Evidence that the Spiritual Battleground is our Mind

Cognitive Dissonance? Cognitive Distortion?

Cognitive dissonance may be defined as the state of having inconsistent or conflicting thoughts, beliefs, attitudes or behaviors, which, in turn, produce a feeling of discomfort within the individual.

Cognitive distortions are simply ways that our mind convinces us of something that isn't really true. These inaccurate thoughts are usually used to reinforce negative thinking or emotions — telling ourselves things that sound rational and accurate, but really only serve to keep us feeling bad about ourselves.

Some Distortions:

• Always being right
• Blaming
• Disqualifying the positive
• Emotional reasoning
• Fallacy of change
• Fallacy of fairness
• Jumping to conclusions
• Labeling and mislabeling
• Magnification and minimization
• Overgeneralizing
• Personalizing
• Making "must" or "should" statements
• Splitting (All-or-nothing thinking, black-or-white thinking, dichotomous reasoning)

It's not whether a thought is positive or negative or a "thinking error". The question is whether the thinking is based on truth, which stirs conviction that leads to hope, or on a lie which concludes condemnation which leads to hopelessness.

Renewing the mind...

Taking every thought captive

Pray without ceasing

The potential in being "Born Again" of the Spirit?.. Emotional Health!

If we are Spirit, Soul, and Body as most Christians believe, how do I make sense of it?

Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ 1 Thessalonians 5:23.

I get "body/flesh", the physical, material container. That has a location and has a perspective that is limited by my 5 senses. But...

Genesis 2:7 states that Man was created as a "living soul."

7 And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul.

The soul consists of the mind, the will, and the emotions.

Image from: www.salvationandsurvival.com/2019/12/christians-do-you-act-out-of-your-soul.html

In one who is born again, the soul and the spirit are mysteriously tied together and make up what the Scriptures call the heart.

The writer of Proverbs declares, " Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life." (Prov. 4:23). We see here that the "heart" is central to our emotions and will.

Our "Heart" is comprised of our Soul and our Spirit. Our soul has free will, emotions, and a mind.

My mind through its intrinsic powers of reason and memory can be informed by the limited perspective that my flesh provides, or by the unbound perspective of the Holy Spirit through my Born Again spirit.

My emotions play an important role in many of the choices and decisions my free will allows me to make.

https://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/how-much-of-my-decision-making-is-emotional

Proverbs 4:23
New International Version-
Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.

New Living Translation-
Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.

New American Standard Bible-
Watch over your heart with all diligence, For from it flow the springs of life.

King James Bible-
Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.

Contemporary English Version-
Carefully guard your thoughts because they are the source of true life.

Good News Translation-
Be careful how you think; your life is shaped by your thoughts.

Three Classes of People

Carnel, Spiritual and Fleshly

1 Corinthians 2:14-15 14 The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. 15 The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one.

1 Corinthians 3:1 Brothers, I was not able to speak to you as spiritual people but as people of the flesh, as babies in Christ. 2. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, because you were not yet ready for it. In fact, you are still not ready, 3 because you are still fleshly.

Think about your thoughts

Do you ever think about your thoughts? Have you ever realized that you were arguing with yourself? I'm not talking about a debate on what movie you should go see. I'm talking about putting forth excuses as to why you should do something that you know you shouldn't do. Or trying to convince yourself you should not do something you know you should do. What's up with that?

Paul said it well when he explained "the things I want to do I don't do and the things I don't want to do that I do."

Realizing this is the first step in understanding the " Battle for your Mind".

The enemy is present in your thoughts. When you find yourself arguing with yourself realize you are under attack. The battlefield is your mind.

There are several verses that you need to understand.

Take every thought captive to the Lordship of Christ.  We do not wrestle against flesh and blood. Pray without ceasing.

Battle of the minds.

Have you ever considered your thoughts? Do you ever think about your thoughts? Why are your thoughts like having a conversation?  Have you ever argued with yourself?

Your thoughts are an integral part of your life. They reside in the realm of your mind. Every choice and every decision you make is a result of the "thought processes" that go on within your mind. The Bible says "as a man thinks in his heart so is he."

What you believe has everything to do with what you think. What you think will be revealed in what you say and what you do. These choices and decisions have their consequence, good or bad! They become unalterable facts in the gist of your life. Will they be lessons for you today?

So what you believe affects what you think, what you think affects your decisions and choices, which creates unalterable facts about you.

This all takes place in your mind. A battleground of competing thoughts, where a conversation is carried on and sometimes even arguments happen.

How do you explain it all? VOICES?

Lies and Distraction

Satan is a liar and he uses distraction.

Wikipedia defines Distraction as the process of diverting the attention of an individual from a desired area of focus and thereby blocking or diminishing the reception of desired information (TRUTH).

The world is full of distraction. It is designed to take up your time. To occupy your attention and to bring your focus on the temporal instead of the eternal.

The enemy’s basic attack is to make you doubt what God has said is true about who you are in Christ. Your identity. He does that by trying to get you to focus on the flesh and what your 5 senses tell you. What you can see as opposed to the unseen. The work of the enemy is to destroy relationship with God and those around you. The battleground is your mind and the weapons are truth and lies. (in your thoughts)

II Cor. 10: 3-5 3 For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh. 4. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. 5. Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience (Lordship) of Jesus Christ