THINK FOR YOURSELF
By Ada Brownell
Adapted from Imagine the Future You
ON SALE FOR .99 Here
As children, we
started thinking for ourselves when we gagged and spit out the spinach baby
food and then decided which cold cereal we like best. If we were born into a
poor Oriental family, we might like rice instead. If we lived in some African
slums, we’d be grateful for slimy oatmeal gruel from a dirty bowl.
In some parts of the
world, you’d think putting live bugs between two slices of bread was a special
treat, even though bugs crawled around on your fingers as you ate them. In
other countries you’d eat dog and monkey.
In times past, it was quite common for
Americans to eat cow and pig brains and kidneys. They made “head cheese,” which
was a meat jelly made from the head of a calf or pig. You can still buy pickled
pig’s feet. I don’t know if they still sell head cheese but it became popular
in a society that didn’t waste anything. In hard times, people also ate
squirrels and turtles.
You cringe. Your
stomach turns. That’s because you think for yourself and form an opinion.
Your head is not
empty now. You learned by experience and from other people. That’s the only way
we assimilate knowledge.
After we learn
something, we usually can recall it spontaneously. We ride a bike without
thinking about how we balance. We can type, text, cook, clean, repair cars, and
program computers. We balance checkbooks, do income tax, use math to buy and
sell, and make chemical formulas to create medicines that save people’s lives
or to invent guns, bombs, and rockets to kill them. You can store billions of
information blocks in your memory.
According to Kenneth
Higbee, author of Your Memory and How it Works and How to Improve it,[1]
your two-pound brain can store more than today’s most advanced computers.
Everything you put into your mind, especially
what you experience, changes you. You study to learn or pick up information
from your friends, your parents, or through the media, and you are affected.
IMAGINE
BEING ON GUARD
I am choosy about what goes into my brain and
hope you are, too.
The
Bible says when we have a close relationship with God, He will guard our
hearts and minds through Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:7). Yet, you decide
whether or not to post that guard, the Holy Spirit, at the door. If we listen
to what our conscience and scripture tells us, 24/7, and resist, Satan and
his cohorts flee in fear.
The
Holy Spirit, through our conscience, convinces us of sin (so we’ll know what it
is), righteousness (so we’ll understand that), and judgment (so we’ll know God
will reward those who live for Him and punish those who do not).
It helps to think on things that are true,
things that are honorable, just, pure, lovely, and of good report.[2] That means we are careful
about what we read, what we watch on television, the movies we go to or rent,
and what activities we practice. We pray for God’s wisdom and knowledge and
actively reject smut, lust of the flesh, lust of the eye, the pride of life,
vulgar language, gossip, backbiting, and wrong attitudes.
We also are able to put some beautiful things
in our brains: God’s Word, good music, good information, a willingness to
learn, a willingness to work, a determination to love, a determination to help,
a determination to make heaven our home.
We can pray for God to help with the words of
our mouth and the meditation of our hearts that they would be acceptable in His
sight. That’s what David did. He’d sinned and knew his vulnerabilities.
Although the Lord’s covenant is etched into
our hearts, we still need to study good things that “Ca-ching!” profitable
character. We’re told in the book of Timothy to study to show ourselves
approved unto God, so we will rightly interpret the Word of Truth.
But even if we memorize the Ten Commandments,
such as “thou shall not lie” or “thou shall not steal,” and “do not take the
name of the Lord thy God in vain,” we don’t automatically reject it when Satan
tempts.
If we use our excellent knowledge of good
things, our character and integrity grow. Our will becomes stronger. It’s like
seeing a growing baby every day. He looks the same size if we see him often,
but if we wait six months or a year, we see a big difference! And you and
others will see a change in you when you put positive things you learn into
action.
When we make good decisions, we become more
mature, more trustworthy, more dependable, and our potential for doing great
things increases.
©Ada Brownell 2014
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