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STINKIN’ THINKIN’

Training Material

by Pastor Kevin Badgley

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STINKIN’ THINKIN’

Preface

(mind of Christ, read God’s Word)

According to God’s Word we are not supposed to trust our own stinkin’ thinkin’! We think about something, and instead of leaving it on the altar we’ll think about it some more.

If you rely on your mind, you will be thinking up ways to get rid of people instead of relying on God to save them! PRAY instead of worrying.

Christians who try to get things done by what they think will never get anything done! The carnal mind is not going to agree with the Word of God!

People try to worship God according to their own way of thinking instead of what His Word says! We need to quit thinking so much about things and start believing God’s Word! When He gets our minds and hearts cleaned up the blind and the lame will come and be healed!

STINKIN’ THINKIN’

by Pastor Kevin Badgley

Jeremiah 1:9-10 says, “Then the LORD put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. And the LORD said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth. See, I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.” Sometimes you have to put down in order to build and to plant.

God spoke to His prophet Jeremiah and let him know that He had put His words in Jeremiah’s mouth! I assure you that when I preach, the sermons are better when the Lord Jesus does the talking! When the Lord puts a word in your mouth, and you yield to Him and preach it as He has given it to you, it’ll be good. However, if you add to or take away, it’ll be bad. I tried a few times in the past to help God a little and garnish it. God may give you a word (so many - no more, no less). If you want good results, do it according to the word of the Lord that He has given you. You need to get in your Bible and get that Word in your heart.

Matthew 12:34 says, “. . . out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.” If the Word of God is in your heart, the Word of God will come out of your mouth. I’m not talking about just memorization of scripture. An anointing will come, and you’ll preach exactly what comes out of the heart of God at that moment. It will be sufficient for every listener on the street or in a congregation.

When you pray for the sick or those who are devil possessed or oppressed, you need the Word of God to come out of your mouth. Isaiah 55:11 says, “So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.”

When it is sent from His mouth, it will be accomplished. When God gives you a word of prophecy and you have spoken it, you may look like a fool, and it may look like there’s no way it could happen, but you can rest in the Lord. It will happen.

If God said it (even out of your mouth or mine) it shall come to pass, because God’s Word can’t lie. Your salvation is based on what God’s Word says. It teaches you how to live, what to believe God for, and it keeps you from being deceived by the wiles of the devil.

According to God’s Word you are not even supposed to trust your own stinkin’ thinkin’! We think all the time. We think about something, and instead of leaving it on the altar we’ll think about it some more. The carnal mind is not going to agree with the Word of God! When you start reading what the Bible says, you’ll find out that your thinking is all wrong.

The servant of God can give you a word of faith, but then you start thinking about it. I guarantee you’ll think up all kinds of stuff that is contrary and at odds with that word because of the enemy. If you listen long enough you’ll start believing what you’re thinking rather than what’s in the Word of God. God’s word is true. You know it’s been proven and even confirmed with signs following, yet you’ll go home and run it over in your mind!

We get cleaned up and purified according to the Word, and then we go right out and roll in a mud hole right between the ears saying, Well, can God? Can God furnish a table in the wilderness? Can God send revival? Can God save my wayward spouse? Can God refire that old dead dry bones ministry?

In Ezekiel, Chapter 37, the Word of God says that in the valley of dry bones God spoke life by His Word, and they got UP. God created muscle, and sinew, and bone, and flesh. They stood up an exceeding great army! Just believe the Word of God, quit thinking about how He did it, and soon you’ll get to watch Him do it right in your very own life.

Your faith in God has nothing to do with what’s between your ears, because what’s between your ears is against God. I believe our own carnal thinking is the biggest blockade that we have against the miracle working power of God.

A lot of people say, The devil made me do it! Some say, The devil lied to me! However, you can even lie to yourself, so how much more will your carnality come against the Word of God when it is preached to you?

Have you ever had a lousy day, and at its end you realize that you weren’t in the Word of God; you were going and doing by your own head. It is bad when you get two or more carnal minded heads together! Then the devil comes along and twists Matthew 18:19 which says, “Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.” Agreement in carnality is the biggest manure pile going!

To be carnally minded is death, so you are going to die if you rely on your brains, no matter how high your IQ is! What you learn in this life won’t amount to anything compared to the Word of God!

Romans 10:17 says, “So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” Faith is valuable. It doesn’t come out of your head, and it doesn’t go into your head - faith goes in the heart! Romans 10:10 says, “For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”

The person whose heart is sanctified by the Word of God and believes God with his heart shall not be ashamed. However, if you lean to your own understanding, you’re going to get in trouble.

The children of Israel experienced deliverance from Egypt, and there was not a feeble one among their tribes as they went into the wilderness. They saw miracle after miracle, yet they did not put those things in their hearts! They started thinking after a few days! They worried about a drink of water and got mad at God!

Can God furnish a table in the wilderness? Can He feed us in this place? Can we have revival in this last day? YES! He parted the Red Sea for Moses. He cast out devils for Jesus and the disciples! He told Noah to build an ark, and then He saved his whole family from a mighty flood that covered this earth! AND HE CAN SEND REVIVAL!

However, the problem is that people get into stinkin’ thinkin’! They need to quit it! As you read God’s Word your mind will be washed. Ephesians 5:26 says, “That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word.” Pretty soon you’ll start taking on the mind of Christ! (See 1 Corinthians 2:16.) If you choose the way of the Lord, God’s power will be upon you, and you will overcome the carnal nature!

You’ve been thinking too much! Your thinking and your believing according to God’s Word will never line up, because you try to line up the word of God with the way you think!

People don’t come to God just by thinking they need to get saved. Jesus said the only way you come to God is by His Spirit drawing you. (See John 6:44.) He doesn’t bring you to the cross by knocking you in the head and dragging you there cave man style. He reaches into your heart and draws you to the altar. He expects you to give your whole life over to Jesus, including your thinking!

Romans 8:6 says, “For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.” Why is there death? If you’re carnally minded, you use your head for everything, and that is against God.

Romans 8:7 says, “Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” The carnal mind is hostile and cannot be converted, so we have to replace it with the mind of Christ!

Obey God’s Word even if it’s against your better thinking. The mind is scared of anything it has not seen, and it thinks, I’ll believe it when I see it! God’s Word says, You’ll see it when you believe it.

I didn’t come to Jesus because I thought it was a good thing to do. I tried that route, and for six years I wrestled, but God didn’t come till one day I felt His conviction power on me. God began to deal with me, and I got upset. The Word of God will distress you.

You can know that you’ve been born again when you’ve been shaken by the power of God and drawn to an altar of prayer against your carnal thinking! In your heart you felt a tug. He reached into that heart and said, Come on. You know you need deliverance. You know you need to walk with me. Then the war began!

People use all kinds of excuses. Well, not today. I’m sitting with my girlfriend. I’m sitting with my boyfriend. When I go home my spouse will chew me up!

God wants to get a hold of your heart. Peter was an awesome man of God who lived with Jesus approximately three and one half years, but sometimes Peter had trouble with his thinking! One day the disciples were all in a ship during a storm. Jesus wasn’t with them, but suddenly they saw Him walking to them on the water. Peter had just enough faith to see Jesus (the Word) and believe Him. Peter asked the Lord to let him know if it was Him. Jesus did, and Peter said for Him to bid him to come to Him. That was a great act of faith that came right out of his heart.

Well, what’s Jesus going to say to faith? You know His answer to faith every time if it’s according to the Word of God! Jesus will always say, Come on! Come on! Peter got out of that ship and started walking on the water! He didn’t even have the Holy Ghost yet. Not too many people have done that. A storm was raging, but faith from Peter’s heart came up when he saw the Word of God. He realized, Yes, I know I can do that! I believe God! I’m going, and he got out on that water and headed for Jesus.

When Jesus said to come, he knew he could! Jesus says that whosoever will may come. Peter went out there a little ways, and then he looked at the storm with his own eyes, instead of with the eyes of faith! Your brain always says the storm’s bigger than Jesus. The mind says, God cannot, or Can God really?

In your heart where faith stays, it’s pure, it’s holy, and it’s righteous, because God’s in there. God doesn’t doubt, but God leaves your mind free to choose life or death up to the day of your death or the rapture!

You can be so full of God that people can walk by and get slain out by the power of God on you. However, your mind is still yours to use, and if you back up on God you’ll miss heaven! Get your thought life under control!

You’re going to have temptations and garbage come against your mind. Have you ever been down praying, believing God, and suddenly the most vile and unclean thoughts go through your mind? If you can’t say amen, then you haven’t been praying. The devil sends that stuff to make you feel ashamed to pray anymore so you’ll quit!

Keep praying and reading God’s Word and obeying it! Go on in faith anyhow! If you stop and listen to your carnal mind you are dead, because the carnal mind is death. That mind used to get you in trouble. You used it to think up ways to sin!

When you get saved the devil comes along and reminds you about what you used to do. He deals with your mind, because he can’t touch the heart any more; God’s in there! Quit trying to believe with your head. Your head will defy God, and it will deceive you every time! People will know how to make right decisions if they know the Word of God.

When you witness, it must come from the heart. If it is coming out of the mind, it will be death instead of life. Some Christians do not know the difference between what they believe and what they think. The Word of God will tear down everything that you think and give you something to believe in from the Word of God. You can’t get a hold of God in some areas because you’ve been trying to figure it out. Just believe God to fix it and provide it.

If you rely on your mind, you will be thinking up ways to get rid of people instead of relying on God to save them! PRAY instead of worrying, and WATCH God do something!

Christians who try to get things done by what they think will never get anything done! Death and life don’t work together.

Don’t try to interpret the Word of God with your mind! Every fear and every human emotion is contained in that thing. That includes every worry, doubt, unbelief, carnality, and the things of death. The lusts and the pulls of the eyes and flesh drive sin to the brain.

The Bible teaches us to set no wicked thing before our eyes (Psalm 101:3), yet some will do it on purpose and call it entertainment. It’ll set you up for sin! If something sinful comes across your eyes for whatever reason, the carnal mind says, Look at that! That’s what you are looking for! However, if you have a heart for God, you’ll recognize what it is and drop your eyes! Do you see that you’re in full control as to which one you choose?

God said to choose blessing or cursing, and we choose every day. The carnal mind says, I don’t have enough money to tithe, and if I do tithe I’m going to tithe just a part of my income! Tithe right if you want God to hear you. The carnal mind works up a device that says, I’ll just give so much, but the sanctified heart says, I know that God’s Word says to tithe the first fruits of all your increase!

Some days the war is so strong that you may feel like you are going crazy. Get down and pray and get in the Word of God. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever, and you can get victory every single day by saying NO to self and YES to God’s Word.

Some people run from the Word of God, just like they run from good preaching, because they’re afraid they’ll find out something they are responsible for, and they’ll have to do it or go to hell!

You need to get born again, washed in the blood of the Lamb, and come clean. Then you need to get hot for God, filled with the Holy Ghost, and stay that way. That’s just the basics. We need to go on from glory to glory, and from faith to faith, and do what God’s Word says. We have to quit just thinkin’ about what we think God’s Word says!

At 29 years old I had been backslid for 18 years. I accepted the Lord at age 11, but I didn’t have enough sense nor teaching by the preachers I sat under to get in the Bible every day. The Lord dealt with me before I came to God again to read His Word, and I obeyed rather than just think about it.

The mind is easily entertained. It’s easier to drive things through your head than your heart. Your head will take anything that comes along, including a little bit of religion. Your heart is another matter, because God’s in there if you’re saved, and He’ll cull a lot of things.

You can watch TV and suddenly in your heart God will be saying, No. Turn it off. At the same time the mind will be going, Well, it’s not too bad yet. The carnal mind says, God will forgive you. Will you live long enough to pray through, and will you be real when you do it? Will the rapture happen when you’re not ready? In your heart you know good and well what God is saying! He says you better get it right, NOW. You had better quit what you’re doing, and find out in the Word what you should be doing! Paul said in Philippians that he counted all things like dung compared to the things God had prepared for him.

You can get into a lot of things that will destroy your soul. Whatever is entertaining you between your ears isn’t worth it. Get in the Word of God so you can have faith, because faith pleases God. God is interested in how much scripture is planted in your heart.

God’s looking for a people who believe His Word and don’t even rely on their own thinking. There’s a difference between somebody who is sold out to God right down in their heart and somebody who lives half the time thinking and half the time believing.

I don’t love my wife because I think I love her. There are a lot of things she does that really stirs it up in my mind. I fell in love with my wife because our spirit was kindred, and we fell in love with each other. Since we’ve been saved it’s grown sweeter, because we know what real love is.

Jesus is the King of kings and the Lord of lords, but I couldn’t find Him, because my carnal mind was always at odds with Him. However, He drew me by His Spirit, and then I found Him. Jeremiah 29:13 says, “And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.” He came into my heart, and touched me, and showed me what real love is.

If you start thinking about these things, the heart says Yes to Jesus, but the mind says, Well now, what can I get out of this? The heart says, I would love to fast and pray, because I know that’s what it takes to break the yoke. The carnal mind comes along and says, Well, what’s in it for me?

I believe the main reason most Christians don’t fast and pray is that they don’t know if their effort will be out weighed by God’s blessing! You don’t know if God’s blessing will be able to match your efforts.

Hey, I spent two hours and fifteen minutes in fasting and prayer. Now - I want God to save all of Africa! A lot of times we’ll try to make deals with our carnal minds, but God doesn’t make deals!

The deal I have with my wife, the marriage contract, is heartfelt. There are times I don’t get along with her, and there are times I wonderfully get along with her. Say amen fellows. Just because I might have a bad day where we might not get along does not mean I am going to divorce her! This isn’t a head contract. Some think, I’ll be with her just as long as she suits me. When she gets out of my way of thinking, I’ll dump her. You can find anybody to get in your way of thinking for a little while. It is hard to find somebody who will get close to your heart, reach in there and touch you, and lift you up when you’re down and out.

The carnal mind says, I’ll sew my oats while I’m young, and later I’ll pick me up someone. What you don’t know is that they are sewing their oats too. Well, I aint gonna marry no man that thinks he’s some old stud and probably has 17 diseases! Then why are you doing the same thing? Well, I wouldn’t marry some old slut that’s slept with every guy in the country!

Why don’t you stand up for God and just do something for Jesus and nothing for the devil? Quit thinking, believe God, and read His Word. The carnal mind does warfare and says, God says I can’t do thus and so, but I’ve got to. The Bible doesn’t say you’ve got to. Even some “church goers” act like the devil.

Some preachers will preach that you can sin and still make heaven your home. Are you going to believe what the Bible says or what a preacher says?

Everybody is of the devil in the beginning. Romans 3:23 says, “For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;” Jesus was the only man without sin. That’s why He was able to make the blood atonement. However, once you’re saved, from then on you can do the same things Jesus did (except make the blood atonement).

1 John 3:8 says, “He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.” Jesus destroys the works of the devil! Therefore, if something is in you that doesn’t line up with God, when you read His Word you’re going to get nervous or upset. It is the Word of God coming against the devil.

You can believe God and let Him destroy sin in you! However, your head will go, Huh-uh, NO. I can’t live without IT. I can’t live without drinking, or cigarettes, or snuff, or drugs, or lust. I can’t live with out it, and I can’t quit.

The Bible says if you can’t quit it’s of the devil! No matter how young you are or how old you are, if you can’t quit sinning, you’ve got a devil, and devils don’t go to heaven!

The carnal mind says you can’t quit, but faith says you CAN. Jesus said in Luke 10:19, “Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.” You CAN quit sinning!

The carnal mind says, I can’t quit sinning, so I’ll do the best I can, but when you die you’ll go to hell!

Sanctification is progressive, so don’t think you get saved and then quit sinning immediately. You’re going to have troubles and trials, and you’re going to mess up, but you’re supposed to get it under the blood of Jesus as quickly as possible and then go on for God.

The carnal mind thinks (and the devil helps you in that thinking), Well, since you’ve already done it, you might as well go all the way! However, the heart that believes God’s Word says, No. Jesus said I have power over all power of the enemy, and I can stop sinning. I can live without sin, and I believe that rather than what I’m thinking.

Do you see the warfare? Do you see why people not only get bound, but why they stay bound? They are relying on something that is against God. Your thinking, and attitude, and impression and opinion of what God can or can’t do is worthless. Only what God’s Word says counts for anything.

Many people get mad and say that you think your way is the only way, but if you’re lined up with the Word of God, it is the only way. If you’re lined up with the Word of God, we’ll think just alike and we’ll be “one” in Christ Jesus. We’ll have unity in the Spirit. We can be of one accord and pray the blessing down. Signs and miracles will follow when Jesus stands in our midst.

Minds go to church, but that doesn’t make them saved. The carnal mind even says, I don’t have to go to church every Sunday, but a faithful heart remembers that Hebrews 10:25 says, “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.”

Some people think in their carnal mind, Oh, I’m gonna sin! I know I’m gonna sin. There’s no sense in even getting saved! However, when you’re reading the Bible and it speaks to your heart, you realize that you have power over all of the power of the enemy. Eighteen inches or so apart, in between the heart and the head, is eternity. Heaven and hell are decided upon between those two places. There’s the war.

Man’s carnal mind works against God. What about preachers who are carnal, yet they have signs following? Matthew 7:21-23 says, “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.”

The working of the flesh is called witchcraft in Galatians. Well, it must be right; everybody’s doing it. Does it line up with the Bible?

God may speak to you, Today’s your day to fast and pray. It comes out of nowhere, and the mind comes on. Do you know my schedule? I had God tell me one time on my birthday and on a holiday to fast and pray. The carnal mind says, HUH uh. You picked the wrong time Jesus. You didn’t check the schedule out. Look here. No fasting today! The carnal mind says, Hungry . . . didn’t have breakfast. The Spirit of the Lord says you’re already a third of the way there. Carnal mind says, Yeah, but my belly’s growling! It usually growls a whole lot worse after He tells you to fast.

You might miss a meal and not even notice it, but if God tells you to miss a meal, God, I think I’m dying. That’s the carnal mind working against God as He tries to deal with your heart! Just look what happens when you get the victory though!

Matthew 21:12-13 says, “And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the moneychangers, and the seats of them that sold doves, And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.”

The people were worshiping Him according to their own thinking instead of what His Word said! When He got the church cleaned up the blind and the lame came and He healed them!

A lot of people will never be healed or delivered unless they quit thinking about it and start believing God’s Word!

CONTACT INFORMATION:

PASTOR KEVIN BADGLEY

LIVING HOPE FELLOWSHIP, P. O. BOX 111, GRAND CHAIN, IL 62941

CHURCH / FAX (618) 634-2541

E-mail livinghope@hughes.net

www.livinghopefellowshipchurch.org

These condensed Bible studies have been published to help new Christians in their new walk with the Lord. Kevin Badgley, the author, is the pastor of Living Hope Fellowship Church.

This is a Living Hope Fellowship publication.