The Influence of Thoughts

Good morning.

Keeping in mind what we’ve learnt about Moses during the past few days, we’re going to look at the thought life, which is the battlefield where the enemy attacks us and is also the foundation of our behaviour. Everything we do is born from a thought and thoughts determine whether we are successful or failing.

Proverbs 23:7 says “as a man thinks, so is he”. Our thoughts determine our actions. We’ve seen with Moses that at first he had a low opinion of himself, but as the Lord developed him, he obtained enough confidence to chat face to face with the Lord Almighty and to lead the great but stubborn nation. What is it that changed? It was his way of thinking. His thoughts at first were based on his blunders, circumstances and fears of the past, which caused him to think lowly of himself and made him feel unworthy. But when he based his thoughts on faith in the Lord, his whole approach changed. Because he spent time in the presence of the Lord, hearing how He thought and seeing what He did, Moses’ way of thinking started to change. He started to think the way the Lord thought and started to do Romans 12:2: “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, in order to prove by you what is that good and pleasing and perfect will of God.” If we start to think godly we’ll become godly.

Faith also starts with thoughts. If for instance somebody prays for healing, what is the first thought that tries to enter your mind? ‘What if it doesn’t work?’ This is the first thought that smashes your faith? But if we discipline our mind and control our thoughts to maintain faith, we’ll believe. Renewing the mind is a conscious process. We need to chuck out everything that is negative and unbelieving and we need to fill the mind with the Word of God. The devil attacks our thought life for he knows that is where faith is born. He manipulated Eve’s thoughts, tried his luck with Jesus and, believe me, is continuously busy with yours. Be very careful of pondering on thoughts – rather demolish them. “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 (2 Corinthians 10:4, 5).” These are also arguments and opinions the devil speaks into our thoughts.

The devil constantly plants thoughts of distraction and doubt in our minds and we need to constantly reject them to maintain our faith and renew our minds. This is one reason why Mammon is God’s greatest enemy (Matthew 6:24), for he keeps our minds filled with materialistic desires and concerns, which is why Jesus offered to look after those issues so we can focus on His righteousness and Kingdom (Matthew 6:33).

Only when we set our minds on things above and not on earthly things (Colossians 3:2) and fend off and take captive thoughts that attempt to distract (2 Corinthians 10:5), we’ll think of ourselves as holy and godly and will become like that (Proverbs 23:7). Then we’ll be able to discern God’s good, acceptable and perfect will (Romans 12:2).

Lord, I want to think the way you do.

If you benefited from this, why don’t you link it to your Facebook or Twitter to make it available to your friends? You can also use the e-mail link to pass it on.