Bible
Study: Colossians 3:1-11. / Luke 6:20-26.
The human
mind is the most powerful machine in the world. The mind is so powerful that it
can bring into existence things that have never been seen or heard of before
and make those things even determine the future of one’s life. Have you noticed
how you spend an amount of time thinking about a particular object only for you
to suddenly start seeing that thing everywhere you go?
As long as
we are capable of thinking, we are bundles of infinite potentials. There is no
limit to what we can become as long as we set out our minds to do it. Long
before man learnt how to fly the first rocket, the idea of going to the moon was
already a reality in the imagination of men. No invention, no painting, no work
of art was ever produced by man physically without first becoming a reality in
the mind.
The human
mind is so powerful that it can either make us great or pull us down. It all
depends on what we keep feeding the mind with. We can become anything we want
to, as long we have the right mind-sets. Any successful actor would tell you
that before ever playing a role in a movie, he or she first employs imagination
which is basically telling the mind a story and making the mind believe it. When
on stage or before the camera, the actor virtually forgets who he is in real
life and takes on a whole new personality which he has made himself believe. This
way, the actor is able to behave, say and do things in a manner that perfectly
suits the script.
Now,
coming to the practical application of all we have said so far, do you know
that you can actually change? Do you know you can completely overcome even
those bad habits and sins which have held you down for so many years? Do you
know you can actually decide from today that you want to become a Saint and
follow it through? Yes, yes, yes and yes but it all begins with what you do
with your mind.
That is
why St. Paul admonishes us today in the first reading saying: “Seek the things
that are above…think of what is above, not of what is on earth…”. If we were to
consciously and deliberately decide to select our thoughts on a minute by
minute basis daily kicking out as much as possible all such thoughts that are
contrary to what we desire to become, we can actually succeed in becoming
Saints. The battle over sin can never be won externally, it is always a
question of the mind.
One practical
example can be, say a person struggling with an addiction to pornography. Every
time, he allows his eyes feast on such demonic pictures whether through the
internet, by phone, or through tapes or magazines, the mind suffers terribly
and the person remains caged like one in chains. You may take away every link
to such things physically but as long as the mind itself is allowed to roam
freely, no sooner or later it returns back there. In other words, unless the
mind itself is healed, everything else one may do to avoid sin is like treating
mere symptoms rather than attacking the virus itself that causes the sickness.
This is why the exercise of contemplation, that is, the practice of spending
time meditating about God or reading about the lives of the Saints is
invaluable.
There is a
saying that no matter how you wash a pig and clean it up, you can never turn it
into a pet. It is not soap and water the pig needs but a new mind and if you
cannot change its mind, that it, its love for dirt, all the soap and water in
this world are useless.
When we
take out time to meditate on what Paul says to us today, we can see that the
battle against immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, greed, and so on can
only be won by a deliberate effort on our part to SEEK THE THINGS THAT ARE
ABOVE. If money, fame or power is your number one priority in life, I bet that
your struggle with sin is a lost battle. But if you make heaven your primary
goal in life, you can even become a saint while still living.
In the
Gospel passage, Jesus gives us the beatitudes, that is, the BE-ATTITUDE of the Christian.
Each of these beatitudes represents how
we should approach life, the kind of attitude we should have. An attitude is
acquired by consciously training the mind to think in a particular way or see
life in a particular way. As the saying goes again, if each of the alphabets
were to represent a number, only the word attitude adds up to 100%. Only an attitude
that puts God as one’s greatest priority can get to heaven.
Let us
pray:
Lord
Jesus, help me to train my mind that it may be a tool for me to get to heaven
and not a weapon in the hands of my enemy, the devil in pulling me away from
you. Amen.
Good morning.
Be Happy. Live Positive. Have Faith. It is well with you.
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