Tag: brain

Rest Your Hope

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“Therefore, gird up the loins of your mind, be sober-minded, rest your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Jesus Christ is revealed.” I Peter 1:13

Where do I rest my hope?

Recently I’ve been thinking about how easy it is to set my hope on life hacks, routines, and daily habits. Being a good steward of our time, money, bodies, and relationships truly does take order and intention every day… but as we get older we realize we can stop thinking that eventually we are going to figure it all out. “If I could just get all my routines down and follow them… if I could just conquer all the problem areas I have and break them all down into daily steps… then I can be healthy, happy, really start living, and start blessing others”. Wrong. Life is always changing. Schedules are always changing. What worked one month won’t work another. We’re never going to figure it all out. And anybody that looks like they’ve got it all going on? They don’t. There are weak areas and they also need constant correcting and re-balancing too. They’re never satisfied if they’re looking to be satisfied in themselves.

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Remain

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Sometimes it’s very apparent when we have to “gird up the thoughts of our mind”. The thoughts have become so plentiful or negative, that we are tripping all over the place or we are truly “stuck” by them all and we are unable to move forward. We can thank the Holy Spirit for those “wake up call” times and for helping us recognize the danger we are in. We can dramatically “gird up” all the worries and cares and bitterness and negativity we have let fester and can have renewed, sharpened focus on Christ & His Word. But girding up the thoughts isn’t only a re-active action step when we’re already in danger. It is a pro-active one to too.

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Disciplining the Gluttonous Mind

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So I knew I wanted to Detox from Mind Junk – but how??? The Lord empowers and helps His children in such unique and personal ways, but fasting and denying the flesh (delayed gratification) are battle secrets that the Lord uses every time.

I’m confident that the far-majority of Americans understand how beneficial fasting from food is for us physically. And I believe most Christians understand how important and beneficial physical fasting is for us spiritually. Jesus Himself fasted to prepare Himself for the testing in the desert (Matthew 4). It humbles and empowers at the same time. Weakens and strengthens.

Fasting from food absolutely is a discipline of the mind as well. There is great work done in the thought life in physical fasting. But this same denial of the physical impulses for food can be has to be applied specifically to the overfed, gluttonous mind too.

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Detox from Mind Junk Food

On By randijoIn Uncategorized1 Comment

Recently I noticed I was really behind in my book count for the year, which made me assess why I wasn’t reading as much. It was not because I had a major downward shift in my free time. (Opposite in fact, we are in summer mode with MORE free time!) It was not because I was in a book desert and there were no appealing books on the horizon. (Opposite in fact, I have SO many great books gathering dust, crying to be read.)

When I thought about it, I realized I had also felt very distracted recently and had been having a hard time focusing for extended periods. Oh man, signs of too much technology started jumping out everywhere: high stress, high anxiety, high distraction, low focus, high comparison to others, low contentment and low peace. BUMMMERR.

But thank you Jesus, He helped me recognize what was going on and get on my knees and confess and ask forgiveness for wasting His time that He gave me, not taking care of my mind that He created, and asking for His grace and help. As always, His grace and forgiveness poured out and I was so grateful for His loving care and reasssurance.

The very next book I picked up after that confession was Jackie Hill Perry’s, “Upon Waking” and it was a divinely orchestrated moment:

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