Thinking and Influence: The Pictures in Our Head

...this is the 3rd time I've written, edited, this post....hopefully, the pictures are maturing!

Doug Sherman, in his Bible Study, Your Work Matters to God, states "we believe that the workplace is today the most strategic arena for Christian thinking and influence. Moreover, until we become godly workers, we have little hope of becoming godly husbands, wives, parents, or church members. For unless Christlikeness characterizes the 60-80 percent of our lives spent at work, we simply are not living Christlike lives."

The most strategic arena for Christian thinking...... Have you ever thought much about your "Christian" thinking being strategic? How about your thinking, do you think about your thinking? How about your thinking being "Christian?" Thinking about thinking is not something most of us today think about. Think about it for a minute or two.........hard to do isn't it? How about talking about your thinking, or another's thinking?

How dramatically is your thinking influenced by what's going on around you? Think about how much your thinking is influenced by the thoughts of others, because the mind is hungry for more information and is looking to be influenced. Are you aware of how your thinking is changed? How critical is your thinking?

Prior to the invention of radio, TV, internet, and even the mass production of newspapers, the spoils and triumphs of what flowed from anothers thinking was likely a much more celebrated event; the recipient of those thoughts was much more aware of the absorption and how his thinking might be changing. He or she had time to be critical about it.

Thinking about thinking - talking about what we think - arguing about thinking is something philosophers have done for thousands of years. It wasn't that many years ago when people would travel for miles and miles to hear a simple speech and then stay to discuss their thoughts in local bars and meeting houses. Today, we get our information in bits and pieces, yet, as if from a fire hose; there is more information in one week's worth of the New York Times than the average 18th century American would come across in a lifetime.

Thinking, critical thinking, and getting one's message across to others has always been an important part of those intent upon critical thinking. Ben Franklin would write letters to his own newspaper under fictitious names just so he could express his thoughts about what he thought just that he could then write the rebuttals to further spin the thinking. He claimed years later that he did this in part to develop opinions within his readers' thoughts.

So what does this have to do with Christian thinking? Everything. Everyone is bombarded with news and information they don't ask to receive; from emails randomly read to story lines of favorite tv shows, but received and process it is.

Writer, journalist, and progressive thinker Walter Lippmann, in the mid 1900's, wrote extensively about the tendency of journalists to generalize about other people based on fixed ideas. He argued that people—including journalists—are more apt to believe "the pictures in their heads" than come to judgment by critical thinking.

The pictures in our heads is what we tend to believe and these pictures are formed from what we watch, hear, and read. And what most of us watch, hear, and read, is accidental; not purposeful.

So, what does this have to do with our Christian influence? Everything. If we are not purposeful about what we watch, read, and hear, our thinking will not lead to practicing Christianity and if we aren't practicing Christianity, we aren't influencing others towards God's glory.

And if we aren't influencing others towards God's glory, then what are we influencing them towards?

What do the pictures in your head look like today, this past year, and what are they going to look like this next year, in 5 years, in 25 years? Are you purposefully drawing those pictures or letting others?


To that end....