When facing the problems of life, there are several schools of thought as to how we can change and overcome. Some believe it is all about the physical. They are convinced that our DNA is established at conception and that in our body are the controlling factors of our life.
Weight problems, attitudes, personalities, addictions, even tendencies to crime are believed to be in the physical makeup of the individual. Scientists are working to adjust or control the DNA of humans to “manufacture” the perfect person.
Others believe it’s in the mind. If we can be educated and trained with the right things, we will be successful and trained with the right things and we will be successful and positive people.
Psychiatrists and psychologists are studying diligently to find answers to the problems of human life. Drug therapies to affect the thought processes are believed to be of value in some cases. They believe if we can control the mind, we can control the life.
Even though we have come so far in understanding the physical and mental makeup of people, we still can’t stop the problems of everyday life. With all our wisdom and abilities, we still cannot stop the breakdown of families, the abuse of the weak, or the hatred of racism.
A Heart Condition
Why do people destroy their own lives with habits like smoking, drinking, overeating, or drugs when the knowledge to solve these problems is so readily available? Why do some destroy their relationships with their spouse, children, or friends when communication skills and relationship insights abound?
The answer is because it’s not just physical or intellectual things that control our lives. It’s the condition of the heart. Our inner person, made up of soul and spirit (Heb. 4:12), is deciding how we live our lives. Proverbs 4:23 says to “guard your heart for out of it spring the issues of life.”
We so often want the external things in our lives to change. We want better jobs, more money, different relationships, or even a healthier body. These are all physical things and one would think they would be easy to change.
Especially in free countries where opportunities abound—we can go where we want to go, do what we want to do. Even in underprivileged circumstances, we see people who break out and live new lives, and change the physical aspects of their world.
But many people never do change and are stuck in the negative things of their world. They blame the people around them—the government, their boss, their spouse, or even the Lord—and they do not change.
These are the people who must read this message; this is for you. You can change your external physical world, but changing things around you does not change the condition of your heart; rather it’s accomplished by changing what is in you.
Jesus sees the condition of the human heart—our need for a new relationship with our heavenly Father and for healing of hurts, insecurities, and other things that would limit our lives.
Jesus is the beginning of the process of building a new treasure into their hearts, for He knows the Word and work of God will flow out of our hearts. Being born again is only the first step in living the abundant life that Jesus came to give us.
He is reaching for those things within us that brought the limitations and defensiveness and hindered us from receiving all He had for us.
As your heart is changed, you begin to bring forth new things, and external change happens. From the inside out, you can change your life.
Excerpt permission granted by Harrison House Publishers
Casey Treat shares the straightforward message that through God's Word, you can change. Through the renewing of the mind to the Word and the power of the Holy Spirit, we can all live a victorious and prosperous Christian life here on this earth.
Casey Treat is a pastor, author and motivational speaker, as well as the founder and president of Vision College (formally Dominion College). He also hosts a weekly television program called "Successful Living".
Wendy Treat is a wife, mother, grandmother, pastor, teacher, international conference speaker, and role model. She writes and teaches from a practical standpoint, seasoning it with her unique sense of humor.
With a desire to make a difference in the lives of people, Wendy enrolled in Seattle Bible College where she met and later married her husband, Casey Treat. In 1980, they founded Christian Faith Center which ministers to many thousands of people in three locations around the Seattle, Washington area.