"Have I Lost My Mind?"

I remember a familiar saying a long time ago that said, “Of all the things I’ve lost in life, I miss my mind the most.”  The first time I read that I laughed out loud, but now some twenty years later it’s not as funny as it used to be.  It’s starting to hit a nerve that wasn’t exposed when I was “younger”.  Let me explain.  The other day I came to work as I always do. When I got into my office I looked down at my feet and noticed I was wearing two different shoes.  The one on my right foot was a dress shoe, the one on my left foot was a sneaker.  I’ve put on mismatched socks before but never mismatched shoes.  Fortunately no one saw me except my wife (sadly to say).  I’m sure it’s not all that reassuring to see your husband, the father of your children walking around with two different shoes on. (unless he’s in a circus).   As I was driving back home to try my matching skills again, a phrase kept going over in my head , have I lost my mind?    How hard is it to put on two shoes that look the same? Who does that? should I be driving a car? I wonder how thick the walls are in those rubber rooms? Can you have visitors? Well, you get the point. On a brighter note, I’m happy to say that so far I have managed to avoid a repeat.  However, I’m not so worried about my socks matching anymore, now I just concentrate on getting the shoes right.  

The Bible has a great deal to say about the mind.  The mind is where we think, it’s where we reason, it’s where we remember. The mind is where we draw conclusions about life, God, other people and how we should live in this world.  The mind is where we determine how we will live and what or who we will live for. The mind is where we store facts, feelings, smells, events etc. The mind is where faith takes root, it’s where what we believe is stored.  It’s where we process the information we get bombarded with every day.  The Bible says our minds and our hearts are very closely connected.  “As a man thinks in his heart so is he.”

The Bible also says something else very important about the mind as well.  The mind of the person outside of Christ (the unbeliever or the natural man) has been tainted by sin.  It is not neutral when it comes to the things of God, when it comes to looking at life and it’s purpose and who it should be lived for. Let me give you some verses that underscore this.  

“Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart.”  Ephesians 4:17-18

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools,  Romans 1:19-22 

There are many more verses we could consider but these drive home the point.  When we think about what these verses are saying about how we process information and how we reasoned before we came to Christ we see the wisdom in what we read in Proverbs 28:26 “Whoever trusts in his own mind is a fool, but he who walks in wisdom will be delivered.”

To trust in our own mind is in some way a parallel to Proverbs 28:11.   The man who is wise in his own eyes is the man who trusts in his own mind.  To trust in your own mind, your own reasoning, your own conclusions, your own understanding, your own way of looking at life, death, religion, God the Bible is to understand these things with a mind polluted by sin.  The unregenerate mind is ignorant of God and His ways.  It is a mind darkened by the hardness of the heart.  

Proverbs says some very unflattering things about the fool in Proverbs 26:1-11.  But as bad as those things are and as hopeless as it seems for the fool,  Proverbs 26:12 talks about a person worse off than the fool. “Do you see a man wise in his own eyes, there is more hope for a fool than for him.”  Do you see a man trusting in his own mind there is more hope for a fool than for him.  This guy has everything figured out. He’s got all the answers. He’ not interested in facts his mind is made up.  His darkened heart is feeding his pride and his trust is in himself and he is blind to everything else - willfully so.  Romans 1:22  When you hear what some people are willing to believe, such as evolution, it is evident that their minds are operating in the dark.  It is not a man’s mind that causes him to deny God’s creation, God’s power, and God’s existence it is his morality.  Never forget that!

However, when a person comes to faith in Christ a glorious transformation takes place, they become new creatures in Christ.   People who love the Lord their God with all their soul, all their strength, and all their mind.

“to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds,”  Ephesians 4:22-23 

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.  For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. Romans 12:2-3 

The Christian is not a person who has lost his mind, he is a person who for the first time knows what it means to use his mind in the way, and for the purpose God intended.  God wants us to learn, to know, to think, to reason and draw conclusions but with minds informed and transformed by the Word of God.  Christians are not people who trust in their own minds.  Christians are people who are not leaning on their own understanding, they are trusting in the Lord.   Proverbs 3:5-6  The Christian is one who has as his final authoirty in life the Word of God not what is right in his own eyes.

David’s words to his son Solomon should still ring true today in the heart of every believer.  As you read these words note the phrases 

1 Chronicles 28:9  “And you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father and serve him with a whole heart and with a willing mind, for the Lord searches all hearts and understands every plan and thought. If you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will cast you off forever.

KNOW the God of your father

Serve Him with a WHOLE HEART 

and a WILLING MIND

“For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For 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 10:3-5 

Jeremiah 17:10 “I the Lord search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.”

What are we filling our minds with?  Are our thoughts flowing from a mind saturated with God's Word or from a mind saturated with the ways and wisdom of this world?  How we think is evidenced by how we life.

Now I've got to go lay out my shoes for work tomorrow. 

"Have You Met Mr. Right""

Have you met Mr. and Mrs. Right?  Chances are you have, but just in case you haven't  Proverbs 21:2 introduces them to us. 

“Every way of a man is right in his own eyes…”

Yes, I’m sure you’ve seen them around, (The Rights)  but now you have been formally introduced.  It is that person looking back at you when you stare into the mirror every morning.   I’m Mr Right, or at least I think I am.   We all think we are right, right?  I do what I do because I think it is right.   The problem is that what I am using as my standard of right is one I have conveniently drawn up myself.  The standard is basically this - if I’m doing it, then it’s right.  If I am accused of doing something that is not right I have a set of excuses to explain why what I did, though it may appear wrong, was in fact right after all.  We may do wrong but we do it for the right reason so it all works out for the best.  “Yes I lied but it was to protect their feelings.”   We are masters of the spin cycle, everything always comes out “right”. 

We all masters of self-justification.  If our only standard of right and wrong is one we have established it’s not all that hard to do.  Judges says “that in those days every man did that which was right in his own eyes.”  Judges 17:6  Judges 21:25.  If you read that book you’ll see it was not a great time to be alive.  

Think about it,  if every man’s way is right in his own eyes, if there is no standard of right and wrong other than our own opinions, if there is no absolute truth, who’s safe?  “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes…”  sounds like the anthem of absolute freedom, but in reality it is a journey to bondage, fear and anarchy.   Maybe you’re married to Mr. Iam Right or Mrs. Neva Wong, how do you like them so far?   

No matter where they are fought, wars are ultimatley a fight over who’s right and who's wrong. 

 “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes…”      

However Proverbs 21:2 doesn’t end there , it goes on 

“but the Lord weighs the heart.”  

 The Lord is not all that interested in our opinion of right and wrong.  The Lord goes beyond the actions of a person to the heart, the seat of our will and motives. The heart is the “real” you.   God knows what is in our heart. God knows who you  really are.  Romans 3:10-19.   God has a standard, It is a standard we have all fallen short of.  The things we do that seem right to us fall short of God’s standard. The sinner’s motivation or reason for doing  even “right things”, is for the wrong reasons.  He does them not to glorify God but to satisfy self.  So his motivation is wrong, but that is not all that is wrong. Mankind does not have a heart that longs to keep the law of God. He mocks God’s law, he thinks it is irrelevant, they have no intention, desire or ability to keep God’s law.  So man can be right in his own eyes yet wrong in God’s eyes.    

The man who is right tin his own eyes is a hard man to reach with a gospel that says  “there is none righteous no not one.”  It doesn’t say sometimes you’re not right , it says you’re NEVER right.  Everything man does falls short of God’s law.  This is why the gospel is attacked, Mr. Right does’t’ like what it says, it contradicts how he thinks about himself.   But to those who will humble themselves and confess they are sinners, broken God’s law and fallen short of the glory of God, Romans 3:23, there is real forgiveness and freedom like they have never know before.  

The gospel is a glorious exchange.  Jesus Christ taking all my sin and bearing the wrath of God for my sin in his body on the cross, and giving to me His righteousness, so that in God’s eyes I am perfectly righteous but it is not my righteousness but Christ’s.  That is why we can sing “Blessed Assurance” because my acceptance with God is based not on my life’s work but upon Christ’s life work.  It becomes mine by grace through faith, not of works lest any man (Mr. Right) should boast.   Ephesians 2:8-10   Romans 3:20-26   Romans 10:1-5  

Is your home a constant battle ground over who is right?  Who is the man or woman looking back at you in the mirror?  Mr. or Mrs Right are not very good listeners.  Do you listen.? Do you want to listen?  Are the conversations in your home, your marriage all one sided?  We all need to listen to what James tells us.   James 1:22-25  Remember “The LORD weighs the heart.”   

What's for Supper?

Judging by the magazines that seem to be the most popular and the TV programs that permeate the airwaves it would appear we have a fascination with the lifestyles of the rich and famous.  As a matter of fact a few years ago there was a TV show dedicated to that very subject.   As we all know the lifestyles of the rich and famous can be quite intriguing.  The cars they drive are amazing, the homes they live in boggle the mind.  The fences they build to protect their stuff are intimidating.   I  must admit I enjoy seeing how the “other half”  (the half I’m not in) lives.    But a beautiful homes and nice things really only tell us one thing.  They tell us that these people make a lot of money.   The life style of the rich and famous is usually a tour where we get to see their "stuff".  But if you've ever done the tour of Beverly Hills all you really see are the vine covered fences that keep us away from the people who own the "stuff".  While we may sometimes admire the things rich and famous people have, once you get behind the fence and see the personal lives of some of these people the fascination often ends.  It becomes more of a spectacle, like seeing a car wreck.  It’s horrible to watch but you can’t turn away.  So we buy the magazines and watch the shows which keep us informed of the latest break up, drug overdose or jail sentence and think to ourselves "if I had all that money that wouldn't happen to me.  If God would just give me a chance I'd prove it." 

Yes, there are many rich people with wonderful marriages and loving families.  But these people will tell you themselves, if they are honest,  their families are not strong because they have a lot of money.  Money can buy a lot of things but it cannot buy wisdom, a good marriage or a loving family.  

Proverbs 17:1  “Better is a dry morsel with quietness, Than a house full of feasting with strife.” 

Better is a dry morsel with quietness.  This will never become a the plot for a TV show. They will not be selling tickets to see this house.  This home will not need a fence around it to keep the paparazzi out.  But the people inside would not trade what they have for anything they see in the house full of feasting.They have quietness.  They have contentment, they love and care for one another.   They have learned that the quality of our lives is determined by the quality of our relationships.  They have found something money can’t buy.  

• It is caring not cash that makes a house a home.
• It is wisdom not wealth that makes a house a home.
• It is forgiveness not finances that makes a house a home.
• It is the time we spend with our children not the things we buy for our children that makes a house a home.

Bottom line - it is Christ that makes the difference.  Christ gives us all we need to have a home where there is quietness, joy, and contentment.  All these are found in a personal relationship with Him.  How sad that so many families have sacrificed the important for the trivial. They have traded quietness for strife because they have believed a lie. Life does consist in the abundance of the things we possess. Our kids will not be happy unless they have more stuff.  That is a lie.  Our children need us not the things we can buy for them.  I don't know if there are any stats to back this up but I would dare say there are many families sitting down today to a feast, who would trade it all for a "dry morsel with quietness", trade it for a meaningful relationship with their spouse, or their children. 

If we know Christ we have all the wisdom, strength, and love to turn our house into a home that the kids will want to be part of and always want to come home to.  Certainly it is not a sin to be rich.  If you have been blessed by God financially, be generous, be thankful, be wise and do not set your heart on riches and remember this...  

• It is faith not a feast that makes a house a home.     

It's better to have a dry morsel with quietness than feasting with strife.  Are you choosing the better of the two?   What's it like around your table?

Proverbs 22:1-2

  

Yes I'm Angry... Do You have a Problem with That?

Being a book on wisdom it is not surprising that Proverbs has quite a bit to say about anger.  Nor is it surprising that a book written to be read by ordinary people has a lot to say about anger.  We know anger all to well.  If we look around and listen to others and to ourselves it becomes obvious that anger is everywhere.  Read the papers and listen to the news - anger is a rampant. Listen to people talk in the lunch room, watch how people treat one another you will find that anger is often the driving force.  We live in a selfish world consequently we live in an angry world.  Because we live in an angry world we live in a violent world.  See what Proverbs says about anger, read these verses slowly really think about what they are saying to us. 

• Proverbs 14:17  A man of quick temper acts foolishly, and a man of evil devices is hated.
• Proverbs 14:29  Whoever is slow to anger has great understanding, but he who has a hasty temper exalts folly.
• Proverbs 15:1  A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.
• Proverbs 15:18  A hot-tempered man stirs up strife, but he who is slow to anger quiets contention.

• Proverbs 29:22  A man of wrath stirs up strife, and one given to anger causes much transgression.
• Proverbs 30:33  For pressing milk produces curds, pressing the nose produces blood, and pressing anger produces strife.

• Proverbs 16:32  Whoever is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he who rules his spirit than he who takes a city.
• Proverbs 19:11  Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offense.

• Proverbs 22:24  Make no friendship with a man given to anger, nor go with a wrathful man,

It is true there is a righteous anger, but that anger is a selfless anger.  It is anger due to man’s blaspheming God and his utter disrespect and contempt for the things of God.   Jesus was angry but never because of the way people treated him.  When Jesus cleansed the temple he was angry because they had turned His Father’s house of prayer into a den of thieves.  Matthew 21:12-13

Remember people do not make us angry.  People simply draw out the anger that is in us.  

If any of us are wondering if we have an anger problem we need to ask ourselves this question.  Are we surrounded by strife?   If our relationships are battle grounds, if we are constantly wounding people with our harsh words and outbursts, we  have a problem.  We don’t need medication or lengthy counseling sessions.  

We need to avoid being with angry people, choose your friends wisely. 

We need to practice good sense.  

We need to learn to act not just react to people.    Romans 12:17-18

We need to learn self-control.

We need to die to self daily. 

But ultimately and most importantly to do these things  We need to walk in the Spirit and we will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh.  Galatians 5:16     Galatians 6:19-20

"Anger blows out the lamp of the mind. It’s a child’s reaction to an adult situation."

Author Unknown

"Do not say, “I cannot help having a bad temper." Friend, you must help it. Pray to God to help you overcome it at once, for either you must kill it, or it will kill you..."  C.H. Spurgeon

"Thanks I Needed that"

“ 

Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid.”  Proverbs 12:1 

This is a very humbling verse. Why?  Because according to this verse I’m stupid. To admit stupidity is a humbling thing.  It is an all to common thing for me and it is always humbling.  He who hates reproof is stupid.  Nothing subtle about that.  I don’t like to be reproved or corrected.  I do not love discipline.  But there are things that I do love. I love my wife, I love to spend time with her, talk with her.  I look forward to those times.  I must admit, the thought of spending a nice quiet evening around the fire with “discipline” does not elicit the same feelings as spending that time with my wife. Discipline and reproof are not my idea of a good time.  Discipline can be painful, restrictive, humbling, corrective, frustrating and that is why we are all tempted to despise it. Hebrews 12:5-8 

To help us see what the writer is saying I think we need to move past seeing "love"  as having romantic undertones  in this verse.  To love something is not necessarily to be attracted to someone so you can spend time with them. To love can be to see the value in something. We love money because we see the value in it, we see what it can do.   In this case  to love discipline means to see the value in discipline.  To see the value in discipline means we see the value in knowledge.  I do not like to be corrected but I see the value in it.  It is humbling to be confronted about an action or something said, but if I long to grow in Christlikeness I see the value in it.  

Do you long to grow in holiness?  Do you long to know more of God? Do you long to be used by God?  If so you will see the value, (love) of discipline.  We cannot grow without it.  We cannot learn obedience without it.  

The person who hates reproof is stupid.  He sees no value in it.  He wants to be left alone, he’s not interested in anyone’s opinion but his own, he despises reproof and instruction.  It’s a “don’t confuse me with the facts, my mind is made up” attitude.  How foolish to go through life so proud that you have no time for instruction or correction. Proverbs calls this person a "fool". 

If we long to be wise, if we have a heart that fears God and longs to know him and follow Him we will love discipline.  We will see the value of correction.  Not because it is enjoyable or “fun” but because it is helping us understand and know Him whom we truly love Jesus Christ.  It is helping us grow in His likeness.  So if God sends someone into your life with a correction or you experience some pain because of a sinful choice see the value in the pain.  Don’t critique the messenger. "He wasn’t loving or caring but rude so I'm not going to listen to what he said".  Learn to love discipline, learn to see the value in it regardless of how it is administered or how lovingly it is carried out.  Sometimes God can teach us some very valuable lessons through some very unlikely sources.    Sometimes God even uses our enemies to discipline us.  Their motivation is to hurt us, there tone is harsh and their words are sharp as daggers.  If we are wise we will see past all that to see if there is any truth in those harsh, piercing words. If so, as much as it hurts, we will receive it and learn from it and repent because we see the value (we love) of discipline.   

Ask God to help you to have a heart of wisdom.   We are all hard wired to hate reproof because we are hardwired to be selfish and proud.  However In Christ we are a new creation.  2 Corinthians 5:17     We need to humbly come into God's throne of grace  when we have experienced discipline or correction saying, "Thanks, I needed that."   That was a good thing,  sent for a good purpose by a loving and good God.    Psalm 51

“Lord today, please help me not to be stupid.  Help me to love  discipline, because I love You and want to know you more each day. "

"Pay Attention"

I was never what you would call a hyper active child growing up.  I didn't’ have a great deal of trouble sitting still in classes.  I was brought up back in the day when if you didn’t sit still in school and your parents found out you wouldn't’ feel like sitting for a while when you got home. Sitting still isn’t much fun but it does have its advantages.   Sitting still can give the teacher the impression you are really paying attention even though in your mind you’re a million miles away.  Sitting still means you will not have to hear the constant reminders to pay attention, because it looks like you are.  But as I said, looks can be deceiving. I was sitting still but not paying attention, I was in the room, but not paying attention, I could hear the teachers words, but wasn’t paying attention, I had my book open but I wasn’t paying attention. 

I don’t think this is a problem that is found just in the school system.  The inability to pay attention is becoming an epidemic of our age.  The ability to focus on one thing for a long period of time is becoming a thing of the past.  The gadgets we have in our pockets, constantly want our attention. All these things compete for our attention and in an undisciplined world we don’t seem to have the ability or the desire to say no to any of them.  It is one thing to ask a person to put there cell phone on silence mode so it will vibrate instead of ring.   But I often wonder what would happen in church if people were asked to turn off there cell phones for an hour.  Cut off from the outside world.  Cut off from tweets, Facebook, messaging with no chance of feeling that vibration in your pocket . . .   Sounds like something out of a horror movie.  When was the last time yoiu sat in any class or meeting at church or in your business with your smart phone turned off?  Unthinkable for some. 

Proverbs tells us something I think every generation needs to hear but especially this one.  

Proverbs 4:20  “My son, be attentive to my words, incline your ear to my sayings.” 

My son “PAY ATTENTION”  Pay attention to my words.  Read them, study them with your whole heart.  Read them and as you do so cut down the possibility of interruption as much as possible.  When you go to church and the Word is read, PAY ATTENTION.  When you go to church and the word is preached PAY ATTENTION.  When your parents are speaking to you PAY ATTENTION. 

God tells us to pay attention to His Words.  They are life, they are wisdom, they are protection, they are direction, they are truth, they are all we need.  They tell us about God, about our lives, marriage, families, relationships.  They tell us the good news of the gospel, that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures.  They give us good counsel, they give us strength, hope and courage.  Joshua 1:7-9

When I read God’s Word during the day, am I paying attention to what I’m reading or is it just reading to get the reading done?  

They’ve banned talking on cell phones in cars because people were getting hurt if not killed due to lack of attention.  When your driving the most important thing is not who is on the phone, the most important thing is to pay attention to the road.   You can do one or the other but not both.   When the word of God is opened there is nothing more important.   

Countless lives, marriages, families, and churches have been destroyed because people opened up the Word of God but they did not pay attention.  They were distracted.  Sitting still but not paying attention, In the church but not paying attention, can hear the words  but not  paying attention, have their bible open but not paying attention. 

 “Let them not escape from your sight; keep them within your heart.  For they are life to those who find them and healing to all their flesh.”   Proverbs 4:21-22

If we really believe that we will make every effort to PAY ATTENTION to God’s Word.  If we don't, someone could get hurt.


That's enough for now, i just noticed,   "I'VE GOT MAIL".