Captivating Thoughts and the Thoughts God Thinks
For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh.
For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds.
We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ.
Yesterday, at dinner, I said “Man, it seems like there are a lot of people talking at once!”
My 9 year old, in complete innocence, said, “Maybe you just have a lot of voices going in your head, too. Like a lot of thoughts.”
I think the Holy Spirit told him that.
I was about to speak to a group of 12 people over 70 the other day, and as I was preparing, I realized that they didn’t need me to tell them anything about the Corona Virus. They were counting on me to tell them about the Bible.
In that moment, I had a choice. I could fight with weapons of the world — tell them to wash their hands, not put their mouths on doorknobs, and everything else they’ve heard everywhere else, or I could fight with divine power the destroy strongholds.
I chose the latter.
This verse is a great one to memorize and keep on a notecard. We can’t deny that we are walking around in the flesh, but we don’t have to be ruled by our flesh. We have something that isn’t normal and the normal world doesn’t have.
That doesn’t mean we can start being stupid, but it means that we can walk in joy and peace while we’re dealing with the pressures of a pandemic. We can walk with joy and peace while we deal with the pressures of grumpy co-workers, busted water mains, or whatever problems we have. Our joy and peace super-powers didn’t start with the current whatever and they won’t stop with it either.
So we take our thoughts captive. We destroy the arguments in our head.
The Devil will always attack two things:
- The credibility of God
- What God says about you as His child
If the Devil can disable one of those things in you, he’s managed to weaken your witness and your testimony.
Just about any fear or anxiety we experience can trace itself back to one or both of those to statements at its roots.
We don’t take the thoughts captive so that the thoughts obey Christ. We take the thoughts captive because out of what we think, we’ll do. If I think that God is credible and reliable, I’m going to obey Jesus command to love my neighbor. If I think what God says about me being His child is true (Isaiah 43:1 says “I have redeemed you, I have called you by name.”) then I don’t need to perform in such a way to make sure everyone else knows my name. Jesus is enough.
Search the scriptures and find whatever helps your thoughts submit to the truth of the Gospel. God is faithful, and He was delighted to call you and keep you as His own.
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