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The Bossy
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For New Christians
8-18-2008
"Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking lies." Psalm 34:13 (NIV)
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><> Death and Life
Are in the Power of the Tongue
by Michael Bradley
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Guest Article
Death and Life
Are in the Power of the Tongue
As part of your sanctification process with the Lord, expect God the Father to come after three main areas in your walk with Him.
The first area will be with your "thought life" - which is the area of your unspoken words. We already have another article in our site specifically dealing with this area. The title of this article is "You are What You Think." In this article, I give you all of the Scripture verses that have to deal with the Lord wanting to impart a right type of thinking into your thought process.
The second area God will be targeting will be your "word life" - which has to do with the words that are being released out of your mouth to other people.
The third area God will be coming after will be your "action life" - which will be how you act and behave towards others. Your actions and behaviors toward others has to line with up with your sanctified thinking and your sanctified speech. The Bible says we have to be "doers" of the Word, not just hearers.
This article will be dealing with the second area - which will be your word life towards others. You can have a certain amount of your thinking and thought life cleaned up to some degree in the Lord with the sanctifying help of the Holy Spirit, but if you can't make the next step and transmit the right kinds of words to others in your own personal dealings with them, then all of the sanctification that you went through to get your thinking and thought life cleaned up will have all been for naught.
In this article, I am going to give you several powerful key verses from the Bible on this topic. When you string all of these verses together like I will do in this article, you will really be able to see exactly what it is God wants to do with you in this area. These verses are once again giving all of us some profound and powerful revelation from the Lord in just this one area alone.
Your "word life" with others will make or break you in your own personal relationships with other people in this life. If you don't learn how to speak to other people in a positive and godly manner, then sooner or later no one will want to have anything to do with you, and you will eventually find yourself being totally isolated and alone.
I simply can't stress enough the power that is on these particular verses - and that each and every Christian do the best they can to clean up their speech and the way they express themselves to other people in this life.
The very first verse I will list below will give us perfect revelation from the Lord on this issue. This one verse is so powerful from the Lord, that I have decided to name the title of this article just after this one verse.
This one verse is telling us that "death and life are in the power of the tongue." Just stop and think for a minute what the Lord is trying to convey to us with these specific words. There are two things to pick up from this verse.
The first thing that God is trying to tell all of us is that we have a certain amount of "power" in our tongues. Our tongue is referring to the verbal words that we speak out of our mouths to other people.
When God is using the word "power," He is telling us that every single one of us has a certain amount of power residing in our mouth and in our tongues with the words that we can release to other people.
And with this kind of power residing in our ability to release spoken words to other people - God then tells us what can happen with this kind of power. This power can either be used to bring life or death to the person that we are speaking to. Think of the responsibility and ramifications of this revelation - that our spoken words to other people can either bring them life or bring them death!
You can either choose to learn how to speak and release positive words of love, encouragement and edification to other people in your own personal dealings with them, or you can choose to release negative words of condemnation, criticism, coldness and harshness. The choice is yours!
God the Father makes it very clear with the way that He has worded all of these Scripture verses which way He wants us to take with the power that we already have residing in our tongues.
Every single one of us can stop and think how good we have felt when someone has released and spoken words of love, encouragement and edification to us. Words can cut right through you like a knife, and when those words are positive and constructive, they can have an incredible way of building up your own sense of self-esteem, self-worth and self-confidence.
One of the verses I will list below says that good words can literally be health to our bones. In other words, good and positive types of words can give you better physical health as a result of the boost your immune system will receive.
However, just the reverse is also possible. If all a child ever hears from his parents as they are growing up are stern and abusive words of condemnation, criticism and negativity - then that child's self-esteem and self-worth can be severely affected if it is not counter-balanced by other people in his life who will speak the right kinds of words of love and encouragement to him.
If a child does not get properly watered with words of love and encouragement from his own flesh and blood parents during his early growing years in the family, then sooner or later he will end up believing in all of the lies of his parents as a result of their constant bombardments - and he will then end up growing up thinking that he will never be good enough to amount to anything worthwhile.
There are many grown adults who never end up accomplishing everything that God would've had in store for them in this life as result of not being able to pull out of all the negativity and pessimism that their parents had heaped on them during their earlier growing years in the family. And all of their possible growth in the Lord in this lifetime ends up getting stunted as a result of the death that was brought upon them by the negative and abusive words spoken to them by their own natural parents.
This is why the Lord is telling us in this verse that some kind of death can literally be brought about as a result of speaking out the wrong kinds of words to someone - especially words spoken between parents and their own children.
This same type of "death" can also occur in marriages between husbands and their wives. Many married women have had all of their healthy sense of self-respect, self-worth and self-confidence beat right out of them as a result of all the verbal abuse they have had to put up with from their verbally abusive husbands.
As Christians, we should all work very closely with the Holy Spirit in allowing Him to help us clean up our word life and how we verbally express ourselves to other people in this life.
If we can learn how to get this part of our life properly cleaned up and sanctified under His direction and guidance, then not only we will become more pleasing to the Lord, but we will also dramatically increase the quality of our own personal relationships that we can have with other people in this life.
For the Holy Spirit to really be able to start to work with you in this area, you will need the knowledge that the following Scripture verses will give you. I will once again break these verses down under their appropriate captions so that you can fully grasp the revelation that the Lord is trying to convey to you.
The Scripture Verses
If you can grasp what the Lord is trying to tell you with the knowledge and revelation that is in these verses, and then start to work with the Holy Spirit in trying to learn how to change, control and curb some of your bad speech habits - you can change the way you talk and express yourself to other people, with all of it being for the better.
I have personally seen the Lord take several people who used to cuss like sailors, and who were very demeaning and abusive in the way they would talk to other people, and completely change and transform them into sanctified saints who no longer cuss and who now treat their spouses, their children and their good personal friends in the godly way and manner that He would like all of us to do.
I will now break these individual verses down under 5 specific captions.
1. Death and Life Are in the Power of the Tongue
The very first verse I will list below is the one that will tell us that death and life are in the power of the tongue. The rest of the verses will further extend off of this revelation with some very interesting verbiage being used by the Lord to try and drive home the point of how powerful our words really are - and how they can either be used to bring life, love, edification and encouragement into a person's life - or bring death, destruction, negativity and torment.
I will list each one of the verses one right after the other, and then point out and highlight some of the key phrases that are in some of these verses so you can really see the powerful revelation that is in these verses.
-
"Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit." (Proverbs 18:21)
"There is one who speaks like the piercings
of a sword, but the tongue of the wise promotes health. The truthful lip shall
be established forever, but a lying tongue is but for a moment." (Proverbs
12:18)
"Keep your tongue from evil, and
your lips from speaking guile. Depart from evil, and do good; seek peace, and
pursue it." (Psalm 34:13)
"A man's stomach shall be satisfied
from the fruit of his mouth, and from the produce of his lips he shall be
filled." (Proverbs 18:20)
"The Lord God has given me the
tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him
who is weary." (Isaiah 50:4)
"Walk in wisdom toward those who
are outside, redeeming the time. Let your speech always be with grace,
seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to
answer each one." (Colossians 4:5)
"The mouth of the righteous is
a well of life, but violence covers the mouth of the wicked." (Proverbs 10:11)
"The words of a man's mouth are deep waters; the wellspring of wisdom is a
flowing brook." (Proverbs 18:4)
"A wholesome tongue is a tree of
life, but perverseness in it breaks the spirit." (Proverbs 15:4)
"Pleasant words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the
bones." (Proverbs 16:24)
"Anxiety in the heart of man causes
depression, but a good word makes it glad." (Proverbs 12:25)
"A
soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. The tongue of
the wise uses knowledge rightly, but the mouth of fools pours forth
foolishness." (Proverbs 15:1)
"He who guards his mouth preserves
his life, but he who opens wide his lips shall have destruction." (Proverbs
13:3)
"Whoever guards his mouth and tongue keeps his soul from
troubles." (Proverbs 21:23)
"The heart of the righteous studies
how to answer, but the mouth of the wicked pours forth evil." (Proverbs 15:28)
"Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth; keep watch over the door of my lips."
(Psalm 141:3)
If you will notice, some of the verses have two sides to them.
On the one side are the positive benefits and blessings one can receive as the
result of learning how to speak properly to others. On the other side are the
negative things that can occur as a result of not properly expressing yourself
to others - either in the specific words that you choose to say to a person or
in the way or manner in which you say these words to a person.
So that you can
fully grasp both sides of this coin, I will first bullet point all of the
positive things that are in the above verses and then I will bullet point all
of the negative things. Here is the positive side of the coin:
-
The tongue of the wise promotes health
-
The truthful lip shall be established forever
-
A man's
stomach shall be satisfied from the fruit of his mouth
-
Let your speech always
be with grace and seasoned with salt
-
The mouth of the righteous is a well of
life
-
The wellspring of wisdom is a flowing brook
-
A wholesome tongue is a tree
of life
-
Pleasant words are sweetness to the soul and health to the bones A
good word can make someone's heart glad
-
A soft answer turns away wrath The
tongue of the wise uses knowledge rightly
-
He who guards his mouth preserves
his life
-
He who guards his mouth and tongue keeps his soul from trouble
When
you read all of these key phrases one right after the other, you can really
start to see how powerful of a thing it really is if you can learn how to
properly express yourself to other people in this life. Notice in 3 of the
middle bullet points - that someone who can speak to others in a righteous and
godly manner will be like a well of life, a flowing brook and a tree of life
to that person.
Pleasant words, good and uplifting type words, and a wholesome
tongue can also help serve to lift a person's spirit up, help make their
hearts glad and happy, be able to turn away possible wrath and anger, and also
help to guard and preserve your own personal life. One wrong word to the wrong
person at the wrong time could lead you to having an early departure from this
life.
If more people would learn how to walk and abide in the revelation and
knowledge that is in these verses, and learn how to express themselves in a
more positive and godly manner to others - we would have less tensions and
conflicts in our marriages, in our families, in our personal friendships and
in the workplace. Now here is the negative side of this same coin:
-
Keep your
tongue from evil and speaking guile
-
Violence will
cover the mouth of the wicked
-
A perverse tongue
will break the spirit
-
A harsh word stirs up anger
-
He who opens wide his lips shall
have destruction
-
The mouth of the wicked pours forth
evil
Jesus has already told us that those who will live by the sword will also
die by the sword. The second bullet point above tells us that violence can
chase after and literally come upon someone if their speech to others is
wicked and evil.
These key phrases are telling us that those with big
mouths, and those who like to speak harsh words to others can bring sudden
destruction down on them and possibly those that may be close to them. Flip
off and cuss out the wrong guy on the highway, and he may be the last person
you will ever see alive again.
Put both sides of this coin right next to one
another and you can see very clearly how the Lord wants us to express
ourselves to other people in this life.
2. Rebuking the Wicked
Though
the
Lord wants us to be able to talk with others in a civil, loving and
uplifting way and manner - this does not mean we have to become submissive
doormats and be too afraid to engage with the wicked and evil people in this
life if we are forced to.
Jesus Himself did not mince any words when
attacking some of the high ranking Jewish leaders of His day. He also did
not hold back when throwing out the money changers who were trying to do
business in His house of worship.
The next set of verses are very
interesting, especially in the day and age we now live in where everyone is
trying to be politically correct and are to afraid to verbally engage with
someone for fear of offending them.
Here are 5 very good verses telling us
not to be afraid to engage when we have to - and be willing to take a stand
and tell the truth even if it means initially hurting or offending someone.
-
"But those who rebuke the wicked will have delight, and a good blessing will
come upon them. He who gives a right answer kisses the lips." (Proverbs
24:25)
-
"Open rebuke is better than love
carefully concealed. Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of
an enemy are deceitful." (Proverbs 27:5)
-
"He who rebukes a man will find more
favor afterward than he who flatters with the tongue." (Proverbs 28:23)
-
"Blows that hurt cleanse away evil,
as do stripes the inner depths of the heart." (Proverbs 20:30)
-
"Therefore, putting away lying,
each one speak truth with his neighbor, for we are members of one another ...
let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for
necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers." (Ephesians
4:25,29)
As I have stated in my article on "The Sin of Abortion," many pastors across
this country are afraid to call out this abomination for the sin that it
really is for fear of offending those who may be pro-choice in their
congregations. As all of the above verses are trying to tell you, anyone who
is to afraid to call out these types of obvious sins are failing to make an
attempt to clean away an evil sin and abomination.
Notice that several of
these verses are telling you that if you would be willing to take a strong
stand and express the Lord's opinion on these kinds of hot issues and topics,
that you initially may hurt and offend a few people, but afterwards you will
end up finding much more favor with others, will help impart grace and
knowledge to these people, and then possibly end up receiving a good blessing
from the Lord for being willing to do this.
This same principle applies
between parents and their children. Nip in the bud any bad and inappropriate
behavior as soon as you start to see it surface and manifest, and you just may
save your son or daughter years of possible trouble down the road.
3. Do Not
Bear False Witness Against Your Neighbor
In the very litigious claims
conscious society we now live in, many people are filing unscrupulous
lawsuits. And in some of these lawsuits, the plaintiffs are bearing some type
of false witness against either an employer, a co-worker, a company or
corporation, or a total stranger. In other words, they are flat out lying
against a defendant, all in an effort to try and make some type of financial
gain either against an individual or a particular company.
As you will see in
the verses I will list below, when God the Father has it set up as one of His
10 commandments that you should not be bearing any type of false witness
against your neighbor, and then tops it off by saying that this type of lying
will be considered an abomination in His sight - any Christian will get
himself into major trouble with the Lord if they try and do this to either
unjustly hurt the person they have targeted as a matter of trying to get some
type of personal revenge against them or if they are doing it to try and make
some kind of financial gain.
You will have the vengeance and wrath of God
Almighty Himself come down on you and your life if you ever try to hurt anyone
else with any type of false accusation or false charge. Let these verses be a
major warning to any Christian who is thinking about doing this for either
personal revenge or any type of monetary gain.
-
"Do not be a witness against
your neighbor without cause, for would you deceive with your lips? Do not say,
"I will do to him just as he has done to me; I will render to the man
according to his work." (Proverbs 24:28)
-
"A false witness will not
go unpunished, and he who speaks lies will not escape." (Proverbs 19:5)
-
"Do not speak evil of one another, brethren." (James 4:11)
"Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord, but those who deal
truthfully are His delight." (Proverbs 12:22)
-
"Getting treasures by a lying tongue is
the fleeting fantasy of those who seek death." (Proverbs 21:6)
Notice the
second verse says that anyone who bears a false witness will not go
unpunished. The first verse tells us that we cannot even try to bear false
witness against someone even as a matter of personal revenge. The Bible tells
us that any type of vengeance or payback always belongs to the Lord. It does
not belong to you or to any of your friends who would like to try and get even
for you.
The last verse perfectly describes what people are doing when filing
unjust lawsuits based upon trumped-up, false allegations. Trying to obtain
treasures and financial wealth by way of a lying tongue is a fleeting fantasy,
and eventually judgment will be rendered against you at the hands of God
Himself.
As a Christian, do not ever tempt your hand or your fate with the
Lord by crossing over into this kind of forbidden territory with Him.
4. Shun
Profane and Vain Babblings
In addition to never, ever, considering bearing any
type of false witness against anyone, these next set of verses will tell us to
learn how to shun profane and vain babblings. The word "babblings" means
"foolishness and meaningless type of talk." In other words, try to keep
unnecessary and foolish type of gossiping and talk to a bare minimum. I know
in the work place where many people are huddled very close together, this is a
real hard one to try and keep on top of.
But as you will see in several of the
verses listed below, if the one you are gossiping and talking about eventually
finds out that you have been doing this behind their back, you will lose a
good friend if that person was your friend to begin with, or you will end up
making an enemy if that person was not a close friend.
One verse below says
that "a brother offended is harder to win than a strong city." Two other
verses say that "a whisperer" and one who "repeats a matter" will "separate
the best of friends."
Many people have lost some of their best friends as a
result of getting caught talking behind their backs or spreading personal
information about them. Once that personal trust has been violated to any
significant degree in a good friendship, it will be very hard to get them to
ever be able to trust you again.
These next 6 verses are a true word to the
wise.
-
"But shun profane and vain babblings, for they will increase to more
ungodliness. And their message will spread like cancer." (2 Timothy 2:16)
"In all labor there is profit, but idle chatter leads only to poverty."
(Proverbs 14:23)
"A talebearer reveals secrets, but he who is of a faithful spirit
conceals a matter." (Proverbs 11:13)
"A brother offended is harder to win than a strong city ..." (Proverbs
18:19)
"A perverse man sows strife, and a whisperer separates the best of
friends." (Proverbs 16:28)
"... but he who repeats a matter separates the best of friends."
(Proverbs 17:9)
Per the article that we have titled "Choose Your Friends Carefully," if
you have been given several good God-friends by the Lord, really value and
cherish these kinds of personal relationships and don't ever be tempted to
betray their trust by engaging in unnecessary babblings and gossiping behind
their back. True good God-friends are hard to find in this life.
I also
believe that cussing, cursing and swearing can also be included in what the
Bible calls "profane babblings." There are many Christians who still like to
cuss out of their flesh, even as they continue to grow in the Lord.
However,
sooner or later what you will find out as you start to draw closer to the
Lord in your own personal relationship and walk with Him, is that your
desire to want to keep on cussing will start to wane. Not only will you be
receiving the conviction of the Holy Spirit Himself when you do start to
cuss, but you will also find your own natural desire to want to keep on
cussing will start to wane and lessen.
The reason for this is because you
will find yourself wanting to become more pleasing to the Lord in your
actions, in your thoughts and in your spoken words. Your desire to want to
please God will increase and once it does, you will start to lose all desire
to want to cuss anymore because you will sense how displeasing it is to Him
and that He really does find it offensive.
If you really stop and examine
all of the cuss and curse words we use, most of them are either attacks
directly against God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit, or they have to do with
some vile and nasty bodily functions. Many people cuss out of habit and
never really stop and think of the actual words they are using when they are
cussing. Just remember, God the Father is watching your every movement, your
every thought and your every action. He sees and hears every thought and
every word that comes out of your mouth. If we really love our one and only
Lord, then we will lose all desire to want to cuss, curse or swear in His
sight. It's not only offensive to Him, but it's also offensive to anyone
else who may be around you when you start spouting off.
5. God Will Judge
You By Your Words I will end these Scripture verses with one very strong and
powerful verse direct from Jesus Himself. In this verse, Jesus tells us that
we will have to give a direct account to Him for "every idle word" that we
may speak in this life. He says that we will either be "justified" by the
good words we have spoken in our lives or be "condemned" by any of the bad
words we may have spoken.
In other words, not only does God the Father want
us to get our speech in order in how we relate to other people, but He is
also going to be holding every single one us personally accountable with how
we have spoken and expressed ourselves to other people in this life.
This is
a very serious warning being given to us by our Lord - and how we talk and
express ourselves to other people in this life should never, ever be taken
for granted.
As the first verse has told us, God has given each and everyone
us a certain amount of power with the words that we can speak out to other
people - and those words can either bring life or death to the person we are
speaking to.
Here is this most solemn verse:
"But I say to you that for
every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of
judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you
will be condemned." (Matthew 12:36)
Not only will the kinds of words you
speak out to others in this life determine how many good friends you may end
up making or how good those personal friendships will end up being, but your
words are also going to be appropriately judged by the Lord Himself on your
day of judgment with Him.
Conclusion
The Golden Rule will really apply to
this part of our walk with the Lord. The Golden Rule says that we should
treat others like we would want them to treat us. If you apply this rule to
this particular topic - you could then say that we should "speak to others
in the way that we would want them to speak to us."
As I said at the top of
this article, every single one of us can flashback and recall all of the
times that good words spoken to us in a positive, loving and edifying manner
have made us feel really good and have helped us to build up our own levels
of self-esteem and self-confidence.
However, we can also recall all of the
times that words spoken to us in a hateful, condescending and critical
manner have made us feel as low as we could possibly go.
When those kinds of
negative words start cutting right through you like a knife, they can
penetrate deep into your heart and soul and cause damage to the emotions and
psyche of a person - especially if that person is not old or mature enough
to be able to consider the negative source from where they are coming from,
and then realize that his self-worth as a person is not based upon what
other people may think about him, but only what God thinks about him.
With
the way the Lord has worded all of the above verses, you can really tell
that this is one area that He wants every single one of us to get a good and
solid grip on.
There is simply no excuse, especially for Christians, for
anyone to be talking to other people in demeaning, critical and
condescending ways. If we are all equal in the eyes of God, then we should
all be looking at everyone else in this life as an equal - not as someone
who may be better or lesser than us.
If you really study the specific
wording in all of the above verses, you will have more than enough knowledge
and revelation from the Lord on how to clean up your speech and how to
properly express yourself to other people in this life.
This is one area
where the Holy Spirit will move in on very strongly in order to give you a
helping hand. You will literally sense and sometimes actually feel Him
guiding some of your words and how you should be expressing yourself to
other people depending on the nature and the intensity of the conversation
that is taking place.
Just learn to be sensitive to His leadings and His
guidance as to what to say and how to say it. You can learn how to flow with
Him in this area if you really have the desire to want to improve yourself
in this area.
Remember - God the Father has given you a powerful gift with
the power that He has allowed you to have residing in your own tongue. You
have the power of life and death in your tongue. Use that power wisely. Use
that power to bring life, love, encouragement and edification into other
people's lives.
If you do, then not only will God be highly rewarding you
once you enter into heaven, but you will also be receiving golden treasures
down here on this earth - which will be all the good personal relationships
you will be able to make and establish with the other people in your life -
and all of those good personal relationships will be permanent and eternal
treasures that you will be able to carry over with you into the next life.
Nothing will draw people to you quicker and easier than being able to talk
and express yourself to other people in the exact same way that Jesus would
do if He was still walking down here on this earth. Let Jesus be your
perfect role model. Study how Jesus expressed Himself when He was walking
down here on this earth. Learn to pattern your own speech after the way He
talked and expressed Himself to other people.
God the Father's ultimate and
highest aim for every single one of us is to transform, shape and mold us
into the express image of His Son Jesus Christ - and part of this
sanctification process will be the Holy Spirit coming after our word and
speech life.
Let the Holy Spirit dig and get into your word life with how
you talk and express yourself to other people, and I guarantee you that He
will make some astounding changes in this area if you are willing to work
with Him in the specific areas that He will want to target for improvement.
Michael
Bradley
Bible Teaching, Knowledge, Commentary and Over 150 Free Articles
Copyright © 2005-2007 by Michael Bradley.
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><> Don’t forget to download Chapter
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><>
G.I.R.L. Club: Guiding & Inspiring Righteous - G.I.R.L. is a Christian website, youth group, & club for teen girls. Great tips on daily devotions & Bible reading. Beaver Falls, Pa.
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The Bossy
Church Lady's Newsletter
For New Christians
8-03-2008
“But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.” Luke 5:16 (NIV)
Warm Fuzzies
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In This Issue
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><> You Are What You Think
by Michael Bradley
><> Resources
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Chapter 1 Pre-Release Copy of
The Bossy Church Lady’s Official Guide For New Christians: 6 Days To Knowing All About God.
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Guest Article
You
Are What You Think
The first two articles we have listed in this section titled "Sanctification" and "Mindset: Being Transformed by the Renewing of Your Mind" all set the stage for you showing you that it is the will of God for your life that you let Him enter you into a sanctification process in order that He may fully consecrate you to Himself and start to mold, shape and transform you into the express image of His Son Jesus Christ.
In this sanctification process, one of the first things you will find that the Lord will want to do is to try and put right thinking into your thought process. Joyce Meyer has a very catchy phrase when describing this. She has said that too many people have "stinkin thinkin."
What you choose to think about and dwell on in this life will make or break you as to what type of person you will end up becoming in this life. Leave it to God the Father to perfectly capture, in one simple one line sentence from the Bible, the secret to being able to have good mental health in this life. When I first saw this verse back in the Old Testament, it literally blew off the page at me. As soon as I saw it, I saw incredible amounts of revelation behind it.
Many Christians have never heard of or found this verse since it is back in the Old Testament in the Book of Proverbs. This powerful verse should be memorized by all Christians, as it is giving us a major spiritual secret in being able to acquire good mental health in the Lord.
Here is the New King James Version of this verse:
"For as he thinks in his heart, so is he." (Proverbs 23:7)
The key word in this verse is the word "thinks." The word "thinks" is telling you that God is targeting your thought process - what you think about on a daily basis.
Interpretation - you are what you think!
This principle is easily seen in our world today. You can really tell who is properly operating on this principle in the way that the Lord has intended for us to operate with it and who is not.
The people who always seem to be more happy, more upbeat and more fulfilled with their lives are the people who have a good sound mind and who are always thinking about and dwelling on the more positive things in this life. They choose, with their own free wills, to dwell on the more positive side of this life as versus always thinking and dwelling on the darker and negative side of this life.
The people who are not happy, who are not fulfilled, who are always pessimistic and depressed all the time and have negative attitudes towards anybody and anything, are all choosing to think and dwell on the negative side of this life.
Granted, this cursed and fallen world in which we live in has a mixture of both life and death in it. Jesus Himself said that we would all have various trials and tribulations that we would have to go through from time to time. Storm clouds are all a part of this life, and no one will get by not having to go through various storm clouds from time to time.
However, there is a flip side to this coin. On the one side of the coin is the darker side of this life, but on the other side of this coin is the good, positive and brighter side of this life. It is not all death, doom and destruction. Even in the worse case scenarios and situations - there is always a hope and a light at the end of that storm cloud tunnel. As Christians, we all have God Almighty Himself on our side to help us take on any storm clouds that may come our way.
The difference between these two types of people is in their thought life. The people who are always happy, upbeat and positive have chosen to look on the bright side of things - even in some of the worse case scenarios imaginable.
The negative type of people have chosen to think and dwell on all of the bad and negative things that can happen or go wrong in this life. No matter what good may come their way, they will always think that something better could have come their way. As a result of this negative and morbid type of thinking in their thought process, nothing ever makes them happy or content because nothing is ever good enough for them.
The Bible is very clearly telling us in the above verse that we can all choose what to think about and dwell on. We don't have to become slaves to negative and pessimistic type thinking. In other words, we can choose to think about what we want to think about!
Our thinking and thought process does not control us - we control it! Negative type thinking can be broken. For many, it has become an actual mental stronghold because they have been mired down into this type of negative thinking for such a long period of time.
However, as you will see in some of the Scripture verses I will list below, the Bible tells us that we can actually take "captive" what we think about. The verse that will give us this revelation says we have to bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Jesus.
What this means is that we are directly responsible for choosing what we think about and dwell on - and then make sure that our thinking always lines up with the Word of God and how He wants us to think about things.
The power lies with us. We cannot blame anyone else, including God Himself, if we have chosen with our own free wills to constantly dwell on the negative and darker side of this life.
Bottom line - we all have to learn how to develop right thinking in our thought process. Our part is to do the best we can to try and think and dwell on the things that God wants us to be concentrating and focusing on. However, as we all know, most of us only have a certain amount of mental and psychological strength in this area. Some will naturally go farther in this realm than others will.
This is where the Holy Spirit will be coming in big time to help get your thinking process straightened out and grounded in the Lord in the way that He wants it to be. This is all part of the sanctification process that God wants to start with each one of us.
As I said in my article titled "Sanctification," this process will not be accomplished overnight. If you have been operating in a negative type mindset for a long period time, God will start to gradually and progressively move you out of it into a better, clearer and healthier type of thinking.
Your job will be to work very closely with the Holy Spirit once He starts this sanctification process within you. You will see Him start to target specific areas in your thinking where you are really off. Once this revelation has been given to you by the Holy Spirit - then it will be up to you as to whether or not you will choose to work with Him to get this particular area cleaned up to the degree that the Lord would really like.
If He tells you that you are too judgmental and too critical of others - then your part will be to do the best you can to try and cast down these types of negative and destructive thoughts and replace them with more positive and godly types of thoughts.
As our site continues to grow, we will be adding additional articles going deeper into this wrestling match that will occur between you and the Holy Spirit once He starts to move in on you to try and get some of your wrong thinking straightened out. For many, this will be very painful process because you will be forced to admit that you have some character flaws and imperfections that need to be dealt with in your mind, soul and personality.
The Holy Spirit is the Master Surgeon - and He will be attempting to do inner spiritual surgery on you to take out what He does not want to be operating in your mind and thought process and put in what He does want to be operating in it.
Your job will be to choose, with your own free will, to work and cooperate with the Holy Spirit once He makes it very clear to you what specific changes He will want to make with you. He will not force these changes on you. He will let you know very clearly exactly what it is He wants to put in your system and exactly what it is He wants to take out.
If you choose to move and cooperate with the Holy Spirit on what specific changes He will want to make with you - then God the Father will allow the supernatural power of His Holy Spirit to truly begin to transform and sanctify you in the way and manner that will most pleasing to Him.
In the additional articles that will be listed in the Sanctification section of our site, I will be giving you some of the specific areas that the Lord will want to target so He can begin the immediate work of trying to getting you cleaned up and sanctified to the degree that He would really like in this lifetime.
And one of the areas that the Lord is definitely going to want to target is your private thinking and thought life - what you choose to think about on a daily basis. In other words, God wants to clean up and straighten out your thought life. With all of the different types of material and sexual lusts that are operating in our world today that are competing for our time and attention, for many, this will initially be a very big battle.
But if you are really wanting the Lord to help clean you up in some of these areas, especially in your private thought life, the Lord will only be too anxious to help get you over some of these mental hurdles through the incredible supernatural power of His Holy Spirit. This kind of inner transformation and sanctification can be accomplished in this life if you are willing to do your part by fully cooperating with the Lord once He starts it up.
Now I will give you some very specific verses from the Bible all showing you that God the Father really does want to come after your thought life and attempt to put right and positive type thinking into your mind.
1. You Are What You Think
For those who like to scan read, I'm going to go ahead and restate the above verse under this specific caption so you can have it once again at a quick glance as you scan down on these bolded captions.
"For as he thinks in his heart, so is he." (Proverbs 23:7)
This verse clearly sets the stage that God the Father really wants to come after our thought life and get it properly cleaned up.
2. You Are Transformed By the Renewing of Your Mind
These next two verses will again show you that God is really wanting to come after your mind. And part of your mind is your thought process - what you choose to think about and dwell on. Both of these verses are using the words "renewing" and "renewed" in reference to your mind.
In other words, part of the transformation and sanctification process with the Lord involves getting your mind properly renewed through His Word and by His Spirit.
1. "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." (Romans 12:1)
2. "... that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in righteousness and true holiness." (Ephesians 4: 22-24)
Notice in this verse it tells you to "put on" the new man. This new man is what the apostle Paul calls the "inner man." The old man is what he calls your outward man. Here is what Paul says about these two in the following verse:
3. "Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day." (2 Corinthians 4:16) Notice Paul says in this last verse that our inner man is being renewed day by day. He is using the same word "renewed" as the above two verses are using when they are talking about our minds being renewed. This means that God wants both our minds and our inner man to be renewed on a daily and progressive basis.
When God says that our inner spiritual transformation is done by getting our minds properly renewed in Him - He is giving all of us an incredible powerful spiritual secret. Again, this is all part of the sanctification process that the Lord wants to start with each and everyone of us.
3. We Now Have the Mind of Christ
This next verse is making one of the most profound statements in all of Scripture. The first verse I will list below says that we now have the "mind of Christ." Think of the implications, ramifications and power of this statement.
As a result of having the Holy Spirit residing on the inside of us - we all now have direct access to both God and Jesus who li |
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