EVERY thought must be held captive and made obedient to that which is noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, and praiseworthy. Each day, we must stand on alert, combing through our minds for any thought that can take us off course. Our lives depend on it.
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As a parent, I’ve become expert at many things by sheer necessity. Some things I never expected would be part of my job description. And some things I never wanted to add to the list. Like nit-picking. And I’m not talking about an overtly excessive form of criticism.
When I found out one of my kids (the one with a lot of hair) had contracted head lice from summer camp, I knew I’d be in for at least a week of hard labor. I’d been told that the miniscule squatters don’t typically gravitate to coarse, coily-curly hair, but apparently my kid was part of the .3% non-typical demographic. At the end of the ordeal, I’d clocked a full 24-hour day plus of examining, treating, separating, combing, and re-examining, and was prepared for weeks ahead of frequent preventative measures.
There’s no being lazy about it when your kid has head lice. If one small nit survives, the threat of re-infestation prevails. Every corner of my house was vacuumed, every piece of affected clothing laundered. Even precious stuffed animals were stored away in tightly closed bags for at least a couple weeks to ward of further threats. And I now know every detail of homeopathic head care I could find.
I apologize if all this is too much information, and I’ll spare you further details. But there’s something to be learned from everything, and I always like to share what I’ve learned…the good, the bad, and the ugly. And I’d like to think writing about something so drudgerous (yes, I think I invented that word) could maybe redeem the hours spent on the tedious task for something worthwhile.
Combing through my kid’s endlessly thick hair minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day…I had a lot of time to think. And one scripture verse kept coming to mind: “take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ.” Just as I had to take captive every tiny nit due to its potential to terrorize my child’s head, I have to take captive my every thought. One small thought can yield a reign of terror in my mind…and life. And it can transfer to those I’m close to.
It might sound scary to submit your thought-life to Christ, but it’s not so scary when we know that he wants us to fill our mind with GOOD things.
The Bible says, “Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” So taking my ignoble, unrighteous, impure, unlovely and unworthy thoughts and making them obedient to Christ is not only necessary, it’s good! And it’s survival.
Who can live with bitterness, rage, malice, and hatred reigning in their minds? Who can survive when evil rules over every thought? It’s not only a danger to our own mental health, but to everyone we know and love. Even the innocent bystander is not immune.
EVERY thought must be held captive and made obedient to that which is noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, and praiseworthy. Each day, we must stand on alert, combing through our minds for any thought that can take us off course. Our lives depend on it.
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“God has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end.” (Ecclesiastes 3:11)
Photo Credit: Sun Rays | A sunset at Sunriver Resort in Central Oregon www.flickr.com
I have an equation for all of you brilliant of mind out there. What does sleep + wake + eat + drive + work + eat + work + drive + eat + watch + sleep x 24/7 x 365 equal? Let’s wait a moment while the imaginary game show theme music plays in the background. Got the answer?
If not, I’ll clue you in.
The survey says: insanity.
Yes, insanity. To spend 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year caught in the monotonous routine of sleep, wake, eat, drive, work, eat, work, drive, eat, watch, sleep is enough to push anyone over the edge.
So why do we subject ourselves to that which steals our sanity?
Necessity, perhaps. We feel we need to sleep so we can have energy to work so we can afford the car to drive to work so we can afford the food that fuels our work so we can pay for the large screen TV that lulls us back to sleep after work and launches us into another day of maddening routine.
Or maybe it’s fear that keeps us bound. We’re afraid of not having enough, of being insecure. We prefer the familiar comfort of routine to the unstable terrain of the great unknown.
Yes, we need to work to care for our basic needs. But somewhere in the midst we have to stop and ask ourselves…what’s it all for? We’re not here just to go through the motions of life and spend our fleeting free time plugged in to our TVs, computers and mobile devices. There is more, so much more, to this life.
Take time. Now. Before it’s too late. Consider. Your life has a purpose far greater than your wildest imagination. You’re here for a reason. And it’s not to be a slave to mindless, meaningless routine.
“Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end.” (Ecclesiastes 3:11)
“For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.” (Ephesians 2:10)
There will come a time when the battles of our days will cease. We’ll see that it was worth the fight, and it was worth our living and enduring. Because no Author starts a good work without bringing it to completion.
Photo Credit; Closed, Book – Free images on Pixabay
Our lives weren’t meant to be formed on an assembly line. There will be bends and turns, times when everything seems opposite of order. Yet from a higher perspective, our Creator observes and declares, “It is good.”
Photo Credit: San, Marino – Free images on Pixabay
Consider the trees. There is beauty and order in each, and yet…in a natural setting they are not lined in perfect rows. Their branches are bent and twisted, growing every which way, yet still forming something…beautiful.
Photo Credit: Planet Earth (TV series) – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This Life & Beyond 
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