Casting down imaginations, and every high thing
that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God,
and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;
2 Corinthians 10:5
You know those thoughts, bad thoughts that come in your mind?
How did they get there in the first place?
The image of the angel on one shoulder
and the devil on the other comes to mind
Your conscience
What you know is right and wrong
Jesus said it is not the outside that defiles a man but what is on the inside
The thoughts that we allow to stay and that we entertain,
even some can become a part of us,
those are the things that defile a man
We have yucky stuff in there thoughts, desires, plans
Maybe our plans aren’t evil,
But maybe they aren’t Gods plans, which makes them evil
or maybe just futile, worthless
We have this battle with the flesh that seems to go on constantly
It happens so much that we’re used to it
and don’t even realize it sometimes when we succumb to the enemy
It takes exercising our senses
It takes learning the word and knowing God in such an intimate way
that our thoughts become cast down in His presence,
as we read His word and as we learn to refuse to entertain such thoughts,
as we walk in His fullness
The Holy Spirit is our teacher and guide
When I was a baby Christian,
I had a spiritual teacher who taught me to try to grab
the vain imaginations with my hand and pull them down
For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal
Kind of like pretending to put on the armor of God
Nope, that should be in place all the time
by doing the things directed by us in scripture,
the same with casting down vain imaginations
Using your hands in the air to try to pull down imaginations
is like washing the outside of the cup, meaningless
Those thoughts revealed to us should send shockwaves through our system
“You are grieving the Holy Spirit”
It’s spiritual and God honors our efforts and when we seek His help,
He makes up for our deficits or shows us how to overcome them
Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone;
because I am a man of unclean lips,
and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips:
for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Isaiah 6:5
Isaiah was made aware of his failings
because he had seen a vision of the Lord God,
Maker of Heaven and Earth
Isaiah was allowed to see God’s holiness,
which shone brightly and exposed the darkness
Then flew one of the seraphims unto me,
having a live coal in his hand,
which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar:
And he laid it upon my mouth, and said,
Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away,
and thy sin purged. Isaiah 6:6-7
That is the only way to clean out what’s vile inside of us,
by seeing God’s holiness and wanting it to be cleansed
and to be willing to do what it takes to cast down those vain imaginations
and bring every thought captive to the obedience of Jesus Christ
Scriptural References:
There is nothing from without a man,
that entering into him can defile him:
but the things which come out of him,
those are they that defile the man.
Mark 7:15
For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal,
but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;
2 Corinthians 10:4