Commandment No. 10 DO NOT COVET

Chapter Abstract: Sinning starts in the mind—with coveting. Do away with coveting and sin is done away with. This explains the instruction, “Love God with all your mind.” Guarding our mind is component to our restoration. The battleplan of Lucifer is mind-centric. This chapter unfolds the battleplan and recommends course of action.  

Our study module on Commandment No. 10 tackles purity and harmony of mind.

Guard Your Mind

A millionaire was asked, “How much is enough?” His one-word response symbolizes covetousness—“More!” [1]

Avah is Hebrew for covetousness. It means a strong desire or passionate longing to appropriate or have something that belongs to another person or body.

²¹ You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife. You shall not set your desire on your neighbor’s house or land, his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor. DEUTERONOMY 5

The first disobedience started with coveting.

⁶ When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. GENESIS 3

Coveting happens in the mind. When God said Do not covet, what was really being said is Guard your minds. The Old Testament said man sins by doing evil. The New Testament says minding to do evil is already sinning. Y’shua illustrated the matter by distinguishing between lusting (minding to do evil) and adultery (doing evil):    

²⁷ You have heard that it was said, Do not commit adultery. ²⁸ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery in his heart. MATTHEW 5

How does lusting make us sin?

Lusting is a five-fold whammy. It is minding to “taste” someone not your spouse, which is sexual impurity, a gross violation of Commandment No. 7. It is idolatry of the flesh, a violation of You shall have no other gods before Me (Exodus 20:3). It disadvantages your neighbor’s spouse (if the object of your lust is married) and your spouse (if you are married)—a violation of Love your neighbor as yourself (Leviticus 19:18). It violates the sanctity of matrimony (Matthew 19:6), as if saying, “I am doing it no matter if what God has joined together is put asunder.” It gives an opening to the devil, a violation of Ephesians 4:27. God’s instructions are disobeyed five times. His Spirit is grieved five times over. Lucifer loves it!

If we guard our minds, “a whole dictionary of sins will go uncommitted by us.” Minding to do evil is “the most universal sin and mother of all other transgressions.” Adultery starts with lusting. Stealing starts with desiring to misappropriate. Murder starts with minding to kill. Breaking the Sabbath starts with plotting to do a worldly chore on a Sabbath day. Dishonoring our parents starts with rebelling in our mind.

If we do not do not guard our minds, dire and serious consequences will come to us. Rape, murder, incest, disgrace, disloyalty, and rebellion came to visit King David and his family after he coveted Bathseba, had her husband murdered, and took her for his wife. In the Book of Joshua, God’s anger burned against Isra’el after Achan coveted the gold and silver which the Amorites had devoted to their gods, and took them for himself. Three thousand Israelites went to battle, but the Amorites who were of lesser number routed them.

Just as sinning starts in the mind, so does righteousness. It starts with a strong desire or passionate longing to love God and neighbor. Minding to please our Mind-Giver is what Love God with all your mind is about. Lucifer deleted the phrase in Deuteronomy 6:5 but Y’shua reinstated it (Mark 12:30), for it is impossible for anyone to love God without minding to love God.

¹⁷ The mind concerns itself with four things: these are good and evil, life and death. They all begin in the mind. SIRACH 37

Question: Is man capable of surviving through life without minding to do evil?

Yes, the Son of Man demonstrated it. He was tempted in every way, just as we are—yet He survived through life without minding to do evil (Hebrews 4:15). We must “have the mind of the Son of Man” (1 Corinthians 2:16).

¹⁴ My children, do as I teach you and live at peace. SIRACH 41

⁴ Obey Me and do everything I command you, and you will be My people, and I will be your God. JEREMIAH 11

What the Opposition is Doing

Lucifer’s battleplan is mind-centric. He knows that everything starts in the mind.

Stop Man from Learning God’s Instructions

Stop the man physically from learning God’s instructions: this is the first satanic methodology. Exhaust him. Make him sleepy. Make him lazy. Make him feel lethargic or sick. Bar his movements. Make him surf the internet or watch TV. Bombard him with fact-knowledge, propaganda and tons of “untold secrets.” Give him a job promotion to keep him busy. Give him an out-of-town assignment. Invite him to an irresistible money-making opportunity or to a party or romantic date. Send someone to beg for his immediate attention. Prevent him from having fare money or available ride to get to Bible class. Cause the teacher to be absent. Let there be no light. 

Disturb the man mentally or emotionally: this is the second methodology. Wake him up on the wrong side of the bed. Feed him with bad news. Make him impatient and short-tempered. Upset him. Anger him. Haunt him with remorse. Make him feel unworthy of being a child of God. Make him find fault in the Bible teacher or the study venue or his classmates. Give him a book or white paper that says the Ten-C are passé (no longer relevant and fashionable) and that no one has to study or obey them anymore.

Distort Knowledge & Understanding

If the man cannot be stopped from learning God’s instructions, sow disinformation. Send him westward if the road to heaven goes east. Teach half-truths. Do not let him see the whole picture. This way he gets to obey some and disobey some. Introduce false teachings and practices. Use the people he trusts (his family, pastor, close friend, lover, school teacher, work supervisor) to do it. Make him taste sinful meals and keep him addicted to them. Make him believe that it doesn’t hurt to disobey God’s instructions.

So many churches are sowing disinformation. Lucifer loves it!

His evil empire is all over the place conditioning our minds. Pick up a newspaper and prove this to yourself. What’s in the news? Not the exception but the rule. That it pays to be corrupt, right? That lawlessness is a shortcut to success. That only a few lawbreakers (usually only the careless and the small pry) are jailed. What’s the editorial? Paid hacks turning the table on the righteous and the law-abiding, softening our resistance to wicked enterprises, diverting our attention away from the evil their clients do. What’s in the society page? That it pays to be rich and famous. What’s in fashion? What’s the ad? Sex and getting sexy… self-worship, vanity, worldly attachments… One ad says it all: “Stop being conservative. Indulge! Be sinful! Everybody else is doing it.”

Listen to music and you will be fed with subliminal messages. Read a paperback, watch TV, take a stroll, sit at the park, go to work or school or church—and the evil empire is there.

Look at the signs of the times: We now have home theaters that allow us to watch horror films (to sow fear of Lucifer and his demons), violent films (to show easy ways to kill and maim a fellowman), and sex films (to arouse impure desires) at home comfort and leisure. [2] Cocaine, shabu, marijuana and other mind-altering substances are now peddled openly. Its users find it harder and harder to get up and keep going in the direction they need to go. And they become susceptible to demon-possession and committing a crime (eg. rape, child abuse, wife-beating, homicide, suicide).

Rebecca Brown said, “Ancient demon gods are being dug up, carefully restored, and placed in positions of honor. Governments even put up museums for them. Cute figurines of Buddha, dragon gods, fertility gods and other gods are being displayed in homes and offices, and sold along with t-shirts, rugs, wall decors and paintings (even coffee mugs) that have demonic designs in them.” (Unbroken Curses, p. 13)

Though the United States claims to be a Christian nation, isn’t it really the sex idols of the magazines and movies, the sports heroes and music stars, and the industries promoting the consumption of alcohol, cigarettes, and food in gluttonous proportion that rule as gods over its society? (Truth That Matters, p. 3) Charles Colson added, “School prayer is being banned. Cases have been sought to banish the Ten-C from children’s classrooms, crèches from town greens, and Bible studies from public schools and private homes. Values hostile to Christianity are perpetuated with impunity in a so-called “value-neutral” environment… High-school students in Decatur, Georgia, were informed that they could not wear their Fellowship of Christian Athletes t-shirts to school (although satanic t-shirts were ok).” (The God of Stones and Spiders, pp. xi-xii, 55)

And what has become of us? We have been so used to Lucifer blowing cigar-smoke at our faces that we think something is wrong whenever the smoke is not there.

Teach Disobedience

This strategy of Lucifer is three-pronged:

Prong No. 1:  Teach that the Ten-C are passé and obeying them is empty legalism.

The matter has been studied in Commandment No. 4, under the heading “The Sabbath Called Seventh-Day Sabbath” and subheading “Study and Observance Necessary?”, and proven wrong.

Nevertheless, what can happen if the Ten-C are removed?

Where there is no moral law, there is no law of decency to break. People are free to function without restraints. (The Ten Commandments Twice Removed, p. 15) The most notorious example occurred in the eighteenth-century French Revolution. France, by action of her legislature, rejected God’s existence, thereby rejecting His Law.  With no moral law to govern by saying, “You shall not murder”, the people soon turned on each other. The end result was “The Reign of Terror” in which thousands of France’s sons and daughters, including the king himself, spilled their blood on the guillotine. And all this was due to the senseless decision of men and women to throw off the supposed binding restraints of God’s moral code. (Truth That Matters, p. 2)    

Prong No. 2:  Make the man believe that 100% obedience is not doable.

So many people commit sin (even among the clergy) and justify it by saying, “Man is inherently weak in the flesh.” That is actually a confession that the demons dominate their spirits and they are not Spirit-empowered yet to resist their promptings. St. Paul observed this in him:

¹⁸ I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. ¹⁹ For what I do is not the good that I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. ²⁰ Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it. ROMANS 7

¹⁴ The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. 1 CORINTHIANS 2

⁵ For those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires… ⁷ The sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s Law, nor can it do so. Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God. ROMANS 8

Doability?

⁶ With man this is impossible. But with God all things are possible. MATTHEW 19

For the undoable to become doable, the human spirit must be freed of its demons and receive Spirit-empowerment.

¹¹ [Come] to the Messiah [and] He [will] set you free from your evil desires, not by a bodily operation of circumcision but by a spiritual operation, the baptism of your souls. COLOSSIANS 2

⁷ Submit yourselves to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. JAMES 4  

¹⁰ Be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power. EPHESIANS 6

Prong No. 3:  Teach the man to obey Nine or less.

Exodus 20:1-17 and Deuteronomy 5:1-21 are marked Ten Commandments yet only nine are listed. Commandment No. 4 is listed as “Observe the Sabbath,” not “Observe My Sabbaths.” Lucifer loves it!

Anyone who does not know any better would likely accept the toned-down version as Gospel truth and live by it. He would believe he is obeying Ten when in fact he is obeying nine or less. For all his strive, he is likely to dishonor an instruction of God he is unaware of and stay barred from heaven. Now isn’t it a tragic irony when the people he trusts for life are the very ones leading him to the Second Death?  

⁵ For of this you can be sure: No impure person… has any inheritance in the kingdom of the Messiah and of God. EPHESIANS 5

Recommended Course of Action

How to counteract the mind-centric battleplan of Lucifer?

Go for Purity of Faith

Search the Word on your own. Do not swallow the teaching of anyone hook, line and sinker. Treat it as hearsay until you have checked with your Bible and confirmed it to be true. Your teacher may be well-meaning, but he could also be wrong. His belief might be carrying him to the Second Death, so why take his word without validation? 

¹⁶ Watch your life and doctrine closely. 1 TIMOTHY 4

¹ My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. 1 JOHN 2

² I give you sound learning, so do not forsake My teaching. PROVERBS 4

²⁰ For I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven. MATTHEW 5

Learn Ten & Observe Ten

If you are attending a church that bats for Nine or less, talk of doing Ten with its elders. Obeying Nine or less is not the divine prescription. The true church of God teaches Ten and obeys Ten. If the elders won’t hear of it, stop attending the church and move to one that bats for Ten. If no such church can be found in your area, then for love of God and neighbor, organize one.

²⁹ We must obey God rather than men! ACTS 5

The church that teaches Nine or less is of Lucifer, not of God. In the same breath, the church that does not teach the proper interpretation of the Law is of Lucifer, not of God. Avoid it, even if it claims to be Christian, because it is not Christian at all.

⁴⁶ Take to heart all the words I have solemnly declared to you this day, so you may command your children to obey carefully all the words of this Law. ⁴⁷ They are not just idle words for you—they are your life. DEUTERONOMY 32

¹⁶ All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, ¹⁷ so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. 2 TIMOTHY 3

⁶³ The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life. JOHN 6

⁴ It is written: Man does not live on bread alone, but on every Word that comes from the mouth of God. MATTHEW 4

Make sure you are taught Ten and observe Ten. Purity requires nothing less.   

¹ Walk before Me and be perfect. GENESIS 17

⁷ Obey My laws, to make you holy. LEVITICUS 20

²² Even the priests who come near Me must purify themselves, or I will punish them. EXODUS 19 tev

¹⁵ But just as He who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; ¹⁶ for it is written: Be holy, because I am holy. 1 PETER 1

⁴⁸ You have to be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect. MATTHEW 5 

Ten or Nothing should be the standard motto of every God-worshiper.

²⁵ The right thing to do is to obey faithfully everything that God has ordered us to do. DEUTERONOMY 6 

⁷ Be careful to obey all the Law… do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you go. ⁸ Do not let this Book of Law depart from your mouth. Meditate on it day and night, that you may wisely do everything written in it. Then you shall be prosperous and successful. JOSHUA 1 

²⁴ The Lord our God commanded us to obey all these decrees and to fear Him so He can continue to bless us and preserve our lives as He has done to this day. DEUTERONOMY 6 nlt

⁵ Now if you obey Me fully and keep My covenant, then out of all nations you will be My treasured possession. Although the whole world is Mine, ⁶ you will be for Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. EXODUS 19

⁴ As you come to the Living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to Him— ⁵ you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood. 1 PETER 2

²² In Him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by His Spirit. EPHESIANS 2

Develop Harmony of Mind

It is possible to use our mind to improve our mind, to reshape our character—to improve the way we interact with our neighbors and the way we counteract Lucifer’s approaches.

Start by knowing how the mind works.

Your physical senses “take pictures” of what it sees, hears, touches, smells and tastes. The impressions are transmitted to your memory bank and triggers associations with other impressions and inclinations stored in it. The associations result in the development of thoughts.

The mind is the kitchen. Thought transforms into a delectable godly desire when cooked with love and truth, and into a distasteful sinful desire when cooked with wickedness.

After the cooking, desire waits for an opportunity to be dished out. Desire + opportunity = realization of desire.

Given the above knowledge, doing three things would greatly help your quest for harmony of mind: 

1.       Deny opportunity to your sinful desires but not to your godly desires. Opportunity makes it possible for potentiality to become an actuality, for godly desire to become righteousness.

¹⁰ Sin waits for those looking for a chance to sin, just as a lion waits for prey. SIRACH 27

2.       Let the Spirit temper your mind. The mind that is Spirit-tempered does not cook sinful desires.

²⁵ The Spirit has given us life: He must also control our lives. GALATIANS 5 tev

¹⁴ He will have compassion on us if we accept His guidance and are eager for Him to show us where we are wrong. SIRACH 18

3.       Filter the transmissions to your mind. In a satanic environment, the impressions are almost always satanic feeds (eg. selfishness, vanity, lust, pride, insecurity). These stimulate sinful inclinations. Whenever possible, do not allow satanic feeds to be exhibited, broadcast, published, advertised or sold within your immediate environment. For what is not presented to your senses does not get transmitted to your mind. Non-transmittal stimulates nothing.

²¹ Test everything. Hold on to the good. ²² Avoid every kind of evil. 1 THESSALONIANS 5

¹⁹ I want you to be wise about what is good, and innocent about what is evil. ROMANS 16

²⁷ Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: …to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. JAMES 1

What if you find yourself looking at a pornographic material or hearing a slanderous accusation? Stir away from it quickly. Do not let your curiosity absorb the satanic feed 100%. Rebuke the demons that come with the satanic feed and the wicked suggestions they are putting into your heart and mind. Hal Lindsey said the old saying applies, “You can’t stop a bird from landing on your head, but you can stop it from building a nest in your hair.” A wicked suggestion fed into your mind is not a sin; it becomes a sin only when you fail to say “No” to it.     

² Do not let your passions carry you away; this can tear your soul to pieces like a bull. SIRACH 6

¹⁵ He who stops his ears against plots of murder and shuts his eyes against contemplating evil— ¹⁶ this is the man who will dwell on the heights [of God]. ISAIAH 33

³ I will set before my eyes no vile thing. The deeds of faithless men I hate; they will not cling to me. PSALM 101

¹ I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a girl. JOB 31

Should a sinful inclination be stimulated in you, heed the Spirit’s advice. He would search your memory bank at super-quick speed for an experience, insight or Scripture verse stored in it that could knock the inclination down. What He finds He would flash to you. Let it shine on the looming darkness. Now be extra sensitive to the stirring because the Spirit is gentle, neither loud nor imposing.

²⁹ If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. ³⁰ And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. MATTHEW 5

Upon hearing this, Simon Peter exclaimed, “Rabbi, in a short time I would be dismembered!” Y’shua replied, “Peter, what is said is a parable: that you must bridle your physical senses, nip the satanic impressions at the bud, and tone down your sinful inclination. Sinful inclination makes you forget your spiritual realities. Does not the eye see the woman but not the Father who created her? The woman comes with her Creator. Set your eyes more on the Invisible and less on the visible. Listen to your inner voice. Find more delight in the Giver than the gift. Anyone who forgets the Giver is guilty of ingratitude, which is a sin. He who finds more delight in the gift puts an idol in his heart.” (cf. Gospel of Barnabas)

³⁴ Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eyes are good, your whole body is full of light. When they are bad, your body also is full of darkness. ³⁵ See to it, then, that the light within you is not darkness. ³⁶ Therefore, if your body is full of light, and no part of it dark, it will be completely lighted, as when the light of a lamp shines on you… ³³ No one lights a lamp and puts it in a place where it will be hidden, or under a bowl. Instead he puts it on its stand, so that those who come in may see the light. LUKE 11

The sinful inclination if not neutralized would develop into sinful desire (coveting), a tiny spark that could cause a great conflagration. So douse it quickly. Do spiritual detoxification. Rebuke the demon of coveting, bind it and throw it into the fires of hell. Command your mind to delete the inclination from its memory bank. It works. We speak from experience. 

¹ What is causing quarrels and fights among you? Isn’t it because there is an army of evil desires within you? ² You want but you don’t have, so you kill to get it. You long for what others have, and can’t afford it, so you start a fight to take it away from them. JAMES 4 tlb

¹¹ Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which war against your soul. 1 PETER 2

¹⁶ A wise man fears the Lord and shuns evil. PROVERBS 14

²⁰ Brothers, stop thinking like children. In regard to evil be infants, but in your thinking be adults. 1 CORINTHIANS 14

³⁰ Don’t be controlled by your lust; keep your passions in check. ³¹ If you allow yourself to satisfy every desire, you will be a joke to your enemies. SIRACH 18

¹⁷ Insist on it in the Lord that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. ¹⁸ They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. ¹⁹ Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more. EPHESIANS 4

³ Your whole aim is wrong [if] you want only what will give you pleasure. ⁴ You are like an unfaithful wife who loves her husband’s enemies. Don’t you realize that making friends with God’s enemies—the evil pleasures of this world—makes you an enemy of God? I say it again, if your aim is to enjoy the evil pleasure of the unsaved world, you cannot also be a friend of God. JAMES 4 tlb

⁷ He that keepeth his way preserveth his soul. PROVERBS 16 kjv

Have the Mind of Christ

The next step to harmony of mind is mirroring the mind of Y’shua. 2 Corinthians 10:5 says, “Restrain your every thought and make it obedient to God’s instructions.”

¹ Set your hearts on things above, where the Messiah is seated at the right hand of God. ² Set your minds on things above [the incorruptible], not on earthly things [the corruptible]. COLOSSIANS 3

⁸ Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. PHILIPPIANS 4

¹ Holy brothers, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Y’shua, the Apostle and High Priest whom we confess. HEBREWS 3

² Let us fix our eyes on Y’shua, the Author and Perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. ³ Consider Him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. HEBREWS 12

²¹ Build yourselves up in your most holy faith and pray in the Holy Spirit. ²² Keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Y’shua the Messiah to bring you to eternal life. JUDE

¹³ Set your hope fully on the grace to be given you when Y’shua the Messiah is revealed. 1 PETER 1

Y’shua said, “Where the mind is, there is the treasure” (Gospel of Mary, chapter 5, verse 9).

³⁵ A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things; and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. MATTHEW 12 kjv

³⁴ For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. LUKE 12 kjv

Check Your Thoughts

The next step to harmony of mind is examining your thoughts.

Y’shua said, “Human thought must be examined the way the banker examines money. Turning the coin over and over, the banker checks whether the image of Caesar is right; whether the silver is of good quality and of due weight. Ah, mad world, how prudent can you be in doing business! But who among you examines his thought as the banker does to the silver coin?”

One of his disciples asked, “Rabbi, how does the silver coin relate to human thought?” Y’shua replied, “James, check your thoughts diligently. Of acceptable quality are thoughts that are holy. As the banker rejects the coin whose silver is not good, so you must reject unholy thoughts. As the banker checks the image of Caesar, so you must check whether your thought resembles the thoughts of God’s prophets. As the banker checks the weight of the coin, so you must check whether the motive behind your thought is love of God.” (cf. Gospel of Barnabas)

⁵ Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. 2 CORINTHIANS 13 

²⁶ The Lord detests the thoughts of the wicked, but those of the pure are pleasing to Him. PROVERBS 15

³⁰ Turn away from all the evil you are doing, and don’t let your sin destroy you. ³¹ Give up all the evil you have been doing, and get yourselves new minds and new hearts. Why do you Israelites want to die? ³² I do not want anyone to die, says the Sovereign Lord. Turn away from your sins and live. EZEKIEL 18 tev

¹⁴ Wash the evil from your heart, so that you may be saved. How long will you harbor wicked thoughts? JEREMIAH 4

²¹ Get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the Word planted in you, which can save you. JAMES 1

²² You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires, ²³ to be made new in the attitude of your minds, ²⁴ and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. EPHESIANS 4

¹⁰ Put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. COLOSSIANS 3

⁴⁰ Let us examine our ways and test them, and let us return to the Lord. LAMENTATION 3

²¹ If a man cleanses himself from [ignoble purposes], he will be an instrument for noble purposes, made holy, useful to the Master, and prepared to do any good work. ²² Flee the evil desires of youth, and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord with a pure heart. 2  TIMOTHY 2

Develop Self-Discipline

The next step to harmony of mind is the development of self-discipline.

Take cue from the scribe of this book. The doctor forbade Coke, ice cream, sans rival, Cadbury and other sweets to him, to lower his glucose level. To defy the doctor’s order would mean health deterioration and physical suffering to him. But he did not have enough willpower to resist the forbidden—especially when no one was there to stop him. He ended up at the operating table twice. At the hospital, the scribe made a resolve to discipline himself. The point is, he could have saved a lot on pain, trouble and expenses had he made the resolve earlier.

God’s instructions, which forbid us from doing many things, caused a great amount of struggle in Paul too. His flesh rebelled at obedience. (Romans 7:18-19) Knowing how to overcome Lucifer’s mind-centric strategies is worthless if we do not have the self-discipline to do it. Billy Graham said, “Our personality type, upbringing and personal history may affect how discipline-oriented we are; however, anyone can become discipline-oriented.” Discipline is what brings about happy, orderly lives… world-class champions and businessmen… saints… Webster defines discipline as mental self-control. That means discipline starts in the mind.

Have Faith

The next step to harmony of mind is the development of faith.

Know that you would feel abandoned and insecure as your baptism of fire peaks. King Hezekiah felt it. 2 Chronicles 32:31 says, “God left him to test him and to know everything that was in his heart.” Even the Son of Man felt it. 

³⁴ At the ninth hour Y’shua cried out in a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani?”—which means, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken Me?” MARK 15

Baptism of fire is like learning to fly solo. In the end it’s just you and the airplane. You must have a good recall of the instructions given you and obey each one to the letter. One wrong move at the take off or at the landing could mean death. A strong turbulence could send your airplane spinning down. And this is where faith comes in: you have to trust the instructions given you, trust that you have learned enough, trust that your carrier is kept in perfect condition, and trust that although you do not see him, your instructor is monitoring what is happening to you.

⁴ The righteous will live by his faith. HABAKKUK 2

(Click What Faith Is.)

Trumpet Call

Set yourself apart from the ranks of the unbelievers. 

¹⁸ In the last days there will be scoffers who will follow their own ungodly desires. ¹⁹ These are the men who divide you, who follow mere natural instincts and do not have the Spirit. JUDE

⁴ They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ He promised?” Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” ⁸ But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. ⁹ The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness. He is being patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. ¹⁰ But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare. ¹¹ Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives… ¹⁴ So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless, and at peace with him. ¹⁵ Bear in mind that our Lord’s patience means salvation. 2 PETER 3

Be a child of God.

¹³ Prepare your minds for action; be self-controlled... ¹⁴ As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. 1 PETER 1

Samuel Smiles wrote, “Sow a thought and you reap an act; sow an act and you reap a habit; sow a habit and you reap a character; sow a character and you reap a destiny.”

⁵ The way you think shows your character, just as surely as a kiln shows any flaws in the pottery being fired. SIRACH 27

¹⁴ Temptation is the pull of man’s own thoughts and wishes [covetousness]. JAMES 1 tlb 

If we don’t go for purity and harmony of mind, wickedness would keep on spreading unopposed.

¹⁴ Evil thoughts lead to evil actions. JAMES 1 tlb  

⁴ Knowing their thoughts, Y’shua said, “Why entertain evil thoughts in your hearts?” MATTHEW 9

If we don’t go for purity and harmony of mind, we and our loved ones would end up miserable and unhappy.

Joyce Meyer wrote, “The devil was controlling most of my life because he was controlling my thoughts... Our thoughts certainly affect our attitudes and moods. When a person is full of wrong thoughts he is miserable, and I have learned from personal experience that when someone is miserable, he usually ends up making others miserable also. Spend some time examining your thought life. Thinking about what you’re thinking about is very valuable because Lucifer usually deceives people to think they are unhappy due to what is going on around them (their circumstances), but the misery is actually due to what is going on inside them (their thoughts).” (Battlefield of the Mind)

² How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and every day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me? PSALM 13

If we don’t go for purity and harmony of mind, God would rebuke and humiliate us, saying, “I know what is going on through your mind” (Ezekiel 11:5). “My thoughts are not your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:8). “You do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men” (Luke 8:33).

If we don’t go for purity and harmony of mind, we stay impure.

¹⁹ Hear, O earth; I am bringing disaster on this people, the fruit of their schemes [thoughts]. JEREMIAH 6

¹¹ For this is a people without understanding; so their Maker has no compassion on them, and their Creator shows them no favor. ISAIAH 27

¹² You will say, “How I hated discipline! How my heart spurned correction! ¹³ I would not obey my teachers or listen to my instructors. ¹⁴ I have come to the brink of utter ruin in the midst of the whole assembly.” PROVERBS 5

Purity and harmony of mind = purity of heart and harmony of action.  

²⁸ Let us worship God acceptably with reverence and awe. HEBREWS 12

¹⁰ Do not think evil of each other. ZECHARIAH 7

¹⁵ You are to live clean, innocent lives as children of God in a dark world full of people who are crooked and stubborn. Shine out among them like beacon lights [stars lighting up the sky], ¹⁶ holding out [offering] to them the Word of life. PHILIPPIANS 2 tlb

Purity of heart and harmony of action = excellent Christians = excellent results.

We will become loving spouses, parents, brethren and neighbors—harbingers of satisfactory, lasting relationships. We will be restored to our original blessed state. As children of the King of kings, we can have an audience with Him at any time. Nobody can stop us from feasting, merrymaking and celebrating life with Him.

Excellent results = victory over the evil empire.

¹⁰ For You, O God, tested us; you refined us like silver. ¹¹ You brought us into prison and laid burdens on our backs. ¹² You let men ride over our heads; we went through fire and water, but you brought us to a place of abundance. PSALM 66