How to Handle Your Thought Life – Part 1

SPEAKER 01 : 0:00

Welcome to the InTouch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Thursday, May 8th. If you are trying to live for God, how you think is supremely important. Let’s continue the series giving helps for holiness with a lesson on how to handle your thought life.

SPEAKER 02 : 0:18

Would you turn please to Ephesians chapter 4. Ephesians chapter 4, how to handle your thought life. And I want us to begin reading in… Verse 17. This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their minds. When he speaks of the Gentiles, he’s talking about lost people. Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them because of the blindness of their heart, who being past feeling, they’ve become calloused. have given themselves over unto lasciviousness to work all uncleanness with greediness, all kinds of sensuality and greed. But you’ve not so learned Christ, if so be that you’ve heard him and have been taught by him as the truth is in Jesus, that you put off concerning the former things the old man which is corrupt according to the deceitful lust, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind. and that you put on the new man which after God is created in righteousness and holiness. Wherefore, putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. And over 300 times the Bible speaks of the mind and of thought and of thinking. And it’s something that all of us do every single day of our life. And sometimes you may feel like, well, you’d like to throw your mind in neutral. But not really. Because we are always thinking something. And even when we relax, at least our minds are thinking about something. And yet today, in spite of the fact that most of us have been saved, there’s still a drag on the mind. Now, what do I mean by that? When you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, you obtained at that moment… a new birth which meant a new life which meant new capacities in your ability to think and to reason and to perceive the truth when you became a child of god according to the scriptures the holy spirit came into your heart so what did he do he began to lift the shades from your eyes and pull back the drapes so that you and i could begin to understand spiritual things I will think about that. I will not think about that. Before you became a Christian, you didn’t have the power, the divine power to assist you in the choosing of your thought patterns. But now we do. There are many Christians who are still being plagued. It’s like an infesting disease within them, still being plagued by old thought patterns years and years and years ago. Now, I want you to listen very, very carefully to what I’m going to say. And I want you parents to listen very, very carefully to what I’m going to say. Because all of us know that thought patterns developed or picked up or become a part of our life when we were young, they will either assist you and help you all of your life or they will be a drag on you as long as you live until you learn how to deal with them. Because you see, watch this, our feelings are always following our thoughts. Now I want us to look at several passages here because, look in Romans chapter 8, first of all. Romans 8, verse 6, look there just for a moment. For to be carnally minded. That is fleshly minded. To think in terms of carnality. To let the old flesh, the desires of the flesh. To be carnally minded is death. But to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Get that? Did you hear what that said? That to be carnally minded is death and to be spiritually minded is what? Life and peace. Don’t all of us want life? Don’t all of us want peace? He says to be spiritually minded is life and peace. So you and I have the choice of what? Being carnally minded or spiritually minded. Carnally minded means death. Death to what? Death to joy, death to peace, death to happiness, death to progress, death to success. You name it. And a carnal fleshly mind, a mind that is given over to carnal thinking is death. Death to all the things in life we want. but a mind that is by an act of the will given over to, surrendered to the control of the Spirit, he says, is life and peace. What we think governs what we feel. Well, you know the Scriptures and Proverbs. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. Now watch this, listen. We can read that verse and quote that verse and we say, oh yes, I know the Bible says, as a man thinketh or as a woman, as a person thinketh in his or her heart, so is he. Now listen, that’s what God said. God said, whatever I choose to think, listen, will make me what I am. Hebrews chapter 4, verse 12. For the word of God is quick. That means it’s alive. Now, it’s not dead. It’s not antiquated. It’s alive. It is powerful. There’s something about this book that has the energy and the dynamic of God in it. and sharper than any two-edged sword. That means it pierces, listen, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and it is a discerner of the thoughts and the intents in reality of what? Of the mind. Listen, the Word of God will discern and pinpoint exactly what you’re thinking. It’ll reveal exactly what you’re thinking. That’s very important to remember that because I’m going to come back to it later. He says, the Word of God. You want to find out what you’re thinking? You want to find out why you think the way you think? You want to find out what motivates you to think the way you think? You want to change your thinking and get control of your thought life? You’ve got to get back to Hebrews chapter 4, verse 12. The Word of God is a divider. It cuts asunder, that is, It gets rid of all of the other stuff and helps us to see exactly what we are facing. Until a person does that, they’ll never be able to get in charge of their thought life. And then if you look in Romans chapter 12, and I’m just going to pass over these verses gently to let you think about them in terms of what I’m going to say, and we’ll come back to them later as we go along. Two more verses you know by heart. I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your body a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is a reasonable service. But if you’re going to do that, you’ve got to think about it. And he says, stop being conformed to this world or shaped into its image, but be transformed. Watch this. Now watch, look for just a moment. Listen to what he said. He said, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your body a living sacrifice unto God. holy and acceptable unto him which is your reasonable service. And then he said, do that and don’t let it be shaped in what? Into the image of the world. But he says, be transformed, changed, what? By the renewing of your what? Your mind, your thought processes, your thinking patterns. Listen, you want to change in your life, you’ve got to think different. He said, now wait a minute, is that mind over matter? No, that’s not mind over matter. That’s not what I’m talking about. But you’ve got to change your thinking if your life’s going to be changed. Listen, you can’t walk in the same old thought patterns you’ve walked in all of your life and have a change of heart. And you see, when the Spirit of God discerns your mind, opens your life and shows you the truth and you’re willing to accept new truth and begin to think different about God, about his Son and about yourself, what happens? That new thought process begins to transform your thinking and you become a new person. Why? Because you’re thinking different about God, His Son, yourself, about sin, about salvation, and the result of its effect upon your life is a change that affects every single area of your life. We’re transformed, what? He didn’t say we’re transformed by going to church. he didn’t say we’re transformed by putting on a new suit he said we’re transformed by what the renewing of your mind now the renewing of your mind speaks of a change of your mind a newness of mind a change that takes place as a result of something from above it is a whole new beginning of thought patterns the renewing of your mind and is something that has to go on constantly So you can see by just these several scriptures that all through the scriptures, God keeps reminding us of this mind. Now listen, you think about how far we’ve come today with computers, for example. I mean, you can just type in a few little things and it’s absolutely unbelievable, humanly speaking, what can happen. Now I want to tell you something. That ought to say something to you about the tremendous power of that is deposited on your shoulders. When men have become great musicians, renowned throughout the world, who could not hear with their ears, but think with their mind. The vast contribution that people who have been blinded early in life have given to humanity, they could not see, but they could think with their mind. The mind is the greatest human force on earth, not counting God. When holy, righteous, omnipotent, omniscient God gets hold of your mind, you become a powerful potential for the unbelievable. And that’s why Satan is doing everything in his power to capture the minds of men and women. And that leads me to say the first thing I want to say. And that’s this. That Satan’s battlefield in your life and my life are not your hands. It’s not your hands, not your feet, not your eyes, not your ears, not your nose, not your mouth. Even though it may get you in lots of trouble. That is not his battlefield. The battlefield of Satan is in your mind. The mind is the battlefield for Satan for all of us. Now, I could talk about jealousy and doubt and a lot of other things, but I’m going to talk about the thing that most of you have the biggest problem with. I won’t say most of it, let’s put it this way, that most people tell me they have the biggest problem with. And that is thoughts of moral impurity, sensuality. And how many young people have said, Lord, I want to do what’s right. God, you know I want to do what’s right. And Satan sucks it to them with moral impurity, impure thoughts. So the mind has become the battlefield and you see we’ve got three enemies. We got our old carnal nature which we can’t get rid of until Jesus comes. Then we have the world system that is just flooding the whole world with sensuality and then we’ve got the devil to tolerate. So it looks like it’s three against one, doesn’t it? But the truth is it’s four against three. The world, the flesh and the devil Against God the Father God the Son God the Spirit and you I Want to tell you something if it were just you and any one of them you’d still be a majority now let me say this to you and the reason I want to I want to center in here on sensuality because I could talk about a lot of other things but I’m here to tell you I know that’s a major problem and When I see what he’s saying here when I when I see what Paul is saying put away all You said, oh, wait a minute. I’ve tried that. I’ve said, Lord, not going to think that anymore. And that lasts for about two or three hours, two or three minutes, or maybe two or three weeks. Now, you see, God knows you meant that. The Bible says he’s acquainted with all of our ways. And if his word is a discern of the intents of the heart, God knows the intent of your heart. And you see, oftentimes it’s not that you don’t want to think right for the moment you think, but oh God, I can’t think right. And you see, Satan has tricked us and enslaved us and snared us and trapped us and lied to us. And we finally said, boy, I guess that’s right. The mind is the battlefield. All right, the second thing, and I don’t want to stay too long on that because I could say a lot of other things about that. Let’s go on to the second thing, and that’s Satan’s strategy. How does he operate to begin with? Well, we do have a mind, so what happens? You look and you see something, or you hear something that somebody says, or whatever it might be. Let’s just take the looking. You look and the thought comes into your mind. When it comes into your mind, you have the choice to either let it keep going or Or stop it, grab it mentally, and consider it. And if you grab it and consider it, you’d say, well, I think I’d like to have that. Or that would satisfy me, or that would be desirous. Then what happens? It moves from your mind down into your emotions. And it begins, your old imagination begins to work. Imagination works and works and works, and you have to watch that. And then if you let it drop down to your will, which is where it’s going, then you’ve got one more chance. When it came through, you could have acted and let it keep going. When you grabbed it and held on to it and looked at it and began to imagine what it would be like, or whether it’s some experience of going somewhere or being with somebody or having something, whatever it might be, when you decided that you want to think about that a little bit, Then, you know what you’ve done? You’ve put yourself in a position, you’ve got to make a decision. You’ve either got to make a decision if it’s wrong to cast it out of your mind, or you’ve got to make a decision that you’re going to act upon it. Because listen, a thought within the human mind that is nurtured and caressed and cared for and looked at and imagined and viewed and pondered and thought over, my friend, you will become a part of that it will become a part of you it will dominate you if you don’t get control of it he says as a man thinketh in his heart so is he that is we are the sum total of our thoughts if a man thinks sensuality and thinks sensuality and thinks sensuality he becomes sensual You see, you can’t feast your mind on one thing constantly and be something else because God said it’s a principle. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is it. If the only thing you think about is money, money, money, money, money, money, money, got to have more and more and more and more and more and more and money, money, what happens? You become a greedy, selfish person. On the other hand, if you think generosity and love and kindness and helping others, what happens? It is the opposite. We do the choosing. When you say, oh, you know, you just don’t know me. That’s right. And more than likely, you don’t even know yourself. Listen, you have on your shoulders a tremendous machine, a tremendous potential that God has placed there. You will either use it for right or wrong, good or evil. So what does Satan do? If something comes along and you grab it and you look at it and whatever it might be and you say, well, you know, just forget that. Don’t put that away. That doesn’t work. So what happens? Satan just whispers to you, that’s right, don’t think about it now. So you just sort of put a little sack on your shoulder over here and you’re on your way and you think, well, you know, that didn’t bother me. But Satan’s got a toehold. You didn’t cast it out deliberately. You just let it, you know, sort of rationalize it. After all, everybody has a little problem here and there and nobody’s perfect and you just sort of deposit it back there. Then what does Satan do? He gets to work. Now remember this, that if you and I are the composite of all the things we’ve been thinking all these years and your old subconscious mind has it all done in there and wouldn’t you just like to pull your subconscious out tonight and put it in the washing machine and wash that thing clean once and for all? The problem is you can’t do it. And that’s the penalty. Listen, that is the lifetime penalty of wrong thinking. That whereas you can overcome it, you can’t get rid of it ultimately. It’s there. What you’ve seen, what you’ve heard, what you’ve felt, what you’ve touched, what you’ve experienced, all of those things are still in the subconscious. So what does Satan do? Satan gets his old computer business out and he says, well, let’s see what we can get out of this. So you’ve got one little foothold Satan’s got and he begins to, you say, well, can Satan read your mind? Well, listen, he’s been around you long enough that he knows what you’ve been thinking. So he says, aha, punch the button and something will come along and that thought will come up again. And what happens? All of us have had it to happen. Satan will throw a temptation in our way. And he punches the button and what happens? Man, the machine starts. The screen is down. And the projector gets going. It is amazing how much junk he can pull out of your mind out of the past. And all he had to work with was a little old toho. That’s all he wants. Because you see everything, you’ve ever thought everything, you’ve ever seen everything, you’ve ever heard everything, you’ve ever said everything. All of these things are down there. And that’s why it takes the omnipotence and the grace of God to overcome.

SPEAKER 01 : 19:14

Thank you for listening to How to Handle Your Thought Life. If you’d like to know more about Charles Stanley or InTouch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of InTouch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.