Your Thoughts Matter

Last week, we talked about how once the soul is broken down into mind, will, heart, and body, it has several implications for us as humans and our relationship with God and others. This week, I want to zoom in on our thoughts. Your thoughts matter.

Thoughts about God

In the last post, I talked about what we think about God matters. If we think He is not good, we will not achieve the freedom we gain in Christ. Often, we subtly think that God is not good. Our actions show us what we believe.

For example, if I mope around and think, “woe is me,” or some version of it, I have subtly shifted my mindset from living like God is good to living 1) focused on me and 2) as if God is not sovereign over my life and circumstance.

To be fair, I was both doing this and acting out of anger before I started studying Romans 8. I knew I was not living as Christ would have me live, but I did not know how to practically change. Knowing you need to change, but not knowing how to change (or feeling powerless to do so) is a chance for despair to creep in. God was so faithful to answer and guide me so that today, I am a new creation from one year ago. I was driven with anxiety and a sense of hopelessness. Now I am driven by peace.*

At the core, what I believe is who I am. Belief drives thoughts, thoughts drive feelings, feelings drive actions and so on. When Jesus is calling you to believe that He is the Son of God and that He is God, the very nature of what He is asking is for you to shift within yourself to a belief that is greater than any other belief. God actually calls you to belief to your benefit. Nothing besides Jesus can provide the internal stability that we crave. You cannot allow your experience to dictate your thoughts of God, but you must allow your belief to change your experience.

I actually thought that my thoughts were my thoughts and that thoughts were not tangibly sinful. Now, I believe this is wrong thinking. Thoughts are not sins, but sin is born in the mind and in our (conscious or unconscious) unbelief and desire. Jesus Himself called us to this in His Sermon on the Mount. He says that looking at a woman with lustful thoughts is to commit adultery or to think murderous, hate-filled thoughts is to commit murder. It is a sin to hate, but not a sin to look at a person of the opposite sex. The problem was that I had become good at self-deception.

Beth Moore said this on twitter, and I thought it was so good, “You don’t have to read the Bible to know there is a God (Romans 1), but you have to read the Bible to know God (Romans 10).” The Bible can be confusing, but it is worth reading to understand the goodness and truth of God and to correct my mind when it has gone astray.

Thoughts about People

Last week, I was really convicted about the way I love others with my mind and thoughts. How I think about others matters. Jesus asks me to love my enemies. Jesus asks me to love all as He has loved. Obviously without Jesus acting in me, I cannot love this fully and deeply.

This means that I must choose to believe the best truth about others at all times.

Thoughts about Self

The problem with thinking the best about yourself is that your self is rarely as good as you’ve made yourself out to be. We want to be good, because being good is like God, so our minds create tactics that make us believe that we are something we are not. We will tell ourselves that we are dieting and have followed the rules, but we can sneak in “this one time” a treat when really it has been more than “this one time.” I think I have in the past alluded to this being your true or real self. Your real self is deceitful and weak, while your false self thinks it is good.

In reading Surrender to Love by David G. Benner, he defines real versus false selves as this:

“Daring to accept myself and receive love for who I am in my nakedness and vulnerability is the indispensable precondition for genuine transformation. But make no mistake about just how difficult this is. Everything within me wants to show my best “pretend self” to both other people and God. This is my false self — the self of my own making. This self can never be transformed, because it is never willing to receive love in vulnerability. When this pretend self receives love, it simply becomes stronger and I am even more deeply in bondage to my false ways of living.” [italics mine]

Thus, the reason why in the very beginning, back to Genesis 3, that God demands Adam and Eve to come out from hiding in vulnerability. We hide from Him because we are ashamed, and He wants our whole, ugly selves, because He is an artist of broken things.

Thoughts about Evil People

Even if someone is blatantly evil, I must have a heart and thus a mind that desires that individual to know the love and hope and changing power of God. It would be wrong to not think of them rightly, as in not acknowledging their evil to make up something untrue but good to help us in our thoughts of them. Instead, in the case of the evil person, we should continue to desire God’s best for them. Often, our mind tells us it is hopeless to have hope for the loveless. That thinking goes against the command of God. 

Thoughts in Marriage

How I think about my spouse matters. If I dwell on what my husband is doing wrong or on what I wish he was doing differently, I create a wall in my mind that keeps me at a distance from him. It keeps me from loving him fully. When I focus my mind to think well of him, it bridges the gap of understanding. The wall breaks down, and I can feel loving and also act in love for him.

Because the soul is mind, body, and will, when one is out of sync, my love will be incomplete. The mind is where love is made in and out of the bedroom. Because the soul is the body also, the body can change the mind to act in love. Sex is an act of the soul. It engages mind, body, and will.

When we understand this, we better understand the immorality of sexual sin. The Holy Spirit within us is continual pursuit of oneness with our souls, just as we are to become one with our spouses. The soul is where we commune with God and sexual sin creates disharmony in our souls. God is a great Healer of abuses and sins, so there is hope for sexual sin and those who have been sexually abused.

How I spend my Time

How I spend my time will determine what I think about. Having become a mom with everyone in school has meant I can watch Netflix while I fold the clothes. This is not inherently wrong. But when I go about my day thinking more about the characters on the show than about my God and who He is or what He’s done, I’ve missed the mark.

Timothy Willard wrote an article last week called, “Binge Watching Makes You Stupid,” and suggests we binge on “the beauty and wonder of the real world.” We have been given freedom to binge Netflix. There are no rules in Christianity against it, yet when we fill our minds more with things not of God than on the things of God, we will live and act on the things we dwell on.

This quotes hangs as a reminder in my home,

“A person will worship something, have not doubt about that. We may think our tribute is paid in secret in the dark recesses of our hearts, but it will come out. That which dominates our imaginations and our thought will determine our loves, and our character. Therefore, it behooves us to be careful what we worship, for what we are worshiping, we are becoming.” -Ralph Waldo Emerson

What we think about is who or what we will become.

—————————

If you want to learn more, much of the Bible Study I’ve written on Romans 8 is about your thought life and how to transform your life and grow in change. Subscribe today to get a free copy of this Bible Study. I’ve had to move its release date to late November/early December to give myself time to edit short videos included the study. If this post has been valuable to you, please share it with someone else who needs it. Thank you for reading.

*{At any point, any one of us, Christian or not, can come to a place driven by anxiety over peace. Sometimes this is a symptom we need to address with a medical doctor. But sometimes, what is at stake is caring for your soul. So know that I don’t think medical care is wrong, but I know too that there are many things we can do alongside medical treatment to help ourselves from the heart and soul.}