Every Thought Captive

 John Ortberg

1. Make a list of your current internal battles, without guilt or shame.

2. Confess to God your need for his help in these battles.

3. Talk with a friend, family member, or church community about your struggles.

These steps will set you on a path to transform your internal battles into opportunities to encounter the Kingdom of God.

Struggles - Romans 7 

Intra personal struggles - regrets, mistakes, past trauma, jaded thinking

Inter personal struggles - learning to handle dysfunctional past, dysfunctional families, controlling boss, grief and loss 

Systemic struggles - commitments and loyalties to employment, organizations, sorting out political non essential viewpoints, filtering out loud voices that communicate false teaching, using Christian words that don’t mesh with the create commandments, great commission, justice, humility  

We must fiercely committed to Jesus and Hus teaching in these issues, loyal to the Soirit’s leading, defiant tongue works with the fruits of the Doirut  

2 Corinthians 10:3-6

[3] For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. [4] For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. [5] We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ, [6] being ready to punish every disobedience, when your obedience is complete.

“I want to talk to you about the battle. I want to talk to you about winning the battle of your story today. This is what Paul writes to the Church of Corinth.

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. So we're fighting a battle, but not in the same way that it's often thought. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world.

They're not weapons of coercive power. On the contrary, they have divine power. We're going to need God's help.

To demolish strongholds. Now, what's a stronghold? A stronghold is an outpost of resistance to a kingdom.

Then Paul goes on, we demolish arguments. So a stronghold apparently is kind of parallel to an argument, to a thought. In other words, those little pockets of resistance to the kingdom of God exist primarily not out there somewhere in some weird spooky place, but actually in my mind, in the way that I'm thinking.

And every potential that sets itself up in the knowledge of God, and then here it is, we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. So that's your challenge[…]”

From John Ortberg | Become New: 47. Take Every Thought Captive | John Ortberg, Jul 31, 2024

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/john-ortberg-become-new/id1554045522?i=1000663893745

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There are very few things that are more powerful than our own thoughts. They can lead us in the right direction, they can lead us in the wrong direction, they can lead us down a rabbit hole, and they can guide us to success. So often we think of “our thoughts” as our own, and yet God makes it clear in 2 Corinthians 10:5 that he wants us to relinquish control of our thoughts over to Him. “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.”  2 Corinthians 10:5 In order to be able to do this, it begins with the understanding the ability to be responsible for our thoughts. For so many years, I am not sure that I thought this was even possible, and therefore I let me thoughts run free, and in many cases lead me down roads that were the wrong ones. It took me realizing that I was accountable to God for my thoughts for me to begin to make a real shift. The Bible makes it clear in many places that it is not just our actions that we are responsible for, but we are also responsible for our thoughts. Thoughts alone can be sins; it does not take an action to cross that threshold.  So how do we do this? I firmly believe that it is a process, little by little, minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day. God not only wants us to be in relationship or communion with him, but he wants our thoughts centered on him. By taking our thoughts captive to make them obedient to Christ, we are refocusing our attention away from ourselves and toward God. Think of it as a way to center your mind on him. So, moment by moment, we have the opportunity to be more in line with what God wants us to be by continually making the decision to keep our thoughts on him and directed toward his teachings for what is right versus wrong. Sounds simple, right? Well, I do not think that is true, at least not at first. It can feel like a daily battle and for many people, especially those people who suffer from addiction, the battle can feel like a war. With that said, this is a battle worth fighting. It will likely not be won in a day, but over time.  The end goal here is a union with God that fulfills our heart and soul in a way that we could never achieve otherwise. God carefully and specifically made us for a relationship with Him, and as we control our thoughts and shift them toward God, we are making a major leap in that relationship.

Paul Amos Founder of The Redeemed