951 Brand New Thoughts

The way you think about things affects the way you see things. If you think something is a blessing, it will look a whole lot like a blessing. If you think something is a burden, it will feel like a burden all the way deep down in your bones. The power is in how you THINK about anything. What if some of the very things causing you stress and worry in your life could be shifted simply by changing your thoughts about them? Would you? Would you be willing to change the way you think for more peace? Would you be willing to exchange your old thoughts for new thoughts if it meant you could be happier? It’s a cheap and easy yes to that proposal, of course you want peace, of course you would choose happiness … but really, would you? The truth is, we’re stupid attached to our old way of thinking. We replay the same old story over and over again in our mind until it has it’s own thought pattern, deeply ingrained within our mind. The pattern becomes so deep it’s as if our thoughts have no other choice but to go in the direction of the dark trenches they have created. Changing your thoughts isn’t so easy. It’s a true mental battle to stop thinking the same things you’ve always thought. And if the enemy can keep you stuck in your same old thoughts, you will never see the new life being offered to you. Yip, there it is! You have a new life offered to you through Jesus. A promise of freedom from everything that has ever served to hold you back in the past. A future greater than anything you can imagine. A future that fits perfectly with the purpose for which you were created, and when you step into it, it’s like finding the groove you’ve always been searching for. Suddenly everything you went through makes sense and it’s all being used for good now. Suddenly every little quirky detail about you is priceless because you can see how you were perfectly designed by the Almighty for something so much greater. That’s the groove. We all want it. We want the groove of this new life that fits like a glove. We want to step into all God is offering us. Why aren’t we? It’s our old thoughts. Your old thoughts threaten to keep you from ever experiencing this new life offered to you by Jesus. Your old thoughts keep you seeing things in the old way, and you never see the new things God is doing. In Isaiah 43:19 God says “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” But you will never see this new thing God is doing if you’re not willing to change your thoughts about it. You could be standing by the trailhead of the path that will lead you to God’s great plans for your life, but if all you’re thinking about is how lost you are in the wilderness, then wilderness is all you will see. God says “SEE I AM DOING SOMETHING NEW HERE! I am making a way through this for you!” But if you’re not willing to start thinking about finding the way, you’re never going to see it. God said “See this new thing I am doing here, I am making streams in the wasteland.” The problem is if you’ve been in a wasteland long enough where nothing ever happens, you lose hope of anything ever happening. You become so focused on all the waste, you miss the stream God is creating. Maybe you’re in the middle of a wasteland. This is the place where everything just seems to be wasted. Your time has been wasted. Your efforts have been wasted. You’re no better than when you started, and it’s all been wasted. That sucks. I hate the feeling of waste. Like I did all of that for absolutely nothing. After so much wasted effort, you no longer want to even try again. You settle in the middle of the wasteland and accept it’s just how it is for you,