Volume XXXVIII, #21: The Hell We Find in Our Minds

The Reminder

Kenneth Chumbley
05/27/18 - The Reminder

The poet John Donne was a brilliant man. At age ten, he was proficient in French and Latin; at age eleven, he attended a school that became part of Oxford; at age fourteen, he matriculated to Cambridge; at age seventeen, he graduated from Cambridge. In time, after being pressured by friends and the king, he became an ordained Anglican clergyman and preached to overflowing crowds at St. Paul’s Cathedral. But despite all this, Donne lived under a dark cloud. In the irresponsibility of his youth, he wrote some things he later viewed as blasphemous and obscene (one was an essay in praise of suicide), and he lived in constant dread that these would become known and be his ruin (some of them did resurface after his death). “If only I had never written them!” was his constant moan.

One of life’s bitterest lessons is when we learn we are capable of doing things we will come to wish we had never done. After experiencing this, the agony of guilt becomes real. John Nelson’s (a stonemason who was one of John Wesley’s assistants) description of how his guilt affected him rings true: “Oh the hell that I found in my mind when I was alone!” If you want to read a description of the hell you can find in your mind, read Psalm 32.3–4. If there was any way David could have undone what he did, he’d have done so. The misery that resulted from his despicable deed with Bathsheba and his unconscionable murder of Uriah was unrelenting. Paul couldn’t undo the crimes he committed (Acts 8.1, 9.1, 22.4, 26.10). It’s often the case that people who find themselves in David’s, Paul’s, or Donne’s situation often spend their life tortured by guilt.

But there’s no need for this. If some wrong we did can be righted, let’s right it. But surely (am I wrong here?) one of the greatest aspects of heaven’s mercy is found in the fact that even when a wrong can’t be righted, it can be forgiven. And it’s in forgiveness—and in believing in its reality—that clouds are lifted and peace returns. David learned that adultery and murder can be forgiven (Ps. 103.10–14). Paul learned that Christ Jesus came to save sinners, including those guilty of heinous crimes (1 Tim. 1.15). The only solution to “If only I’d never done it” and the resultant hell we carry inside is the forgiveness Jesus gives. So let us confess our sins and believe 1 John 1.9. And in regard to our victims, let us pray that God cleanse those we’ve defiled, strengthen those we’ve weakened, set right those we’ve misled, and recall to Himself those we have alienated from Him.

For Jesus’ sake.