There is a reason you can’t go to the store and buy a bottle of spiritually-minded thinking. The mindset we need cannot be bought, but must freely be earned because anything we obtain to easily we esteem to lightly, much the way butterflies are born.
The challenges, changes, sin, suffering and sorrow do have a cure, but the medicine for it is not contained in a bottle. It begins as a concept in your mind and extends to your decisions/habits. God has not only made it a requirement to master our minds through natural law (law of the harvest), but he has both commanded us to do so and gives us the way to win. For Christ said,
“be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, ” Romans 12:2
It isn’t a complex task to acquire this spiritual force and control of mind. It’s simply a powerful combination of a change of mindset (the mind of Christ, positive thinking) and consistent, righteous habits (renewal). If the mind, like any muscle, hasn’t been disciplined to those practices, create your own program to begin cultivation. It only takes a desire, time, patience, and faith, and persistence but the fruit is more than filling and fulfilling.
There are two Chinese proverbs about nutrition that are applicable, “make food thy medicine” and “2/3 of what you eat keeps the doctors in business.”
In the spiritually minded way they can be restated:
“Make your mind your medicine, the scriptures your standard and principle (gospel truth) your prescription”, “2/3 of what we consume keeps the devil in business.”
You can “pay the farmer now or the doctor later.” You can pay the price to cultivate a rich mind of spiritual, positive, peaceful, powerful thoughts now or suffer spiritual, mental, and emotional pain later. What other [now or later] analogies can you think of?
Change doesn’t take time, but deciding to does. So, aside from scripture study and pondering, here are a few quick reads I highly recommend to develop the medicine of the mind:
- Can you concentrate on Christ? take the test
- Medicine for the Soul by Sterling W. Sill
- Peace of Conscience, Peace of Mind by Richard G. Scott
- Be Renewed in the spirit of your mind by Patricia Holland
- Concentration of the Mind by Orson Pratt
- The Poetry of Success
My mind to me a kingdom is,Such present joys therein I find,That it excels all other blissThat earth affords or grows by kind.