Imagining and the Transformation of Man

"When I walk by faith, I know my way by objects that only the mind sees. And so, when I want to walk by faith, I set up in my mind’s eye objects to lead me. The objects are the faces of the friends that I call my friends, who would sincerely rejoice with me if they learned of my good fortune. Then I let them know of it. I see the world as I want to see it, not as it is here to be seen. So I rearrange the structure of the mind; and then I remain faithful to it—as the patriarchs remained faithful to their invisible being: For we are told in the 11th of Hebrews that Moses endured as seeing him who was invisible. He was told about him as Job was. And Job said, “I have heard of thee with the hearing of the ear, but now, in the very end, my eye sees thee.” He was faithful to the end, and then he saw the being who predicted the moment in time that he would actually stand in his presence. And Job went through, as you know, the proverbial hell, but he was always faithful. He never once complained, but he did not feel for one moment that this pain that he endured was justified. But in spite of that he still believed in God. He believed in the promise. So the promise is to all of us that God one day will give himself to us, individually. That’s called grace in scripture...and grace is God’s gift of himself to man. So when he embraces you he gave you himself. All that he had he gave you in that one moment that he embraced you. If he is the king of kings, he gives you that honor. If a king has a kingdom, he gave you the kingdom. So you will inherit with that embrace not only a presence but a kingdom. He doesn’t take back anything. He gives you his most precious possession: He gives you his only begotten son (David) as your son. Not as your companion, to walk as a friend, but he gives you his only begotten son as your son. Therefore, he gave you fatherhood in that gift. He gives you everything that he has. Now, you are sent into the world to encourage all to be faithful and endure as seeing him who at the moment is invisible. And to prove to them that you are on solid ground you explain to them the nature of faith, that faith is the assurance of things and the conviction of things not seen. So I would put it in these words, faith is simply loyalty to unseen reality. So you tell me what you want in this world and you name it. You want to be successful and you name what you mean by success. I’m not here to judge you, just to guide you, to tell you, well alright, if you really want to be successful, assume this very moment that at this moment now you are now what you want to be. Take the dream and wear it as you would a suit of clothes. Now, see the world as you would see it were it true. Now that’s the invisible you. Now you walk faithful to this invisible you. But make it natural, wear it just as you would wear any apparel in the world, and as you wear it, it becomes more and more you, more and more natural. And you can tell it in your dreams. Your dreams will change, because your dreams will reflect the mood that really dominates you; because the dominant mood really spells out the individual. That mood to which man most often returns constitutes the man’s truest self. So if I return constantly in the course of a day to the mood of success, at the end of a couple of days it’s a natural thing. I don’t have to come back to it as often. Then, in a little while, I take it for granted. It’s the most normal, natural thing in the world thereafter.