I love Jules Verne (1828-1905). He’s the guy who wrote 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Journey to the Center of the Earth and Around the World in 80 Days and From the Earth to the Moon.

National Geographic actually compiled a list of eight things he wrote about that were later actualized, including the Nautilus, an electric submarine he imagined in 20,000 Leagues under the Sea. Some of his other fiction to non-fiction ideas were the public newscast (the first of which did not occur until 1920), solar sails, lunar modules, skywriting, video conferencing, the taser, and splashdown spaceships.

I find it especially fascinating that he could talk about technology and inventions that weren’t even created yet!

I’m also fascinated by people like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, because his Sherlock Holmes character developed techniques that are used in detective work and forensic science today.

Then there’s George Orwell. If you look at the book 1984 it was actually written in 1948 during a time when they did have radio and television, but they didn’t have anything like the technology we have today like internet, Facetime, Zoom meetings, etc. And yet in one of the scenes of the book, he shares about someone who conducted exercises for people through a screen on their wall. The person on the screen could tell whether those in their homes were participating or not. The amazing thing about this? The technology he was referring to hadn’t even been invented yet!

Absolutely amazing.

Lately I’ve been thinking about our imagination and God’s purpose for it. In Scripture, both the Old Testament and New, God condemns people with evil imaginations.

in Genesis 6, God’s heart was deeply troubled because he saw that every inclination of the thoughts of the people was evil.

In Proverbs 6, there’s a list of things that God hates. What does he include in the list? People who devise wicked imaginations.

It’s hard not to imagine evil when the press has taken it upon themselves to speculate on the worst case scenario in every situation. I imagine worry falls in this category too, since most worry is basically imagining a future scenario in which God is absent. God’s grace, his provision, his kindness. Worry leaves no room for God’s intervention or redemption, and that frequently leaves us with hopeless visions of chaos and despair.

If we want to see positive change or anything of God’s kingdom, we need to lend God our imaginations. We need to pray and discover what he sees and hopes and desires in our communities and in our families, in politics and those hotbed controversial situations.

Again, I think we ought to lend our imaginations to God and dream with him and allow him to lead us from imagination to actual practice. Nothing is ever accomplished unless it was first thought of, but if our thoughts are never bridled by God then how can they bear the fruit that God produces?

Thoughts are the root that produce the fruit that God desires, but only if our thoughts are set on Him. As Christians especially, we need to submit our imagination to God and ask him to bridle it and use it for his kingdom purposes.

If Jules Verne could dream up technology 1 to 200 years beyond his time, then I’m sure God can give us a heart to dream up solutions for the angst that is in the world right now, even if our solutions seem small, or close range and only extend to our families or our own neighbors. You have to start somewhere.

Thanks for the inspiration Jules.

What an imagination.

Originally posted September 2, 2023