What’s on your mind? Does that question sound familiar?

The Bible says in Proverbs 23:7 that ‘as a man thinks in his heart, so is he.’ What the Bible actually implies here is that we are all a sum total of what we imagine or what we ponder; reflect on, or reason about. It’s as simple as that.
What you think is what you are and what you are is exactly how the world will treat you.
Your mind, being the centre of reasoning, thoughts and feelings is a very important part of your being. It is actually both a receiver and a donor of information. This essentially means that whatever you decide to feed your mind on will eventually influence all your mental faculties and mechanisms.
By the grace of God and the privilege given by my leaders I have had opportunities to minister at a number of high schools around the city and one of the most evident problem that I have noticed over the years is that people’s mindsets are messed up. Many young people’s minds are full of information they have gathered from the television, from the music, the movies and the internet and all this garbage becomes the basis of their lifestyles and according to the scripture above, they become garbage themselves.
I remember sometime last year we were at a certain school and we encouraged the young people there to surrender all the worldly material they had in possession so that we could get rid of it. I tell you, the young ladies brought out books which had pictures of male celebrities they idolised; they brought out song books which were overly better kept than their own school books. My eyes were opened on that day to the fact that what we are essentially dealing with as ministers of God is simply the issue of replacing the information that would have been accumulated over the years.
Many people’s minds have been fed with all the wrong ideas about life, relationships, love, sex, family and God. The things that they have been exposed to have caused them to reason in a particular way and they have become particular people as a result.
The word of God says in Romans 12:2, ‘And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, in order to prove by you what is that good and pleasing and perfect will of God.’ In other words, your mind has to be wired in a certain way so that people can access the will of God through your lifestyle.
Our minds are the ultimate register of our convictions and we usually express them through words, no wonder why Facebook asks you, ‘What’s on your mind?’ Speaking of Facebook, allow me to meddle here a little bit; what some born again Christians post on their walls shocks me sometimes.
Thank God for Facebook because it openly shows you people’s worldviews, which unfortunately at times are stupid and wrong in a Christian sense.
The reason why you find it so easy to post curse words like the ‘F’ word, the ‘B’ word et cetera is primarily because that is what your mind is wired in. So, until you change what is in your mental faculty, you cannot help but post junk on that public platform, more so as a Christian.
The world is supposed to experience the goodness and the grace of God through us and we are doing them a disservice if we have minds that are completely wired like theirs. Imagine having a school-teacher or a lecturer whose mental prowess is also as good as yours. The fact is that you wouldn’t really need them, would you?
Ask yourself whether there is any difference in the way you think in comparison with the people around you who might not be saved or who might not be fully committed Christians. What do you begin saying when everyone complains about the economic situation of our country? Are you also as hopeless and helpless like the rest of them? Have you also been fed with negative information as them?
What do you think when one of your close relatives is said to be HIV positive or when you are found to be HIV positive? Are you also proclaiming like everybody else that you are waiting to die? You shouldn’t because you are a child of the Most High and your thoughts are based on the Word of God.
I shared last week from Colossians 3 saying that we should set our minds on things above only because, I’m afraid, most of the things on earth are a total opposite of what the things above are like and hence you cannot afford to bank on them.
If we are going to be effective Christians and ministers of this gospel in our various calls, we have to change the stuff that we allow into our minds. We should have the bread of life only, which is the Word of God. Only then can we then have the proper ‘status updates’ in our actual daily lives at any given time.
Let’s continue chatting on Facebook. Until the next time good people, may God richly bless you.
If Christ be anything, let Him be everything.
Bruce Itai Chimani is a BSc in Journalism and Media Studies Student at NUST.
He can be contacted on [email protected]
Facebook Page: Bruce Itai Chimani I
Blog: www.bruceitaichimani.wordpress.com