A More Fulfilled You
Ralph Waldo Emerson, an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, and abolitionist, once noted that the controlled person is the powerful person. If so, how powerful are you? One of the fruits of the Spirit is self-control. This means you have an aid in developing self-control. Together you can “Build up your strength in union with the Lord, and by means of His mighty power.” (Ephesians 6: 10 TEV)
Unfortunately most people are pushed and manipulated by emotions of the moment, not regulated by reason. A training period may be required in order to “let the peace of God rule [that is, be dominant] in your hearts.” (Colossians 6: 10)
The expression “rule” in your heart is like a baseball umpire calling safe or out. If you do not experience a peace with God about a matter the call is out. If you have peace with God about it the call is safe. Don’t argue with the umpire, that is, don’t try to correct the umpire’s call.
Two steps are required for doing this. In order to plant a potentially productive crop, the ground must be cleared. Romans 12: 2 expresses how this is to be done spiritually: “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”
Job, a man experienced in the extremities of stress, suggested the second step: “Acquaint yourself with Him, and be at peace.” (Job 22: 21)
First, decide if change is needed, wanted, and possible. Next, flush out old futile philosophies, and preconceived negative concepts from your mind. Your thoughts are your renewable resources. Old thoughts can pass away.
Don’t leave a vacuum. Begin at once to feed your mind on Bible facts.
Load your gumption-gun with good news.
Desire a change for the good. Increase your “want-to.”
Decipher your opportunities. Evaluate your resources.
Dedicate yourself to working hard for the change.
Discern what you want to be like and do it. Consider what is needed.
Devote yourself to Jesus, and as His servant to people. Know, “Inasmuch as you have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me.” (Matthew 25: 40)
Demonstrate your intention by including God in all of your life by praying daily. Prayer is not your last resort — it is your first resource.
Now is a good time “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, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” (Ephesians 4: 22 – 24)
That is a wonderful ideal to which to aspire. You can be a better you — a more fulfilled you.
The Best Time to Make a Decision
Chris Kraft, NASA’s first flight director and the inventor of the mission control, was asked when was the best time to make a decision and said, “The best time to make a decision is before you have to.” He went on to explain that every possible thing that could happen regarding a mission was considered before the mission and a decision was made regarding the response to each. Therefore, when anything happened they had a response predetermined and did not have reason to rush and panic.
It seems in his classic novel “Pilgrim’s Progress” John Bunyan had this concept in mind when he wrote: “Most Christians are not mortified and crucified to that world, not acquainted with God and the promises as they might be, nor so resolved to follow God, fully, as they ought, and therefore are so dejected and discontented when afflictions come.”
In his Old English style he continued, “So it must be our care to provide for afflictions; for to prevent them altogether we cannot; but prepare for them we may, and must, as was hinted before; to treasure up God’s promise, and store our souls with graces, and to bear up and hold on; we need be but to well shod our feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace.”
Like Kraft he acknowledges the inevitability of difficulties. Observation and experience teaches us most people are not as prepared as they should be when difficulties come. When God’s word is stored in our memory, it can be pulled out as a resource file in the face of stress-producing events.
Much can be gained by Scripture memorization. This must be followed by interpretation, gaining an understanding of the verse’s meaning. When a provisional promise is understood there is a better chance of its application.
Catalog concepts that confirm character in crisis.
The Psalmist gave us this pattern as a means for making advanced plans.
“Your word I have hidden in my heart, That I might not sin against You.
Blessed are You, O Lord! Teach me Your statutes. With my lips I have declared All the judgments of Your mouth. I have rejoiced in the way of Your testimonies,
As much as in all riches. I will meditate on Your precepts, And contemplate Your ways. I will delight myself in Your statutes; I will not forget Your word.” (Psalm 119: 11 – 18)
An example of this is when you feel all alone you know you are not, for the Lord has said He will never leave us. Don’t act like it, act because of it.
There is an ancient prayer which states, “Slow me down, Lord, and inspire me to send my roots deep into the soil of life’s enduring values, that I may grow toward the stars on my great destiny.”
How to Prepare for Stress
Everyone experiences stress. An awareness of what goes on in the body when stressed is evidence of how fearfully and wonderfully God has made you.
He has designed your body with a coping system to deal with stress.
When stress begins, the tiny pituitary gland at the base of the brain — the repair-crew foreman — initiates protective response by secreting chemical messengers or hormones ACTH and STH. The blood system carries these agents to two small glands above the kidney and adrenal glands. The outside border of these glands, the cortex, then produces cortisone, and other messengers. The center of these glands produces adrenal hormones. These adrenal hormones instantly prepare the body to deal with the emergency. Proteins are drawn from the thymus and lymph glands which are broken down to form sugar necessary for quick energy. Blood sugar soars. Blood pressure rises; minerals are drawn from bones; fat is mobilized from storage deposits; an abnormal amount of salt is retained. Numerous other alert and standby precautions are made to equip the body for fight or flight.
Fortunately it is not necessary to understand the God designed miracle of all that. It is important to know a lot happens in your body when stressed.
God has provided an even more effective means of dealing with stress. William Wordsworth, the great English poet, descriptively spoke of the effect of solitude. “And I have felt the presence that disturbs me with joy of elevated thought.” Elevated thought is a therapeutic way of relieving stress.
Isaiah was familiar with stress resulting from the conflict with court and conditions. Out of his experience he wrote what was his and can be yours: “You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on you. (Isaiah 26: 3)
The evening before His execution Jesus shared with His stressed disciples a truth that remains: “My peace I give to you: not as the world gives, I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.” (John 14: 27)
Embed these truths and others like them in your mind so they can be drawn out like a file and applied. Thus, His peace can be yours. Much is to be gained from Scripture memorization. You will be amazed at how much you can memorize if you take in bite sizes and let each passage marinate in your mind. Slowly take it in. Continue the process.
Many people are manipulated by emotions rather than being regulated by reason so “….let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another ….” (Col. 3: 15, 16)
Resolve to pre-program your mind to deal with stressful circumstances.
Thus, you can cope more effectively.
A New Renewed You
A short course in Christian behavior psychology is found in Col. 3: 1 – 15.
“If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth….
Therefore, put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience, in which you yourselves once walked when you lived in them.
But now you yourselves are to put off all these: anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language out of your mouth. Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his deeds, and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him….”
A reading of the things that should be put to death will leave most people feeling good about their conduct: “fornication, uncleanliness, passion, evil desire, covetousness.”
The second list is more personal: “anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy language.” Then lying is added as the capstone. Oops!
Most will conceive of the first list as alpha evils, and rightly so. However, notice the second list which most people are inclined to think of as more acceptable is listed as though equal to those in the first list. That puts them in perspective.
Both lists note the things to be put off. Now comes the positive things to be “…put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him….”
Then follows the new man’s spiritual wardrobe: “Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering; bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do.
But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection.
And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.” (Colossians 3: 11 – 16)
Don’t leave these truths having given them a nominal reading. Instead pause and do two things. First, read them again and evaluate your lifestyle in light of them. Then pause and make a conscientious commitment to the Lord to live according to them. This will result in a spiritual renewal.
Sparkling Like a Fountain
Sigmund Freud gave this description of the conscious and subconscious mind. (Disclaimer: this is by no means an endorsement of all of Freud’s work. However, if you find a diamond in a pigpen, it is still a diamond.)
“The conscious mind may be compared to a fountain playing in the sun and falling back into the great subterranean pool of subconscious from which it rises.”
Autosuggestion is the process of feeding the subconscious mind on thoughts. Constructive new and better ones produce higher ideals and better motives.
All that is modern speak of what the Bible means by meditation. There are several ways to meditate. Remember your object is to let your mind become absorbed with a specific text, topic, or subject. If you do not have the Scripture memorized, read it a couple of times, close your eyes and begin to repeat it over and over in your thoughts, Think about it and how it applies to you. This involves thinking deeply, pondering, and reflecting on the subject. That is good, very good, and though taught in scripture is not practiced by many Christians.
Meditation, autosuggestion, is the mind sending messages to the subconscious until the subconscious begins to send these messages to the body, and they become reflexive. When they become the standards of conduct they have not only been received, but agreed with. Habit is the body’s way of saying, “I got the message.”
When the Bible mentions meditation, it often mentions obedience in the next breath. An example is the Book of Joshua: “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it.”
The Book of Psalm opens with this concise commentary of meditation. “Blessed is the man Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, Nor stands in the path of sinners, Nor sits in the seat of the scornful; But his delight is in the law of the Lord, And in His law he meditates day and night. He shall be like a tree Planted by the rivers of water, That brings forth its fruit in its season, Whose leaf also shall not wither; And whatever he does shall prosper. The ungodly are not so, But are like the chaff which the wind drives away. Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, Nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the LORD knows the way of the righteous, But the way of the ungodly shall perish.” (Psalm 1: 1 – 6)
Make certain those thoughts of the conscious mind cascade into the subterranean pool of your subconscious that you may develop new Bible based habits.
Consider making this resolution. “I will meditate on Your precepts, And contemplate Your ways.” (Psalm 119: 15)