Active or Passive?

It wasn’t so long ago that you were mired in that old stagnant life of sin. You let the world, which doesn’t know the first thing about living, tell you how to live. You filled your lungs with polluted unbelief and then exhaled disobedience. We all did it, all of us doing what we felt like doing, when we felt like doing it, all of us in the same boat. (Ephesians 2:1-2 MSG)

Whatever came of our 'old man'? No, not your father, your old nature - the one that used to find it so easy to run toward sin. It wasn't hard for us to compromise and choose sin because we allowed the world and all its enticements to tell us how to live our lives. The loudest voice received our attention - the 'coolest' or 'newest' fad took us in. We chose to listen to the advice of worldly counselors instead of the voice of God. No wonder we fell so easily into the traps the enemy of our souls set to ensnare us!

What we fill our minds with eventually becomes the very things that lead to action - you have probably heard me say that way too much, but it is something we all need to grasp fully and really get into our brains. We allow thoughts to enter both actively and passively. It is the passive ones that we need to guard against more than anything else because they 'seep' in without much notice and before long, they have taken hold of us. Too many times, we have come to believe something as truth simply because there has been so much bombardment of our 'passive pathways' that our brain just soaked it all in.

This is why I emphasize the importance of getting into scripture yourself. If you don't know scripture, it is easy for someone to tell you, 'This is what scripture says', and you fall for their misguided beliefs. We must allow God's Spirit to show us truth, but that doesn't happen through our 'passive pathways' as much as it occurs when we actively engage with him in times of study, worship, and listening. We settle for being 'fed' information rather than seeking it out on our own. The moment we begin to become 'passive learners' is the moment Satan has an inroad to bring us all manner of lies and half-truths.

Don't let the world, which doesn't know the first thing about living as God wants us to live, be the one to formulate your thoughts and lead you into life choices. Let God! Let his Spirit! That tiny three-letter word gives us so much trouble at times - we "LET" so much happen to us, around us, within us, and without us. What we allow matters. We can allow more than we realize when we are not actively engaged in choosing what we will allow into our thoughts. Close off those 'passive pathways' and begin to open the 'active pathways' to God and his Word. You might just find your thoughts about this world and its enticements changes significantly when you do! Just sayin!