In the process of being transformed by God, I know that how I think is included. It might even be more important than what I say and do because Jesus says in Matthew 15:19–20. “For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person . . . .”
Paul also included thought life in his NT teaching about putting off the old and putting on the new. He says in Philippians 4:8. “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” I’m to reject the junk.
God also knows my thoughts: “O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.” (Psalm 139:1–4)
It seems obvious that I’m to talk, act and even think like the Lord yet what the Bible says about God’s thoughts make this a challenge!
The OT word for thoughts can describe plans as well. Many verses apply to people. A few are about God. The psalmists stress the depth and wonder of His thoughts:
Psalm 40:5. “You have multiplied, O Lord my God, your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us; none can compare with you! I will proclaim and tell of them, yet they are more than can be told.”
Psalm 92:5. “How great are your works, O Lord! Your thoughts are very deep!”
Psalm 139:17. “How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!”
The prophets describe how God’s thoughts are not like ours, often meaning that what He is doing seems contrary to what we expect.
Isaiah 55:7–9. “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
Jeremiah 29:11. “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.”
Jeremiah 51:29. “The land trembles and writhes in pain, for the Lord’s purposes against Babylon stand, to make the land of Babylon a desolation, without inhabitant.”
Micah 4:11–12. “Now many nations are assembled against you, saying, “Let her (the daughter of Zion) be defiled, and let our eyes gaze upon Zion.” But they do not know the thoughts of the Lord; they do not understand his plan, that he has gathered them as sheaves to the threshing floor.”
The NT brings the greatest surprise of all.
1 Corinthians 2:14–16. “The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. ‘For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?’ But we have the mind of Christ.”
Wow! The gift of God’s Son includes His incredible mind that we might think like God thinks! This is totally awesome. Earlier, 1 Corinthians 2:11–14 says:
“For who knows a person’s thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.”
GAZE INTO HIS GLORY. The way to think God’s thoughts is to be occupied with Him, reading what He says, listening to His Spirit, shunning outside thoughts and human wisdom . . . “For the wisdom of this world is folly with God . . . . The Lord knows the thoughts of the wise, that they are futile.” The idea that God knows our thoughts is one thing, but that God lets us into His mind is incredible — and good reason to keep my focus on Him.
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