Sabbath School TodayWith the 1888 Message Dynamic
Jesus Wept: The Bible and Human EmotionsLesson 6: "Good Thinking"
Our Sabbath School lesson covers the results of bad thinking--the undesirable behavior, and asks us to consider the "specific actions that we are called upon to do in order to live the kind of life in Christ we are promised" (p. 51). This is the "gray" area that plagues our thinking--a checklist of what we must do to change our thinking. Books and books (Christian and otherwise) have been written on the subject of mental health, but we would like to present this lesson topic in a different light, to stretch our thinking beyond ourselves.
Could this issue of good (or bad) thinking correspond to the Old Covenant and the New Covenant? Can Old Covenant thinking be passed down from generation to generation? For example, throughout ancient Israel's centuries, Baal worship kept infiltrating generations of God's true people. Only occasional brief revivals under kings like Hezekiah or Josiah brought temporary relief. The source of the problem? Always, the Old Covenant thinking their fathers embraced at Mt. Sinai and bequeathed to their children. Even today the spiritual failures of many sincere people are the result of being taught Old Covenant ideas, especially in childhood and youth.
The New Covenant truth was an essential element of the 1888 message, and even today lifts a load of doubt and despair from many heavy hearts. The Old Covenant idea of "obey and live" does nothing more than "gendereth to bondage" (Gal. 4:24; "slavery, NEB), while the New Covenant was established on "better promises" [the promises of God rather than the promise of the people, Heb. 8:6] (see Patriarchs and Prophets
, p. 372)."You are weak in moral power, in slavery to doubt, and controlled by the habits of your life of sin. … You cannot control your thoughts, your impulses, your affections. … You cannot change your heart, you cannot of yourself give to God its affections; but you can choose to serve Him. … Thus your whole nature will be brought under the control of the Spirit of Christ; your affections will be centered upon Him, your thoughts will be in harmony with Him" (Steps to Christ
, p. 47; emphasis supplied).Some questions arise: Is it possible for any church in any age of history, anywhere in the world, to be "lukewarm" and at the same time be living under the New Covenant? Is this what Christ died to accomplish--to raise up a professed Christian church that is apathetic in its devotion to its Savior and thankfulness for His sacrifice on the cross?
You can't read very far in the New Testament without being confronted by a painful truth: spiritual lukewarmness is inconsistent with understanding and believing the New Covenant. Wherever we see such pathetic devotion, we can know we are in an area of spiritual experience dominated by Old Covenant ideas. They may have their roots beneath the surface of our consciousness, and it's the height of arrogance for us to boast that we are "rich and increased with goods" in our understanding of the gospel when Old Covenant principles still bedevil our thinking.
Old Covenant "Christian" living is highly popular, but it's difficult for Jesus to explain to the holy angels how His people can be content to go on generation after generation, century after century so spiritually naïve, so self-satisfied. In His message to the leadership of His church in the last days, He confesses that this lukewarmness perpetuated so long makes Him feel like throwing up (see Rev. 3:16, 17). He is suffering the pain of acute nausea; should not our concern be, not for self, but for His healing?
When asked, "How can I control my thoughts," Ellet J. Waggoner once wrote that there is only one remedy for our wayward thoughts, and that's found in Isaiah 55:7-9: "Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." In other words, let the Lord do our thinking in us. This is possible; for we have His assurance: "Commit thy works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established" (Prov. 16:3).
The apostle Paul wrote, "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 2:5). But how do we get that "new mind"? Not by "working," not by "doing." It's our choice, by faith, to "see" Jesus and permit His thoughts to become our "right thinking." If we don't resist the Holy Spirit, Christ, our great High Priest in the heavenly sanctuary, will work to impart that "mind of Christ" to us--the greatest joy we can have to be totally "at-one" with Him. The process is ministered by "grace." As you begin to appreciate the dimensions of the agape that drove Him to the cross, His "mind" begins to be imparted to you. And you "overcome … even as [He] overcame" (Rev. 3:21).
As we near the glorious finishing of God's work in the world and the coming of Jesus, all the cobwebs and junk of legalistic, egocentric thinking will be swept out. Then when the Lord has a world church truly reconciled to Him, the world can be lightened with His final message (18:1-4).
--Carol A. Kawamoto[With thanks to Robert J. Wieland]
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