Each day, we are faced with decisions as to what we will allow our minds to focus on. I cannot expect my day or my heart to be filled with joy if I choose to let my mind dwell on sinful or ungodly thoughts, or if I fill my calendar and time with issues that have no eternal significance. 

“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace . . . “ (Galatians 5:22), but the soil of my heart is cultivated and nourished day by day with those things that I think and dwell on in my life. 

Paul’s teaching is not easy, but it is right on the mark when he guides us to re-direct our focus and thinking. I really like the way in which Richard Foster expresses it in “Celebration of Discipline” when he writes: 
 

“The decision to set the mind on the higher things of life is an act of the will. That is why celebration is a Discipline. It is not something that falls on our heads. It is the result of a consciously chosen way of thinking and living. When we choose this way, the healing and redemption in Christ will break into the inner recesses of our lives and relationships, and the inevitable result will be joy” (p. 195). 

Joy begins in the heart. All of our efforts will not give joy to life if the heart is not right. The only way to make the heart right is when we are covered in the righteousness of Jesus. If we are not right in Him and with Him, there will be no joy. A happy heart makes the face cheerful, but heartache crushes the spirit . . . All the days of the oppressed are wretched, but the cheerful heart has a continual feast” (Proverbs 15:13, 15). 

While His righteousness gives me joy, I must remain alert. I know all too well that there is someone worse than the thief who wants nothing less than to steal away the peace and joy I have in Jesus. Satan will seek to do this by filling my mind with worry. My confidence, however, rests in knowing that God’s peace, like a military sentry, will patrol the boundaries of my mind and keep me in Christ Jesus.
 

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