{"id":13917,"date":"2017-09-05T01:00:32","date_gmt":"2017-09-05T08:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/?p=13917"},"modified":"2017-09-05T19:23:59","modified_gmt":"2017-09-06T02:23:59","slug":"renewing-our-minds-for-rejoicing-pt-6-think-accurately","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/2017\/09\/05\/renewing-our-minds-for-rejoicing-pt-6-think-accurately\/","title":{"rendered":"Renewing Our Minds for Rejoicing, Pt. 6 \u2013 \u201cThink Accurately\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Pastor James Lee<\/em><\/p>\n

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. (Philippians 4:4-8)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To think well is to think accurately. We\u2019re commanded to dwell first on \u201cwhatever is true\u201d, not on whatever might be true, or whatever we\u2019ve convinced ourselves to be true. But, we\u2019re to dwell on the facts of who God is and what He\u2019s promised, on what the gospel says about our reality. We\u2019re to think accurately about our sinfulness and to think accurately about His amazing grace! Instead of thinking about whatever is true, instead of pondering, mediating, giving our fullest attention to, intentionally and carefully evaluating, and joyfully celebrating whatever is true\u2026 when we\u2019re struggling with depression, when we\u2019re not doing well spiritually, when we\u2019re engaged in bitter unforgiveness like Euodia and Syntyche in v.2, whatever is true is exactly NOT what we\u2019re dwelling on.<\/strong> Instead, we tend to dwell on our pride, our unmet expectations, our unfulfilled desires, our vindication, our very real hurts, our immediate relief, our reputation. We\u2019re fixated on falsehood, or selected facts, and not on loving God and loving others. Satan likes to prey on weak minds, seeking to devour us and undermine the unity and witness of the local church. So, the command to think accurately in light of God\u2019s Word is to combat the serious error of thinking only about what\u2019s wrong. Thinking the worst of people and the worst of situations and the worst of our future, is NOT living in a way that takes God at His Word!<\/strong> We\u2019re not consistently resting our hearts and minds with thankful, humble, reliant, prayerfulness and submission, as we see in v.6-7. Unfortunately, instead we\u2019re either believing lies or inventing lies, or we\u2019re trapped in the fear promoted by them, unwilling to trust God and serve others.<\/p>\n

Our minds are a battlefield, but the key to our lives is our hearts. That battle rages for the conquest of our hearts. And the command center of our minds is involved in a very real spiritual war, so it\u2019s not that we merely let \u201cJesus take the wheel\u201d, but that we acknowledge His Lordship over all of us\u2026 including over our minds, especially how we think. He\u2019s called us to actively, not passively respond. It\u2019s not the heresy of \u201clet go and let God\u201d, but it\u2019s dependent responsibility. Thus, we\u2019re fully responsible for how we think.<\/p>\n

Yes, we\u2019re influenced, and not all of that is within our control. Nevertheless, no one puts a gun to our head to make us give into whatever worldly or false influence we currently choose to believe. To dwell on whatever is true, is to think accurately from the authoritative standard of God\u2019s Word, especially in the context of our relationship with Him. John 17:17 declares, \u201cYour word is truth.\u201d<\/em> The Greek word for \u201ctrue\u201d is truth in its broadest, most comprehensive sense, namely divine truth. So it\u2019s not just parts that we like or that serve our self-exalting agendas, but it must be ALL of the truth of God! Truth begins and ends with the Lord. Anything and everything not in line with His truth is by virtue false and anti-Christ, and let every man be proved a liar. Therefore, it ends up proving self-destructive, though it promises happiness, never ruin?!<\/p>\n

Godly living comes from godly thinking. That\u2019s axiomatic. And the converse is true as well, ungodly living always comes from ungodly thinking. That\u2019s why Paul commands us in Romans 12:2, \u201cDo not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.\u201d<\/em> That\u2019s why John also commands us in 1 John 2:15-16, \u201cDo not love the world or the things in the world (world here meaning anti-God world system not people or creation). If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world- the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions- is not from the Father but is from the world.\u201d<\/em> It may include good things that we make into idols when we elevate them above the Lord. So if we\u2019re going to be cultivating contentment and joy in our lives, it can\u2019t be divorced from what\u2019s in our hearts and what\u2019s in our minds. But all of us, every one of us, has pockets of bad theology. In different areas, we\u2019re blind to unbiblical thinking. We need to be in a process of continually renewing our minds in progressive sanctification. That doesn\u2019t happen once for all, like our justification, it\u2019s ongoing.<\/p>\n

The Bible is very clear that our lives are the product of our thoughts. Proverbs 23:7 states, \u201cFor as he thinks within himself, so he is.\u201d<\/em> Turn to Mark 7:20-23 “What comes out of a person is what defiles him. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”<\/em> In other words, garbage in, garbage out. What we think, what we say, how we act, reveals what\u2019s in our hearts. And so does what we intake, what we eat, what we entertain, what we read, what we watch, what we think most about. In that sense, they expose us, not excuse us!<\/p>\n

John MacArthur said,<\/p>\n

\u201cPaul\u2019s call for biblical thinking is especially relevant in our culture. The focus today is on emotion and pragmatism, and the importance of serious thinking about biblical truth is downplayed. People no longer ask \u2018Is it true? but rather \u2018Does it work?\u2019 and \u2018How will it make me feel?\u2019\u2026 Too many people go to church not to think or reason about the truths of Scripture, but to get their weekly spiritual high; to feel that God is still with them. Such people are spiritually unstable because they base their lives on feeling rather than on thinking.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In his book, Your Mind Matters<\/em>, the late John Stott adds,<\/p>\n

\u201cIndeed, sin has more dangerous effects on our faculty of feeling than on our faculty of thinking, because our opinions are more easily checked and regulated by revealed truth than our experiences.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

We can\u2019t immediately control how we feel. For example, I can\u2019t command you to, \u201cBe sad, be happy, be angry\u201d, as though we could flip a switch. Thus, in shepherding others, we exercise a certain patience and grace with people until their feelings catch up, so to be speak, to be in line with the truth. But the good news is that we can (and must) influence over time\u2026 how we think\u2026 and thus come to even impact how we feel, by biblical thinking.<\/p>\n

Instead of thinking constantly about what we\u2019re missing and who\u2019s not giving it to us, we\u2019re to think actively about how rich we are in Christ! His prophets, apostles, preachers, and the Lord Jesus Himself were always admonishing, \u201cDo you not know, have you not heard, do you not understand?\u201d<\/em> No surprise, that Scripture describes the unsaved mind as depraved, fleshly, hostile to God, blinded by Satan, foolish, ignorant, defiled, but Romans 10:17 says faith comes from hearing the word of Christ! That\u2019s really the beginning of the gift and opportunity of renewing our minds, our salvation! So if you\u2019re a true Christian, you are able to do and enjoy something the rest of the world cannot. Yes, they can grow their intellect, but they can\u2019t in of themselves, renew their mind. That\u2019s the opportunity given to every single believer from day one! 1 Peter 1:13 exhorts us, \u201cPrepare your minds for action!\u201d<\/em> We\u2019re to love God with all our hearts, soul, strength, and MIND! Dr. Robert Somerville encourages us and invites us to rejoice, \u201cThe sphere, in which your joy as a believer exists, is totally unrelated to your circumstances of life or your feelings about them, but related to your unassailable, unchanging relationship to your sovereign Lord.\u201d<\/em> To think joyfully is the beginning of thinking accurately, and to think accurately is the joyful joy of thinking joyfully. Rejoice!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Pastor James Lee Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":469,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-pastors-corner"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/469"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13917"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13917\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13919,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13917\/revisions\/13919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lighthousebc.com\/beacon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}