First Thought
A whiteboard used to hang in our bedroom, on the wall facing the bed, with these words written on it.
There’s a type of hazy consciousness that we awake into on most days. The dream state slowly mixing with reality, the fog lifting and revealing again the solid outlines of our life.
Where does your mind wander during these in-between times? What do you think on as you drift in and drift out?
There is a tendency to linger in this space. It’s comfortable, safe, warm, and so we find ourselves stalling, biding our time until “the thought” hits us.
This thought acts as the lightning bolt of motivation, waking us from any last remnants of sleep and propelling us forward in our day. This thought grants us energy, purpose, and perhaps a little excitement. We are now looking-forward-to rather than lingering in-between.
It is on this thought that I want to speak today.
What is your first thought each day?
A whiteboard used to hang in our bedroom, on the wall facing the bed, with these words written on it, “First Thought.” These words served as a reminder to us of our desire to serve God every day, starting with our very first ounce of consciousness.
We can make all kinds of scientific claims about the power of our thought life, negative vs positive self-talk, motivational words and phrases we repeat to ourselves, and these claims would hold a certain amount of validity.
Yet for us this wasn’t about psychology, it was about idolatry.
“Thou shall have no other gods before me,” means more than just avoiding carved images and satanic temples. If the God I serve, the One true living God, He who holds nations in His hands and He who shares the title of savior with no one, promises to be unto me my everything, to meet my every need, to satisfy me, to grant me access to every spiritual blessing - then holding anything back from Him or turning to anything else in place of Him is idolatry. He is sufficient, I have need of no other.
As I started to examine my own thought life, I found that as I laid in bed searching for the motivational thought to give me energy for the day I would turn to other sources:
Big work project today
Got an early appointment
Looking forward to trying out that new coffee we just bought
Lots on the to-do, better get to it
Time for exercise
Each of these thoughts gave me the energy I needed, a sense of purpose, a little excitement even. And so I would start my day feeding on the bread of the world rather than on the Bread of Life.
“My voice you shall hear in the morning, O Lord; In the morning I will direct it to You, and I will look up.” Psalms 5:3
We talk much in these letters about faith, much about the knowledge of God and His Kingdom, and much about sound doctrines which give us a firm and steady foundation. These things are crucial, central and beautiful.
Yet these inner certainties must also lead to an outward appearing - a change in practices, a producing of fruit, a steadiness of resolve, a commitment to not grow weary of good works. Unfortunately, the emphasis is often placed on the external change before the internal root has been made to lay bare. (Job 28:9)
Be cautious then of the order in which you confront change in your life. Without a foundation of faith, only made possible by the grace of God unto salvation, whereby He places inside of you a new heart and a new mind, and makes it possible, through His Spirit, for you to confess, “Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God,” without this foundation, any external change will be a law you cannot keep, a weight you cannot bear.
Stop then at this point and “examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith.” (2 Corinthians 13:5)
My Morning Prayer
Psalms chapter five encourages us to begin each day with a first thought which glorifies Christ. Moffat translates the passage as such:
“My King and God, give ear to my appeal, for I am calling out to thee; oh hear my morning prayer, for in the morning I set forth my plea, waiting thine answer.”
Hear my morning prayer…I set forth my plea, waiting thine answer.
Will you set your thoughts and affections on Him this early in the day? Will you raise forth a “morning prayer,” one with the desperation of a “plea” and then will you quiet yourself to “look up” and wait for His answer?
As you begin to pursue this discipline in your morning thought life, you will see how it carries over into the rest of the day as well. You will begin to sing out with joy as did the psalmist, “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing [or acceptable] unto You.” (19:14) This is not a burden to keep but a praise to lift forth!
And as you set your thoughts upon the sufficiency of the Lord, He will come to you with everything you need for the day at hand. Not just in material resources but in abundance as well. When our thoughts are consumed with Christ, we have no room left for worry about tomorrow.
“Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.” Matthew 6:34
This, ‘do not worry,’ is not primarily an appeal to a strict self-discipline you cannot keep - similar to the trick, ‘don’t think about purple elephants,’ and then it’s the only thing you can think about. But rather it is an indication of the overwhelming abundance of each day with Christ that is available to us. This is a hard concept to grasp intellectually until you’ve felt this abundance for yourself. Pursue it!
We each at times will face seemingly insurmountable challenges, we will be pushed to the brink, our character will be challenged, and we will grapple with feeling unprepared, unqualified or unworthy.
Yet…from the very first moment of every day, think on these things:
Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Philippians 4:8 ESV
Even in our prayers, think on these things
It is even in the praying for and thinking about the well-being of others that we must be cautious to guard our thoughts. Let me recount a story from the life of John Hyde (nicknamed ‘Praying Hyde’):
The confession of the sin of others laid hold of John Hyde’s heart. It was about that time he was taught a very solemn lesson - the sin of fault-finding, even in the prayer for others.
He was once weighed down with the burden of prayer for a certain Indian pastor. So he retired to his inner chamber, and, thinking of the pastor’s coldness and the consequent deadness of his church, he began to pray, ‘O Father, thou knowest how cold’ — he was going to say; but a finger seemed to be laid on his lips, so that the word was not uttered, and a voice said in his ear, ‘He that toucheth him toucheth the apple of mine eye.’
Mr. Hyde cried out in sorrow: ‘Forgive me, Father, in that I have been an accuser of the brethren before thee!’ He realized that in God’s sight he must look at ‘whatsoever things are lovely.’ Yet he wanted also to look at ‘whatsoever things are true.’ He was shown that the ‘true’ things of this verse are limited to what are both lovely and true —that the sin of God’s children is fleeting; it is not the true nature of God’s children.
For we should see them as they are in Christ Jesus - ‘complete’ - what they shall be when He has finished the good work he has begun in them. ‘And it is right for me to be thus minded concerning you all, because I have you in my heart.’ Then John asked the Father to show him all that was to be praised (‘If there be any virtue and if there be any praise, take account of these things’) in that pastor’s life. He was reminded of much for which he could heartily thank God and spent his time in praise.
This testimony of confession in Mr. Hyde’s prayer life is worthy of praise all on its own, yet the story continues…
He shortly afterward heard that the pastor had at that very time received a great reviving and was preaching with fire.
—
Will you join me this week in examining our first thoughts? Let’s give Him not only our very best, but also our very first.
In love,
Derek