Thinking/Thoughts – Taking Every Thought Captive

Our thoughts are the seeds from which our actions grow — renewing the mind and taking every thought captive is central to living a life that pleases God.

We Are Thinking Beings

We are thinking beings because God is a thinking being. God has given us minds to think, imagine, plan and reason, with our thoughts being seeds of actions that will bring forth results unless stopped (Mk 7:21-23). As the type of seed sown determines the ultimate crop, can we expect good actions to be the result of feeding our minds with trash? The unconscious root causes of our warped, wrong and false thoughts (which determine our behaviour) need to be confronted with the truth of God’s Word, replacing negative, selfish or wrong thoughts with positive, other-focused and correct messages.

Our thought patterns (mindset) are very important, for “As a man thinks (or calculates) in his heart so he becomes” (Prov 23:7). If I am continually thinking I’m sick, more than likely I will bring some sickness into reality, for our thoughts provide the foundations of our actions through self-fulfilling prophesy (Job 3:25).

Thoughts are often forerunners to action

A self-fulfilling prophesy is a prediction that, simply by being believed, brings about the very outcome it foresees: what we expect shapes how we feel and act, and our actions shape what happens — confirming and strengthening the expectation. The expectancy itself becomes the foundation on which actions are built.

This cuts both ways. Fear of failure or believing “I can’t” quietly programmes us to give up early and prepare half-heartedly, so failure becomes the fruit of the expectation rather than of our ability; faith-filled expectation does the opposite — trusting God, we prepare diligently, persevere and speak in line with His promises. Thoughts don’t control circumstances, but they always drive conduct, and conduct carries consequences (Gal 6:7). Since the harvest follows the seed, replace fearful predictions with God’s promises, so the prophecy over your life is one worth fulfilling (Rom 12:2; Phil 4:8).

Instead, in faith visualize your goal and work towards it. As our thoughts have creative power to develop ideas into innovative solutions, it is important to ensure they receive correct input from our senses, otherwise we can be deceived into wrong assumptions and inappropriate actions (Act 8:20, 12:9, 16:27). Having judged them sound, consider whether to act now or later — most ideas need further processing by meditating and refining over time. We are to think before speaking and acting, and afterward reflect on that action, giving careful thought to our ways (Prov 4:26, 14:15, 15:28, 21:29; Hag 1:5-7).

Thoughts Feed Visualisation and Imagination

Every picture the mind holds began as a thought: thoughts feed visualisation and imagination, and what we dwell on is what we eventually see. Visualisation is the mental screen on which repeated thoughts project their images, and imagination is the workshop where those images are developed into plans, dreams and expectations. Just as input through the senses shapes thought, thought in turn shapes the inner picture — a Godly thought dwelt upon paints a faith-filled vision, while an unwholesome thought entertained quietly builds an image we never chose to create.

This is why guarding the thought life matters so much: the imagination can serve faith or serve fear. When the mind is renewed and filled with God’s Word, imagination becomes an ally — helping us picture His promises as reality, plan wisely and act creatively for His purposes. When the mind is left unguarded, the same imaginative power vividly rehearses anxieties and temptations, until the imagined picture begins to demand obedience. We cannot stop the mind from picturing, but we can choose what it is given to picture — deliberately feeding it truth so the vision it forms is one worth following.

Thoughts feed visualisation and imagination

Our Senses Are the Gateways of Input

Our five senses — seeing, hearing, touch, taste and smell — are the means by which input reaches our minds and thoughts. Nothing can be thought about that has not first come in through one of these gateways, and of them all, seeing and hearing are the primary channels: the volume of what we watch, read, surf and listen to far outweighs every other form of input, streaming into the mind hour by hour. This is why the Bible treats the eyes and ears as entrances to be guarded, not windows to be left permanently open — “I will set no worthless thing before my eyes” (Ps 101:3), “I made a covenant with my eyes” (Job 31:1), and we are to “look straight ahead” and keep our feet from evil (Prov 4:25-27).

Input, however, is never neutral. As impressions are refreshed and reflected on, they do not remain isolated snapshots: they accumulate, layer upon layer, into a composite mental image — a settled way of seeing the world, ourselves and God. This is the very essence of meditation, which Scripture commands for God’s Word (Josh 1:8; Ps 1:2-3); but the same principle works in reverse, for whatever we turn over repeatedly in our minds grows until it governs our outlook.

Whatever we repeatedly see and hear, we gradually become

A steady diet of fearful news, immoral entertainment, materialistic advertising or unwholesome conversation is gradually painted into a distorted picture — and once formed, that mental image fuels wrong thinking patterns such as anxiety, lust, envy and unbelief, largely without our noticing the shift. Jesus warned that “the lamp of the body is the eye”: when the eye is clear the whole body is full of light, but when it is not, the whole body is full of darkness (Lk 11:34-35) — what we keep looking at eventually lights up, or darkens, everything else.

Since faith comes by hearing (Rom 10:17), it is equally true that fear, lust and unbelief come by hearing also — both are built the same way, through repeated input. We therefore cannot be passive: as gatekeepers of our own senses we must actively screen what enters, judge it in the light of Scripture, and deliberately counter wrong input with Godly input, choosing instead to dwell on “whatever things are true, noble, just, pure, lovely and of good report” (Rom 16:19b; Phil 4:8).

We are the custodians of our mind, so the old patterns of thinking are to be crucified to receive the transformed, renewed mind (Rom 12:2; Eph 4:22-24). Do not just blindly accept all that is propagated — use your brains and do some critical thinking: by its nature, does this come from God or a wholesome source?

Be transformed by changing your thought patterns – Romans 12:2

Taking Every Thought Captive

God knows all our thoughts, and long ago He stated that they are continually biased towards evil (Ps 94:11; Gen 6:5). Because we are accountable for them, we should not think about how to gratify sinful desires, but turn and go the way that pleases God (Ps 119:59, 139:2; Prov 12:8, 15:26; Jer 17:10; Ezek 11:5; Rom 14:12; Heb 4:12-13; Rev 2:23).

The Bible calls the wicked to forsake their evil thoughts and ways. The Holy Spirit aids us in this, yet we must be actively working — eliminating the bad and replacing it with the good. We are to take every negative, defeatist attitude captive, along with every impure and lustful thought (thoughts which, if entertained, can make us their prisoners), and lay these potentially destructive ideas before Christ so they cannot grow and produce an evil result (Prov 4:23; 2 Cor 10:4-5; Col 2:8; Jas 1:14-15). Jesus made it clear that if the action is wrong — adultery, for example — the lustful thought is just as wrong (Mt 5:27-28). Every thought we fail to take captive will take us captive.

We must capture every thought and align it with Christ's teachings

Sin, then, does not begin with the hand or the eye — it begins in the hidden place of thought, long before it ever shows in behaviour.

Why are lustful, hateful or impure thoughts so serious? Because they are not random mental events — they are the outflow of the inner heart: “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies” (Mt 15:19). Notice the order — the heart comes first, and the thoughts follow. The inner heart and the thought life are inseparably connected: the heart is the wellspring, and the mind is the stream that flows from it, so whatever rules the heart will inevitably colour our thinking and eventually surface in our words and actions.

This is why Scripture commands us to guard the heart, for it is the gateway of the thought life. A heart entertained by impurity will produce impure thoughts, while a heart set on God produces thoughts that honour Him. Since actions grow from thoughts, and thoughts grow from the heart, lasting change must reach all the way down to the heart itself — it is never merely a matter of cleaning up surface behaviour.

Therefore, we need to evaluate our thoughts; if they are bad, reject them and replace them with something honourable, guided by Scripture. We will be transformed as our mind is renewed by Godly input and we are disciplined in our attitudes to focus on “the good, worthwhile and wholesome things in life” (Rom 12:2-3; Phil 4:8; Heb 3:1; 2 Pet 3:1). As we allow the Spirit of the Lord to work within us, we become more and more like Him (2 Cor 3:18).

Unless we take control of our thoughts, Satan will

What Controls Our Thoughts Controls Us

As we align ourselves with the Word of God and declare it over our lives, we set it in motion in the spirit realm. Speak the Word of God and His principles such as: I’m reigning in life through Christ; the old life is dead; all things are working for my good; I’m growing in the image of Christ; if God is for me, who can be against me?; I am more than a conqueror; I’m a new person in Christ; it is for freedom that Christ has set us free; I have been blessed…with every blessing in Christ; I can do all things through Christ; I have a clear sound mind (Rom 5:17, 6:4, 8:28-29,31,37; 2 Cor 5:17; Gal 5:1; Eph 1:3; Phil 4:13; 2 Tim 1:7).

To live in victory, our thoughts must come into agreement with Scripture; we need right thinking for right living. Our thoughts govern us and reflect our character, so we need to regularly assess them — they are the best gauge of our spiritual state — and fix our thoughts on Jesus (Col 3:2; Heb 3:1).

What controls our thoughts controls us

God’s thoughts and ways are very different to ours as He knows all things, from beginning to end (Isa 55:8-9). He is constantly caring for His creation and has gone to great ends to restore humans to their rightful place as children of God (Jer 29:11). However, when people do not think it of any value to have anything to do with God, He gives them up to whatever their hearts devise (Rom 1:28). In contrast, David, a man dedicated to God, prayed, “Search me, O God and know my heart and test my thoughts” — he knew there would be areas he wasn’t aware of blocking his spiritual pathway (Ps 139:23-24). Am I responsive to deal with the issues the Holy Spirit brings to my attention?

Reflection and Application

What seeds is my mind currently sowing — and what harvest will they produce?
Which recurring thought do I need to take captive and replace with God’s truth?
Am I feeding my mind with wholesome input, or allowing trash to shape my thinking?
What Scripture will I declare over my thought life this week?