Church & Ministries

How God’s Word Changes Our Lives

If you want to see lasting change in your life, you need to commit to a steady diet of God’s Word, the Bible. We all want to be spiritually and relationally healthy, but we fail to realize the power of this one habit – filling our minds daily with truth from our Creator. James 1:25 says, “The truly happy people are those who carefully study God’s perfect law that makes people free, and they continue to study it. They do not forget what they heard, but they obey what God’s teaching says.”

We tend to believe a lot of lies – about God, about ourselves, about our world – and the result of believing those lies and repeating negative, untruthful thoughts is that we wind up depressed. We wind up dependent on things other than God. The way to change that mental pattern is to fill your mind with the Word of God.

For emotional and spiritual stability and for mental health, I need to soak up all of the truth I possibly can from God’s Word so that my focus will be on the right things. And the Bible emphasizes at least three things I can focus on that can change the way I think.

1. The Bible shows me Jesus.

Think about Jesus. You’ve heard about the old cliché you become what you think about most. If you read about Jesus, talk to Jesus, and focus your thinking on who he is, what he has done, and what he wants you to do, you’re going to become more like Jesus in your beliefs and in your behavior. When our character begins to line up with the character of Jesus, you know you’re changing in the right ways.

2. The Bible gives me a burden for others.

Philippians 2:4 says “Don’t just think about your own affairs but be interested in others too and what they are doing.” The world around us teaches us to think about ourselves and nobody else. But it’s not about you. And it’s only in giving your life away that you’ll understand what it means to live. I hope you’re in a small group because your small group is the laboratory for love. It’s the place to learn unselfishness.

3. The Bible paints a big, eternal picture.

There’s more to life than just here and now, but we fall into the trap of short-term thinking. Colossians 3:2 says, “Let heaven fill your thoughts. Do not think only about things down here on earth.” My problems always seem smaller, and always shorter term against the backdrop of heaven and eternity.

I need to feed my mind on truth every day. I need to free my mind from destructive thoughts. I can choose not to think them by changing the way I think. Then I can focus my mind on the right thing. When I’m focused on the right thing I don’t have time to pay attention to the wrong thing, and that’s where real life change starts.

How God’s Word Changes Our Lives, by Pastor Rick Warren, is an article from Pastors.com. © 2012 Pastors.com.

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