“Capture Your Thoughts”

We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. II Corinthians 10:5 NIV

 

Verse Reflections: Knowing God makes all the difference. When we know God intimately, we can “take and hold, keep within bounds” our thoughts. The power of our thoughts is so underestimated. I have read estimates that 70-80% of our thoughts are negative. I know I criticize myself 90x more than I compliment myself. Does God want that for my life? Absolutely not. None of us want our children to think negatively of themselves. We need to capture our thoughts and lift them up for inspection by Christ. If we love ourselves as Christ loves us or as we love our children, then we will not speak negatively within our minds. We must change our lives, our minds, our thoughts. If we think back to our creator as the source of our beauty, our physical and mental abilities we will not criticize ourselves because we are instead criticizing the way He made us. He also wants us to “love our neighbors as ourselves” so we must not think negative thoughts about others.  I have to make captive my thoughts about food and the temptations that enter my mind. This verse reminds me that it is an act. It is work. I keep waiting on the temptations to just float away. I want God to capture these thoughts and eliminate them with a poof. This verse reminds me that I have to do the work. I literally have to lasso the thoughts that creep into my brain or in some cases roar into my brain. Once I have corralled them, I have to look at the thoughts as Christ would and change them. Eventually, I will have less of these arguments come into my head. Today, our thoughts will be on our beauty, our amazing bodies created by God and imagining healthy, nutritious foods. Today, we will be obedient to Christ and eat the foods He has created.

Prayer: Father, I hate that I have allowed the negative thoughts to enter my mind so often. I hate that I allow temptations to crowd my mind and even slip out into my actions. I rededicate myself to You today. I will take those thoughts captive and hold them up to You. Please remind me. Please give me the power to make my thoughts reflect Your amazing love, Your unconditional love, Your lack of judgement, Your grace. I am humbled by the idea that this is my responsibility. I forget the power I have over my thoughts. I think thoughts are harmless when in reality they are devastating. I am giving them power by allowing them to exist, allowing them to linger. Father, thank You for the reminder to be obedient to You. Often, I think if my “life” is obedient to You then we are all good. But this verse reminds me that I have to delve into my mind and make it obedient to You. There are a lot of negative thoughts there, please help me capture them today and change this cycle. Allow me the grace to think beautiful thoughts about everyone I encounter. Allow me to think beautiful thoughts about myself. I love You and yes, today I will hold my thoughts captive and make them obedient to You. Let’s think about the God foods we will eat to feed this beautiful body You created.

Did you know?  Other names for sugar include:   dextrose, fructose, galactose, glucose, lactose, maltose, corn syrup, high-fructose corn syrup, honey, agave nectar, cane sugar, evaporated cane juice, coconut sugar, dextrose, malt syrup, molasses, and turbinado sugar, levulose