“We are human, but we don’t wage war as humans do. We use God’s mighty weapons, not worldly weapons, to knock down the strongholds of human reasoning and to destroy false arguments.” (2 Corinthians 10:3-4 NLT)
In a recent devotion by Ron Hutchcraft he told this story: “My friend, Ed, thought he had the perfect hiding place, and he told me about it. Now, Ed’s not really his name, but it is a true story. The incident happened this way. Some years ago when he was a teenager, and he came from a nice Christian family – nice Christian boy, except for some of his reading material. Now, it was before Internet days but there was a magazine called Playboy. He had a habit of going out and buying Playboy and some other magazines like it, and he hid them in an old, unused icebox where no one ever went. And he was sure no one knew the place. Well, when he went to get his dirty magazines one day, they were gone. But that’s only part of it. In their place there was a Bible. He knew his dad had to leave it there. There was never any yelling, his dad never talked to him about it, but he bought no more magazines because of that little switch his dad had made.
Our minds are the devil’s playground, and they’re subject to the old adage – “garbage in, garbage out!” As I’ve shared often, what we think about comes about, so, when we feed our mind on things of this world, we’ll never reap a spiritual harvest. If our goal and ambition is to model Christ-like behavior, we must feed our mind on the truths of God’s Holy Word, the Bible.
Too often our attitude is to skimp on Bible reading and flood our minds with what’s on the news or burning up our text or other electronic feeds, but nothing – NOTHING – will nourish our spirits like Scripture. Filling our minds with God’s words coupled with believing, expectant prayer prepares our heart, mind, soul, and body for whatever Satan throws at us.
Another avenue of healthy mental nourishment is the reading of God-exalting books. There are many very useful books by many godly authors, but if you haven’t yet begun to build your resource library of helpful volumes begin with notable authors like: C. S. Lewis, Major W. Ian Thomas, John Piper, Tim Keller, John MacArthur, Lee Strobel, Andrew Murray, Henry Blackaby, J. Edwin Orr, Erwin W. Lutzer, Rick Warren, Jim Cymbala, John Eldridge and many others. Ask your Pastor or Christian friends to make recommendations.
The point is, make the switch to quality, God-honoring words and themes to feed your mind and build your spirit up in the Lord. Another avenue of nourishing words is conversations with godly friends. If you’re not a part of a small group of hungry believers and you can’t find a good one, start one. There is ample audio-video material in addition to printed materials to use for starting a group.
When my wife and I move to a new community one of the first things we do is send a note to 10-20 of our new neighbors inviting them to come to an “open house” at our house so we can get to know our neighbors. Out of that group we send follow-up invitations to come to a study of some sort. We’ve had great success using Rick Warren’s “Purpose Driven Life”, but there’s other quality material available as well.
The point is, feed you mind on the Scriptures which will equip you to become more invested and involved in the lives of those in your spheres of influence. The “switch” to walking in and under God’s authority, brought about by feeding your mind and heart a more spiritually healthy diet will change your life in positive ways you can’t begin to imagine.
Make the “switch”! You’ll be eternally grateful you did!
Blessings, Ed 😊
Walking With Jesus 