agitated to
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  a certain degree, and a temporary madness, a delirium, prevents all subtled
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  thought, and is not the same regularity of thought in a measure occasioned by
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  every nervous disorder. So does the corruptible body press down the soul and cause
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  it to muse about many things? Does it only cause this in the time
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  of sickness, or preach natural disorder? Nay, but more or less at
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  all times. Even in a state of perfect health. Let a man be
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  ever so healthy, he will be more or less delirious every four and twenty
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  hours, Or does he not sleep? While he sleeps? Is he not
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  liable to dream? And who then is master of his own thoughts? Are
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  able to preserve the order in consistency of them? Who can then keep them
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  fixed to any one point, or prevent their wandering from pole to pole?
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  But suppose we are awake, Are we always so awake that we can steadily
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  govern our thoughts? Are we not unavoidably exposed to contrary extremes by the very
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  nature of this machine the body? Sometimes we are too heavy, too dull,
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  and languid to pursue any chain of thought. Sometimes, on the other
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  hand, we are too lively. The imagination, without leave starts to and
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  fro and carries us away hither and thither, whether we will or no,
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  And all this from the merely natural motion of the spirits or vibration of the
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  nerves farther, How many wanderings of thoughts may arise from these various associations of
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  our ideas, which are made entirely without our knowledge and independently on our choice.
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  How these connections are formed we cannot tell. But they are formed in
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  a thousand different manners. Nor is it in the power of the wisest or
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  holiest of men to break those associations or prevent what is the necessary consequence of
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  them. And matter of daily observation the fire. But touch one end of
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  the train, and it immediately runs on to the other. Once more,
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  let us fix our attention as studiously as we are able, on any subject,
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  and let either pleasure or pain arise, especially if it be intense,
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  and it will demand our immediate attention and attach our thoughts to itself. It
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  will interrupt the steadiest contemplation and divert the mind from its favorite subjects. These
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  occasions of wandering thoughts lie within, are wrought into our very nature. But
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  they will likewise naturally and necessarily arise from the various impulse of outward objects.
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  Whatever strikes upon the organ of sense, the eye or ear will raise a
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  perception in the mind, and accordingly, but if we see or hear,
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  will break in upon our former train of thought. Every man, Therefore,
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  that is anything in our sight which speaks anything on our hearing, occasions our
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  mind to wander more or less from that point it was thinking of before.
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  And there is no question but those evil spirits who are continually seeking whom they
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  may devour, make use of all the foregoing occasions to hurry and distract our
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  minds, sometimes by one, sometimes sometimes by another. Of these means,
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  they will harass and perplex it, and so far as God permits, interrupt
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  our thoughts, particularly when they are engaged on the best subjects. Nor is
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  this at all strange. They will understand the very springs of thought and know
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  on which of the bodily organs, the imagination, the understanding, and every
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  other faculty of the mind more immediately depends. And hereby they know how by
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  affecting those organs, to effect the operations dependent on them. Add to this
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  that they can inject the thousand thoughts without any of the preceding means, in
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  being as natural for spirit to act upon spirit, as form matter to act
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  upon matter. These things being considered, we cannot admire that our thoughts so
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  often wanders from any point which we have in view. What kind of wandering
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  thoughts are sinful? And what not? Is the third thing to be inquired
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  into. And first, all those thoughts which wander from God, which leave
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  him no room in our minds, are undoubtedly sinful. For all these imply
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  practical atheism, and by these we are without God in the world. And
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  so much more are all those which are contrary to God, which imply opposition
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  or enmity to Him, such a murmuring, discontented thought, which say,
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  in effect, we will not have THEE to rule over us all unbelieving thoughts,
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  whether with regard to His being, his attributes, or his providence,
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  I mean his particular providence over all things, as well as all persons in
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  the universe, that without which not its sparrow falls to the ground, which
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  the hairs of our head are all numbered. For as to a general providence,
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  vulgarly so called hutter, distinguished from a particular is only a decent while
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  sounding word which means just nothing. Again, all thoughts which spring from sinful
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  tempers are undoubtedly sinful, such for instance, of those that spring from revengeful
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  temper, pride, or lust, or vanity. An evil tree cannot bring
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  forth good fruit. Therefore, if the tree be evil, so must the
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  fruit be also, And so must those be which either produce or feed any
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  sinful temper. Those which either give rise to pride or vanity, to anger,
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  or love of the world, or confirm and increase these or any other
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  unholy temper, passion, or effect. But not only whatever flows from evil
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  is evil, but also whatever leads to it, whatever tends to alienate the
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  soul from God, and to make or keep it earthly, sensual, and
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  devilish. Hence, even those thoughts which are occasioned by weakness or disease,
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  by the natural mechanism of the body, are by the laws of vital union.
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  However innocent they may be in themselves, do nevertheless become sinful when they
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  eye that produce or cherish an increase in us any sinful temper, suppose the
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  desire of the flesh, the desire of the eye, or the pride of
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  life. In like manner, the wandering thoughts which are occasioned by the words
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  or actions of other men, if they cause or feet any wrong disposition,
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  then commence sinful. And the same we may observe those which are suggested or
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  injected by the devil. When they administer to any earthly or devilish temper,
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  which they do whenever we give place to them, and hereby make them our
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  own, then they are equally sinful the tempers to which they minister. But
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  abstracting from these cases, wandering thoughts in the latter sense of the word,
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  that his thoughts, wherein our understanding, wanders from the point it has in
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  view, are no more sinful than the motion of the blood in our veins
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  or the spirits in our brain. If they arise from an infirm constitution,
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  or from accidental weakness or distemper they are as innocent as it is to have
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  a weak constitution or a distempered body. And surely no one doubts, but
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  a bad state of nerves, a fever of any kind, and either transient
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  or lasting delirium, may consist with perfect innocence, And they should arise in
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  a soul which is united to a healthful body, Are that from the natural
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  union between the body and soul, or from any of ten thousand changes which
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  it may occur in those organs of the body that minister to thought. In
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  any of these cases, they are as perfectly innocent as to causes from which
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  they spring, And so they are when they spring from the casual, involuntary
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  associations of our thoughts. If our thoughts wander from the point we had in
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  view by means of other men variously affecting our senses, they are equally innocent
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  still, for it is no more a sin to understand what I see and
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  hear, and in many cases cannot help seeing and understanding, than it is
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  to have eyes and ears. And if the devil injects wandering thoughts, are
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  not those thoughts evil, They are troublesome in that sense evil, but they
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  are not sinful. I do not know that he spoke to our Lord with
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  an audible voice. Perhaps he spoke to his heart only when he said,
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  all these things, will they give thee if thou wilt fall down and worship
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  me. But whether he spoke inwardly or outwardly, our Lord doubtless understood what
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  he said. He had therefore a thought correspondent to those words. But was
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  it a sinful thoughts? We know it was not in him was no sin,
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  either in action or a word or thought. Nor is there any sin
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  in the thousand thoughts of the same kind which Satan may inject into any of
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  our Lord's followers. It follows that none of these wandering thoughts, whatever unweary
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  persons have affirmed thereby grieving whom the Lord had not grieved, are inconsistent with
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  perfect love. Indeed, if they were, then not only sharp pain,
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  but sleep itself and be inconsistent with it sharp pain. For whenever this supervenes
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  whatever we are before thinking of, it will interrupt our thinking, and of
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  course draw our thoughts into another channel. Yea, and sleep itself, as
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  it is a state of insensibility and stupidity, and such as is generally mixed
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  with the thoughts wandering over the earth, loose, wild and incoherent it.
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  Certainly these are consistent with perfect love. So then, are all wandering thoughts
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  of this kind. What has been observed is easy to give a clear answer
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  to the last question. What kind of wandering thoughts we may expect and pray
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  to be delivered from? From the former sort of wandering thoughts those who are
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  in the heart wanders from God, from all their contrary to His will,
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  or to leave us without God in the world. Every one is perfected in
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  love is unquestionably delivered this deliverance. Therefore we may expect this. We may
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  we ought to pray for wandering thoughts of this kind imply unbelief, if not
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  enmity against God. But both of these He will destroy bring utterly to an
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  end. And indeed, from all sinful wandering thoughts, we shall be absolutely
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  delivered all their perfected in love are delivered from these, else they are not
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  saved from sin. Men and devils will tempt them all manner of ways,
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  but they cannot prevail over them. With regard to the latter sort of wandering
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  thoughts, the case is widely different. Till the cause is removed, we
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  cannot in reason expect the effect should cease. But the causes or occasions of
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  these will remain as long as we remain in the body. So long therefore
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  we have all reason to believe the effects will remain. Also, to be
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  more particular, suppose a soul, however, wholly to dwell in a distempered
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  body. Suppose the brain be so thoroughly disordered as that raging madness follows,
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  will not all the thoughts be wild and unconnected as long as that disorder continues.
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  Suppose a fever occasions at temporary madness, which we term a delirium.
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  Can there be any just connection of thought till that delirium is removed? YEA
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  suppose of what is called a nervous disorder de rise to so high a degree
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  as to occasion at least that partial madness. Whether not be a thousand wandering
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  thoughts, and must not these irregular thoughts continue as long as the disorder which
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  occasions them. Will not the case be the same with regard to those thoughts
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  but necessarily arise from violent pain. They will more or less continue while that
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  pain continues by the unviolable order of nature. This order, likewise will obtain
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  where the thoughts are disturbed, broken, or interrupted by any defect of the
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  apprehension, judgment, or imagination flowing from the natural constitution of the body.
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  And how many interruptions may spring from the unaccountable and involuntary association of our ideas.
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  Now all these are directly or indirectly caused by the in corruptible body pressing
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  down the mind. Nor therefore can we expect them to be removed till this
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  corruptible should be put on in corruption. And then only when we lie down
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  in the dust shall we be delivered from those wandering thoughts which are occasioned by
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  what we see and hear among those by whom we are now surrounded. To
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  avoid these, you must go out of the world for as long as we
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  remain therein as long as there are men and women round about us. And
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  we have eyes to see and ears to hear. The things which we daily
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  see and hear will certainly affect our mind, and will more or less break
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  in upon and interrupt our preceding thoughts. And as long as evil spirits run
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  to and fro in a miserable, disordered world, so long they will assault,
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  whether they can prevail or know every inhabitant of flesh and blood. They
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  will trouble, even those whom they cannot destroy. They will attack if they
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  cannot conquer. And from these attacks of our restless, unwearied enemies, we
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  must look not for an entire deliverance till we are lodged, whether the wicked
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  cease from troubling, and from where the weary are at rest. To sum
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  up the whole, To expect deliverance from those wandering thoughts which are occasioned by
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  evil spirits is to expect that the devil shall die or fall asleep, or
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  at least should no more go about as a roaring lion. To expect a
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  deliverance from those which are occasioned by other men is to expect either that men
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  should cease from the earth, or that we should be absolutely secluded from them,
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  And have no intercourse with them, whe that having eyes, we should
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  see neither here with our ears, but be as senseless as stocks or stones.
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  And to pray for deliverance from those which are occasioned by the body is
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  in effect to pray that we may leave the body. Otherwise it is praying
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  for impossibilities and absurdities, praying that God would reconcile contradictions by continuing our union
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  with a corruptible body without the natural necessary consequences of that union. It as
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  if we should pray to be angels in men, mortal and immortal at the
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  same time. Nay, but when that which is immortal has come, mortality
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  is done away. Or rather, let us pray both that the spirit and
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  with the understanding, that all these things may work together for our good,
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  that we may suffer all the infirmities of our nature, all the interruptions of
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  men, all the assault and suggestions of evil spirits, and in all be
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  more than conquerors. Let us pray that we may be delivered from all sin,
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  that both the roots and branch may be destroyed, that we may be
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  cleansed from all pollution of flesh and spirit, from every evil temper and word,
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  and work, that we may love the Lord, our God with all
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  our heart, with all our mind, with all our soul, with all
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  our strength, that all the Spirit may be found in us, not only
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  love, joy, peace, but also long suffering, gentleness, goodness,
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  fidelity, meekness, temperance. Pray that all these things may flourish and abound,
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  may increase in you. More more, do an abundant entrance be ministered
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  unto you into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ. End of Section
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  forty two.