Bruce Collins, Evangelist

The personal website of Bruce Collins

Right Thinking

 

 

All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:6)

 

We are all like Sheep

We would like to think we are all leaders but the Bible is clear that at least initially we are all followers and we follow the wrong person.  We follow the leadership of a subtle enemy who wants to destroy us.  He doesn’t appear to be an enemy.  He often appears to be very attractive like Absalom was in the Old Testament.  He will tell us what we want to hear, he will flatter us, he will kiss us (tell us how much he cares) and when we listen to his lies, he will destroy us. We need to be delivered from the lies of Satan.

 

Critical Thinking

I had an interesting discussion with a college professor recently who teaches political science.  We agreed that public education generally does not teach people to think critically.  When I taught at the college level, many students didn’t care about how we got problems solved, they just wanted the formula for finding the answer. They weren’t trying to think critically.

 

Some people think that they are finding the right answers to life’s questions by belonging to particular groups. They join churches and clubs and become members of political parties.  Often they become so loyal to those associations that they do not realize that they are being led like sheep to support things that are wicked and immoral. They are not thinking critically.  They are doing what they are doing because they want to "fit in."   It is one thing to be unsaved and to follow a leader blindly, but Christians have the Holy Spirit and a good Book to guide them.  We need to set the standard when it comes to critical thinking and when it comes to following the right leader.

 

When I go to Bible studies, many people tend to study somebody’s study guide.  I find that when we do that often we are more concerned with figuring out what the author of the study guide thought the passage meant than we are with trying to figure out what the Lord meant.  Instead of teaching tools for good study habits, we teach the conclusions of an author that we respect.  As a result, we have many varied opinions on many things.  I have found that many people are no longer concerned with the doctrine of the new birth even though the Bible says we must be born again.  I have also found out that there are many opinions about what a scriptural baptism is and means.  Some seem to think that the how and why of baptism simply doesn’t matter so long as one is saved.  But if one is saved, shouldn’t the Lord’s teaching on the subject of baptism matter?

 

Sometimes we Forget Who is Really in Charge

As we come to the end of the period of the judges in the Old Testament, we find everyone did that which was right in their own eyes (Judges 21:25).  This led to a Levite hiring himself out to be a priest in the house of one who had made an idol for his family to worship. Idols were wrong.  God appointed priests, not men.  A priest was supported by God through tithes and offerings but this man was willing to hire out for a position that was not found in the instruction Book. The Levite left that house to be a priest for the tribe of Dan (supposedly he obtained a more successful ministry).  The tribe of Dan became idolaters because of that idol. They had left the instructions of God and were following their own desires.  In addition, the whole tribe of Benjamin was nearly wiped out by their own countrymen because of the immorality that developed when everyone did that which was right in their own eyes.  Like sheep they had gone astray. They were no longer thinking critically or right.

 

When we do what is right in our own eyes (when we make our own decisions) as the Israelites did, who are we really following?  Normally, we are following the deceitfulness of Satan.  The Bible says that we don’t think like God thinks and we need to seek Him.  We may not like what He tells us but we will find out that the pleasing Him requires us to trust Him.  We can either be like the Israelites who turned away from the Lord and suffered because of that or we can do what the Lord asks us to do the way He asks us to do it and be blessed.  Isaiah says,  ‘"My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,"  says the LORD. ‘For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9)." 

 

Let’s get back to the basics and do what God says pleases Him rather than what the religious and secular world says works.  As Christians let us remember that yoking with unbelievers in business, marriage, politics and in our social lives will cause us to think like unbelievers.  It will not cause unbelievers to think like Christ.  The Lord is clear that we are not to do this (2 Corinthians 6:14-18).    When we get to the “other side,” we surely want to hear those words,  “Well done, good and faithful servant; you have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of your lord (Matthew 25:23).”

 

Let’s make sure that as sheep we are not going astray..

 

Bruce Collins

 

Meditation for the week of April 22, 2018

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