Thinking About What We're Thinking About...

The Unbelievable Effects of Unbelief

So this is a totally different post from what I have previously written, so bare with me here.
On Sunday, our Pastor gave a sermon that hit me right at the core. Do you ever have days when what you are listening or watching or just hearing feels like it was tailor-made for you? That's how this sermon felt. It was basically about getting out of your own head because the way we think determines who we are. He spoke about taking our thoughts into captivity and not letting them get the best of us.

2 Corinthians 10:4-5

"The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ."

I believe that Jesus is our Lord and savior with every ounce of my heart. That being said there are moments or days when my head starts second guessing the miracles he can perform in my life or the amount of love he has for me. I whole-heartidly KNOW he is going to perform miracles in the lives around me but when it comes to my own life, I have a harder time having such a strong conviction.

Listing to Bob talk about how my thoughts can be a betrayal to Christ really got my attention. How is it that I know these things (God's great love and divine power) to be true but yet I can have doubts about my own life in the same sentence? From what I learned from his sermon it's about the way we go about thinking, the process that can change things for us.

Proverbs 23:7

"For as you think you are."

Basically it comes down to the fact that we can only think about one thing at a time. As I was listening to this I thought, I can think about so many things at the same time haha, but what he means is we can only focus our mind on one thought at a time. So if we are focusing on other things how can our eyes be trained on the Lord? He made the joke that of course we have to think about things like paying the bills, traffic lights, making sure we eat, etc. These things just shouldn't interfere with Jesus being the center of our lives.

He gave us a little "cheat" sheet to use for our thoughts. Ask yourself are they:

True

Holy

Instructive

Nurturing

King Pleasing

If the answer is no, then take those thoughts captive. We will never get away from feeling anxiety if we are constantly thinking about it. I am really going to work on taking captive those negative thoughts and focus my mind back on Him. I am not a pastor and I'm probably not doing this sermon justice, but I just thought I would share what I learned :) I'll link the sermon here if you want to listen.