… If there be any virtue, and
if there be any praise, think on these things. Philippians 4:8
The Bible has a great deal to say about our
thoughts; current evangelicalism has practically nothing to say about them. The
reason the Bible says so much is that our thoughts are so vitally important to
us. The reason evangelicalism says so little is that we are overreacting from
the “thought” cults, which would make our thoughts to be very nearly everything
and we counter by making them nothing. Both positions are wrong.
Our voluntary thoughts not only reveal what
we are—they predict what we will become. The will can become the servant of the
thoughts, and to a large degree even our emotions follow our thinking. Thinking
stirs feeling and feeling triggers action. That is the way we are made and we
may as well accept it.
Thinking about God and holy things creates
a moral climate favorable to the growth of faith and love and humility and
reverence. We cannot by our thinking regenerate our hearts, nor take our sins
away nor change the leopard’s spots. But we can by Spirit-inspired thinking
help to make our minds pure sanctuaries in which God will be pleased to dwell.
The best way to control our thoughts is to
offer the mind to God in complete surrender. The Holy Spirit will accept it and
take control of it immediately. Then it will be relatively easy to think on
spiritual things, especially if we train our thought by long periods of daily
prayer, even talking to God inwardly as we work or travel.
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. 2
Corinthians 10:4-5
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