Thought Bombs

I’ve been thinking a lot here lately about the place I am in the world. A lot of people would call it a mid-life crisis or something to that effect. I don’t necessarily agree with that assessment of my life. Although I do admit that I’ve been a bear to live with lately and that my thoughts have been focused on where I’m at in the world today, and what have I actually accomplished.

There is a book that I’ve been reading called “The Power of Praise and Worship” by Terry Law. In it he used the term “Thought Bombs”. Thought bombs are words that the enemy lobs at us on a daily basis. They are contrary to what God’s Word says about us, and they have just one intent, and that is to destroy our lives.

But you see the devil, our enemy really doesn’t have any power over the born again believer. Jesus defeated him all those many years ago. Stripping him of any real power that he had, and in turn Jesus sent us the Holy Spirit Who gives us the power to overcome the enemy every time.

The Bible likens our enemy to a “roaring lion”. Notice what it does not say. It does not say that he is a consuming lion. It says that the devil is only a roaring lion, and a roaring lion is one that just makes a lot of noise, but nothing else. That is exactly how he operates in our lives. He roars his words of doubt and unbelief at us, trying to trick us into saying the same thing that he is saying.

He is lobbing “thought bombs” at us, and they have no effect unless when we hear them, we take those words and begin to say them out loud with our own mouths. The devil knows he has no power over what we give him, and therefore tries to trick us into believing that these thought bombs are really just our minds talking, and not him attacking us.

Look with me at Proverbs 23:7a in the King James Version. “For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he…” The word that I’m the most interested here is the word “thinketh” or “thinks” in common English. It is pronounced in the Hebrew shaw-ar and means to split or open that is to act as a gatekeeper, to estimate or think.

Then look with me at what Jesus said in Luke 6:45; A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh. Here Jesus tells us that it is out of the abundance of our hearts that we will speak. In other words, we only speak that which we know, and we only know that which we think about.

What I see here is that whatever we are thinking about is what gets down into our hearts. And it is whatever is in our hearts that we are going to speak, thus giving power to the enemy or to God to work in our lives.

When the enemy is lobbing his thought bombs at us, they are not to just make us feel down, low or even just to harass, he is using them to in effect get us to think on his things instead of God’s things. He does this because he understands this Kingdom principle that out of the abundance of the heart the mouth will speak.

So when those thought bombs come, what are we to do? This is what I am learning to walk out right now. We can’t stop the thought bombs; there are too many voices on the wind in our lives. It’s kind of like walking through thick brush in the woods. There are hindrances all around you; and you just have to keep pushing through them.

I know that I for one would really like to just sit down and wish them away, but that doesn’t happen. And if you did that in the woods, eventually (given enough time) all that brush would grow up around you and cause you to be even more blocked than before. So we can’t sit down and stop, we just have to press on, no matter how hard it gets.

How does that look though? And how do I exactly do that? Through the power of praise and worship, now I’m not talking about getting a band together and start singing, although singing is one aspect in the praise and worship of God.

We have to start first with an understanding of what praise and worship is first. Praise is you telling God about how great He is. And worship is you telling God how much you love Him. Remember in the Old Testament where David wrote about praise? It’s found in Psalm 8:2; Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.

Then we see Jesus quote this scripture in Matthew 21:16, but He does so in just a little different way; And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise? It’s interesting that David called it strength and Jesus called it praise.

What I see here is that through our praise to God, we are given strength to shut up the enemy and the avenger. So when he lobs his thought bombs at us, and we in turn begin to praise God it turns those thought bombs into naught bombs. When we think on the greatness of God and what all He has purchased for us through the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus, what else can we do but praise Him?