Why Is it So Hard to Take Your Thoughts Captive?
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I used to cringe when I heard or read 2 Corinthians 10:5, which talks about taking thoughts captive to make them obedient to Christ. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to follow this biblical practice. I just didn’t feel like I could! And not for lack of trying.
I’ve been actively following Jesus for over two and a half decades. While I haven’t lived out my faith perfectly, I have done my best to honor Him in all things, managing my internal chaos included. I’ve memorized and prayed countless soul-building verses, sought God’s help ceasing my negative self-talk, and have little more than a bunch of self-condemning journals to show for it.
The problem wasn’t with the Scripture. The issue was, I sought to apply them with unrealistic expectations. Reading instructions that occupy little more than a blip on a page, coupled with my extreme lack of patience, made me believe I’d experience relatively quick results. I didn’t understand that mental patterns take considerable time to change. I also paid little attention to the ways in which Paul, the first century church planter who wrote 2 Corinthians, used this statement in his letter to the men and women in ancient Corinth. And so, when my experience contradicted my interpretation of the text, I took this as evidence that my faith wasn’t strong enough or I wasn’t trying hard enough.
If you’ve ever found yourself battling shame and condemnation because your thoughts zip through your brain faster and stronger than you can contain them, perhaps my discussion on this often-quoted verse will provide you with the same encouragement the Lord has given me.
Biblical Context
In order to accurately understand Paul’s discussion on taking thoughts captive, we must first consider why he penned the letter in which it’s found. A preliminary reading of 2 Corinthians demonstrates that he wrote to these first century Christ-followers to deal with significant issues invading the church. This included hostility toward him and his calling. In chapter 10, Paul isn’t addressing anxious spirals, toxic shame or how to manage one’s inner critic. That’s not to say those aren’t valid applications to the verse about taking thoughts captive. But that’s not the primary point he’s making.
Instead, Paul is defending his ministry — out of love for those he leads. He begins the chapter responding to his critics with a touch of sarcasm, stating,
“By the humility and gentleness of Christ, I appeal to you — I, Paul, who am ‘timid’ when face to face with you, but ‘bold’ toward you when away!” (If his use of this type of speech surprises you, you might find this article intriguing.)
Adding in verse two,
“I beg you that when I come I may not have to be as bold as I expect to be toward some people who think that we live by the standards of this world.”
In other words, “Certain individuals are evaluating our ministry through a human perspective, and therefore aren’t seeing things clearly.”
It also seems as if certain individuals (“some people”) were spreading gossip or slander in the church. In chapter 11, he mentions people he referred to as “super apostles.” Although there is some disagreement on this, many commentators believe Paul is sarcastically referring to the false teachers maligning his ministry and message. His point here is that their so-called wisdom is based on worldly standards, not Christ’s.
Then, we get to verses 3-5, where he counters the claims mentioned previously. Despite what others might have claimed, he and his team were led and empowered by the Holy Spirit to engage in spiritual battles, such as those infiltrating the Corinthian church.
Whose Thoughts Is Paul Taking Captive?
John Piper from Desiring God explains this passage:
“When Paul says, first, that he’s destroying arguments and arrogant opinions against God and, second, that he is taking thoughts or minds captive, we need to realize it’s the minds and thoughts of others. He’s not talking about taking his own thoughts captive. … So, he’s the warrior and the enemy is these people whose minds and arguments are proud and lifted up against God. And when Paul defeats those minds and arguments in the power of the Holy Spirit, their thoughts and their minds are taken captive and they become people with the mind of Christ or obedient to Christ. It’s not a command. It’s a statement about what Paul is doing to his opponents.”
This doesn’t mean, however, that we can’t apply this same practice to ourselves.
Does It Apply to Our Self-Talk?
While 2 Corinthians 10 isn’t necessarily instructions for us, Paul does encourage us to “Follow [his] example, as I follow the example of Christ” (1 Corinthians 11:1). And in Philippians 4, which he also wrote, he describes how God wants us to manage our minds.
He begins in verses 6-7 with instructions for dealing with anxious spirals. We’re to give them to the Lord and, in return, He gives us His peace. I often find it helpful to process my immediate emotions and concerns with Christ, which then makes it easier for me to focus on those things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely, excellent and admirable.
Romans 12:2 refers to this as “renewing our minds,” adding that this enables us to “learn to know God’s will for [us], which is good and pleasing and perfect.”
And finally, Scripture tells us that as God’s children, we possess the mind of Christ, which means viewing the world, our circumstances and ourselves as He does. This is one of the most powerful ways we counter the devil’s lies. Each time we entertain falsehoods, we’re in essence giving in to his destructive themes while making it harder to resist our spiritual enemy in the future.
What Makes This Hard
In his book, Everything Thought Captive, author and preacher Kyle Idleman suggests that most of us tend to entertain the same thoughts each day. This causes ruts to form in our brain similar to how water flowing downhill carves channels in the ground that deepen with every subsequent thought. If not countered with truth, those trenches become more deeply ingrained. (Catch more from Kyle in the Faith Over Fear episode titled, “Taking Every Thought Captive: Breaking Free from the Lies that Hold us Captive.”)
Dr. Weissenbacher, another Faith Over Fear podcast guest, provided an analogy I found helpful in explaining why it can feel so difficult to change our habitual ways of thinking. Using a person’s pull toward drugs and alcohol as one example, he wrote:
“When I talk to people with addictions, I tell them to think of their addiction as a superhighway inside their brain and their sobriety as a narrow, dirt path laid by deer, somewhere off to the side of the highway. This dirt path is particularly small if the recovering addict is new to sobriety. When an addict experiences stress, their brain does not choose the narrow deer path. Their brain seeks the most efficient route, the superhighway, and the addict likely defaults to their addictive thinking and behavior. It’s an unfortunate biological reality that they are forced to contend with.”
This is complicated by the fact that, according to author and pastor Kyle Idleman, up to 80% of our thoughts are both automatic and subconscious. This means that much of the time, we might not even be aware of the destructive things we’re telling ourselves throughout a given day.
The first step, then, is becoming increasingly alert to when we’re ruminating on things that deny truth. Do we berate ourselves whenever we give in to our cravings for cookies and ice cream instead of a healthy dinner? Do we condemn ourselves for normal human weaknesses or rehearse all the reasons we deserve someone else’s rejection? Or, on the other end of the spectrum, do we try to counter our insecurities by focusing on everyone else’s faults?
Once we’ve detected our negative thought patterns, we stop them by refusing to entertain them further, then intentionally replace them with truth and do this again and again until we’ve formed new, and more hopeful mental “roads.”
Admittedly, this is far from a quick endeavor, and the entire process might initially feel daunting. But here’s the good news: We make progress each time we practice this important skill. This means, not only can we stop reinforcing the neural pathways that don’t serve us, we can also experience more peace tomorrow and even more so ten years from now, than we do today.
Most importantly, I’m encouraged to know, as difficult as it can be to wrangle our sometimes-rogue brains into godly submission, we’re never left to do so in our own strength. We have the power of the Holy Spirit working in us to bring us the life we crave and Christ died to give us. And we know that nothing is too hard for him, not even figurative brain surgery.
Photo credit: ©Getty Images/Pakin Songmor
Jennifer Slattery is a writer and speaker who co-hosts the Faith Over Fear podcast and, along with a team of 6, the Your Daily Bible Verse podcast. She’s addressed women’s groups, Bible studies, and taught at writers conferences across the nation. She’s the author of Building a Family and numerous other titles and maintains a devotional blog at JenniferSlatteryLivesOutLou
She’s passionate about helping people experience Christ’s freedom in all areas of their lives. Visit her online to learn more about her speaking or to book her for your next women’s event, and sign up for her free quarterly newsletter HERE and make sure to connect with her on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and GodTube.
