Mentoring Men for the Master

WE HAVE DONE THE DIFFICULT – even Showing Up!

WE HAVE DONE THE DIFFICULT – even Showing Up!

NOW WE MUST DO THE IMPOSSIBLE IN MOST MEN’S EYES –

Internalizing the Word

But how, you may ask:  Answer:  THE POWER THAT STOPPED THE SUN (Josh. 10:13) and RAISED JESUS FROM THE DEAD (Romans 1:4) DWELLS INSIDE OF EVERY BORN-AGAIN PERSON (Romans 8:11).  But that power must be released in us individually.  But How?  We find the answer in the Book of Acts in the way most first-century believers prayed:

  1. All those first-century Christians were “FILLED” (Acts 2:4) or controlled by the Holy Spirit because they were obeying Jesus (Acts 5:31).
  2. All Christians prayed TOGETHER.  There is not one reference of one Christian praying alone because they believed the promise of Jesus in Matthew 19:19-20).
  3. All Christians prayed for one definite cause at the time (Acts 4:29).
  4. The power of God shook the individuals, the whole church, and turned the whole world upside down (Acts 17:6)
  5. The church was empowered to do the impossible (Acts 2:41-42) for nothing is impossible with God (Luke 1:37; Matthew 19:26; Jer. 32:17), since “God is able to do exceedingly abundantly above anything we could ask or imagine” but “ACCORDING TO THE POWER  working or released in us” (Ephesians 3:20).
  6. The relatively small church, made up primarily of the common man, conquered the Roman Empire by 313 AD when Christianity was pronounced as the official  religion of the vast world-wide Empire.

 

APPLICATTION TO MENTORING MEN, INT’L.

  1. We have done the difficult, even to show up to be accountable for Internalizing the Word of God.
  2. We must now do the impossible in men’s eyes, not just the difficult, if we would Internalize the Word of God until our minds and hearts are so filled with the Word that we think the very mind of God and learn to live godly as Jesus lived.  To state this more simply means that every mentoree will believe that Internalizing the Word is the command and will of God for him, and that he will highly resolve and have the intention in his heart to Internalize the Word, one verse at a time (It’s hard by the yard, but a cinch by the inch), always persisting and repeating the verses until they are etched in his soul,  and never giving up or quitting, all the time depending on the Holy Spirit who is available to him because he is obeying Jesus, the result that he is so filled with God’s Word that he thinks and lives the very Word of God and conforming to the image of Christ (Romans 8:29).
  3. We must pray together at our tables at the outset of each class, in small groups, and with one or more some times.  Thad and I do this as we meet weekly to plan our work.
  4. We must pray for one definite thing:  Internalizing the Word of God.
  5. We can easily stick with the 5 B’s when we concentrate on one great cause.
  6. WE must cease being “LDS’s”, because we will begin praying at 5:45 on Friday and 7:00 on Saturday.
  7. The Captain of each table will be prepared to call his group to pray as described above at the outset of each class.

 

 

 

The Way to Upgrade Your Mind is to Download Scripture

Half of learning is learning.  The other half of learning is unlearning.  Unlearning is twice as hard as learning.

If you study the teachings of Jesus you will note that learning was not his primary goal.  His primary goal was unlearning.  He was engineering religious minds in reverse.  For example in the Sermon on the Mount, He repeats two phrases over and over:“You have heard that it was said…”

  1. “But I tell you…”

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery’.  But I tell you that whoever looks at a woman lustfully, has already committed adultery” (Matthew 5:28).

“You have heard it said ‘love your neighbor and hate your enemy’. But I tell you, love your enemies” (Matthew 5:44).

So Jesus was seeking to unlearn His generation the disastrous lies that had been etched into their psyche.

So we see that half of spiritual growth is learning what we don’t know and the other half is unlearning what we do know.  And mark this down – The failure to unlearn irrational fears and false prejudices keeps us from becoming who God wants us to be.  We are born with only two fears, fear of falling and fear of loud noises, but mankind has conjured up 2000.  That means that every other fear is learned and more importantly, that means that every other fear can be unlearned.

The lame man in John 5 is a shining example of the need of unlearning.  He had been crippled for 38 years and assumed that he could only be healed if he was the first one into the pool of Bethesda when the waters were stirred. But Jesus uninstalled that false belief with one sentence, “Pick up your bed and walk.”

In a word, Jesus rewired the man’s brain which had kept him captive for 38 years.

Neurologically speaking that is what we do when we internalize Scripture.  We are literally upgrading our minds by downloading the mind of Christ which is set forth in Scripture.  We are specifically commanded in Romans 12:2, “Do not conform your thinking any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”  I read that a computer hard drive needs to be defragmented to optimize performance.  Our minds also need to be defragmented.  But how do we defragment our minds? How do we get ourselves out of the mental pit we’ve gotten ourselves into?  The way to upgrade your mind is to download or internalize Scripture. 

Permit me to express this truth in a neurological way.  “Doctors Avi Karni and Leslie Ungerleider of the National Institute of Mental Health did a fascinating study asking subjects to perform a simple motor task – a finger-tapping exercise.  As subjects tapped, the doctors conducted an MRI to identify what part of the brain was being activated.  The subjects then practiced the finger-tapping exercise for four weeks.  In each instance, it revealed that the area of the brain involved in the task had expanded.  That simple task – a finger-tapping exercise – literally recruited new nerve cells and rewired neuronal connections.”[1]   As it were, when we internalize Scripture we are recruiting new nerve cells and rewiring our minds.  The result is that we stop thinking human thoughts and start thinking God’s thoughts.   “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he” (Prov. 23:7).

Final conclusion:  The reason scores of men in MMM, young, middle aged and old, are being literally transformed is not because of Bill Bennett or Thad Faulk or Walt Fletcher.  It is simply because  they filled their minds with the Word of God and the Holy Spirit has taken this truth and produced godly thoughts which issue in godly men.  Deo Soli Gloria!

If you are not willing to look foolish, you are foolish

When you get excited about God, don’t expect everybody to get excited about your excitement.  Why?  When you begin to internalize God’s Word in your life, the Holy Spirit will turn up the heat underneath you and that will disrupt the status quo.  Some people will be inspired by what God is doing in your life and will join you.  Others will be convicted, and they will mask their personal convictions by finding something to criticize.  Nine times out of ten, criticism is defense mechanism.  We criticize in others what we don’t like about ourselves.  According to 2 Samuel 6, when the Ark of the Covenant was returned to Jerusalem, David leaped and danced before the Lord.  Many thought David was crazy, especially Micah his wife.  But David knew that spiritual maturity was caring less and less about what people think and more and more about what God thinks.  Do you agree?

BROTHER, MEET YOURSELF IN THE WORD!

Hebrews 4:12

Oh, how you and I need to know ourselves.  But how can we?  Jeremiah the prophet writes, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately (incurably) wicked.  Who can know it?”(Jeremiah 17:9).   No one on this earth can know his heart apart from the x-ray of the Word of God.  The Word of God is the only instrument which can diagnose our need, cut out the problem and heal the wound, so says Hebrews 4:12.  Consider this verse with me phrase by phrase:

  1. The Word of God X-Rays Our Unknown and Unseen Spiritual Condition.  As it were, the Word of God stretches us out on the operating table and reveals to us the critical needs of our souls when we thought we were perfectly healthy though on the verge of death.  Illus.:  Millions of people go to their doctors for a check up, thinking they are perfectly fine, only to learn that they have a cancer which must be removed or they will be dead in a very few days.  Millions are dying in our world – many in our churches – think they are in good shape because they have never seen their true needs in the Word of God.

 

  1. The Word of God Does Not Simply X-Ray and Reveal The Cancer of Sin, But It Cuts Out What Needs To Be Cut Out.  No physical surgery is pleasant, but absolutely necessary for healing and without which there is certain death in a matter of time.  So it is with the spiritual surgery, but spiritual surgery is rough.  Because of this many will go no further than getting a band aid.  Facing our sins and turning from them, real repentance from the heart which changes our lifestyles are hard, hard, hard, but unless it takes place, spiritual death is inevitable.

 

But how does this take place?  Our text says God’s Word is active and living and pierces even to the “division of soul and spirit.”  The soul is what we are naturally; the spirit is what we are super-naturally.  The point is that the Word of God reveals to us our true selves, even the thoughts and intents (motives) of the heart.  The Word shows us whether we re natural (lost) or super-natural (born again).  And if born again, the Word will reveal to you if you are sinning against God’s holiness and you have been deceived by religious activism.

  1. Finally, The Word of God Does Not Just X-Ray Our Condition, And It Does Not Just Cut Out The Cancer, But The Word of God Heals Us Where Healing Is Needed.  So after pointing out the x-ray of the Word and the spiritual surgery that is needed, the writer of Hebrews invites us, even commands us, to come to the Throne of Grace to be totally healed.  Listen to Hebrews 4:15-16, “For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched by the feelings of our infirmities but was in all points tempted like we are, yet without sin.  Let us, therefore, come boldly to the Throne of Grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

 

Will you today come to the Word and permit it to x-ray your souls, then to cut out the cancer, and finally to heal you that you might live and not die?

 

INTERNALIZING THE WORD OF GOD

 

Definition:   Internalizing the Word Consists of  4 simple steps:

  1. Know the Word in your head – Hear, Read, Study
  2. Stow the Word in your heart – Memorize and Meditate
  3. Show the Word in your life – Obey

You can Sow the Word in your World – Witness

 

Now let us consider the discipline of Internalizing the Word of God.

Golden text for discipline – 1 Tim. 4:7 “….discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness” (NASV).

The Spiritual Disciplines are the God-given means we are to follow to be godly or conformed to the image of Christ, which is God’s purpose for every believer (Rom. 8:29).

The 7 Steps of “Internalizing”:

  1. We Must hear God’s Word with the intent to obey it.

Key Scriptures: Luke 11:28, Rev. 1:3, Rev. 2:7, 11, 17, 29, 3:6, 13, 22, Deut. 6:6, and James 1:19.

    1. Prepare your soul to hear the Word with the intent to obey.  This should precede the hearing of the Word (James 1:19).
    2. Be sure to steadfastly attend a church where God’s Word is faithfully expounded in context.
    3. Remind yourself that you are hearing God’s Word not the word of man (1 Thes. 2:13).
    4. Commit yourself to one pastor or expositor (John 10:27).  So hearing the Word is not merely passive listening but it is a discipline to be cultivated.
    5. Hearing, not doing, is a huge deception (James 1:22).

 

  1. We Must Read God’s Word daily to know its overall content. 

3 Practical rules for consistent success in Bible reading:

    1. Make time each day.  Try to meet at the same place and time.
    2. Devise a Bible reading plan so you won’t run out of material.

Do you realize that tape-recorded readings of the Bible have proven that you can read through the entire Bible in Seventy-one hours?  The average person in the United States watches that much television in less than two weeks.  In no more than 15 minutes a day you can read through the Bible in less than a year’s time.  Only 5 minutes a day takes you through the Bible in less than three years.  And yet the majority of Christians never read the Bible all the way through in their whole life.  So we are back to the idea that it’s primarily a matter of discipline and motivation.  It’s no wonder that those who simply open the Bible at random each day soon drop the discipline.

    1. Find one word, phrase, or verse to meditate on each time you read.

 

  1. We Must Study God’s Word to know the depths of its meaning.

If reading the Bible can be compared to cruising the width of a clear, sparkling lake in a motorboat, studying the Bible is like slowly crossing the same lake in a glass-bottomed boat. The motorboat crossing provides an overview of the lake and a swift, passing view of its depths.  The glass-bottomed boat of study, however, takes you beneath the surface of Scripture for an unhurried look of clarity and detail that’s normally missed by those who simply read the text.  As author Jerry Bridges put it, “Reading gives us breadth, but study gives us depth.” Why do so many Christians neglect the study of God’s Word?  R. C. Sproul said it painfully well:  “Here then, is the real problem of our negligence.  We fail in our duty to study God’s Word not so much because it is difficult to understand, not so much because it is dull and boring, but because it is work.  Our problem is not a lack of intelligence or a lack of passion.  Our problem is that we are lazy.”

  1. We Must Memorize in order to have fuel for meditation and for use in our ministries.

Many Christians look on the Spiritual Disciple of memorizing God’s Word as something tantamount to modern-day martyrdom.  Ask them to memorize Bible verses and they will react with about as much eagerness as a request for volunteers to face Nero’s lions.  How come?  Perhaps because Many associate all memorization with the memory efforts required of them in school.  It was work, and most of all it was uninteresting and of limited value.  Frequently heard, also, is the excuse of having a bad memory.  But what if I offered you one thousand dollars for every verse you could memorize in the next seven days?  Do you think your attitude toward Scripture memory and your ability to memorize would improve?  Any financial reward would be minimal when compared to the accumulating value of the treasure of God’s Word deposited within your mind.

When Dawson Trotman, founder of the Christian organization called The Navigators, was converted to faith in Christ in 1926, he began memorizing one Bible verse every day.  He was driving a truck for a lumberyard in Los Angeles at the time.  While driving around town he would work on his verse for that day.  During the first three years of his Christian life he memorized his first thousand verses.  If he could memorize over three hundred verses a years while driving, surely we can find ways to memorize a few. (Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life, Donald Whitney, p. 40-41)

Steps in Memorizing:

(b)  Disabuse yourself of the myth you can’t memorize.

(c)   Memorize one verse at a time.

(d)  Continue to review the verses that you have memorized until they are etched in your psyche.

(e)   Use the Scripture you’ve memorized – in prayer, conversation, writing, teaching, counseling, preaching, telephoning, etc.

(f)   Be Selective – memorize verses on important teachings of the Bible.

Keep up the process.

 

Benefits of Internalizing of the Word (All 6 steps above):

  1. Builds your faith – Rom 10:17.
  2. Keeps you from sin – Psa. 119:11.
  3. Repels the devil – James4:7
  4. Gives divine guidance – Psa. 119:24.
  5. Enhances preaching, teaching, counseling, witnessing, etc.
  6. Imparts incredible joy – Jer. 15:16.
  7. Increases one’s credibility and authority – Matt. 7:28.
  8. Fills you with the Holy Spirit – Col. 3:16
  9. Assures success in all you do – James 1:25, Joshua 1:8
  10. A Great Timesaver.

 

  1. We Must Meditate for deeper understanding of the Word and food for our soul.

A good example would be that of  a cow chewing the cud.   The cud is a mouthful of previously swallowed food regurgitated from the first stomach of cattle and other ruminants back to the mouth, where it is chewed slowly a second time.  Likewise meditation is regurgitating the spiritual food that we have memorized and receiving great nourishment for our souls.

  1. We Must Make an Application of the Truth to show its value.
    1. Pray it through.
    2. Dialogue with God.
    3. Prov. 3:5-6.

 

  1. We Must Be Motivated in Knowing that Internalizing the Word is the one and only formula God gives for success in our Spiritual lives
    1. Joshua 1:8, Psa 1:1-3 and James 1:25
    2. There is a specific connection between success and the practice of meditation on God’s Word found in Joshua 1:8.

We must remember that the prosperity and success the Lord speaks of here is prosperity and success in His eyes and not necessarily in the world’s.

True success is promised to those who meditate on God’s Word, who think deeply on Scripture, not just one time each day, but at moments throughout the day and night. Success in God’s sight is to develop to spiritual maturity so you become the godly person God intends you to be and then do the ministry he calls you to do.

No Spiritual Discipline is more important than the intake of God’s Word.  Nothing can substitute for it.  There is simply no healthy Christian life apart from a diet of the milk and meat of the Scripture.  The reasons for this are obvious.  In the Bible God tells about Himself, and especially about Jesus Christ, the incarnation of God.  The Bible unfolds the law of God to us and shows us how we’ve all broken it.  There we learn how Christ died as a sinless, willing substitute for breakers of God’s Law and how we must repent and believe in Him to be right with God.  In the Bible we learn the ways and will of the Lord.  We find in Scripture how to live in a way that is pleasing to God as well as best and most fulfilling for ourselves.  None of this eternally essential information can be found anywhere else except in the Bible.  Therefore if we would know God and be Godly, we must know the Word of God – intimately.

 

[1] Mark Batterson, In a Pit with a Lion, Nashville, Tennessee: Multnomah Publishers, 2006, p. 46.