Stinkin Thinkin......

A friend of mine from church gave me a book to borrow and it just feels so perfect. Have you ever started reading a book and after the first two sentences you were instantly hooked, you felt as if the author wrote that book specifically for you?? This was one of those moments for me. The book is about our thinking and how quickly we can allow negative thoughts to take over and brings us down. A friend of mine also refers to this as "stinkin thinkin" we get in this mode where one negative thought leads to another and eventually we are in a dark place of lies and negativity.

In the darkness satan loves to meet up with us and make us believe those lies and anything that will seperate us from Christ. I must admit i could probably earn a degree in this area in my own life and i wonder how many of you feel the same way. Maybe something will happen throughout my day that isnt good and the next think i know everything around me is bad...i get into this mode of "stinkin thinkin" where its like a snowball effect once one things goes wrong i throw in the towel and allow my mind and my spirit to just take on the idea that everything will go wrong that day and everything stinks and blah blah blah. I believe we can also go to that dark place when we think about our past and the hurts we have been through in life. We allow ourselves to be put right back in the midst of that hurt reliving all that tore us apart so that before we know it our past is dictating our present and our future. We allow satan to use where we have been or what we have been through to tell us who we are now instead of leaving the past behind and believing God can restore us and make us who He wants us to be now....satan has no authority in that!!!!!

A friend always says to me "We are who God says we are" this is amazing because i think we often get caught up in that "stink thinkin" and believe the lies around us and take on the character of what everyone else thinks of us or what satan tries to make us believe. In the book the author uses Phillipians 4:8 "Finally brothers whatever things are true meditate on these things" This verse just represents to us how important it is for us to focus on whats true and whats real. We can't control what others think, and we can't control the past all we can do is focus on the here and now and whats true. Nine times out of ten when we get in our "stink thinkin" mode the things we are filling our minds and hearts with that end up bringing us down are usually not true anyways. God challenges us to focus on what is true and what is real.

If your going through a difficult time its understandable to look at the situation and see "it is what it is" but when we allow our circumstance to dictate every thought, attitude and step we take in life we are going to end up on a dead end street, isolated, hurt and deceived by satan. Focus on being real and allowing God to transform your thoughts into something postive, if there is something negative that creeps in take it for what its worth but dont allow it to have presidence over everything in your life because thats satan trying to bring you down instead look at the good in the midst of the bad and the fact that God loves us unconditionally and can be present no matter what we are facing.