What do you think about yourself?

1. The book of Proverbs has this short comment: “ For as he thinketh within himself, so is he.” (Prov. 23.7) What do you think about yourself? What do you think about God? What do you think about your children, your friends, your fellow workers? your neighbors?

2. What goes on in your mind and heart about all these will determine what kind of person you are, how happy you are, how miserable you are, whether you will succeed or fail, whether your children will succeed or fail, whether you will get along with people, and whether you live a useful life.

I. What do you think in your heart about God?

Is God a far distant being who looks down on you and tells you to stop doing anything fun? Is God someone who judges everything you do and holds up the judgement of hell before your eyes? Is God someone who is so distant that you don’t really think you can know him?
Is God someone who rejects the good things we enjoy? Are you bound by guilt and feel that sooner or later God is going to get you?

There may be many negative thoughts about God in your heart and mind, but let us focus on the true one: God loves you and his love is so great that He came in the person of Jesus of Nazareth to teach us the truth about God. God so loved the world....that he gave.....
Do you really know that God loves you and wants the very best for you?

Let me tell you of a couple my daughter knows in Phoenix. This couple have a 22 year old son. They have had to throw him out of the house because of his choices. He has been on drugs, he will not change, he will not work, and he is sleeping in his car. The parents are heart broken to see their son do things that are destroying his life, his future, and all the good things of God’s world. They love their son, but he is rejecting their love and destroying himself. He is doing pot and his thinking is clouded and unclear.
When you look at the rules giving in the Bible they are designed for our own well-being.

If you follow the great law of Loving God with all your heart, and loving your neighbor as yourself, you discover that God wants the best for you. There is joy in knowing God loves you. There is joy in being obedient. Obedience sidesteps many pitfalls and heartaches.

Do you really know what hurts the heart of God? It is the willful rejection of the good life He has taught us. Jesus said,.”I have come in order that you might have life---life in all its fullness.” (John 10:10) God made all the senses we have. He has given us direction about enjoying life.

The world’s so-called pleasures will not be satisfying, only life lived in relationship to God will bring joy, happiness, and peace.

II. What do you think in your heart about others?

You may know people who have come from dis-functional families. One person I know could never do anything right. She was given comments like stupid, ignorant, and was never encouraged in a positive way. I once knew a graduate student at ESU who was bright in his own right, but his father was overbearing and demanding. Once when it was time to enroll for courses the father came along and the son suggested a course he was interested in and the father berated him say, you don’t want that course, you want this one. The poor son looked like he had no personality of his own.. He had not been encouraged to think for himself. His father thought of him as a boy who needed constant supervision.

Women have been thought to be less than men. One of the most tragic is the story of Muslim women who have been denied education, denied equal rights with men, and even when getting an education could not use it in their culture. Right now there are half-billion Muslim women who are denied many rights in their different cultures. There are many women in the Old Testament and New Testament who did important things and served God in significant ways.
Woman was created with Man. They are equal and should be encouraged to do what God wants them to do and be.

The second great commandment is love your neighbor as yourself. Who is my neighbor? Jesus answered the question with the story of the good Samaritan. Jesus answered, "There was once a man who was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho when robbers attacked him, stripped him, and beat him up, leaving him half dead.
It so happened that a priest was going down that road; but when he saw the man, he walked on by on the other side. In the same way a Levite also came there, went over and looked at the man, and then walked on by on the other side. But a Samaritan who was traveling that way came upon the man, and when he saw him, his heart was filled with pity. He went over to him, poured oil and wine on his wounds and bandaged them; then he put the man on his own animal and took him to an inn, where he took care of him. The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper. 'Take care of him,' he told the innkeeper, 'and when I come back this way, I will pay you whatever else you spend on him.' " And Jesus concluded, "In your opinion, which one of these three acted like a neighbor toward the man attacked by the robbers?" The teacher of the Law answered, "The one who was kind to him." Jesus replied, "You go, then, and do the same. (Luke 10:30-37)

III. What do you think in your heart about yourself?

N.V. Peale tells of speaking in a midwestern town to several thousands of people. It was a bitter-cold winter night and a high wind was driving snow across the street as I went to the hall in a taxi. We were stopped at an intersection by red traffic light. On the far corner was a gasoline station above which a high banner flapped in the wind. On the banner in large letters was printed the slogan, “A Clean Engine Always delivers power.” It was an ad for some kinde of motor oil. The statement struck me forccible. The hall was packed.Hardly anyone was over 40. Paul Harvey was speaking.

The slogan on the banner, A Clean Engine Always delivers power, was on my mind when my time came to speak. I looked into the face of that great assembly of young people, sensing the power represented there. I told them about the slogan and commented that there were in that auditorium several thousand “mental engines” each known as the head. I made the point that if these engines were unclean, the power needed for a great life could not get through.

I defined an unclean mental engine as a mind that is full of negative thoughts, self-doubt thoughts, hate thoughts, envious and resentful thoughts, lustful and dishonest thoughts. Now I said, I know that I am not speaking in church, and preaching a sermon, but there is only one sure way by which a mind can be washed clean of such corrosive thinking which blocks off the power flow. And that procedure is for each in his own way ask the Lord to cleanse the mind, empty out that old debilitating mass of stuff, wipe it clean, and then to fill that mind with positive thoughts of faith in God, hope, love, and enthusiasm.
I had no sooner finished and gone back stage when a big fine-looking strapping fellow came charging back. He rush up to me, threw his arms around me, nearly crushing me, Boy, he shouted, do I like you.

Well, I responded, I like you too, but what’s up?
Because, said he, my life has been changed in the last thirty minutes, and I don’t mean maybe. I have been a flop, a failure, a washout. I am the lowest man on the totem pole on our sales force, Can’t understand why I haven’t been fired. And that is not all. I’m a failure as a husband, as a father, a failure period.

There I was slumped down I my seat and you started talking about that dirty engine and no power coming through. I knew you were talking about me. For my mental engine, my mind, could not have been dirtier, filled as it was with negativism, jealous, resentment. excuses, dishonesty, low in morals. You name it. Anything bad, and it has been there in my mind. When you said to turn it over to the Lord, brother, you had me for sure. I talked to the Lord Jesus and I meant it, deep down, every word of it. I asked him to change me and he did. I could feel it in my mind, in my heart, all over, I am a new man.” And as I looked at his face and into his eyes, I knew that he spoke the truth. The great old words came to mind, If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature; old things are passed away...all things are become new.” (2 Cor. 5:17)

Conclusion:
1. When you give your heart to Jesus, you become a child of God. Does your mind and heart live as a child of God? Does God’s love permeate your heart? Does God’s love bring joy and delight to your soul? Are there thoughts in your mind that are contrary to what God wants for you? Remember the words of Jesus, I have come that you might have life and life more abundant.