TRY THIS ATTITUDE

I have often wondered about how difficult it is for many to change from what they believe and adhere to even when they have found out that it is wrong. Many hold on to their ideologies even when they have discovered the falsehoods they contain. In short, many do not want to change and this is a basic predisposition. They would rather believe the things they have been believing or keep doing the things they have been doing. Their wish to continue in this manner most often has no bearing on whether what they are believing or doing is wrong or right. They are just attached to doing or believing those things and would not want to change because changing means agreeing that they have been wrong and they are too proud to do that.
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Many do not want to change partly because of the implications of change. Most of the time, they consider themselves too deep in a situation to turn around or even feel the things they must confront should they agree to the offer of change are too much to bear. They just cannot go through with the process of change. I however say this that anyone who actually does not like change is a coward and his cowardice is revealed in his pride.
 

We must come to understand that change is inevitably constant. Change is necessary once we do not know all things and we are learning. Change brings improvement and improvement is key to the successful life. Whereas it is difficult for many people to accept change, it is relatively easier for many to want a different result from that which they are getting. It is easy for a poor person to want to be rich. It is easy for a sick person to want to be well. It is easy for a poor student to want to be the best, etc. These are very easy for a person to accept but to accept the change that brings these is difficult for him because he must first accept that he had been wrong in the way he did his things previously. And people generally do not want to accept that they have been wrong. And even when they have accepted this, they may not be willing to implement the change because of its implications.

It is the same with the gospel. Many who do not accept the Lord as saviour mostly do so because they just do not want the implications of having the Lord as saviour and lord. Many would rather rule over their own lives and stay in their sins. They are not against the good things that are found in the Lord but they are just not willing to go through the 'believing' because of its implications. Even with people of other beliefs like Muslims, Hindus, etc., they are also (at times) stuck with what they believe because they cannot afford to believe the Gospel in wariness of the implications that believing brings. At times it means neglect from family, ridicule, having to throw away many things, etc. I encountered an idol worshipper who also claimed to believe in the Lord Jesus. She even agreed she was not supposed to be having that idol in her house. She however could not let go of the idol because of what, apparently, the idol had done for her in the past. She just could not believe the Lord could and would do those things for her.

Even among believers, this problem exists. Church History reveals that the Church is coming out of the period which the Scriptures describe as great darkness covering the earth. Great darkness refers to the absence of truth and the prevalence of falsehood:

Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path (cf. Ps 119:105).  

We are coming from a period where many of the truths in the Kingdom were lost. We are coming away from a period of great darkness even in the Church of God: where people believed all kinds of things and many were deceived by the clergy, where the truth was hard to find. This period began some years after the death of the early apostles, spanning the time when the Roman Catholic Church ruled the world. It is known to history as the Dark Ages.

Since these times, the Lord has been restoring His truth to the Body and it has been in doses. So men and women of God have been raised according to history to help the Church in this regard. With this kind of historical perspective, a believer ought to know that revelation is progressive and to flow effectively with the Lord, one must be willing to change.
 

Every believer must realise that it is very easy to be brought up to believe the wrong things and that even some of the things that previously were thought to be right may actually be wrong or not the whole truth. As a result of this realization, we must have a certain attitude to life and our faith- a teachable heart. A humble heart that seeks not to preserve himself by holding on to a lie but one who is constantly open to the Lord to be shaped and molded from glory unto glory. One that accepts correction from the Lord and quickly believes and changes in conformity to those beliefs.
 

I have realised that many believers are unduly attached to certain beliefs even though countless proofs have been given them that show that those believers [who propagated the untruth] have been wrong. They just do not want to change from what they have believed from infancy even though they are wrong according to the Scriptures. Many vehemently disagree when new truths are presented to them not because they have cross-checked and found them to be false. They disagree because it just does not agree with what they supposed. That is sad.
 

Many want to get out of poverty but when you teach them financial prosperity according to Scripture, they cry out that it is love for money. They do not want to remain poor but they somehow rather think that God likes it that they are poor.  Love for money has nothing to do with whether you are poor or not. Both the poor and the rich can be plagued with this evil.  You show them with proof that God wants us to prosper and they think there is something wrong with your doctrine. Meanwhile they want to prosper, only their approach is incorrect . So out of sheer helplessness, they rather believe that it is God who has called one to be poor and the other to be rich. In essence, they blame God for their poverty. But the Bible states clearly that believers may perish for lack of knowledge (cf. Hos. 4:6).
 

Many believe sickness is not a good thing but when you teach them about divine health, they think it is ridiculous. They just would not agree with you. Even with proof from Scripture. The examples go on and on.

There are some also who agree with the truths they hear but are just not willing to walk in them. They can hear a truth today and still go away operating by their old beliefs. Why must it be so? They hear that they must steer their lives with their tongues and yet they go about talking poverty and sicknesses and weaknesses, etc.. They would love that they are rich, successful, healthy but are not willing to walk in the truths that produce these results. They would like to keep to their old beliefs and ways but would want different results. This is madness according to Einstein and I agree: to do the same things over and over but expecting different results. This is a wrong attitude that must be dropped. We must hear truth with the attitude of believing and walking in the light of it. We must have the attitude of doers and not just hearers deceiving ourselves. We must not look into the Word and turn away to walk by other principles. This attitude must change into the attitude of the doer.  


But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed (cf. James 1:22-25) .