Your Unlimited Life (4 page)

RENEWAL TRUTH

Death and life are in the

power of my tongue.

I will speak life.

(Proverbs 18:21)

When you think about it, you make a good confession, but when you’re not thinking about it, all that negativity in your heart comes out. That is what is killing you, keeping the pain in you, frustrating you, and keeping the stint on your life. Each of us must become responsible for the condition of our hearts and make sure that the only thing that comes out is “good” fruit.

Setting your mind on God’s Word is the beginning to your ultimate life. It is the essential ingredient to God’s best for you. If you receive this message alone, this book would be deemed a success. Understand the principle of the tree bringing forth fruit. Setting your mind on God’s Word is like uprooting the rotten tree and planting a new one. You can do it - your unlimited life awaits you.

2

YOUR HEART CONDITION

In Matthew 15:2 the Pharisees asked Jesus,
“Why do Your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat bread.”

That ticked Jesus off! He began to confront them and ended up calling them hypocrites. His wrath serves to highlight the importance of the situation and brings light to the reality of the power of the mouth.

Jesus said to them,
“Not what goes into the mouth defiles a man; but what comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man”
(v. 11). The disciples said to Jesus,
“Do You know that the Pharisees were offended by Your message today?”
(v. 12). Then, in verse 15, Peter said to Jesus, “Explain this parable to us.” Jesus responded:

Are you also still without understanding? Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts.

Matthew 15:16-19

Notice, that which can defile your life and comes out of the heart are your
thoughts
. Some of us have been taught that the heart is synonymous with the spirit and it is separate from your mind or soul. But here we recognize what’s going on in your thinking is an integral part of what is going on in your heart and therefore must acknowledge the connection and unity therein. I am convinced from Scripture that your heart is made up of spirit and soul. The inner man is your heart; spirit and soul, and your heart includes your thoughts. If your thoughts aren’t right, your heart isn’t right.

Have you ever heard someone say, “He has a good heart but a bad temper,” or “that wasn’t like her to say that; she means well”? In reality, although socially we have accepted those statements, they contradict the Bible. If you have bad thoughts, they are coming out of your heart.

For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, and blasphemies. These are the things which defile a man, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man.

Matthew 15:19-20

Religion, tradition, and the world inevitably force you to focus on all the wrong priorities. Even in church we see the power of the enemy trying to derail our thoughts and fill our mind with distractions that hold no eternal value. If you allow your thoughts to control you, you will become concerned with things like what kind of car the preacher drives, who is serving communion, or the attire of the praise team, rather than the condition of the hearts of those receiving communion, the passion of the praise team desperately trying to lead you in worship, or the level of sacrifice the pastor has given in order to be your spiritual authority. All the things that God does not care about such as religion, traditions, and the world have stolen people’s focus.

God cares about the condition of the heart because that is where the fruit and the productivity of your life will originate. What goes on in the heart of man is relevant because out of it springs the quality of life. A right heart will attract God’s best to you, while a wrong heart will attract trouble and problems. Either you will walk in the blessings and enjoy all God has for you, or you will keep bringing forth trouble.

RENEWAL TRUTH

Search me, O God, and know my heart:

try me, and know my thoughts.

(Psalm 139:23 KJV)

If you set your mind on things above and are renewed in knowledge after the image of Jesus, you will stay on course with God’s destiny for you.

S
TRUGGLE
, S
TRUGGLE
, S
TRUGGLE
!

Why do many Christians go through divorce? Go bankrupt? Stay sick? Get angry? Lie? We are supposed to be delivered from all of these problems, so why are they still going on? The answer is though we are saved, we haven’t set our minds on things above and we haven’t gotten our hearts right. As I said in the first chapter, it is because the tree is still rotten and it needs to be uprooted and a new tree needs to be planted.

Why do many Christians struggle with their weight? Is it your hormones and your metabolism? Why do you fight in your marriage? Why can’t some get their children to obey, catch up on their financial obligations and get out of debt? The good man out of the good treasure of the heart brings forth good things, but the poor man out of the poor treasure of his heart keeps bringing forth poverty. What are we to do? We must get the heart right.

Some people say, “I love God. I am sincere. I’m telling you the truth, Pastor, my heart is right.” In that sense the heart is right, but what thoughts are going on in the heart? It’s not about being sincere or being a good person. It’s about knowing what’s going on with your thoughts. And now that you are aware, the power to change is available.

There are people who can’t receive this teaching because they don’t have a clue what is going on in their head. If you don’t have some awareness of what is happening in you, you can’t even begin to understand this teaching. It takes honesty and openness to understand and then apply this teaching in your life.

When I first got saved, my mentor, Julius Young, would say to me, “Casey, you don’t even know what is going on in your own head.” I wanted to act like I knew everything about the world, yet I was nineteen, fresh off the streets, and had memorized maybe three Bible verses. He said, “You not only don’t know the world, you don’t know yourself.” Of course, in my adolescence I thought I knew everything and explained to him in my freshly sober state that I was fully aware of my environment. He responded, “You are completely unaware. You’ve got wrong thoughts and wrong attitudes so deeply imbedded in you and this process of change is going to be just that, a process.”

Do you ever catch yourself mad about something and you say, “Why did I get mad?” “What set me off today?” That’s where you are unaware. Do you ever catch yourself in the refrigerator, choking down about 9,000 calories, and you are thinking, “My God, why am I doing this?” Or, rationalizing one more day of cigarettes, thinking, “Why do I keep going through this?” Do you catch yourself skipping one more trip to the gym, and you wonder, “Why do I keep neglecting my exercise time?”

You are so unaware of how you are thinking that you are doing things out of habit, and therefore you are not getting the fruit that you want. You keep doing it because you haven’t plugged in to how to renew your mind, how to change your heart, or how to take hold of that tree so it starts producing the kind of fruit you desire.

RENEWAL TRUTH

I am swift to hear, slow to speak,

and slow to wrath.