Billy Joe Daugherty - Taking Control of Your Thoughts

Contents

Chapter One

Be Transformed By the Renewing of Your Mind

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

Romans 12:2 In the J. B. Phillips Translation of the Bible, this verse says, "Don't let the world around you squeeze you into its own mold, but let God re-make you so that your whole attitude of mind is changed. Thus you will prove in practice that the will of God is good, acceptable to him and perfect."

To be transformed is "to be changed or altered in the way you live by the renewing of your mind." The way you are living right now is a product of what is inside of your mind. You are living out what has been programmed between your ears!

You can demonstrate the perfect will of God if you align your thinking with His Word. Proverbs 23:7 says, "For as he thinks in his heart, so is he."

We are programmed to respond to people and situations by what has been put into our minds. This is one of the reasons I encourage you to guard what your children watch on television, because their minds are being programmed to respond in accordance with what they see. The average child growing up today, in a home where there is no screening of TV programs, sees thousands of murders in a year's time.

If we want to control our lives, we must start with what is going into our minds through the eye gate and through the ear gate. What you listen to on radio, tapes and discs, what you watch on television, videos and movies and what you read will program your life.

If you don't like the way things are right now, then you need to stop the input that has been negative, and add the input from God's Word that will reorient your life in the right direction.

It is possible to believe on Jesus in your heart and still have a mind that is going another direction. One of the most tormenting things in life is to be pulled two directions at the same time. Your heart says, "I really want to do this," but your head says, "Go this direction." Many people think they aren't saved when they have thoughts that are wrong.

We met a man in one of our apartment crusades who had been saved for many years, but cigarettes had control of him. He asked for prayer to be free. Today, he is no longer a slave to a health-destroying habit.

As a born-again believer, your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, and your money has been given to you by God . Therefore smoking is a spiritual matter. I'm not condemning people, but I'm saying that there is victory over cigarettes or over any other habit that has a hold on your life.

Perhaps the devil has tried to convince you that you'll never lick a particular habit. Renew your mind with Mark 9:23: "All things are possible to him who believes."

Renew your mind with Psalm 37:4, which says, "Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart."

If you'll get your mind aligned with what

God's Word says, then your spirit will dominate you and your mind will come underneath the control of your spirit. Your body will follow underneath both your mind and your spirit.

When Adam and Eve sinned, they allowed their body and mind to overrule their spirit. Man's spirit shifted to the bottom, and that's the story of the human race. There are wars and hatred for others because man's spirit lost the life of God in it. It became ruled by darkened minds and sensual, fleshly desires.

Until you are born again, you will be dominated by the soul realm (the mind, will and emotions) and by the body. But when you are born again, your spirit can gain the ascendancy over your body and mind by renewing your mind with the Word of God.

If you don't renew your mind, your spirit can be born again, but your soul and your body will go a different direction. You've got two against one, and that's where the pulling comes. Your heart wants to go one way, but your body and mind want to go another direction.

Many people cry out for deliverance, but if you don't renew your mind, you will go back to the old life. Part of deliverance is the prayer of faith that someone else can bring, but your part is to reprogram your computer (your mind) with God's Word so your thought processes come into alignment with God's will for your life.

Chapter Two

Offering Yourself to God as a Living Sacrifice

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.

Romans 12:1

Dead sacrifices were offered on the altar in the Old Testament. Paul says we are to offer our bodies to God as living sacrifices. A living sacrifice is one that can crawl off the altar! That's why Paul is saying, "I beseech you to keep on offering your life unto God."

Your decision to offer your body as a living sacrifice to God isn't a one-time thing. There is an initial one-time offering, but it requires a daily follow through or a continual commitment to offer your life as a living offering unto God.

To offer your body as a sacrifice unto God refers to your service to God. Paul says that to offer your body unto God is your "reasonable service." In other words, God has a right to ask that you offer your life to Him, because He bought you and He owns you! When you are born again, you are no longer your own .. You no longer have a right to do your own thing. You have been bought with a price, and the price God paid for you was the blood of His own Son.

It is reasonable, if someone saved you from hell, that you offer your life to serve Him. It's a debt that you can never repay . Scripture says you are to owe no man anything except the debt of love. (Romans 13:8.) We will forever be paying a love debt to Jesus Christ. Salvation is free, but for the rest of our lives, we are to offer our love and service to God and to other people.

When you are saved , the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses you. Then by a decision of your will, you offer your life in service to God.

When I was saved, I accepted the gift of salvation because I didn't want to go to hell! It was at a later time in my life that I understood I was to give my life, my future, my career and my time to God.

I became a love slave of the Lord Jesus Christ. By my choice, I offered my life unto God to serve Him every day of my life. That's a choice every believer must make . It has nothing to do with the call to a specific office of ministry, but it has to do with being born again.

As we offer our lives to God, we can prove what is the good, acceptable and perfect will of God .

Chapter Three

God's Plans for You Are Terrific!

"For I know the thoughts that I think toward you," says the Lord, "thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope."

Jeremiah 29:11

God's plans for you are terrific! Ephesians 2:10 says, "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them."

Those works have already been planned out. God didn't bring you into this earth and then say, "What am I going to do with this one?" He already has a plan for you that is good, acceptable and perfect.

If you've made some mistakes in your past, God's grace will put you back on track. The story of Abraham is a story of God's grace. God doesn't recall any of his mistakes in the New Testament.

Instead, He says of Abraham that he was a great man of faith.

The scripture records King David's failures, yet in the New Testament he is called a man after God's own heart. God still worked in his life.

We're not talking about perfect people. We are talking about a perfect Savior who has a perfect plan for our lives as imperfect people. When we come by faith to Him, we receive His mercy and grace. God can change our thinking and cause us to walk out the plan that He has for our lives. It is a wonderful plan.