When Negative Thoughts Come

And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. - Philippians 4:8 NLT

I want to focus on an area that I think many people struggle with, their thoughts (thinking).  I do believe that many people struggle with negative, depressing, hopeless, and discouraging thoughts.  I may not have even mentioned the type of thoughts you may be dealing with in that list, but know this: there is hope for you. You do not have to live enslaved to those evil thoughts. I use evil, not necessarily in the sense of sin, but in the sense of not good, God-like thoughts. 

One of the first steps to victory in this area is to know that you are not a victim. In other words, these thoughts are not something you can do nothing about. What I am about to say may sound harsh, but if you are enslaved to evil, negative thoughts, then you are most likely the one who is allowing it to happen. Please, do not get offended by that statement.  That statement is meant to help and not offend. Someone may say, "How does that help?"  Well, think about it this way: if you are allowing it, you can also unallow it. That may not be a word, but it fits for this situation. 

Now, most of us have probably had the experience of a random, negative thought come through our heads.  What we do with that thought is important.  I may not be able to keep a bird from flying over my head, but I can keep it from building a nest there. Meaning, I may not always be able to keep a negative thought from coming into my mind, but I can keep it from staying.  If a depressing, discouraging, hopeless thought comes into my mind, what do I do?   Some may have been taught to rebuke such thoughts, and I will say that can help for a moment, but that is not the proper fix. If you have ever done that, you may have experienced the return of that thought in a short time. 

The true fix is to replace that thought with a God thought. The sooner we do this, the better off we will be. Now, what do I mean by a God thought?  I mean a thought that is of God. A thought from God.  We can discover much of what God thinks about us from the Scriptures. The Scriptures are so very important for us on so many levels.  We need the Scriptures. So, if a thought comes to me that is contrary to what God says in His Word (the Scriptures), I need to replace that wrong thought with the right one. The God, one so to speak.  This might take some effort on our part, but it is worth it.  

To just allow any type of thoughts to abide in our mind can keep us in defeat instead of leading us into victory.  So, please, do not just passively allow your mind to think things that are not of God.  Take action!!  Do something about it. Actively engage your mind with Godly thinking. Notice in the above Scripture, Paul said to "fix your thoughts".  He did not say to pray for God to fix your thoughts. He said for us to do it, and we can. We can fix our thoughts on the things listed in that Scripture, and enjoy wonderful benefits as a result—all of those things that the verse mentions can be found in the Scriptures.  True, honorable, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, and things worthy of praise are all found in the Scripture. So, let us get into God's Word and discover these things so we can fix our thoughts on them.  We will be better off as a result of it.  God bless.