Shaping Your Thinking

That is a present tense designation. I believe that you could paraphrase that verse this way: For as a man thinks in his heart that is what he will become over a period of time. Let’s say for illustration purposes that a person determines in his mind that he is going to be a millionaire. He takes a picture of himself as a millionaire, then he frames the picture in his mind. Now he sees two people. He see himself in his present state and he sees himself in the future state. In other words, he sees himself present and future at the same time. The man in the present is not his focus, but the man in the future becomes his focus because that is the man he wants to become. He becomes impregnated with the thought of being a millionaire in his heart. He carries that thought nine months (nine months may be years), to the full term. When that thought is birthed, what will come forth is the way he was thinking in his heart for the past nine months, because now, that thought is fully matured and developed and it shaped the person to be what he was thinking in his heart. The nine months was the preparation period to get to that point.

Let’s look at it another way, let’s say our thoughts are seeds. The seeds are planted in our life, we nurture the seeds, and over a period of time, the seeds grow and bring us a harvest. The harvest that we will reap will be what we planted in our lives with our thoughts or with the way we were thinking. So plant positive thoughts in your life and begin to see yourself that way and that is what you will become over a period of time. The Bible tell us "... not to think of ourselves more highly than we ought to think..." (Roman 12:3). Notice it did not say not to think of yourself highly, but more highly that you ought to think. God doesn’t have a problem with us thinking highly of ourselves. He only has a problem with it when we exaggerate it. When a person starts thinking of his or herself highly, they will stop taking drugs, they will stop laying up with everybody because they feel lonely, and they will stop doing things that will destroy their bodies. If we can see ourselves on the level that God sees us, we wouldn’t have low self-esteem problems. We would see ourselves as a person going somewhere. We would associate with positive people that are going somewhere and doing positive things. Begin to see yourself in a positive way and begin doing positive things. Begin to speak out those things that you want to happen in your life and call those things that be not as though they were. That is the way God does it, He calls those things that be not as though they were. (Romans 4:17) Psalm 19:14 says, "Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my Redeemer." The word acceptable means pleasing, so for clarity we will use the word pleasing instead of acceptable. When we think or talk oneway and the Word of God says something other than the way we are thinking and talking, that is not pleasing to God. For example, someone may have the thought that God doesn’t love them or that He will not forgive them. Well, we know that this is not in line with God’s Word. But that is the way the devil wants us to think so we will never come to God. If we would think and say, I know God loves me and will forgive me, then we are in line with God’s Word and that will be pleasing to God, because that is His promise to us. Do you see my point?