Memories

Memories. The first day of school. The first date with your wife. The night your child was born. The funeral of your best friend. The aching regret of a mistake, a sin, that cannot be undone. Water skiing on the lake with friends. The smell of hot-dogs and popcorn that takes you in your mind’s […]

Twilight and renewing your mind and your reading

Ephesians 4 is perhaps on of the most crucial portions of Scripture concerning the spiritual life of the believer. While the truths stated here are echoed throughout Scripture and the NT, so many statements about the inner life of the believer are made clearly and directly in this passage: …walk in a manner worthy of […]

Sleepy thinkers?

Paul is clear that the ability to put off (repent of and stop doing) sin and putting on (embracing and habitually doing) righteousness is the result of allowing the Holy Spirit to renew our minds through the taking in of Scripture. A changed life comes from a renewed mind. The key is alertness of mind […]

What we think is what we are

It seems so innocent, really. It’s just a fleeting thought about a single wayward dalliance. Or maybe it’s just a brief longing for a slight but sweet revenge. Or lingering look at an indulgent — and way-beyond-your-means — purchase. Or the contemplation of a series of stinging retorts that weren’t said and wouldn’t be said, […]

Thinking about our thoughts

David longed for words and meditations that were acceptable to God — words both inward and outward that reflected a heart conformed to the character of God. Solomon notes that the inward thoughts of a man reveal the very character of a man — it is not what he does but what he thinks that […]

Today’s Quote – Priorities (Tozer)

A. W. Tozer, The Radical Cross: We Christians do so many things that are not really bad, they are just trivial. They are unworthy of us — much as if we discovered Albert Einstein cutting out paper dolls. Our minds may not be among the six greatest of the ages, but like Einstein’s, our minds […]

Today’s Quote – Sanctified Memory (Lloyd-Jones)

Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Spiritual Depression: …you and I must never look at our past lives; we must never look at any sin in our past life in any way except that which leads us to praise God and to magnify His grace in Christ Jesus. I challenge you to do that. If you look at your […]

Today’s Quote – Idols (Lewis)

C. S. Lewis, quoted in Christian History: There are three images in my mind which I must continually forsake and replace by better ones: the false image of God, the false image of my neighbors, and the false image of myself.

Television, the mind, and conduct

The headline might as well have said, “As a man thinks in his heart, so is he…” (Prov. 23:7) Instead, yesterday’s headline said, “Study links teen pregnancy to sexy TV shows.” The short version of the story is that a recent study conducted by Pediatrics found that there is a much higher incidence of pregnancy […]

Today’s Quote (9/2/08)

J. I. Packer, Knowing God: Meditation is the activity of calling to mind, and thinking over, and dwelling on, and applying to oneself, the various things that one knows about the works and ways and purposes and promises of God. It is an activity of holy thought, consciously performed in the presence of God, under […]

Books, the internet, reading, and thinking

A couple years ago, I read Iain Murray’s classic biographical work on Jonathan Edwards. As I put the book away, I remember being struck at the depth of thinking produced by Edwards. A couple brief stories. Murray recounted that Edwards would often go on journeys by means of the common mode of transportation of that […]

Think About It

Martyn Lloyd-Jones wrote these words in application of Ephesians 2:2 a generation ago, but they sound just as true today as in the day in which he wrote them: Their little life is entirely controlled by the organization of the world. They think as the world thinks. They take their opinions ready-made from their favourite […]

Lies We Believe

John MacArthur makes the good point that man likes to live according to five dominant lies — lies that constitute the attempt of man to rid himself of the influence and authority of God. These lies are: Life is random. We are all products of evolutionary chance with no purpose and no creator and no […]