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Have you ever looked at a situation you’re facing in utter disbelief and thought, "How will I ever get over this?" Lysa TerKeurst understands. After years of heartbreak and emotional trauma, she realized it’s not about just getting over hard circumstances but learning how to work through what she has walked through. Now, she wants to help you do the same. That’s why Lysa teamed up with her personal, licensed professional counselor, Jim Cress, alongside the Director of Theological Research at Proverbs 31 Ministries, Dr. Joel Muddamalle, to bring you "Therapy & Theology." While Lysa, Jim and Joel do tackle some really hard topics, you’ll soon find they're just three friends having a great conversation and learning from each other along the way.
Lysa TerKeurst:
Welcome to a brand-new season of Therapy & Theology. I'm so excited you're here today. And in today's episode, we're going to answer a question about intrusive thoughts. Now, before I get into the content though, I have to let you know our team has put together a very helpful listener guide that you can download for free using the link in the show notes. It's a summary of our discussion, and it'll be useful for you as you unpack what we discuss and maybe take your own notes, and it'll just be a great reference even if you have conversations with family or friends and want to refer back to something that was said on the show today.
Now, let's dive into today's content. How do you combat intrusive thoughts? All right, intrusive thoughts ... how do we combat those? How do we combat intrusive thoughts? That's the question that was submitted to us. And I relate to this a lot. Now, let's define what an intrusive thought is, and then we're going to get right into your thoughts and your thoughts, Jim and Joel. Now, intrusive thoughts are, according to this definition, negative ideas and images that are uninvited and unwanted. It's not the positive side; it's not looking at something and go, "Wow, this might actually work out OK." It's looking at something, and all of a sudden, a thought comes to you that is negative; it's uninvited, and it's unwanted.
Now this can happen to me, because sometimes I struggle with catastrophic thinking, but even more than that just worst-case scenarios. And I'll be looking at something, and I'll be thinking, "You know what? OK, this is what needs to happen, and then I can do this, and then I can do this," and all of a sudden, it's almost like this jarring feeling of "This isn't going to be OK. Things are going to fall apart. Things have been OK, and now when is the other shoe going to drop?" And so, that's usually how it occurs to me. So I want to hear from you guys about how do we combat those?
Jim Cress:
Well first, it seems so simple doesn't it? As I like to say, "It's simple but not simplistic." And that is to pay attention to it. Just to notice it. What is the thought? And the old Martin Luther quote that we've talked about I believe here on the podcast before, that just because those thought birds fly over your head doesn't mean they get to make a nest in your hair. So to notice it and say, "What is the thought that's coming in?" It'd be great if you could know where's it coming from, but often I go first just to notice and say, "This is the thought that's going on." And quite frankly, a lot of times I'll speak that out loud. See, those intrusive thoughts, they're not out loud. If someone was next to you they couldn't hear them. But it's OK; I think this is the thought that I'm having right now; I wonder where am I also feeling it in my body?
Anxiety, often people can feel that in their chest or in their mind or their head, or you can see anger in eyes or flaring nostrils or something like that. But the idea is, where is this coming from? And even to put your hand on your body, where am I feeling it right now? In your stomach or wherever you're feeling that. And how many times we've said here that if it's hysterical, it's historical. So I'd like ... just at least contemplate and ponder, for me in that moment, for y'all in that moment, I wonder if this is a thought that while it is intrusive it's been here before, and what did I learn about that thought? Did I say, "OK, that's silly; that's not true." And we'll get to, which we've gotten to many times, to move to that: taking every thought captive and making it obedient to Christ. But first just begin to notice the thought, where it's coming from if you can know, and be present with it.
Lysa TerKeurst:
Now how do I know the difference between an intrusive thought and a warning, like something in my discernment that's warning me? For example, the other day I was on a road trip, and we stopped at a convenience store. And I went inside; I went to use the restroom. And when I walked into the restroom, there was someone washing their hands at the sink, and I went into the stall, and I just got this overwhelming bad feeling that I'm not safe. And the stall walls didn't go all the way to the floor. And so all of a sudden, this thought came to me like I've seen enough shows where people get kidnapped, that all someone would have to do is have a needle, stick it underneath the opening, put me out somehow with some kind of drug, and cart me off through a different entrance.
And so all this stuff was running through my mind, and I thought, What is wrong with me? Why am I having these thoughts? I came into this bathroom happy, and then something happened. And so how do I know, like was that a warning? Was that discernment? Or is that truly an example of an intrusive thought where once again I'm thinking worst-case scenario?
Jim Cress:
You've given a historical context, so apparently you have seen somewhere a movie, read a novel, something about said scenario. Is that right?
Lysa TerKeurst:
Yes.
Jim Cress:
And I would imagine hearing what you've said, I know it is for me, probably for Joel, that that thought was autonomic and came on fast. You were not in a linear A plus B equals C thinking. Here's what is happening. I think I saw it in the movie; it could happen to me. It even felt like it was like that, right?
Lysa TerKeurst:
Yes.
Jim Cress:
To me it's a classic sign of an intrusive thought. So in that moment also, you're in a vulnerable situation, going to the bathroom, getting in a place where there is a stall, and that's a time often if you've come out of a car, too, remember your brain gets really open in what we call bilateral stimulation of just the car ... left, right, or just walking. So you may have been very present or talking with someone in your car. You come into the bathroom, and suddenly you've changed this venue, and obviously a bathroom, think about it, is a vulnerable place to be vulnerable to do what you need to do in there. So that idea is on you fast. So again, what did you do? What'd you do next? When the thought was there, did you say, as some people would, "Hey, man, I'm not going to go into that restroom. I don't feel safe." They'd drive down to another exit and find someplace where they'd feel safer.
Lysa TerKeurst:
Yeah, when the thought came, I was already in the restroom, and so I just quickly gathered my things, washed my hands, ran out of the bathroom, and I was really kind of panicked. And I was, "This is crazy." I walked in thinking I'm going to get some water and some M&M's and go to the restroom, and now all of a sudden something happens in the restroom, and now I'm bolting out. I can't stop in the store. I'm like, "Something's wrong." And what's really ironic is Chaz had gone to get gas. He came in and said, "I wasn't having a great feeling about you being in here." And so it was almost like both of us ... but we both sometimes struggle with catastrophic thinking.
So I'm like, is this discernment or is this something that it's like, OK, in that moment I should tell myself to calm down, because if I was really in danger I don't need to tell myself to calm down. So that's where I'm thinking, like sometimes we have these intrusive thoughts, and there's an element of truth to them. It's not just trying to tell ourselves, “Don't panic,” but it really is quickly discerning what's really happening.
Jim Cress:
I would be comfortable, before we go to our resident theologian seriously here about this thing spiritual warfare in many different categories, but I can pay attention to an event like that and I will live with ... you know what I'm going to say here ... the mystery of it all. And say certainly it's an intrusive thought because it came seemingly out of nowhere, but usually it is actually coming out of somewhere: this data bank of your mind. Is it coming from some movie you saw or whatever? Now you've talked about Chaz, your husband, coming in and saying, "Hey, wait a minute; I felt something was askew here too." We are discerning; women have that sixth sense we don't even have as guys, and I'm saying, “OK, the discernment might've just said something is off or I don't feel well; it doesn't mean you were in ... momentarily, you could have been harmed; it doesn't mean that.”
But I would say sometimes, “You know what, I just don't feel good about this and I don't have to for me know much more deeper about that, something deeper.” I'd just say, “I don't feel safe.” We move and go. I think that's happened to me ... I'm sure to you all at different times. I just don't know. It could be like, I don't feel safe in an area, or I don't for some reason feel safe in this restaurant that the food ... you might see that sanitation score or something you didn't even pay attention to. I'll just live with the mystery of it and say, “All I know is I don't feel safe.” And apparently you didn't do what you needed to come into the restroom for; you just left. Is that what you're saying?
Lysa TerKeurst:
Yes.
Jim Cress:
I don't need to know which is which. Now, if it becomes a pattern everywhere, and I'm like, "Look, I'm right here," I mean the church, a bathroom, then that part I think you could understand more. But I think you probably had some discernment going on.
Lysa TerKeurst:
OK, well I think that's really good to pay attention to: Is this an isolated instance? And I just need to manage the panic because whether it's a true warning or whether it is an intrusive thought, it's the panic that will make me not have the logical thoughts that I need to get myself out of that situation. But if it's a pattern, then that's probably indicating something deeper that I would need to pay attention to or work on.
Jim Cress:
Well, let me throw the cherry on top of the things. Dr. Bessel van der Kolk wrote the classic New York Times bestselling The Body Keeps the Score, and one of the things that he teaches that I love — and I do a lot of work in the trauma world — is after a situation like that where you have a panic attack or in a fight, flight or freeze, one of the more common responses or reactions when things settle down, you and Chaz back in the car, will be to go into shame. And we have said that I teach self-hatred at my expense. Hatred? Well then I'm like, That was ridiculous; what was I even thinking? So that's a common thing, and I tell people, “Please don't allow yourself to go to that.” At the end to say, “It's a mystery, Chaz. I don't know what was going on, but I felt unsafe.” You felt something unsafe. And we just let it be the mystery of it. But often we'll go to shame like, "I'm crazy, man. I need more counseling." It's like, no, no, you get to be human.
Lysa TerKeurst:
OK, that's really helpful. OK, Joel, we're all on the edge of our seat wanting to hear your theological wisdom. Jim mentioned take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ. I love that verse. I've quoted that verse. I've taught that verse, and yet at times when I'm really having an intrusive thought, I'm like, How do I take this captive? What do I do to it? How do I make it obedient to Christ? Because the emotion that's tied to the thought, like the feelings, maybe it's a feeling of fear, anxiety, whatever it is, sometimes that's screaming so loud that it's really hard to settle down into what this verse is instructing me to do.
Joel Muddamalle:
Yeah, I was just listening to you guys talk, and I think what's super fascinating is the description of the events that the both of you were working through really does have an absolutely Edenic kind of echo to me in the sense I think it's super, super important for us to always test every thought with the validity of the truth. And what do I mean by that? One, in your situation in the bathroom, like that type of thing, I think safety is always the most important thing. And so I just think about if it was my daughter or if it was Britt, my wife, I'd be like, get out. If you have that, trust your discernment, and then pay attention to the pattern though. I think it's fascinating that Chaz came back in and said, "Hey, I kind of had this weird feeling. Are you OK?”
So back to your mystery thought ... we have a very real Holy Spirit who is our Paraclete, our Helper, our Guardian, but what the Holy Spirit is consistently going to do is to guide us in the pathway of Truth. And so we have a gift in other brothers and sisters in Christ who are able to speak to and who are able to identify patterns for us. I want to go back to Eden and especially with this intrusive thought idea. Think about what the serpent does with Eve. The first thought up until this point, the thought framework for Adam and Eve is guard-railed by the Truth of God's Word. But what the serpent does is present an intrusive thought that ought not be there, right? A thought that is contrary to the Truth of God. But what Eve and Adam don't do is go back to the source of Truth.
They entertain a thought, and that entertainment of the thought becomes a curiosity, which turns into a crisis in their lives. And it's not that the thought itself is improper. Especially after the fall, we're going to have all kinds of crazy thoughts and ideas, and it's going to feel dysregulating for us. But the question consistently as believers, as Christians, people being led by the Holy Spirit, is to go back to the source of Truth. I want to get into the 2 Corinthians passage, but I always have had this thought, Lysa and Jim, Why didn't Eve and Adam just say to the nachash, the Hebrew word for the serpent, "That's a great thought. Hold up one second; let's go grab Yahweh.”
Lysa TerKeurst:
Or better yet, tell the serpent in Genesis 3, "If you have questions, go ask God yourself.”
Joel Muddamalle:
“Go ask Him yourself” ... absolutely. And the other interesting detail is that in Genesis 3 we’re being told that there's this indication that it was routine for God to walk with Adam and Eve, and the connotations of the Hebrew language there is there's a routine to it, and the goal of the walk didn't have a destination in mind. It was leisurely. So there's plenty of space and time.
Lysa TerKeurst:
It was relationship.
Joel Muddamalle:
It was relationship. You're not trying to get to your destination; you're trying to establish a quality of relationship in between the walk that's happening. And so again, going back to the source of Truth is this, and you kind of did that with the bathroom scenario. It's like, “Wait a minute; I had this feeling. Chaz kind of affirmed it. I'm in a place that might not be safe.” And then identify, OK, are there patterns? When we get to 2 Corinthians 10, and it's a passage that's quoted all the time, let me go ahead and read it for us: 2 Corinthians 10:4-5. Paul says this to this church in Corinth, "Since the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but are powerful through God for the demolition of strongholds," if you're circling or taking notes you want to highlight that word “stronghold.” He says this, "We," which I think is interesting that it's second-person plural, right, like the we idea of it. "We demolish arguments and every proud thing that is raised up against the knowledge of God, and we take every thought captive to obey Christ" (2 Corinthians 10:4-5, CSB).
OK, what are these strongholds? These strongholds I think are in this context thoughts that are contrary to the Truth of God. So one of the questions that we want to ask is: Are the emotions, the intrusive thoughts that we're experiencing as we're evaluating them, are they obstacles that are actually setting us up against the knowledge and the wisdom of God? And if they're obstacles that are setting us up against the knowledge and wisdom of God, these are things like what you said, Jim, that you watch the bird and you're like, "Bye, see ya; you don't belong here." Right? The phrase “taking captive,” it actually has a military context to it, and the picture is prisoners of war.
You would see this in the ancient world all the time: prisoners of war. Super important here, Paul is addressing the thought, not the person. The thought that is against the wisdom of God is actually attempting to take the person and make them a prisoner. What Paul is saying is: Don't let the thought make you a prisoner. You actually, by the power of the Holy Spirit, have the availability to properly and appropriately address the thought, and if the thought is against the wisdom of God, you take that thought captive.
Lysa TerKeurst:
Instead of letting that thought hijack you.
Joel Muddamalle:
Exactly.
Lysa TerKeurst:
So good. Jim, I know you have a really good example about getting on an airplane, and the fear of flying has been something that you've had for a good long while. And yet in this past year, you flew probably more than you've ever flown in your life, and you still have a system that you have prepared in advance for the intrusive thoughts when they come because you've seen a pattern of this is when some of those intrusive thoughts come. Tell us about that.
Jim Cress:
Well, as we are recording this podcast, I'm at the 10-year anniversary. And so it was 10 years ago exactly when totally unexpectedly, as far as I saw in the moment, this thought came over, and I flew in airplanes, and I could sleep on the floor, sleep across aisles if it was an empty plane, no problem at all. I loved it. I just loved getting on airplanes. And the pilot said — you all know the language — "Flight attendants prepare for takeoff." And man, it overcame me. I was in a middle seat. I had been angry. I had been burned out talking to my wife and a therapist I worked at the time and said, "Look, I'm burning out, burning out," ... hosting three national radio talk shows a day up until two o'clock in the morning, and I was really asking for someone to rescue me. So in the moment of course that panic came out of nowhere, and I thought, What in the world? And I literally cried out, almost crying, and said, Lord, please don't take my flying, because so much of the ministry I do was involved in flying.
Well, through this 10-year journey, I learned a lot more therapy around it, some EMDR, which is brain trauma healing type of therapy. And I began to know that from now on when anxiety comes in or a panic attack or something, I do not want to see that any longer as my enemy. It is either nothing; it's an intrusive thought out of nowhere maybe, and/or this is the question I asked myself, Is there something out of alignment in my life? We would call that something that's incongruent. A lot of stuff 10 years ago was out of alignment. I knew that I was burned out, stressed out, 60 pounds overweight, compassion fatigued with doing a lot of clients, a lot of counseling. So inside ... some underlying anger and just frustration. So when that anxiety came in, I saw it as an enemy, but it became one of my greatest friends because as I interviewed it, I said, ‘From now on, I'm going to do an inventory to ask myself daily: Is something out of alignment in my life?”
Also, do I have a good friend, which I do and more than one, that I could call and just say, "Hey, I'm feeling this anxiety." I'm going to do my language here; I'm going to interview anxiety. I was a broadcaster. We do that here. Think about this. And I've done thousands of interviews in my radio career. “All right, anxiety, take a seat; you're not my enemy. What are you trying to tell me?” And often it's like the anxiety just says it's something that could be in my body that I can't figure it out. I found out one time — you could appreciate this, Joel — in the Charlotte airport, I went to Bojangles in the airport, and I massively — I was way more overweight then — and massively carbo loaded up, I mean bad, like with a soft drink and all this.
Joel Muddamalle:
Why can I appreciate all of this right now?
Jim Cress:
Well, because we've talked about this quite honestly.
Lysa TerKeurst:
We weren't going to bring none up, but go ahead.
Jim Cress:
Come on; you get it.
Joel Muddamalle:
OK, yeah.
Jim Cress:
And I realized, and then I go research, and our mutual good friend Dr. Dan Amen and others, I realized if you have anxiety that carbs ... so I began to study it, and I found out that anxiety was my friend. I took anxiety, that X standing for the key or the chi in Greek, the first letter of Christ's name, so I spelled anxiety. This is where my ADD helps. Anxiety, spell the word, and now Christ, the X, and now, Christ, I enthusiastically trust You. I saw the exit sign, and I took that and said embracing Christ I trust. Now that may not work for you all, but I found this thing and I thought, Anxiety is not my enemy. It may try to be my enemy, but when it comes, and then way before I get on the plane, which we've talked about, you think where are you flying? All the things we do before we get on that plane.
Lysa TerKeurst:
So have all the facts like that.
Jim Cress:
But I'm like, that's our itinerary before you get on the plane. We do TSA PreCheck, or not. And I said, "Well, I'm going in." I began to use essential oils ... I did. Traveling with those, and I said, "I cannot afford to be late to the airport." I'm a two-hour-before guy, and I used to run at a fast clip like, get there a half hour before. I can walk around. People make fun of me with my Starbucks cup all over social media. But that's my rituals, and I'm calming myself down. I'm listening to a resiliency playlist, a resiliency playlist in my ear as I'm walking.
Joel Muddamalle:
Do you have a titled resiliency playlist?
Jim Cress:
Oh yeah, absolutely ... yeah, you can do that. And you just make your own playlist, right? So I come in, and now the airport is my friend, and I'm preparing myself. And then when I get on the plane, which I've shared with you, I walk down the chute getting into the plane, and I want to make sure that nobody's right on my tail, and I will bend my knees and say, Jesus, You are the Lord of this airplane. All anxiety must bow to You. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit and the matchless, powerful name of Jesus. And I'm doing this under my breath. But, anxiety, if you come my way, you will bow ahead of time to the Lord Jesus Christ. You must bow. And then if anxiety were to hit me on the plane, which it's happened from time to time, I will sit there and I will say in my mind, Take your best shot. You're going to do that; Jesus Christ is the Lord over you. And I've survived every airplane anxiety thing that I've ever had.
But I'm telling my brain, remember we've said our brains are wired for confidence and knowing, so that piece is to say — tell your brain — You've got this. What do you need to do? Music. A distraction is one of the number one keys to battling anxiety in the moment. Get on your phone and distract and all like that. Those are tools I have. And then if the anxiety does hit me, and sometimes maybe it is in a bathroom or a place I least expected, that's a big one, then I'll say, "What are my tools? Wait, breathe, what's going on for me right now?" And I'd like to if I may just quickly come back to the 2 Corinthians 10:4-5, "We," not God, "We are demolishing the strongholds." I love that, just demolishing them by taking every thought captive. Psychology teaches thought stopping, which is good. It says you need to say, “I refuse that thought. Thought, stop right here.” It doesn't take us farther. And where we go farther is do the thought stopping but then take it to the cross.
Joel Muddamalle:
I love that, Jim.
Jim Cress:
Take it to the cross.
Joel Muddamalle:
I love that. A couple of things I misspoke earlier. “We” is a first-person plural; it's going in my head that I made that mistake.
Jim Cress:
That's its own intrusive thought that was good for you.
Joel Muddamalle:
Yeah, yeah. I was like, "I've got to correct that." Yeah, it's a first-person plural. And I think it's important because “we” has in mind us here together. So there's a community. But there's a couple of things that you said that I can't let go of. One is what you just described for us is a liturgy; there's a comfort in the consistency of the liturgy. And in the ancient church, forever we've had liturgies. And in the generation that's a bit younger than us, there is a love that is growing again for liturgy, because it gives us that comfort and consistency. I'm working through the Bible; I'm doing a chronological Bible reading plan for the first time ever this year, so it's like an invite into my own personal kind of reading deal with Jesus. And I am hitting Leviticus, which is dreaded for every Bible reader. I joke, I think Leviticus is the biblical graveyard for Bible in a year readers. It's just like that place —
Jim Cress:
Like February for working out.
Joel Muddamalle:
When you're talking, what I think about Leviticus is actually a liturgy, that God in His kindness knew that His people were about to face all these different circumstances, intrusive thoughts, emotions, dysfunctional relationships, and He was like, Hey, here is a consistent pattern of behavior, of actions that you can participate in that will always remind you of the beauty of God's covenant in people and the beauty of who I am so that when you're in those situations, you can be drawn back to Me. And it's like routine, like festivals. At this time of year, every year, you do this. Or if this situation happens, well here's what the response is. So you're not left wondering like, Oh my gosh, what am I going to do? You just know, "Oh, here's a liturgy. Here is a routine." And there's comfort in that consistency.
Lysa TerKeurst:
I love that. You know, Jim, one of the things that you've taught me is prepare in times of strength for times of struggle. And I think about that quote a lot. And so for me, I have kind of a plan when things hit me. And it's not so much like the bathroom incident that I described. It's more like I'll get some kind of bad news, and it feels so all-consuming in that moment that the intrusive thoughts were this is going to play out worst-case scenario because I've seen other things play out worst-case scenario.
Jim Cress:
History.
Lysa TerKeurst:
And so I'll take the bad news, and I will run it so far down the field to where I'm planning funerals, I'm declaring bankruptcy, [and] I am destitute. Everyone in my life has left me. And so the intrusive thoughts sometimes are just more catastrophic thinking as I play something all the way out. And so something that I know when that train starts happening and I'm starting to spiral in my thoughts is, I ask myself, But what is real right now?
Jim Cress:
That's good.
Lysa TerKeurst:
What is real right now is I got some bad news. What is real right now also is that I'm in a home, I am with people that I love, I am able to eat my next meal, [and] I am able to go to my job. There are so many real good evidences of Christ's faithfulness that part of taking the thought captive for me is just that question, OK, but what is real right now? And then I'll go to tomorrow and what is real for tomorrow? And I don't allow myself to go past that because sometimes worst-case scenarios do happen.
Jim Cress:
That's true.
Lysa TerKeurst:
But a lot of times, I need to change my thought. But what if it all works out OK? There were things I was so completely stressed out about and having catastrophic thinking, worst-case scenarios a year from now, that somehow over this past year through counseling, through Bible reading, through letting life unfold through God's protection, that maybe I don't even see that it says protection ... those worst-case scenarios did not happen. And things did in some situations really work out OK. I think for me, one of the biggest things is when I think about the protection of God sometimes, I think about Him doing one big miraculous answer.
But what I'm learning is, it's no less miraculous for God to just protect me today, for God to just provide for me today. And so when bad news comes or an intrusive thought comes or this catastrophic thinking is knocking at my door, keeping it very focused to what are the circumstances right in front of me, and Jesus even taught us this: Don't run ahead of the future. Tomorrow will have trouble of its own. Let's look at what's real right now today. And that really helps me a lot.
Jim Cress:
And this is going to be tracking with you, a potentially exegetical reading into the text, I will borrow from the Bible and admit at times things that are there that I'm not trying to say this is what the text or context means, but I can still borrow ... we borrow from psychology and bumper stickers and things on coffee cups. That's a good quote. Here's one for me. And that is if someone comes to your house, you all know this in the Word of God in the New Testament, and they bring a gospel that is not the euaggelion — the true gospel — if they bring that, at that moment, you don't have to be a jerk to them, but you don't have to let them into your house, and you don't have to receive their message or dialogue with them. You can say, "No, no, this is wrong. This theology or the thoughts you're sharing is wrong." And shake the dust off your feet, and you go on.
I apply that in my own life that when I say interview the anxiety, see it personified. It is a person coming to the bathroom in your story or somewhere else, and that catastrophic thinking comes on; it's like someone's trying to deliver me something, and that may be from my past; it may be from the enemies of the world, the flesh or the devil, and to say, "You know what? You're not welcome here." Instead of having to blast it and say, "I hate you for coming in," but to say, "You're not bringing me maybe a little ‘g’ gospel; you're not bringing me the truth — you're bringing me a lie. And if you are bringing me a lie, then you are with the father of lies." And to harken back to where it's very practical, like you're not welcome here versus —
Lysa TerKeurst:
Get out.
Jim Cress:
Some people do that, and it works. I harken back to Joel and your teaching on Genesis 3 that we've talked about so much, and that is first it appears — and this is important on intrusive thoughts to me — it appears that Eve and Adam did not have an intrusive thought about God, but Satan intruded their thoughts. Because in that Hebrew, as you know, he didn't say God didn't say that. He said in that construct is, the King James [translation] says, "Hath God said" (Genesis 3:1) or whatever. He said, "You shall surely die, not." That's a mind molestation. And I look for at times, at least in that story, they didn't have an intrusive thought, but Satan intruded their thought life. Whether that can still happen today, we'll punt to you.
But I'm going to say here comes the thought: “You're bringing the wrong gospel to me. This is not right, and I refuse you.” And like you said, almost very gently, “Now get on your way and go along.” But I'm going to say, “Hang on before you go. I might think about you intrusive thought later and interview you and say maybe you were trying to tell me something. Watch, bathroom. Am I unsafe in some other part of my life?”
Joel Muddamalle:
Yeah, [inaudible] where else?
Lysa TerKeurst:
That's a great point.
Jim Cress:
I could interview it.
Lysa TerKeurst:
Yeah, I love that. One of my favorite verses, and I'm sure I've mentioned it here before, is Matthew 5:8, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God" (NIV). And I love that: “the pure in heart”; there is not “blessed is the perfect person who always does everything right.” And in this situation, I'm not going to take every thought captive and do it perfectly and hold it up and make it obedient to Christ. There are sometimes where the thoughts come in, and they stay a while. They do make a nest. It's like they land on me, and I allow them to make a nest, and I entertain them.
Joel Muddamalle:
And it's messy, you know when the birds make a nest; there's poop all over the place and stuff? I've got that in my front doorstep, and I've got to clean it.
Lysa TerKeurst:
Thank you, Joel. But that is true.
Joel Muddamalle:
It is true.
Lysa TerKeurst:
It is true. And we really needed to hear about poop right now, so it's all good. But you're right; it is messy. And so I love that. That verse for me reminds me I don't have to do this perfectly, but what I do need to do is ... when I lay in bed at night before I allow myself to sit in whatever's happened that day is to have an intentional cleaning out of my heart. Like I was afraid today in the bathroom, and nothing happened, and God was with me, and on that road trip, I made it home safely.
Jim Cress:
Listen how organically versus this: make it obedient to Christ organically; all of that was healthy ritual, and you were making all those thoughts obedient to Christ. Read the old timers who talked about the daily examine, and looking and saying you were doing a review, a daily examine there and just speaking it. You're going to be obedient to Christ. And then gently, Is there something I could learn from this today? Is there something maybe out of alignment in my life? And then no, if it's not true, and you're clearing that out ... by the way, we know in our sleep studies, right, powerful in our sleep studies now that what I'm doing is defragging the hard drive before I go in. He wants to give us sleep and rest versus going to bed with all this tension. There's a place to release that. Some people do it through journaling or just a prayer, just lying in bed talking or just sitting there with your spouse saying, "Hey, babe, what about this? I'm letting that go." Right?
Lysa TerKeurst:
And I love that the verse says, "Blessed are the pure in heart." In other words, in my mind I'm taking it and I need to clean whatever is still hanging on me. The anxiety from the day, the frustration, the fear, whatever, cleaning it out, and I will see God. I will see Him, I'll see His presence in my life so much more clear when I don't have all of this uninvited stuff also competing for my attention. Well, I think we have had such an amazing talk today. There were other questions that were sent in, but I think really addressing these intrusive thoughts was going to be absolutely crucial. So that is going to conclude our episode today. Jim and Joel, thank you guys for your wisdom and your help with intrusive thoughts.