My mind

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’  Mark 12:30 (NIV)

And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.  Philippians 4:7-9 (NIV)

And no, I'm not losing it completely, but I have trouble with allowing my mind to get away from me.  We were just talking in Sunday School class about how we are to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength, but our minds get in the way a lot of times.  I know mine does and it is so frustrating sometimes. 

Last week there was this issue with a particular thing (can you tell I'm trying to be as vague as possible to protect the innocent?) and it ate at me all week.  I could not figure out why someone wouldn't give me back this 'thing' that I really needed to perform certain duties.  This 'thing' had been mentioned a couple of times, but still was not returned to its natural position.  I stewed and stewed over why this 'thing' was being kept from me.  Was it intentional?  Was it an oversight?  Was I doing something wrong?  I kept discussing this 'thing' with my friend and we were both trying to figure out what in the world was going on with the 'thing'.

I prayed every day about getting this 'thing' back into my control, how I was going to approach the subject, again, what could be the reason for keeping it from me, etc.  Finally, on Friday, after my friend said one of the funniest prayers I have ever heard (especially from a serious prayin' grown woman;), we got an answer.  (No surprise there, right?)  I asked about the 'thing' and the answer I got was a simple one, and it had absolutely nothing to do with me or my abilities or inabilities.  And it would be returning to my possession and control soon.

I had to laugh and so did my friend...we had completely let our minds get carried away with the why's and what if's of the situation...and there was no need.  But let me tell you, it was like a dark gloomy cloud lurking overhead all week.  It was driving me crazy.  Again, all because I let my mind get out of control.

I can think of many times when I have thought or said, "What were they thinking?"  It is not hard to see how many people can get carried away with thoughts swirling around in their heads.  Maybe thoughts of "You're not good enough,"  "You'll never be loved,"  "You're such a disgrace," and I could go on and on.  Our mind is a powerful thing.  It's not hard to get fixated on statements like that, statements that Satan wants you to believe and surrender to.

In another example of the battle of the mind, how many times have you known with your heart the right thing to do, but your mind took over and instead you did the opposite or didn't do anything at all?  I know there have been times when my mind was saying no, I don't want to take on something else, but my heart was saying, yes, this is something God wants you to do...and vice-versa.  Sometimes our minds and hearts work against each other instead of in sync with one another.

I told my friend after our little incident with the 'thing' that we (I) must not doubt ourselves anymore.  We are good at what we do and we need to believe it.  There was no good reason for me to worry and stew and lose energy over the 'thing' and what might or might not be behind keeping it from me a couple days.  Ridiculous of me.

We are told in the book of Mark, as noted above, that the most important commandment is that we are to love God with four things.  I believe that he breaks it down into those four specific groups because it is important that we love him with EVERYTHING we've got.  When we are loving God completely with our heart, mind, soul and strength, it is easier to control our thoughts. Then if we put that verse together with the Philippians scripture up above, and focus on the good stuff, God will give us peace and guard our hearts!

A good reminder for me that somehow I have got to get a handle on my crazy, gets-carried-away-from-me-mind and stay focused on the good stuff.