The Don Quixote Syndrome

Greetings to all,

I remember speaking with a man who was afraid to become a Christian because he didn't want to lose his ability to reason. I thought it was interesting that he thought that way...as he saw that Christians were no longer able to think rationally.

And he did have a point. At least in some circles...the idea of taking on the mind of Christ means to lose one's own mind to some extent...or to a great extent...depending on the zeal one brings to the table.

Now Don Quixote was a novel about a rich man who fantasized so much about the novels he was reading that he lost his mind and began to think he was a fictional character come to life. he then pursued his chivalric dreams of traveling the world as a knight...tilting at imaginary foes (including windmills).

What I want to show is that there is this kind of syndrome among those believers who have been doctrinally conditioned to think they are required to believe certain things...even fantastical things...in order to please God. These believe they must enter into the imaginary world of a "positional" theology. So then attacking a windmill is good...if it represents evil.

There is not a lot then to distinguish, in some cases, one who loses ones own mind for Christ...or just lose one's mind in a religious offering in futility.

When we take on the mind of Christ...is that at the expense of a sound mind? Some think so.

I hope to investigate this phenomenon in this thread.

2 Tim. 1:7 For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.

Must we lose our ability to reason in order to follow Christ? Now many would say yes...thinking that ALL reasoning comes from the carnal mind.

But this isn't so.

There is a carnal reasoning to be sure. But there is also a sound logical reasoning that comes with being sober-minded.

Paul himself reasoned from the scriptures and God Himself would reason with us.

Acts 17:2 And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures,

Isaiah 1:18
18 Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

Of course there is a different kind of reasoning....that of the kingdom of God...where everything is turned upside down (actually everything is inverted back to it's original state).

But everything in the bible can be taken as fantasy, a make-believe world...so don't we have to adopt a "make-believe" mindset to apprehend it? That is the essence of a religion...a belief in a fantastical reality that is not meant to actually be comprehended...or that one can find a reason for...it's meant to just be accepted in order to please the deity.

So then we bring in pagan practices...and deviate the words from God from the power of reality and truth and bring them into the religious sphere of the make-believe.

We turn what is truth and turn it into a fable...like in the Don Quixote story. We lose our minds in order to try thinking just like we read in the bible. But in our own way of doing it.By a refusal to think rationally...in order to seem to be pleasing to God.

But we are to love God WITH our minds...not out of our minds.

Why are religious people so irrational? Well, worship an irrational god.

But this is a deviation... the truth is perfectly reasonable and logical...but only in an eternal sense.

2 Tim. 4:4 And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.