How can we control our thoughts? This devotion looks at using worship to help us learn to focus our thoughts where they should be.
Nuggets
- Self-discipline leads to self-control.
- Always, prayer should be us pouring out our worship to our loving Heavenly Father.
- When we keep our thoughts focused on God, He provides us peace.
- We must praise Him with all our nature.
- One of these days, we will continually be worshiping our Father.
Devotions in the What I Believe series
Devotions in the Religious Education category
Using Worship to Educate Our Thoughts
I look at a lot of different sermons when I am researching for a post. When we were doing the Worship category, I ran across this sermon where one sentence caught my eye.
It was Statham’s Spiritual Worship. He wrote, “Whatever other ends are secured by sanctuary service, — the education of thought, the quickening of sensibility, and the deepening of religious trust, — this is one main end, the worship of God.”
That “education of thought” bit caught my eye. Corralling our thoughts can be difficult at times. Is there some way we can learn how to control them?
Using Statham’s sermon as the foundation, let’s see if we can get some pointers.
Let's Put It into Context
What is the purpose of education? The Holman Bible Dictionary wrote, “The primary purpose of education among the Jews was the learning of and obedience to the law of God, the Torah.”
Resource
To me, religious education is instruction to teach us about the plan of salvation and the character of God, in order to build relationships so that we can imitate Him.
Worship is our personal or corporate response (confession, thanksgiving, praise, etc.)
based on our attitude to God’s presence. Praise is also our response to God, but it usually involves music.
Regulate Our Service
“For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline” (II Tim. 1: 7 NIV)
Well. Isn’t that what we’ve been talking about all year? Self-discipline leads to self-control.
Let’s take a look at Paul’s purpose of writing the letter. He is corresponding with his “son” Timothy in order to mentor the young preacher in his faith. Yep, Paul is trying to teach Timothy.
Now, Timothy had been given a pretty good education to begin with. His grandmother Lois and mother Eunice had instructed him in the Jewish ways. “Paul went first to Derbe and then to Lystra, where there was a young disciple named Timothy. His mother was a Jewish believer, but his father was a Greek” (Ac. 16: 1 NLT).
Paul knew that we never give up learning things. Thankfully, we have the Holy Spirit to help us.
One of the things the Spirit gives us is self-discipline. The Speaker’s Commentary called it a sound mind. Venn stated that it implies “… recollection, calmness, and discretion, the guidance and control of reason.” Irons said can only come from God.
Reynolds called it self-mastery. Venn also called it sobriety.
We are trying to win the battle over sin. Sin is when we disobey God and break one of His laws and commandments. That battle is waged through temptations. Temptation is that period of time between conception and execution of doing what is sinful.
Where is that temptation occurring? In our thoughts. We are wresting around deciding whether or not we are going to give into the temptation or hold firm.
Now, you may say “Chick, this next quote doesn’t really apply.” I think we can work it so we can apply it, so follow along.
Statham wrote, “The instincts of a fervent Christian man will resent all that is showy and formal, and will rejoice in all that lifts his heart and his thoughts into communion with the living God.” It’s that last part that hooked me.
Rejoicing is being thankful and praising God — worshipping Him. “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice” (Phil. 4: 4 ESV).
Worshiping God puts us in communion with Him. When we are talking with Him and listening to Him, that focuses our thoughts on the promptings of the Holy Spirit.
What is the Holy Spirit’s job? To teach us.
So, we can regulate our thoughts by focusing on our worship on God. We educate ourselves in the ways in which God calls us to worship.
Prayerful Thoughts
“Devote yourselves to prayer with an alert mind and a thankful heart” (Col. 4: 2 NLT)
I had never thought of it this way. Statham wrote, “Meditation is prayer in preparation, and prayer is preparation spoken.”
Meditation, as defined by the Holman Bible Dictionary, is “the act of calling to mind some supposition, pondering upon it, and correlating it to one’s own life. Statham was saying, in Elaine-speak, that we have to do the thinking before the praying.
Psalms 119: 15 says, “I will meditate on your precepts and think about your ways” (CSB). If we are thinking about God’s rules and how He wants us to live, that should flow into prayer.
Oh, yeah. Sometimes, prayer will be pouring out our troubles at the foot of the cross. We are good at that. Always, prayer should be us pouring out our worship to our loving Heavenly Father.
If we think about how God wants us to live, that informs our prayers. We need to evaluate our lives so that we can pray accordingly.
So, isn’t it saying that they all have to be wrapped up together? The prayer bone has to be connected with the meditation/thought/mind bone, which is connected to the thankful/worship/heart bone.
But it isn’t just Ezekiel putting Dem Bones together, as the song says. It is the Holy Spirit wrapping it up so it focuses on worship.
Resource
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
Harmony
“You will keep the mind that is dependent on you in perfect peace, for it is trusting in you” (Isa. 26: 3 CSB)
When we keep our thoughts focused on God, He provides us peace. Statham wrote, “… worship must be in harmony with our life, and not a brilliant exception to it. True prayer is connected with the continuous life of God in the soul.”
Think about it. When we are meditating on God’s Will and praying and worshiping Him, that beings us peace. And not just any peace — perfect peace.
But what is perfect peace? What is the “… peace of God, which transcends all understanding …” (Phil. 4: 7 NIV).
We can look at the perfect peace as either being a blessing or a promise. Knight note that, “whether you understand by the word, reconciliation with God, amity with men, composure in the conscience, resignation to the appointments of providence, rest from the turbulency of sinful passions and appetites, or finally, that everlasting state of rest and felicity which remains for the people of God; rain all these senses peace is the happy lot of those whose minds are stayed on God.”
Peace has to be an inward tranquility. Yes, it can be lack of outward chaos, but the inward has to be filled with something.
It does all come down to trust. Remember, trust is assurance that the promises of God are true. We have the assurance that we know how things are going to end. We have been promised that God defeats Satan — it gives us peace knowing that.
Watkinson had a pretty good run down of what takes away our peace.
- We get bogged down in our history. We are focusing on the mistakes. We have to bury those at the foot of the cross.
- We focus on the current sins and temptations. It is Satan’s goal to take away our peace. He does this by falsely identifying things that he wants us to think will give us greater peace. We have to remember what a liar he is.
- There is a conflict between feeling and reason (or instinct and logic). Unfortunately, we lead with feelings too many times. Feelings can often be colored by what we are experiencing at the time.
- Peace can be stripped away when we are put into situations that test our character. We like that with which we are comfortable. New situations — especially difficult situations — steal our peace.
The bottom line — again — is, if we focus on God, we have peace. Worshiping Him must be a component of that focus.
Worship Through Praise
“Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name” (Ps. 103: 1 NIV)
We’ve talked before about worship and praise. There are three types of worship: personal, family, and corporate. Everyone is supposed to shout joyfully and triumphantly praising God. We worship God because we praise Him as Sovereign God.
Statham felt praise had an appropriate place in worship. He wrote, “… we do want the united service of all voices and hearts, as they are touched with the Spirit of the living God.”
The psalmist said that we should praise God with our “… inmost being …” (Ps. 103: 1 NIV). That talks about our nature. Pearce wrote, “Our nature is a many-stringed instrument, and every string is to contribute its quota to the symphony. If the soul is to be the leading singer, then every faculty of our mental, moral, and spiritual being, like a united choir, are to render the chorus.” We must praise Him with all our nature.
If the lead singer is going to be our thoughts, we might have a rougher go of it. Our thoughts can be influenced by a variety of things.
We need to make sure God is influencing our thoughts. Continuous praise can help that.
Future Worship
“Day and night they never stop, saying, ‘Holy, holy, holy, Lord God, the Almighty, who was, who is, and who is to come’” (Rev. 4: 8b CSB)
Just wait. One of these days, we will continually be worshiping our Father. It will never stop. Our education will be completed. We will have passed the test and will be welcomed as sheep on the right.
That is why it is important to corral our thoughts now. We need to worship now. Yep, sing our praises now.
The day is coming soon when our faith will become sight.
Making the Connections
We’ve got to focus on God. We must believe that His promises are true. We must out our faith and trust in Him.
Not into Bible reading? Not into singing? One day you will be. This life is to be used as an training session. Make the most of it.
We have to trust God. We have to have confidence that His promises are true.
Making the Connections to Self-Discipline
If it is going to take focus, that means we will have to be disciplined. It will have to take more than a decision to be focused. We must be committed to being focused.
We’ve been looking at defending our beliefs when we are witnessing. That means we have to be secure enough to convince someone to accept our beliefs.
Our questions should still serve us to determine on what we need to focus.
- What does the Scriptures say?
- What do I believe?
- Why do I believe the same/differently than the Scriptures?
- What are the talking points when witnessing to a non-believer?
Related Links
I have created a worksheet of the questions above. Click on the button below to access it.
How Do We Apply This?
We focused on only one element of worship: praise. But that is a major element. It is something we are to constantly do.
- “From the rising of the sun to its setting, the name of the LORD is to be praised!” (Ps. 113: 3 ESV). Every waking moment, we need to be in an attitude of praise.
- “I will sing to the LORD as long as I live. I will praise my God to my last breath!” (Ps. 104: 33 NLT). It isn’t just on Christmas and Easter. It isn’t just while we are gainfully employed. It is every day of our lives.
Father. Our thoughts are one of the hardest things for us to control. Help us to focus on You to keep them in check. Amen.
What do you think?
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