Have you ever noticed that much our lives run on auto-pilot? You wake up, you reach for your phone, you scroll through social media…
You worry about what’s going on in the world. You compare yourself to your friends on social media. You rush to get stuff done because you’ve packed so much into a day…
and before you know it, your mood, your attitude, and your outlook for the day have already been shaped… and you haven’t consciously chosen any of it.
I don’t know if we realize it not but our thoughts shape us. Today… we are starting a brand-new series called, “Every Thought Captive” and it’s based on the book of the same title by Kyle Idleman.
And one thing that Kyle points out in his book is that our thoughts establish our emotions, they direct our decisions, they regulate our relationships, and they control our goals.
Basically, our thoughts… are what dictate what we do in this life. And here is a truth that I think we need to understand, our thoughts are not neutral.
Your thoughts are shaping you right now. Your mind is being molded by something. Proverbs 4:23 tells us…
Above all else, guard your heart,
for everything you do flows from it.
The Good News Translation translates it this way… which I think is more accurate.
Be careful how you think; your life is shaped by your thoughts.
So if this is true… if our lives are shaped by how we think… what do we think about?
Paul understood this concept long before neuroscience did. He writes to the church at Rome about this idea of transformation and he says this in verse 2a…
Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Romans 12:2a
And the Greek word here for conformed means…
Conformed = To be molded by something external
Paul is saying… “don’t let your mind be molded by something out there.” The Philips translation puts it this way…
Don’t let the world around you squeeze you into its own mold,
And the interesting thing about this word conform is that it’s written in the present-imperative tense which means… stop doing what you’re already doing.
Paul is not saying… hey, there’s gonna come a day when you have to decide whether you are going to be conformed or not. He is saying, “you are being conformed.”
The world you live in is squeezing you and shaping you and molding you… stop it. Stop it… it’s happening right now. Stop doing what you’re already doing.
And modern neuro-science would agree with what Paul is teaching in this passage. The term neuro-plasticity means that our minds are constantly be re-molded by what we experience and what we are exposed to.
So… every thought you think, every image you see, every conversation you take part in, every second of your screen time… molding… there’s a pattern that we are being squeezed into.
So Paul is saying… “whether we realize it or not, we are being squeezed into this pattern."
They say that the average person has between 60,000 and 80,000 thoughts a day. Most of us would say… “that’s a lot of thoughts”. I’m not aware of that many thoughts in a day.
And this is the point, 95% of our thoughts are below the level of consciousness. This means that we’re not even aware that we are thinking the thoughts that we are thinking.
95% of our 60-80 thousand thoughts are on repeat. They are just happening. We don’t think about the thoughts we’re thinking. This is why we can look back over our lives and see something that we said or did and think… what was I thinking.
Why did I do that? I must have thought about it because clearly, I did it. But I don’t remember thinking any thoughts about doing that. Let me show you exhibit A.
This is our felis catus, our feline, our cat… AKA – “Lola”
At some point… about 10 years ago this month actually… I thought this was a good idea. I don’t know… maybe deep down in the 95% of thoughts that were bouncing around in my subconscious, I was thinking…
“Look how calm she is in that cage. This is clearly her personality.”
“Look… she’s sleeping. That’s a good sign. Se’ll probably do that all night.”.”
“I can totally leave a glass of water on the counter. She wouldn’t even think of knocking it off.”
“This will in no way change my furniture, my sleep schedule, or my understanding of authority.” (Oh I could go on all day)
Somewhere along the way, I obviously thought it was a good idea to get a cat. Because here we are, 10 years later, and we still have a felis catus running our house.
And I know that some of you have made some decisions along the way that you’re not too proud of. Some of you guys chose to wear pants like this at one time…
Anyone here guilty of wearing parachute pants in the 80’s. I wanted some… but Mom would never let get them. I had one friend who wore them all the time. I mean all the time.
He also carried around a large piece of cardboard with him all the time… just in case the occasion called for impromptu breakdancing…. True story!
How many of you ladies chose to put a half a can of Aqua-net on your hair before you could leave the house in the 80’s.
Am I preaching to anyone this morning?
But in all seriousness, we’ve all made some choices in life that have been far more serious, far more damaging, far more consequential than just a wrong pet.
And the question is… How do we mold our minds to avoid that in the future? How do we become transformed? Because that is the goal. Here is the first thing I think we need to understand.
1. Transformation begins in the mind.
Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.
I think Paul is telling us something here that is absolutely crucial. Change doesn’t come by just trying harder. Change starts with thinking differently.
We often say things like… “If I was just more disciplined.” “If I could just stop doing that.” “I just need to try harder next time.”
Paul is saying… “the real issue here isn’t effort… it’s formation.”
Think about what happens if you are pouring concrete. I know Lance Rogers has done this a ton, and I’m sure he can back me up on this.
Once it hardens, it doesn’t matter how badly you want it to look different… it’s not going to change. The only way it can look different is if the mold is different.
Your thought patterns are your mold and the direction of your life is the result of those thoughts that lead to choices.
That’s why the writer of Proverbs told us earlier… Above all else… guard your heart… for everything you do flows from it. If you don’t intentionally guard your mind, something else will gladly shape it for you.
One of my favorite chapters in the Bible is Philippians 4. I read it often. I share it with others often. The Apostle Paul, from a prison cell writes to the church at Philippi and tells them to rejoice in every circumstance…
But then he continues with this in verse 6 and 7…
Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. 7 Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:6-7
Paul tells us… the peace of God is what guards your hearts and your minds. There are just too many people in our world who don’t have the peace of God.
Some of you might be here today or watching from home today… and you don’t have that peace. Stop filling your mind with the junk of the world and start praying with thanksgiving.
That’s what Paul said, before he said that the peace of God will guard your hearts and minds. He said…
Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. 7 Then you will experience God’s peace,
The next thing we need understand today is this…
2. The world has a mold and it’s always pressing.
Paul says… don’t be conformed to this world. Don’t let the world press you. Don’t be pressured into a pattern like those who are outside of Christ.
The world is constantly pressing. I used to love watching Kendall’s South Decatur basketball teams because they were constantly pressing.
They brought some much pressure that it caused absolute chaos on the basketball court. The pressure didn’t let up… most of the time… until the other team was obviously defeated.
That’s what the world does… The world constantly presses fear into your thinking… comparison into your identity… busyness into your value or worth… comfort into your decision-making.
And before you know it… you’ve conformed. You don’t even realize it happened… because conformity happens quietly. You don’t just wake up one day and say… “I think I will let culture disciple me.”
Unlike the losses that happened when South Decatur pressured teams on the basketball court… conformity happens slowly.
It happens slowly… passively and unintentionally. Most people don’t drift away from Jesus because they reject Him, the drift because they stop paying attention to what’s shaping their thoughts.
That’s why Paul doesn’t say… “Hey guys… stop doing bad things.” He says… “Don’t let the world shape how you think.”
And Paul is saying… you need to change the way that you think. Transform your mind. That is God’s way.
3. God’s way is transformation, no conformity.
Paul says… “be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”
The word transformed is the same word as metamorphosis… and complete change from the inside out.
I think… somewhere along the way… we developed this idea that Christianity is self-improvement, behavior management, positive thinking.
Here’s the deal… God doesn’t just want better behavior, He wants a renewed mind. Because here is what happens when we have a changed mind.
There is a progression that takes place. Changed thinking leads to changed desire… changed desires lead to changed choices… and changed choices lead to changed lives.
That’s why Paul said this in 2 Corinthians 10:5… We destroy every proud obstacle that keeps people from knowing God. We capture their rebellious thoughts and teach them to obey Christ.
Or as the NIV says… we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
This is the passage of Scripture that Kyle Idleman got the idea for the book from. Every thought…. CAPTIVE.
Not some thoughts, not just the obvious ones… every thought.
I have a confession to make… for years, I have counseled people and I’ve said… “You know what… you can’t help what thought pops into your brain… but you can help what you dwell on.”
I think I need to back up on that some. I think you can help what pops into your brain. If you’re filling your mind with junk, it’s going to come up eventually.
Those things are floating around in that 95% and it’s going to find it’s way out eventually.
This is why listening to music or watching shows with foul language is dangerous. It’s floating around in there somewhere.
This is why pornography is destructive. Those images are floating around in there still… somewhere. Those images have a destructive effect on a person.
I want to put an image up here that I find incredibly interesting and alarming. This was presented at a conference I went to this past September.
Here we see a picture of three brain scans.
The first one on the far left is a normal brain. The middle one is a brain scan of a person addicted to heroin. The third one is a scan of a person addicted to pornography.
So not only will pornography eventually work itself out into your everyday life… it will also destroy your brain. So… what does a renewed mind look like you say?
Well… I don’t have a scan that can show it… but I do have some Scripture.
4. What does a renewed mind actually look like?
Let’s get practical for a moment. A renewed mind doesn’t mean you will never have a bad thought. There’s just too much junk down there in your subconscious that you’ve already ingested.
A renewed mind means… you don’t let your thoughts take over. When fear shows up, you filter it through God’s promises.
When temptation shows up, you filter it through God’s truth. When shame shows up, you filter it through God’s grace.
Philippians 4:8 basically give us the grid.
Finally, brothers and sisters, 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.
Ask yourself this week… Is this thought true… or just loud?
Is this thought from God…. Or from fear?
Is this thought helping me follow Jesus… or pulling me away from Him?
Here is what we have a tendency to do sometimes in our relationships and conversations. Kyle Idleman talks about this in the first chapter of his book.
What we do sometimes is… in our minds… as we are having a conversation with someone… we are filling in the gaps.
In all our relationships we have certain gaps to fill. Sometimes it’s an information gap, where we don’t have all the information we need to make a certain decision.
It could be a context gap, where we don’t understand the context in which a certain comment was made.
Other times, there’s a connection gap, where our lives have gotten so busy that we haven’t spent time together.
“With our thoughts, we are constantly filling in the gaps, and we have to decide if we are going to presume the worst or assume the best. Are we going to give a cynical or a generous explanation? Are we going to think positive or negative thoughts?” - Kyle Idleman
The point is that when we fill in the gaps… what our mind has been filled with will significantly impact our relationships.
It makes me think of the story about a lady whose husband was an airline pilot, and he often had difficulty locating items around the house. One day he asked his wife where the salt was.
Annoyed, she responded, "When you’re flying a plane, how on earth can you find Detroit at night in a blizzard, but you can’t find the salt in your own kitchen?"
"Well, darling," he replied, "they don’t move Detroit!"
Now… I don’t know if that’s the right response or not, but…
If we are constantly feeding our minds with garbage, then our gap filling will most likely not be great. What we are thinking in that moment has the power to regulate how the conversation goes…
And if it doesn’t go well… then it leads to fights and ill feelings and broken relationships.
You say… OK great… but how about some practical steps to help make this happen.
5. How do we let God re-mold our minds?
I think there are four things that you can do to let God be involved in the re-shaping… the re-molding of our mind.
• Scripture before screens
What you start your day with shapes your perspective
• A prayer life that listens
Prayer isn’t just talking to God with our wish-list… like He’s Santa Claus or something… it’s about aligning your thinking with God’s truth.
• A community that sharpens
You need people who challenge your thinking, not just affirm your feelings.
• Ongoing surrender
Paul starts Romans 12 with this… offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship.
A renewed mind starts with a surrendered life.
I want to get really personal now and ask you a question… “what mold are you in?”
Your life is being shaped right now… the only question is… by what?
God is inviting you… not to try harder… but to think differently.
Not to conform… but to be transformed.
Not to live on auto-pilot… but to live intentionally under the Lordship of Jesus Christ.
So maybe this is a prayer that we could pray together right now… out loud. I know we don’t do this often… but maybe we should. Let’s pray out loud… this prayer… because I think it’s something all of us should be praying.
“Lord, renew my mind
Show me where I have believed lies
Shape my thinking with your truth.”
Here’s the deal folks… when God changes your mind… everything else in your life begins to follow.
Let’s pray!
