The Monday Memo from John Stanko

Memo 965: How to Build a Better Stronghold

Have you ever said, "If God would only speak to me or show me a sign, then I would know and do His will"? There is nothing wrong with that, except that if you have a thought that conflicts with what God is trying to say, then you may not be able to hear it as you thought. Let's take a look this week at how a stronghold gains such a strong hold on your life and how you can replace it with another better and stronger stronghold.

KILL AND EAT

You cannot just stop thinking about something that has a grip on your mind, that has also become part of your worldview and life philosophy. You established that thought or network of thoughts over time with concerted effort, so it will take some time and effort to pull it down and replace it. Let's look at how Peter replaced a stronghold in his mind as an example from which we can learn. We read,

About noon the following day as they were on their journey and approaching the city, Peter went up on the roof to pray. He became hungry and wanted something to eat, and while the meal was being prepared, he fell into a trance. He saw heaven opened and something like a large sheet being let down to earth by its four corners. It contained all kinds of four-footed animals, as well as reptiles and birds.Then a voice told him, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.” “Surely not, Lord!” Peter replied. “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.” The voice spoke to him a second time, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.” This happened three times, and immediately the sheet was taken back to heaven (Acts 10:9-16).

Peter was raised as a kosher Jew, only eating food declared clean by God's word. That thought had become a way of life and a stronghold in his mind. Then he had a vision telling him to eat unclean things and he naturally resisted, telling the Lord he would never do that—because Peter did not believe the Lord would require him to do that.

Right after the vision, some men appeared where Peter was staying and invited him to come to Cornelius' home. Peter went, saw the Holy Spirit fall on the Gentiles, and only then realized God was speaking to him, and the result was to be a new way of thinking or a new stronghold: 

“As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit came on them as he had come on us at the beginning. Then I remembered what the Lord had said: ‘John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’ So if God gave them the same gift he gave us who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to think that I could stand in God’s way?” (Acts 11:15-17, emphasis added).

TRANSFORMED BY A MIND RENEWAL

Peter asked those who challenged what he did, "who was I to think I could stand in God's way?" That certainly hadn't stopped the Jewish leaders, for they thought they could stand in God's way, which is why they tried to eliminate Jesus. Peter decided to change his thinking and was transformed into a man who did not resist Samaritans or Gentiles, but welcome them into the Kingdom because he allowed God to give him a new stronghold: "Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will" (Romans 12:2).

How did this happen to Peter? It happened with the Spirit's help:

Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ (Romans 8:5-9).

But be careful not to over-spiritualize this process. While the Spirit was involved, Peter had to cooperate. He had to be open to the fact that his old stronghold was wrong or at least incomplete or inadequate. He had to have the courage to face the new thought by examining the vision, the visitors, and his encounter with Cornelius and then come to and announce a new conclusion—then allowing that conclusion to build a network of supporting thoughts in his mind.

What steps can you take to build a new stronghold? It's quite simple:

1. accept the fact that you cannot see or know it all and that you may be wrong or only partially correct;
2. listen to others, even with those who hold a different view, without obligation to agree or prejudice to refute;
3. search the Scriptures.

If you do your part, I promise God will do His and the Spirit, whose job it is to lead and guide you into all the truth, will empower you to be transformed not by some supernatural encounter but through the power of new thoughts. Then you will have the courage to discover, confront, and replace the other strongholds in your mind so you can be constantly transformed into a vessel for God's purposes. Have a blessed week!

Memo 964: How to Build a Strong Stronghold

A few weeks ago, I began a new series titled 'Unlocking the Power of Your Thinking." I acknowledged that the path to this topic is littered with debris from teachings labeled 'name it and claim it,' 'positive thinking,' and 'mind over matter.' It would make sense, however, that a topic of this importance would have opposition and a variety of counterfeits, for no one ever makes phony $4 bills because there are no real $4 bills. There is only value in producing a fake that has some basis in truth and reality, and that is why I have chosen to write about how God made your brain to function and how we can use it to work with Him and not against Him. 

Last week, we looked at a stronghold and I promised this week, we would look at how to pull down a stronghold. Rather than study how to deal with a counterfeit stronghold, I thought I would share how to build a proper one. Let's get started.

HOW TO BUILD ONE

Last week, I defined a stronghold as "an accumulation of thoughts and beliefs over time that become a rigid way of doing things or seeing the world." I thought I would describe how I built what I consider a positive stronghold to help you build the same. Then next week, we will look at how to demolish a negative one.

About 40 years ago, I was diagnosed with a bad back. My mother had suffered with back problems, so it made sense to me that I could have inherited this condition from her. I was told by a doctor that it was just a matter of time before I would need surgery to correct a structural problem. I was presented with a thought and had a choice to either build a supportive cast of thoughts that would reinforce that diagnosis or build an alternative collection that would focus on healing. I figured I had nothing to lose by choosing to build a positive stronghold around healing. If I was wrong, I would just have surgery and would have gone off chasing an idle pursuit. If I was right, there were obvious benefits.

From that day forward, I decided to trust God for my healing, even though I was in pain. I read and meditated on Exodus 15:26: "“If you listen carefully to the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep all his decrees, I will not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I am the Lord, who heals you” (emphasis added). It was not debilitating pain and I continued with my life, assured by my doctor that playing softball, working in my garden, or other normal activities would not cause further damage. Every summer I would play softball, go to the chiropractor the next day, and thank God for my healing. This went on for years. I would be in the shower or in the car and when I would feel the pain, I would thank God for my healing.

I SLIPPED UP

After many years, my wife and I were on a cruise with the ministry I was working for at the time. We were walking down the corridor to a meeting when I stepped on a piece of celery from a reception that had just been held in that area. My one leg went flying into the air and i fell hard on my back, at which point I began to shout, "Thank You, Lord! Thank You, Lord!" People thought I was injured but the opposite was true. For the first time, I realized my back did not hurt. I could not say when the pain left, but the pain that should have resulted from that fall was absent. That fall took place in 1994 and I have had no problems since.

I did not allow the thought of surgery to get a strong hold in my mind. Instead, I built a stronghold that God is my healer, reinforcing and surrounding that thought with other thoughts that were in line with my starting point. I have used that model to build other strongholds to guide my thinking and behavior, such as "I can write more than one book a year." "God doesn't need a company to pay me. He can do that Himself." "I can have energy and be productive until I die at a ripe old age." As with my healing mindset, if I am wrong, what have I really lost? If I am on the right path, however, I have much to gain.

Next week, I promise we will examine how to tear down and replace a negative stronghold, but the process involves what I described this week. You must find a new thought that will become the foundation or pillar and build a supportive mental structure around it. For this week, you can start to build a positive, godly stronghold by accepting a simple truth and choosing to believe that, no matter how much opposition it receives from conflicting thoughts that assail your mind. your job will be to find thoughts and Bible verses that can partner with your new thought. While you do that, I am going to once again bend over and thank God for His healing power that proved stronger and mightier than a doctor's prognosis. Have a blessed week.

Memo 963: A Stronghold Has a Strong Hold

Let's continue with our new series titled Unlocking there Power of Your Thinking and look at what exactly is a stronghold, since we often refer to it often as something we must pull down. We often think
of it as something that is "out there," but this week, let's look at the possibility that it can be something "in here"—something in your mind that may be hindering your spiritual growth and progress.

RENEWING THE MIND

In a preached message I once delivered in my home church, we looked at two passages:

"Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will" (Romans 12:1-2).

"For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 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 10:3-5).

Can there be a stronghold that has a strong hold on our minds? The answer is yes. A stronghold is an accumulation of thoughts and beliefs over time that become a rigid way of doing things or seeing the world. For example, if you as a child did not do well in math, you began to think, "I am just not good in math." That thought is reinforced by poor performance, which just "proves" you are not smart. Perhaps comments from others reinforced the thought even further, so therefore you began to avoid math classes. When you got to university and were confronted with having to take a math class, panic set in because you knew how you are: the thought had become a stronghold in your mind telling you that you are not good in math. Even though your parents worked with you and encouraged you, even prayed for you, the stronghold remained and it affected your performance.

Another stronghold would be your ability or need to use social media: "Oh, I'm no good at that. I don't have time anyway." As the world continues to go digital and connects through many media, you resist the trend because you have a stronghold that actually causes you to fear social media. Oh, you may not act like you are afraid, maintaining that it is your choice not to participate. You may even reinforce your position with biblical truths, but in most cases, you have built up a thought that now has a strong hold on your mind. Once you put a stronghold behind a biblical or religious fortress, it becomes even more difficult to change, which is what we are really trying to do when we "tear it down."

STRONGHOLDS AND FEAR

The thing I saw for the first time when I preached from the two passages mentioned at the beginning is that a stronghold in your mind always results in panic and fear when that stronghold is challenged or confronted, just like the life examples I provided earlier. An example of this truth about fear can be seen l in the story of David and Goliath. The army had a collective stronghold in their mind, which was that Goliath was too big for anyone to fight. When Goliath's presence confronted their stronghold , they were terrified: "On hearing the Philistine’s words, Saul and all the Israelites were dismayed and terrified" (1 Samuel 17:11) and "whenever the Israelites saw the man, they all fled from him in great fear" (1 Samuel 17:24).

You can memorize all the Scripture verses you want, but if, for instance, there is cancer in your family and the thought you will get cancer has a strong hold on your mind, you will live in fear. Studies also show that the stronghold can actually lead to the thing you fear becoming a reality! That is why it is important to identify your strongholds. I have determined that I am to be on a search-and destroy mission for my remaining days to identify my fear strongholds and bring them down.

How can you tear down your strongholds? You can do so first by honestly assessing where your greatest fears are. Where do you have a rock solid fear that seems rational but it limits your faith and then your walk. The opposite of fear is not unbelief; it is fear, so a strong hold keeps you from acting in faith, and if faith is how you please God and your fear won't allow you to function in faith, well Houston, we have a problem.

Once you acknowledge a stronghold has a strong hold on your life, then you can begin the process of dismantling and disarming it. The Spirit will help you do this, but there are no shortcuts. You must work to undo what it has taken you years to build. Next week, we will look further into how you can pull down a stronghold, but your assignment this week is to get comfortable with the fact that you have them, and analyze the effects they produce in your life. Have a blessed week!

962: Taking Thoughts Captive

I have known for some time that I have a mental health challenge, and I am learning to confront it on a daily basis. That's the good news. The bad news is you have the same mental health condition, but the good news is that you can deal with it just like I am. Let's examine this "problem" together as we begin our series Unlocking the Power of Your Thinking.

THE PROBLEM

Here is a definition of mental illness I retrieved from the National Alliance on Mental Illness:

A mental illness is a condition that affects a person's thinking, feeling or mood. Such conditions may affect someone's ability to relate to others and function every day. Each person will have different experiences, even people with the same diagnosis. Recovery, including meaningful roles in social life, school and work, is possible, especially when you start treatment early and play a strong role in your own recovery process. A mental health condition isn't the result of one event. Research suggests multiple, linking causes. Genetics, environment and lifestyle influence whether someone develops a mental health condition. A stressful job or home life makes some people more susceptible, as do traumatic life events like being the victim of a crime. Biochemical processes and and circuits and basic brain structure may play a role, too.

Notice the first line: "A mental illness is a condition that affects a person's thinking, feeling or mood." I agree with most of what the rest of the paragraph says is true, but I would disagree with one point. The experts say that "a mental health condition isn't the result of one event." I would argue that it is and that one event is known as the Fall of man. When Adam and Eve decided to eat from the tree of the knowledge of God and evil, they unleashed the cause of my mental condition (and yours).

Even when my mental condition may be caused by genetics or faulty brain function, I can trace that problem back to the Fall, for God did not create man with any defect (remember, He kept declaring that what He made was "good"?). Sinful thinking was my problem, is my problem, and will continue to be my problem, and I dare say the same is true for you. My thinking has been so wrong for so long that when I confront it, I am often facing a lifetime of accumulated wrong thoughts. The good news is that the Spirit is with me when I start to rebuild my thought inventory:

Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so.Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ (Romans 8:5-9)

(I realize there are some genetic defects that hinder or prevent normal brain functioning, and I am not addressing those. My point is that the main function of our mental capacity is to think and that function has been deeply impaired and the problem reinforced by wrong thinking, which has impacted my moods and behavior.)

MY THINKING, YOUR THINKING

Isn't your thinking the source of your feelings and moods? Isn't your thinking the source of yours (and my) addictions to shopping, anger, fear, and/or anti-social behavior? Paul wrote an interesting passage in regards to our thinking in 2 Corinthians 10:4-6: "The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 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. And we will be ready to punish every act of disobedience, once your obedience is complete."

In those verses, Paul introduced another possible cause for my mental condition and that is demonic activity! My thoughts that lead to my moods and behaviors can have their origins in supernatural powers that want to keep me enslaved and prevent me from obeying God. All this wrong thinking requires some measure of resistance on my part, as our definition above stated as well: We must play a "strong role" in our own recovery process. Paul would agree and say we must take every one of our thoughts captive to the obedience of God's word in Christ.

For me to play a role in my recovery, I must be aware of my thoughts—I must think about what I am thinking about. I must put my thoughts under the microscope, send it off for lab results, or put it through a series of x-rays to determine if they are the source of my mental condition that is hindering my effectiveness and relationships with others. When I find they are, then I must wrestle and fight to change those thoughts. If I take a "strong role" in the power of the Spirit, I can reverse this mental condition, which seems to be a lifetime process as I walk out my faith in Christ.

I am not fighting the diagnosis of my problem, and I urge you not to resist yours as well. I am the source of my own problems, but I can hasten my healing by not fighting the diagnosis or the cure, and that cure is aligning my thoughts with God's thoughts, thus unlocking the power of my thinking as God intended. The Spirit came to give me the mind of Christ, and I must be aware that this does not come naturally or easily, but only through spiritual effort free from my tendency to control the process. I must stop eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and feast on the fruit from the tree of life. When that happens, my diet of right thinking will deliver me from my condition, and it will do the same for you. Have a blessed week!