Idealizing God. Every sincere and earnest believer in God experiences this stage. It is the stage in which he stands before God in humility and gentleness, or with repentance for his sins and faults, or looking up to heaven and asking for pardon. Whether the Being or Person he idealizes is much greater or only comparatively greater than himself, he understands that he is a mere drop in comparison with the ocean, that he is a most limited being as against an unlimited God, that he is most feeble while the other is almighty. He realizes that there is a Being filled with all the virtues and goodness and justice and mercy and compassion imaginable. Everyone, whatever his religion, experiences this first stage during which he is a faithful believer in God.