Who Are You Listening To?

Our brains are like sponges. We are constantly soaking up information from the world around us. Some of this information comes to us from our five senses. Our bodies are designed to use these senses to gather information from our environment. They filter this information to our brains, and then our brains process that information and decide what to do about it. That system works great for some things, but not so great for others. For example: If there is a fire, your nose smells the smoke. Your eyes may see the fire and/or the smoke. Your skin may register heat from the fire. All that information goes to your brain, which processes that a fire is present and tells you to put it out or get out of danger. But what if your brain is receiving information that isn’t true? Well, then the things your brain tells you to do with that information wouldn’t be true either or helpful.

God designed us to process information through our five senses. In the garden, our senses gave us information that was untainted, and we processed that information with our brains and with God. Remember, Adam and Eve walked with God every day. So if information came in that was confusing or different or new, they could take that information directly to God and receive the meaning of that information from Him. Since God is Truth, they would always be relying on a source of truth for interpretation of the world around them.

But when Adam and Eve sinned, things got complicated. Satan tempted Eve with the idea of knowing good and evil for herself, apart from God. Instead of going to God as the final judge of information, Satan was offering Eve the opportunity to be her own source of final judgement. Now, all the incoming information Adam and Eve processed was being run through their own faulty filter of good and evil. They were interpreting the information for themselves. They weren’t going to the source of Truth for how to interpret that information.

That’s the situation we find ourselves in today. Our senses supply us with information. We could refer to that information as “facts.” Facts are neither good nor bad. They just are. It’s what we do with those facts that makes a difference. How are we interpreting those “facts”? What source are we plugging into? In essence, who are we listening to? Satan loves to have us in this position because he can take those “facts” of what our senses are telling us, add a bit of a lie to them, and have us trapped in strongholds within our mind.

Let’s look at how this might play out in our lives. We walk into the office one morning. Our coworker doesn’t even look up or acknowledge our presence. The “facts” that our brain receives are: 1) Our coworker is present. 2) Our coworker doesn’t look up. 3) Our coworker doesn’t say “hi.” Those are the facts. Our brain then processes those facts through the filter of our experience. If we’ve had a bad experience in the past, our brain is going to interpret those facts through the lens of the bad experience. If I’ve experienced rejection before, then I might think my coworker is rejecting me also. I might believe she intended to ignore me, that she doesn’t like me, that I’m “invisible” or “worthless,” etc. All kinds of thoughts can go through my mind attributing significance to the simple fact that my coworker didn’t look up and say “Hi.” But none of those thoughts may be true. The Truth is that I don’t actually know anything about my coworkers motivation, and I’m probably unlikely to ask. I have served as my own judge on this matter. I have determined my own truth, tainted by sin. I have listened to my own authority. I have begun the process of allowing Satan to build a stronghold in my life.

What’s a stronghold? A stronghold is a wrong pattern of behavior or a pattern of thinking that is contrary to the nature of God and the Kingdom of God. Strongholds are rooted in the Devil’s lies. Here’s what a stronghold looks like:

Something happens. That’s the event. In our scenario above, it’s walking into the office and my coworker not acknowledging my presence. That leads to the lie. The lie is Satan’s interpretation of the event. It’s always negative. We assign a negative meaning to what happened. In this case, the lie I attach to this event is that my coworker doesn’t like me and is rejecting me. That brings me to the defense stage. In the defense stage, I act on the lie I have believed. Maybe I refuse to talk to this coworker. Maybe I build up walls of protection around myself so that this coworker can’t hurt me in the future. Defense is my attempt to take control of my life as a result of believing this lie. That leads to the response. The response is others reactions to my defense. If I stop talking to this coworker, they probably won’t reach out to talk to me. They may think that I don’t like them just the way that I thought they didn’t like me when this whole pattern started. Because they aren’t reaching out to me, I’m back at event. They aren’t talking to me. And the whole thing starts again. I’m trapped in a pattern of behavior and thinking that has me feeling stuck.

God has the answer to this, of course. 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 says “The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretense that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” Adam and Eve made the choice to unplug from God as the final source of knowledge and judgement of good and evil. We can, likewise, make a choice to unplug from ourselves as the final source of knowledge and judgement and instead plug into God as our final source.

Most people tend to think that they are struggling because of the negative event. They think that they are trapped by the negative things that happened to them in the past. If that were true, freedom would never be possible because we can’t time travel back to the past to undo the event. What we CAN do is attack the lie that we have associated with the event. How do I tear down the lie?

First, I have to identify the lie I have believed. Once I start thinking about the struggles in my life, it might become obvious what the lie is, but if it’s not obvious I can go to God and ask Him to reveal the lie to me. This puts God back as my source of information. I’m not trying to do this on my own power or in the flesh; I’m relying on God to be my source of information, Truth, and strength.

Next, I have to confess and receive forgiveness. Ultimately, by allowing Satan to dictate how I viewed the event, I have placed an idol in the place of God. I have looked to someone or something other than God to be my source. I have made Satan and his lies the final word on how I view the events in my life. So I need to confess to God that I have believed a lie and put Satan in charge, and then I need to accept the forgiveness God offers me for that. I don’t have to feel condemned or beat myself up for doing this. I just need to acknowledge what has happened, confess that it happened, and hand it to God.

Third, I need to renounce the lie. It’s all well and good to confess that I have believed a lie, but I have to go a step farther and renounce and reject the lie that I have believed. I need to actively speak against that lie, stating that I know it to be a lie and that I will no longer believe it. Most negative events involve other people, and so while I’m rejecting the lie I have attached to the event, I need to also forgive anyone involved in that event. Forgiveness doesn’t erase the event. It doesn’t say that what happened is okay, but it does release me from having to hang onto those negative feelings. It puts the event in God’s hands and allows Him to handle making it right.

Finally, I need to ask God to show me the truth. I need to let God show me how He viewed the event that happened to me. I need to see how He sees me. I need to get my Truth directly from the source of all Truth, which is God. When a negative event happens, I can stop right then and ask God to show me the Truth about this event. In the case of my coworker ignoring me, if I stop and ask God He may say things like “Your coworker is just preoccupied with work. She isn’t rejecting you.” or He might say, “I accept you no matter what. You are the apple of my eye, and My opinion of you is the only one that matters.” Hearing the truth from God allows us to reframe the event in our minds. We need to replace the lie we believed in the past with God’s revealed truth, and we need to confess that truth over our lives from that point forward.

When we accept God’s truth as the final word on the matter, we no longer need to defend ourselves. We put out defense in God’s hands. We let His opinion of us be the only one that counts. If God is for me, who can be against me? I don’t have to protect myself from hurt because God will protect me. Now my defenses start to come down as I begin to see myself the way God sees me and allow Him to protect and defend me. When my defenses come down, the way others react to me also changes. This leads to positive events, or at least positive interpretations of the events that happen. I’m no longer seeing life through that lens of hurt and pain. Now the cycle has flipped. I’m not caught in a stronghold any longer. I’m set free!

God wants us to experience freedom. It’s part of His mission to destroy the works of the enemy. If you’re struggling with freedom in an area of your life, ask God if you might be dealing with a stronghold. Take those negative thoughts captive. Hold them up to what God’s Word says about you and about your situation. Let God reveal to you the Truth. Make Him your final source.