THE MIND

The mind itself is made up of three parts: thoughts, will and emotions. The thoughts comprise the consciousness and sub-consciousness.

The Thoughts

The thoughts are literally what is thought and what knowledge and social forces have trained the mind to think intuitively. Everyone has a brain. In the brain is stored experiences, knowledge and social training. The brain is the hard drive. It is arguable whether the experiences, knowledge and social training are part of the brain or part of the thoughts, but ultimately the distinction is unimportant. Thoughts occur when something in an individuals environment creates conflict with something which is stored in the brain. For an example, you see an ice-cream truck. You recall from experience that ice-cream tastes good. Therefore, you think something like, “I want some ice-cream.”

Jesus addressed some of the issues with thoughts. He said that “everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment” and “everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”[1] Anger is a socially trained response and therefore a thought. In the same way, lustful intent requires that one must think about the lust before doing it. Not to mention, lust takes place in the form of thoughts. Barclay considers adultery to be the fruit of lust.[2] In the same way, murder is the fruit of anger. The mind produces these thoughts which subject a man to judgment, even without action. Motive, even without action, is enough to subject a person to Christ’s judgment.

There are two major facets which effect ones ability to be obedient through thoughts. One must first consider their source of knowledge. All the experiences, education and social training which men subject themselves to are ultimately their basis for reason in determining purity of thought. It is far more effective to fill the mind with the things of the Spirit, rather than the things of the world if obedience to God is what is desired. Secondarily, one must be focused on the application of knowledge, which is done through reason. If one cannot use reason, then knowledge—pure or impure—is useless as it can only produce inconclusive results. Therefore, the one who is obedient in thought must have knowledge and intuition which is biblically accurate and be able to rely on the Spirit to discern pure thoughts.

The Will

The will is the ‘want’ and the drive behind actions. You can think about drinking a soda, but if you don’t want to, there is no logical reason to do it. The will is the part of the mind that ‘wants’ to drink the soda. Peter addresses the will of man:

But you need to realize that no one alone can understand any of the prophecies in the Scriptures. The prophets did not think these things up on their own, but they were guided by the Spirit of God. [3]

The prophets provide an exact example of the will. If the prophet were to speak something which they came up with themselves, then they were acting in accordance with their own will. They were speaking because of their own wants. But, when a prophet spoke because the Spirit of God was guiding them, then their will was in line with God’s will. The prophet was one in purpose with God. In the same way, man cannot understand scripture if it is read with a presupposition of want for the self. It must be read for want of God, from a desire to see God’s will be done. Collins notes that “the human will is bent on doing things it’s own way,” but Jesus only did the will of the Father because he was in complete submission to the Spirit.[4] Therefore, submitting one’s wants to the wants of God, through the Spirit, is essential to the effort for obedience. Obedience in the will is attained through submission of a person’s own will to the will of God.

The Emotions

The emotions are the part of the mind that a person is not in control of. Every person reacts to things in different ways. The feeling which causes these reactions is the emotion: happy, sad, excited, etc. Emotions are able to influence thoughts and even the will, but ultimately the thoughts are what determine the actions. People cannot have control over their emotions in the sense that they can control in some way whether they have them or not. Nor can a person control what emotions they have at any given time. Rather, people can control their responses to emotions. To play on the ice-cream example, the ice-cream truck may be far more effective in producing a want for ice-cream if the person has an emotion which predisposes them to it, such as anger or sadness. The emotions influence the thoughts.

The Bible addresses the way in which we allow ourselves to be influenced by emotions in order to define how to be obedient in spite of emotions. “…we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by…the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming.”[5] It seems that a person who gives themselves over to these ‘waves’ is easily influenced by men and by the world. In order to be obedient to God, a person must deny the influence of emotions that cause unholy action. “When the emotional faculty of the conscious life isn’t under the domination of the Spirit, an imbalance is produced, resulting in degrees of personal instability.”[6] This is not to say that Christians should not be emotional creatures; rather Christians should only rely on emotions secondarily, at best, as a source for reasoning truth. Primarily, Christians should rely on the Spirit of God to guide.

[2] Barclay, 1958, p. 144

[3] 2 Peter 1.20,21 CEV

[4] Collins, 1998, p. 121-122

[5] Ephesians 4.14 NAS

[6] Collins, 1998, p. 123