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One of the strongest and clearest messages throughout the Bible is God’s love for us. We are reminded that God doesn’t forget us (even though many of us feel forgotten); that God is close to us (even though He often feels far away); and that not only has He created us in His image, but He knows us, and that doesn’t scare Him away (although we always fear that the moment someone truly understands us, they’ll bolt.)

And yet, many of us still struggle to believe God loves us.

We believe that God loves the world and that, through Jesus, God will redeem and restore it; however, we struggle to live as if this is true. 

So we run, hide, put up fronts, wear masks, beat ourselves up for past mistakes, try to earn God’s love, and try to prove ourselves worthy of God’s love. All the while, God’s love sits there.

If you’re like me, you can relate to this.

The problem for many of us is that we read verses about God’s love for the world and us (John 3:16), that Jesus loves us (John 15:9), that God predestined us in love (Ephesians 1:4 – 5), that God sings over us (Zephaniah 3:17), that God loved us first (1 John 4:19), that God draws us to Himself (John 6:44). We read the apostle Paul saying over 160 times that as a follower of Jesus, we are “in Christ”, and yet we live every day as if God is disappointed in us, indifferent towards us, mildly happy with us or “likes” us.

We’ll say, “I know God has forgiven me, but I can’t forgive myself.” Or, “God loves me, but I can’t love myself.”

When we say those things, we have made love and forgiveness something it is not. We have based that on our definitions and life.

Over the last two years, if there is one message that God has put on my heart for me to learn, it is this: His gracious, unrelenting, never-stopping love for me.

I keep returning to Luke 15 and the stories that Jesus told: a shepherd who goes after a lost lamb, a woman who searches for a coin, and a father who runs out to meet his son, who doesn’t deserve grace, let alone a party. Through this passage, God has softened my heart, enabling me to understand and feel His love.

Some of us (at least I did) balked a little at this because it seemed too emotional, making God too close and personal, and we feared it would diminish His transcendence and power. He’s God, Creator of the universe. Yes, and He’s also a personal God who created you in His image and sent His Son to die in your place so He could rescue you and so you could know His great love for you.

Here’s my challenge to you. Spend as much time as you need, months or years. Dive into Luke 15, Ephesians 1, and the passages listed above and ask God, “Show me Your love for me; help me to understand and feel Your love for me.”

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I just celebrated 3 years in my role at Community Covenant Church. It is hard to believe it has been 3 years already, but that is what COVID-19 does to you when it comes to time!

I was talking to a friend recently, and he asked me what I was learning in my new role and about transitions in particular. I’ll share some things over the coming weeks and months (especially as I’m beginning my doctoral research project on “Revitalizing Declining Churches in New England”), but here’s one lesson I learned when I heard a podcast that articulated it.

The person being interviewed came into her role after there had been a revolving door in that role.

One lesson I’ve learned about church transitions.
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I am the fourth lead pastor at CCC since 2015. While some churches have seen a lot more transition than that, that kind of transition shapes a church and its culture.

When I meet someone, whether they still attend CCC or not, I ask them who their lead pastor was when they came and when they left if they left. That tells me a lot about their experience of our church and how they view our church.

This is incredibly important if you’re a new lead pastor or attend a church in transition.

Here’s why: When you start attending a church (and when you leave a church), it goes a long way to determining what you see in that church and your experience there.

Each lead pastor has a different personality, passions, and, sometimes, different visions. They lead and preach differently, emphasize missions or community differently, view the culture around the church differently, and all of that shapes the church. It shapes who comes, who sticks, the kind of disciples made, and so on.

For the church I’m at, a pastor who had been here for over 30 years left in 2015, the next lead pastor left in 2019, and then they brought in an intentional interim pastor. While he was here, COVID-19 hit, and that made significant changes in the church and staff.

Looking back, while it was the same church with many of the same people, in some ways, it has been four different churches since 2015.

Here are some lessons for leaders and churches:

Understand the power of memory. If you’ve been through all the transitions, you have a lot of memories and potentially some scars. This group has some incredible stories of God’s faithfulness, but they have also been through the most transitions and change. They have held on and often believe great things are ahead for the church. I was talking with a leader who was in a similar position to me, and he said this group has been the hardest group to win over at his church. Thankfully for me, that hasn’t been the case! This group has loved and welcomed our family and reminded me often of how much they are praying for me.

Celebrate the seasons you remember. As the pastor, celebrate all God has done in the church’s history. You might feel like you are competing with a memory (and you might be), but speak well of the people who have gone before you and what God has done in the past at your church. The last thing you want to do is speak ill of people who are no longer there, regardless of what they did or didn’t do in their time as leaders. You weren’t there, didn’t know all the details, and couldn’t do anything about what they did or didn’t do. 

You don’t know the whole story. It took me years to understand this principle. And while it is important in all walks of leadership, it is especially important during transitions. When someone comes and tells you a story, know that you aren’t getting the whole story of what happened. That doesn’t mean they are lying to you; they are simply telling you what they know of the situation and their perspective. Yes, you need to listen and glean all you can from someone, but you can’t base your decision on something because of what one person said. Get other perspectives, and talk to as many people as you can as you learn the history of a church. When I arrived at CCC, I interviewed over 50 people. I asked them the same questions to learn as much as possible from as many different perspectives as possible before making any decisions. 

Lessons from leading a church in New England.
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Move slower than you want or think you should. If you’re a leader, you likely like to move fast and get things done. After all, that’s what leaders do. We make things happen. But when revitalizing a church, a long history came before you got there, and that history won’t move quickly. There is hurt and grief that people still have to navigate, hopes and dreams that didn’t happen, so you must move slower than you want or think you should. I had an older pastor tell me when we moved here that I should expect 5 years to lead the changes I wanted to lead at CCC. Someone told me, “I was here before you came, and as long as I don’t die, I’ll be here after you leave.” Now, he wasn’t being mean but articulating his reality. He has lived in New England and can trace his family back many generations. He has watched a lot of turnover happen at our church. 

When leading change in a church, move slower than you think or want to move.
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Relationships will win the day. One thing that is true in every church but is even more true in an older church is that relationships will win the day. When a decision is made, or a change is made, people will rarely talk to the new pastor; they will talk to the people they have known for years. This is natural. But you need to be aware of it. As a leader, to make changes, you must know where the power and influence in a church is. If you’re new, it isn’t with you. You have the title. I’ve heard Brian Croft and Karl Vaters say, “An older church lets a pastor make changes.” That’s real. When I arrived, I spent a lot of time observing meetings, watching who could sway the room and who spoke last that everyone listened to. Those were the people who I needed to have on board before making any change. I didn’t make any changes in my first 3 years that didn’t have certain people on board first. 

In a church transition, relationships will win the day.
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Learn what brought people to the church and what has kept them. One of the most important things you can learn about a church you lead is why people came and stayed. Talking with people who have left and learning why they left is also valuable, but those can be hard connections to make sometimes. Listen to people talk about what they love about a church; ask them what they love. 

6 lessons I’ve learned in my first 3 years in New England.
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One of the most difficult aspects of a change in leadership is changing the culture of that church, group, or organization. 

You can change the values, the mission statement, and the strategy. But those changes to values and strategy won’t matter if you don’t change the culture. 

Why?

Because whatever the culture is, that is what people do. 

Tod Bolsinger said, “Culture is the set of default behaviors and usually unexamined or unreflective practices that make up the organizational life and ethos of a company, organization, family or church. In short, organizational culture is the way we do things around here.” 

Organizational culture is the way we do things around here.
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To change culture, you must look at how things are done. How do decisions get made? Who needs to be in the room for those decisions to be made? Do decisions get made by a small group after the meeting?

You can have the most outward-oriented strategy as a church, but you won’t be effective if your behaviors don’t match that. 

Many new pastors come into a church and think that if they change the mission, vision, or strategy, they have changed the church. 

But the group will always default to culture. 

How does that culture get set?

Culture is rarely decided on. A meeting is held to work through vision, values, mission, and strategy. But a meeting is rarely held to decide culture. Culture simply happens. It happens through behaviors, policies, celebrations, and demotions. When you cheer someone on, culture is set. When you scold someone or redirect someone, culture is set. 

John Kotter said, “Organizational culture is usually set by the group’s founders and reinforced through success. When a value leads to a behavior resulting in a desired outcome, the values and behaviors become embedded in the group’s DNA.” 

Culture is reinforced through success.
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One important thing leaders need to do is listen to the stories people tell. You will find the culture and where things came from in those stories. 

To change a culture, you must connect that culture change to success. 

People will always default to what brought success in the past. If they see momentum from a ministry project or behavior, they will seek to replicate that. 

As you change culture, focus on new behaviors and do whatever you can to connect them to success. 

To change culture, focus on new behaviors and do whatever you can to connect them to success.
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Changing anything is a challenge.

Whether in your personal life, finances, marriage, work, or church. The reason isn’t that people hate change, even though that is what everyone thinks. On the contrary, as Ronald Heifetz says, “What people resist is not change per se, but loss. When change involves real or potential loss, people hold on to what they have and resist the change.”

What people resist is not change per se, but loss. When change involves real or potential loss, people hold on to what they have and resist the change. -Ronald Heifetz
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But when you lead change in a church, the challenges you are facing are obvious and not so obvious.

The first challenge is authority and influence. You can only accomplish something with authority and influence. When they begin to make changes, many pastors think they have authority and influence but may not have what they need.

This is important because you will need authority and influence to change anything. If you are new to your role or church, you must determine who has the most authority and influence. For my first two years at CCC, I only made changes by getting crucial people on board first because they had the relational equity I needed. According to the org chart, I have the authority to do things but need more influence to see them through.

How do you know who has authority and influence? Listen to whose name comes up often. Who do people seek out for advice and input? When you bring up ideas, does anyone say, “I wonder what _______ thinks?” As you sit in meetings, see who sways the room and who people wait to hear from. The person with the most authority and influence in a church is rarely the person with the title but who has built the relational capital over the years. This person can make or break change.

Do you have the authority and the influence to make the changes you want to make?
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The second challenge is tradition and how things have been done. Countless leaders can tell stories of new ideas that died on the vine of “That’s not how we do things around here.” Or, “We’ve never done it that way here.”

This doesn’t mean you don’t try something or do something, but you need to know what has been done and what hasn’t been done in the past. It is particularly important to know what has been attempted and has failed in the past at a church. Those have important lessons for you as you lead.

When you seek to change traditions or how things have been, you must do some groundwork to understand why something began and how effective that thing is, and also understand the sweat equity people have in a ministry or program.

To understand tradition, you need to look at who is involved, who has a passion for that ministry, and how much budget it receives. When you ask questions about a ministry or a way of doing something, listen to how people respond. When you ask why things began or have changed over the years, listen to any indication of people trying to change or take away a ministry or way of doing things.

Does this mean you should always keep something that falls into this category? No. But it does require care and influence, which will take time.

The third challenge is cultural. If you are new to the city your church is in, this is one of the hardest challenges. You don’t know what you don’t know about culture. I grew up in Pennsylvania, similar to New England but also different. Each state in New England has its flavor and way of doing things, which impacts how the church is done. The same is true in other parts of the country. And while some places are more transient, which lends itself to less tradition, there is still a culture there.

There is also church culture that you have to navigate. That culture has been built from Day 1 (even before) of your church. Was your church started as a plant or a split? What families built the church? How much power do they have? How has the conflict been handled over the years? How many transitions have there been in your church? Has your church experienced growth or decline in recent years? These things fit into the culture and “how things are done around here.”

Culture is simply what people do without being told. Culture can be shaped and changed, but that is a very intentional process that is a different blog post.

Culture is simply what people do without being told.
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For now, you must become a student of your culture. Over the last two years, I sought out staff members and leaders who have left our church to find out what happened and looked for commonalities (which there are). That’s culture. Watch how things get handled, how decisions are made, and how things happen. That’s culture.

Make no mistake; culture can work for or against you, so you must know how it plays out.

The fourth challenge is memory. This one is the least obvious because it is so personal.

Every person in your church has memories of your church, for good or bad. They can tell you stories of the church at its peak, when the building was full, when this program or that began, and the excitement of it.

Many pastors find themselves working against the memories of the past. Those memories are real but only sometimes accurate. While you will hear stories of how full the building was for that program, you will hear from someone else about how that program burned them out or made a different part of the church challenging. Memories and stories are personality and people-specific. They are also never as great or bad as people remember them. So, ask for stories, listen for commonalities, and talk to as many people as possible inside and outside the church to get as many details as possible. 

These stories will help you as you lead change because they help you understand your church’s story and your people’s experiences. 

When you arrive as a new pastor, you will feel the pressure of living up to people’s memories. This is hard, especially after COVID-19, because the reality is that those memories won’t easily be replicated.

The memories people carry from your church’s past are incredibly powerful and shape how they experience your current church.
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Is leading change difficult? Yes. 

Is leading change impossible? No. 

It will require a certain kind of leadership. 

To begin, lay out what will change and won’t change. This can begin just in your mind. Share it with trusted leaders, get feedback and help. 

A simple first step is laying out your top 3 priorities as you move forward. These are things that are ripe for change. Not everything is ripe for change. 

How do you know?

Here’s a simple question: If you don’t change anything about ____, will it matter in two years?

If you don’t change anything about ____, will it matter in two years?
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Not everything is worth changing now or maybe ever. This question will help you know where to begin, what to work on, and what to fight for. 

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When I started at CCC, I read as many books on transitions and leading change as possible. One of the things they talked about is how new leaders will want to make changes, maybe even a lot of changes, but you need to know when to make those changes.

One of the key tasks for any leader, especially a brand-new leader, is figuring out what to change and when to make that change.

Leaders make changes. Leaders see things before others and the things that need to change or shift to get somewhere. The issue isn’t seeing what needs to change but knowing when to make that change.

So how do you know when to make a change? When something is “ripe for change.”

In one of my favorite leadership books, Leadership on the Line, Ronald Heifetz says: 

What determines when or whether an issue becomes ripe? How does it take on a generalized urgency shared by not just one but many factions within the community? Although there are many factors, we have identified four key questions; What other concerns occupy the people who need to be engaged? How deeply are people affected by the problem? How much do people need to learn? And what are the senior authority figures saying about the issue?

What other concerns occupy the people who need to be engaged? Leaders, like all people, have blinders and only see certain things. It is important to get different perspectives on changes because the thing you want to change or think is the next thing may not be the biggest thing your people are thinking about or seeing.

You can cut your legs off if you make the wrong change.

When I came, I listened to what people were talking about and what they said about hopes for the future. I also interviewed and surveyed over 50 people in our church, so I could get an idea of what the people of our church were thinking about and seeing.

That doesn’t mean they are right, but what you see as a leader also doesn’t make you right.

For a new pastor, this could be about starting a new ministry, remodeling the building, updating the parking lot, or changing the music style.

I asked each church I interviewed, “If all of your prayers for this church got answered, what would this church look like?” This question is a great way to understand what the people in a church are seeing and thinking about.

How deeply are people affected by the problem? One thing pastors and leaders do too often is change things or die on hills that aren’t that big of a deal.

One thing pastors and leaders do too often is change things or die on hills that aren’t that big of a deal.
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We do that because we are passionate about it, think it’s a great idea, or saw something at a conference that we “just have to do.” I’ve reviewed changes I made in Tucson, or things I thought were a big deal, and shook my head. Most things in the church are not worth dying on. So choose wisely the things that you change. 

The best thing to change is the pain points most people see or feel. 

One question that I have used since moving to New England is to ask, “If I don’t do anything about this, will it matter in two years?”

One question to ask about making changes: If I don’t do anything about this, will it matter in two years?
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This question has slowed me down to ask if it matters. Some things need to be changed immediately; if you don’t do something, it might be fatal to your church. By asking this question, it also helps put me in the future of what matters. 

How much do people need to learn? Pastors and leaders are notorious for making a change without educating anyone on the change or the reason for the change. And then, we get angry with our people for “not being on board.”

Pastors, remember that whatever change you are making or considering, you have been thinking about, researching, and getting excited about for months or years. Your people will also need time to fully embrace what you are doing. 

So educate them. Share the resources you’ve used, the books you’ve read, or the podcasts you’ve listened to. Expose your people to the changes in your heart and mind that led to the change. 

What do people need to know for you to make changes at your church?
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And what are the senior authority figures saying about the issue? The people in your church with formal and informal authority, what do they say? Are they on board? Do they see what you see?

Leaders who skip this part will do so at their peril. 

When you make a change, especially as a new leader, people with complaints won’t come to you. They will go to those with authority and influence, the ones who have been at the church longer than you have. You need to have them on board so they can help answer questions and run interference for you in a change. 

4 questions to ask as you lead change.
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As we near the end of the year, I thought I’d repost the top 10 posts from this year, just in case you missed them or want to go back.

A lot has happened in my life, and many lessons have been learned, which come through in the posts. Here they are:

The most read posts of 2022.
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1. 20 Things I’ve Learned About Marriage after 20 Years
2. What Changes to Make as a New Leader (And When to Make Them)
3. Red Flags in a Job Search
4. Two Sneaky Things for Leaders Over 40
5. 1 Question to Save You From Regret
6. One Thing Pastors Overlook in Preaching
7. 5 Things Productive People Do in the Morning
8. 5 Ways to Lead When You Aren’t in Charge
9. How to Survive Monday as a Pastor
10. Creating a Rhythm of Sabbath Rest

The top 10 articles of 2022.
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It’s that time of year. When I look back over what I’ve read and list out my favorite books of the year! 

Admittedly, I read fewer non-fiction books this past year. Part of that was the energy our move across the country took and settling into life here. I’m also finding that I need to give my brain a break and enjoy more fiction and historical books.

Below is a photo of my favorite books of the year, with my favorite one on top. To see everything I read this year, go here.

If you’re curious about past years’ lists, click on the numbers: 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021.

First, the fun books!

Here are my 6 favorite novels of the year:

My favorite novels of 2022
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1. The Son
2. Ordinary grace
3. City on fire
4. Violin conspiracy
5. Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer and Grace: President Obama and Ten Days in the Battle for America

Here are my favorite books of the year:

10. The Power of Place: Choosing Stability in a Rootless Age. I didn’t read this before we moved, but it said many things we have thought about over the years about the power and importance of place in our lives. I put a big emphasis on place, and this book was helpful to have a theology on it. Suppose you are trying to find your place in this world, where you should live, etc. This is a helpful book on that. 

9. Invitation to a Journey: A Road Map for Spiritual Formation. I have had this book on my shelf for a long time and finally got around to reading it. Wow. The section on spiritual formation and personality was fascinating. It helped name some things in my life that I needed to be aware of and some deficiencies I can easily fall into as a pastor. 

8. How Minds Change: The Surprising Science of Belief, Opinion, and Persuasion. Everyone who preaches and communicates should read this book. Most sermons go after the wrong argument, and this book was eye-opening to what changes people’s minds from a scientific perspective.

7. Letters to a Young Pastor: Timothy Conversations between Father and Son. This book was so rich and soul-stirring. Eugene Peterson wrote letters to his son as his son started in ministry. This is a book I’ll come back to in the coming years.

6. A Non-Anxious Presence: How a Changing and Complex World will Create a Remnant of Renewed Christian Leaders. If there is one book pastors need to read as we move into a post-pandemic, divisive world, this is it. It names what we have felt and experienced and a way forward. 

5. The 6 Types of Working Genius: A Better Way to Understand Your Gifts, Your Frustrations, and Your Team. I love personality tests and explaining why we do what we do in work, life and relationships. This book was something we took our staff and elders through and has been incredibly helpful in understanding our wiring as a team. 

4. Attached to God: A Practical Guide to Deeper Spiritual Experience. While I disagree with the author on some theological areas, this book was beneficial for me to understand my relationship with God and how I process that based on what I’ve experienced in life and relationships. 

3. The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure. I have recommended this book to every parent of teenagers since I read it—a must-read for parents. 

2. Leadership on the Line: Staying Alive Through the Dangers of Change. This is a bit of cheating since I’ve read this book three times, but it is still relevant and spot-on. If you are leading change of any kind, this book has to be at the top of your list. This book has saved me many times as I’ve led change processes over the years. 

1. From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness, and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life. I’m starting to read and think more about the second half of life as I get older, and this book answered many questions and helped me think through a roadmap for my future steps. If you’re over 40, you should read this book. 

My 10 favorite books of 2022
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Covid gave the church some opportunities.

Yes, I know that statement might seem odd because it has sped things up and made a lot of things about being a pastor more difficult. But, leading your church into the future has many potential opportunities if you look for them.

What are they?

While there are some universal ones, some are just for your church.

How to not miss the opportunities waiting for your church.
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First, you have to decide to embrace it. Many pastors are trying to get back to what it was, getting people back into the room, etc.

You can’t go back. And while some things about the past are nice, there are some things you’d like to leave in the past.

Where is your church? Once you know, you can lead her into the future.
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Second, you need to know exactly where your church is. Many pastors don’t know who is a part of their church, who is still engaged, or what things are or are not working.

Too many pastors make decisions based on feelings. It feels full, and that service felt good. But, you can’t lead simply on what feels full or good.

I would encourage you to pull your team together. Whether that is staff, volunteers, elders, or a combination of these. Ask them some simple questions about every ministry (kids, students, groups, worship, outreach, etc.):

3 questions every church needs to be asking right now.
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Why did we start this? Everything your church does begins with a need (or it should). Someone saw a need and started something to meet that need.

Do you know why you do everything that you do as a church? This is the time for every ministry and program to be clear on why it exists and why it is taking staffing and resources. Gone are the days when churches could do all things.

Does it still meet that need? Once you know what needs you are trying to reach or what caused you to start doing something as a church, you can ask the following question: Does it still meet that need? Is that still a need we are called to meet? The reality is that just because it is a need or a good idea doesn’t mean your church needs to complete it or do it. Also, just because you used to meet that need doesn’t mean you must keep meeting that need. Maybe you no longer have the vision or passion or lack a leader or skill set to do it well.

One of my favorite questions is, What problem created the meeting that resulted in this answer? Every ministry or program or way of doing church started with a problem. That problem resulted in getting some people in a room to solve it. What came out of that meeting is the way your church does church.

Every leader must regularly ask, “Is that still a problem for us to solve? If so, what is the best way to solve it?”

You see, it might not be your problem to solve; it may not be a problem anymore. The things you started 10-20 years ago may no longer be issues or things your church is passionate about.

3 questions every pastor needs to be asking right now.
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When it comes to change, there are a few different ways of seeing it and seeing why we need to change that keeps us stuck:

How you get stuck in life and relationships.
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• Some of us don’t think we need to change. We aren’t perfect, but we aren’t terrible in our opinion. There is some hidden system known only to us, but that system tells us we aren’t as bad as an employee, child, parent or spouse as other people.
• We’ve tried to change, and it didn’t work. So, it must not be worth it. Which takes us quickly back to the first spot, we don’t need to change then.
• I’d change, but I can’t because and we fill in the blank. That could be something from our past, someone in our present. But the other person is keeping us stuck where we are. This is the person who changes jobs and keeps working for a boss that doesn’t see how amazing they are. The problem is, they keep running out of bosses. In this person, they hold others responsible for their problems, their pain. This is the view that the problem is out there. And as long as the problem is out there, I don’t have to change or take responsibility for it.
• Or, have you ever said or heard someone say, “That’s not me. That’s not who I am. It was just once.” But it wasn’t just once, and most of the time, we are blind to our blind spots.
• Sometimes we shrug it off. We’ll say things like, “well that’s just how life goes.” We rationalize things as a way to protect ourselves. We often do this if we grew up in a chaotic home or are related to an addict or an alcoholic. Unknowingly, this is a defense mechanism for us and keeps us from having to engage hard parts of our lives.
• Connected to this is “this is just the way I am.” I’m just loud; I’m just controlling, fearful, I worry about everything. What this does is it gives us a way out. I don’t have to change because this is how I am. What if, that is causing problems in our closest relationships or keeping us from experiencing life.

When it comes to change, we have all kinds of opinions on the possibility of change and how it happens.

What’s fascinating to me is how the bible, psychologists, and neuroscientists say the same thing about change and your brain (the bible just said it first): The brain, your mind is crucial. It is powerful.

The Power of Your Mind When it Comes to Change
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Dr. Daniel Amen called America’s most popular psychiatrist, and a neuroscientist says that your brain is involved in everything you do and everything you are, including how you think, feel, act and how well you get along with people. That when your brain works right, you work right. When your brain is troubled, you are more likely to have trouble in life.

 Craig Groeschel said: You cannot have a positive life when you have a negative mind.

You cannot have a positive life when you have a negative mind. -Craig Groeschel
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Two thousand years ago, the apostle Paul writing in the New Testament said in his letter to the church in Philippi: Don’t worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Finally brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable—if there is any moral excellence and if there is anything praiseworthy—dwell (or think) on these things. Do what you have learned and received and heard from me, and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.

The writer of the book of Hebrews in the NT told us: to pay close attention, pay attention to what you pay attention to. The idea of attention, what we focus on is all over scripture.

Why?

As Craig Groeschel says, Your life is always moving in the direction of your strongest thoughts.

Your life is always moving in the direction of your strongest thoughts. -Craig Groeschel
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It’s the idea that what fires together, stays together. The more you think about anything, no matter what it is, the more your brain gives real estate to that subject. So, and this is key at least for me because I’m not a naturally optimistic person (and let’s be honest, our culture is not optimistic, just turn on social media), but if you repeatedly focus your thoughts on negative experiences (their words hurt me) those negative thoughts get wired more deeply into our brains.

Have you noticed that you recall negative experiences faster and easier than positive ones? It’s called negative bias. We recall negative things; words said to us, negative emotions more quickly and we remember negative experiences longer than positive ones.

It’s why you can remember being left out at school, not picked on the team, what your parent or guidance counselor said in school, the feedback from a boss over a decade ago.

One neuroscientist coined the phrase the survival of the busiest to explain this: that the more we think specific thoughts, both unhealthy and healthy, the more powerful they become.

This is why, the apostle Paul writing in the New Testament said in his letter to the church in Rome said: Be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may discern what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.

Our mental habits, what we give our attention to, shape our brain, which in turn forms our behaviors.

What Romans 12 is telling us is how we align our minds with our feelings and what God is doing in our lives.

I believe to see the change in our lives; we need to understand the power of our minds and how much they shape our heart and behaviors.

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For all of us, something or someone runs our lives. When this happens we find ourselves not living the life God has called us to. When we stop long enough to catch our breath, we realize how tired we are, how much debt we have, how we said yes to things we should have said no to.

If we aren’t careful we simply jump from “I need to lose weight”, to “I need to get out of debt”, to “I need to slow down”, and we try to make changes in those areas. We get on the latest diet, sign up for a financial class or clear our calendar for a week.

If you are like most people who try this approach, a month from now you’ll look up and see the same problem.

The question becomes, “What then?”

In most church counseling sessions we would look at the sins in your life. We would talk about your addiction to porn, your willingness to give your heart and body away in relationships, the pace that you keep, how you go into debt buying stuff you can’t afford, how you always gossip, or why you push yourself and your kids to be the best and attain a certain kind of lifestyle. We often want to move to fixing those things and think, “I’ll just stop doing them.”

If you’ve ever tried this approach, you know it doesn’t work. We can’t simply change our behavior and see lasting change. Until we understand why we do something, change and freedom will continue to elude us.

Have you ever been to a buffet – one where the plates are stacked, and whenever you pull a plate off, they all move up? Think of your life and sins as being like that stack of plates. Most of the time when we sin or hear about sin in a sermon, it is about the plate on top. To see true change, to see the things that crowd out our lives get conquered by the power of Jesus, we have to keep pulling up plates until we get to the last one, what we’ll call the sin under the sin.

If we aren’t careful this sin under the sin starts to drive our lives. What makes this easy to miss is that it is often something good that we give prominence to in our lives. Things like our kids, a job, money, keeping a clean house, retirement, a dream house or another goal.

These things are what drive us to go into debt, to run at an unsustainable pace on our calendar, which leads to an unhealthy lifestyle. This is the why.

Let me put it another way: often when we sin, without realizing it we are looking for meaning. We sin from a place of emptiness.

We sin from a place of wanting to be filled up, a hope to feel better, more alive, a part of something, or to take away the fear of missing out on something.

As well, for many Christians we pursue changing the wrongs things. We change what we see, what is obvious to ourselves and those around us. The image of an iceberg comes to mind.

In How People Change by Paul David Tripp & Timothy Lane said:

Many Christians underestimate the presence and power of indwelling sin. They don’t see how easily entrapped they are in this world full of snares (Galatians 6:1). They don’t grasp the comprehensive nature of the war that is always raging within the heart of every believer (Romans 7). They’re not aware of how prone they are to run after God replacements. They fail to see that their greatest problems exist within them, not outside them.

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