Calling The Thought Process

Calling

The Thought Process

Are your thoughts becoming more like God’s thoughts?

God’s purpose for you and I

is not only that we be like Him…

But to “think” like Him.

 

  

When I was growing up,

I thought ignorance could get me out of trouble.

If I acted like I didn’t know, how could

anyone punish me for doing something wrong.

This is futile thinking;

 ignorance is not a good excuse,

in fact it is not an excuse at all.

In Romans 1:20 God says…

we are without excuse

because the knowledge of God

has been made clear and easy to see.

From the scriptures, it is easy to think

 of the person who plays ignorant to be

the young man who can’t control his

lust and sleeps with every girl he can.

Or, the girl who wants a man to give her

security so she becomes willing to trade

her purity for a false sense of security.

Yes, the scriptures here in Ephesians 4 and Romans 1

describe the ignorant as sexually immoral even

including those who indulge in same sex activity.

Their ignorance is costing all of us, as tax

dollars have to support many of the children

they have and disease they spread.

Futile thinking hurts a society;

but wait a minute… can I be

ignorant or have futile thoughts?

Over and over again the scriptures tells us

to put on the mind of Christ.

If I am going to put on the mind of Christ,

I need to know how God thinks.

Now what were you thinking about yesterday at 3:00pm?

Then ask yourself, what was

God thinking at that time?

In comparison to God’s thoughts,

was your thoughts futile?

How did your thoughts and mine

at 3:00pm compare to God’s?

God created us for a purpose…

“to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.”

You might have heard others use this phrase,

“Don’t let your mind go there.”

But when God says it,

 He is talking about holiness.

A mind set on knowing God’s

thoughts is a holy mind.

If we are going to walk worthy of our calling,

we need to put on the mind of Christ.

 Scripture Reading

Ephesians 4:17-24 NIV

17 So I tell you this,

and insist on it in the Lord,

 that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do,

in the futility of their thinking.

8 They are darkened in their understanding

and separated from the life of God

because of the ignorance that is in them

due to the hardening of their hearts.

19 Having lost all sensitivity,

they have given themselves over to sensuality

so as to indulge in every kind of impurity,

with a continual lust for more.

20 You, however,

did not come to know Christ that way.

21 Surely you heard of him

and were taught in him

in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus.

22 You were taught,

with regard to your former way of life,

to put off your old self,

which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires;

23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds;

24 and to put on the new self,

created to be like God

in true righteousness and holiness.

Romans 1:18-32 NIV

18 The wrath of God is being revealed

from heaven against all the godlessness

and wickedness of men

who suppress the truth by their wickedness,

19 since what may be known about God is plain to them,

because God has made it plain to them.

20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities

— his eternal power and divine nature

— have been clearly seen,

being understood from what has been made,

so that men are without excuse.

21 For although they knew God,

they neither glorified him as God

nor gave thanks to him,

but their thinking became futile

and their foolish hearts were darkened.

22 Although they claimed to be wise,

they became fools

23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God

for images made to look like mortal man

and birds and animals and reptiles.

24 Therefore God gave them over

in the sinful desires of their hearts

to sexual impurity

for the degrading of their bodies with one another.

25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie,

and worshiped and served created things

rather than the Creator

— who is forever praised. Amen.

26 Because of this,

God gave them over to shameful lusts.

Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones.

27 In the same way

the men also abandoned natural relations with women

and were inflamed with lust for one another.

Men committed indecent acts with other men,

and received in themselves

the due penalty for their perversion.

28 Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile

to retain the knowledge of God,

he gave them over to a depraved mind,

to do what ought not to be done.

29 They have become filled with every kind

of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity.

They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice.

They are gossips, 30 slanderers,

God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful;

they invent ways of doing evil;

they disobey their parents;

31 they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless.

32 Although they know God's righteous decree

that those who do such things deserve death,

they not only continue to do these very things

 but also approve of those who practice them.