I have been thinking much lately about how I allow the truth to affect my decisions. I have also been thinking much about truth and my identity and how they play out together in my actions. What do I think about most of the time? In who and what do I find my identity? How do I define myself? How does what I think about play into who I am? As a Christian, I am told in numerous passages that my identity can be found in Christ. Here is my favorite one:
Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory. Colossians 3:2
ONTRUTH
Indeed, a child raised in a Christian home is hopefully taught truth while they are young. This is what most every Christian couple hopes to do for their children. An excellent goal but here is a something to keep in mind. A question: Even if one grows up in a Christian home where the Bible is taught and truth discussed regularly, will that person still end up with a plethora of lies rolling around in their head into adulthood? I think the answer is yes. Why? Because we are fallen sinful creatures who, in our flesh, would rather believe a lie than the truth. Not only this, but as Christian parents we cannot always play interference with the multitude of hidden and private thoughts and perceptions that our children think about and adopt all by themselves. Just as our parents could not do so adequately for us, Christian or not. AND... there is no such thing as a perfect parent so we will inevitably instill false beliefs into our child's brain. Praise God that the Word of God can supersede the mistakes of any parent. And if you know, all too well, how many mistakes you made and struggle with it, you can know this: There is grace for you! Because the reality is, regardless of parenting skills, children grow up and develop poor thought processes all by themselves too. But I am not a fatalist!
It is a good thing that children are taught a foundation of truth because as they grow and mature the truth can deter some temptations for wrong thinking and it could eventually replace those deep-seated wrong beliefs that were adopted despite mom and dads best attempts. Then, as an adult, the child that was given a strong Biblical foundation will, hopefully, have an easier job of recognizing and tossing out the lies. Lies that were not taught to them as a child but inevitably come up in a life of living in a dirty world. But even then, despite best attempts, regardless of the excellent foundation given them, a lie or two or a thousand may sneak in. All this to say, I am not, you are not, our children are not immune to the effects of living in a fallen world. Nor are any of us capable of peeling off the flesh that we must live with. A fleshly tent that is at enmity with God.
BUT (love that word!), there may be some things that can take place to lessen the impact of living in this tent and living in this world. I can't name them all but here is one that might get you going in your own thinking. One thing that is good, all the time, and I do mean ALL THE TIME is to be watchful and constantly mindful of the existence of imbalance. In other words, how much "thought fodder" is being downloaded into the brain? Another good question to ask oneself: Is the Word of God taking precedence above the worlds offering of information? This doesn't mean that a person would have to read more of the Bible than what they take in of other stuff. Ideally speaking, that certainly would be the choice. Factually speaking, because we don't live in an ideal world, it isn't practical or possible. I think it is more about how we intake information. It also has to do with what we do with the information. If I am reading the news, it certainly should not take the same place in my heart and in my mind as the Bible. I would even venture to say that all information should be filtered through the truth of God's word...and maybe this isn't extremely practical advise but enough to work out a system of your own. I suppose a good indicator of how we are processing information could be about what we think about the most...true in some instances but not necessarily always true. Perhaps it has more to do about what happens in our thinking when certain events take place in our life. I think the goal would be to have words of truth readily available when a complicated or painful event takes place. Better said, having the truth of God's word laying fresh on the mind for easy access at all times is the ultimate goal. I learned along time ago to keep my keys in the same place everyday. Is the truth of God's word placed in a high priority position where I don't have to dig for it too? We are in the age of grab and go. Is the Word of God, packaged up nicely and laying conveniently in the reasoning center of the brain? Has the reasoning center of the brain been programmed with truth? Maybe it was programmed well in childhood but has that programming continued into the adult years? In short, the truth needs to be fresh in the heart and mind so that I can apply it to situations and to information. Keeping in mind that because of our current fallen state, truth is contrary to everything that onslaughts us. It is and will remain to be so, until Christ returns, difficult and challenging to keep the truth forefront in our lives. It is hard-work to maintain a proper thought life.
I have hidden Your Word in my heart that I might not sin against you. Psalm 119:11
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