Don’t Be a Mastermind

God doesn’t need masterminds, people who are always the smartest person in the room. He is the only Mastermind that the world needs.

God does need mind-masters, or people for whom God’s Spirit leads their thought life. After Apostle James dealt with our need for patience in trials, he summed up the idea of mental integrity:

James 1:5-8 NKJV If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. (6) But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. (7) For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; (8) he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

He may as well have said, “If any of you thinks that he is wise, think again, and let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.” (JT’s paraphrase)

How Should We Behave Toward One Another?

Regarding the way we are to treat one another in the church, Apostle Paul wrote:

Romans 12:10-18 NKJV Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another; (11) not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord; (12) rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer; (13) distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality. (14) Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. (15) Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep. (16) Be of the same mind toward one another. Do not set your mind on high things, but associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own opinion. (17) Repay no one evil for evil. Have regard for good things in the sight of all men. (18) If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men.

While I included the whole passage, the second part of verse sixteen speaks directly to those who would be masterminds: “Do not set your mind on high things, but associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own opinion.” 

Verses seventeen and eighteen build on that command—and it is a command:

• We are not to seek retribution!
  Don’t we prize our grudges, though? Someone offends us and we assume it was deliberate, so even though we may wear a Sunday smile and shake the offender’s hand, in the back of our minds we seek payback. We all know that’s wrong, “But, this is different!” Instead, …

• We are to regard what is good!
  Even if we don’t like someone, Jesus commands us to love them. Often that takes the form of burying the hatchet, but not in their backs. Bury it in the deepest part of the sea. If we do that, the last command will take care of itself.

• We are to live peaceably with all people!
  That doesn’t mean we must live peaceably with all our friends, but even with those we don’t like. Here’s a sure tip: Pray for the unlovable, sincerely, passionately, and consistently. We can be sure that if God placed a difficult person in our way, it is to gain our attention; they need prayer more than all our Christ-following friends.

My advice? Pray through James’ letter to the twelve tribes scattered abroad (Christ-followers are descendants of Abraham by faith). Make those principles and commands your passion, and God will use you like never before. But don’t stop there; take the time to pray and meditate your way through the whole of God’s Word, and through His Spirit you will be the master of your own mind, rather thinking of yourself as a mastermind.

Optimize That Thing

Anyone who spots the above title while racing at light-speed along Al Gore’s Information Superhighway will assume “That Thing” is at least their Internet connection, and probably their whole digital shebang. But optimization takes work, so most of us flow with the default condition.

The same idea applies where “That Thing” is our mental, emotional, spiritual, or physical conditioning. Using our physical conditioning as an example, the default condition is known as, “Flab.” We have some vague idea that we could look or feel better, “if only,” but that would come at the price of concentrated “Work!?” as Dobie Gillis’ pal Maynard G. Krebs would say.

Meet Maynard Krebs

Our list of default conditions could fill a library, but the most crucial area is responsibility, whether personal, family, intellectual, spiritual or civil. You may have noticed the many ways in which these areas of responsibility can overlap, so by connecting them all as our personal skeletal structure, we can work toward the personal integrity and strength that all great people enjoy.

Did you say you need a measuring rod for personal integrity? That’s easy. It’s the neighborhood polling place. That’s right, the way you vote is the best single indicator of your personal character and integrity. Do you cast your vote for principle, or for self-interest, hoping to get something from government?

Hey Maynard, are you listening? Or maybe you’re one of the cynics who say, “What difference does it make?”

Krebs, old buddy, you need to yank your proverbial head out of the sand. Sure, some of the most common advice you’ll hear is, “I don’t waste my time voting. Don’t really matter who gets promoted to Head Honcho, don’t ya know?”

Okay Maynard, how do you explain all the money and time political activists spend during an election year? Would those savvy insiders waste their resources buying ad-time and space in every imaginable media outlet if votes really didn’t count? In fact, votes count so much that liberal organizations like ACORN resurrect dead people and transform pets into human beings to get their votes.

Problem is, Maynard, responsible voting isn’t easy. Cynics have one thing right; during political campaigns we know one fact: When politicians’ lips are flapping, we know they’re lying. One explanation for that fact is most of them are lawyers. Our only recourse as voters is to ignore the hype and find out the truth for ourselves. But researching the candidates and issues takes work—DON’T SAY IT, KREBS!

Despite their public posturing, all political candidates have beliefs about how the world works. And while they all believe, “Them that has, gets,” the ways each one employs to pursue that goal differ like night from day.

The Dark Side

Socialists, whether or not they label themselves as such, consistently aim their policies toward fomenting discontent, such as class warfare and social fear. Our Progressive (euphemism for Socialist, Secularist, Liberal, or Democrat) friends work toward trivializing traditional morality, and the spiritual influences that support it. Their motivation? To so erode our society that enough people will change their names to Maynard G. Krebs to keep them in office until all we hold dear comes crashing down on our heads.

This quest for power has succeeded brilliantly over the past seventy-five years, with the people only occasionally catching on and temporarily arresting the downward spiral into Socialism and its entitlement-based culture. I still find it hard to believe that my memory is better than society’s.

But Maynard says, “Right-on, groovy, and outasight!” As a card-carrying leach, the idea of government filling his pockets with “Rich People’s” money sounds irresistible. What he and his friends fail to grasp, however, is the demotivating effect wealth-transfer has on those “Rich People,” who own the businesses and sign the paychecks for all those folks who like to wear decent clothing while eating and sleeping in a secure home with their well-educated kids who also love the amenities their parents spend their lives accumulating.

That welfare-based, entitlement-oriented society is nothing more or less than a Ponzi scheme on a vast, international scale. The Government, “We The People,” continually borrows unbacked “money” from the financial establishment, driving our national debt up, our real value down, and accruing astronomical interest debt in the process. Eventually, that valueless debt will come due, and we will have no way to pay it, short of selling our national and personal sovereignty to the highest bidder, who now happens to be the Communist Chinese. While independent economists have painted this dismal picture for years, all the Maynards hear only what Big Brother wants published—nothing personal against anyone actually named Maynard.

Is There a Solution?

OPTIMIZE!

Computer geeks realize that true optimization begins in the Command Line instructions. It tells the Operating System what’s what and who’s who. It also initiates a thorough virus scan at the most fundamental level: The Boot Sector. Without circumventing computer viruses at this level, the entire system on which it’s built will be corrupt.

Analog life(that’s everything but computers) closely parallels that process. Every human being carried a unique virus when we were “booted up.” That’s not the way we were made, but it’s what happened when we first presumed to edit our own “machine language programming.” In Windows terms, the Creator granted us “Administrative Control” over ourselves, and we thought we could “tweak” His plan for us.

The Creator’s Holy Spirit enables and conducts a very special virus scan for sin in our lives, but it’s not completely automatic. He still gives us the responsibility for “clicking” on the “Clean Button” before our sin is added to the database that He eradicated at the decidedly low-tech, wooden cross where He died. Only when we are freed from that sin-virus can we begin the Spiritual Optimization process that will make us into the fully functioning “units” He created us to be.

Application Execution—Without Crashing

Each area of our lives is like an application on a computer; it gets a specific job done, and our “Spirit-Operating System,” built on and by our Creator, provides the unseen foundation for all else. When our “S-O.S.” is out of whack, we can’t function well, if at all. In computer terminology, that last part is calledCrashing!

The tragedy is, few of us will decide to “click” on that divine “Clean Button,” and allow our Creator to optimize our unseen foundation. While we “spiritually optimized units” may not comprise a large enough force to prevent our world’s, or even our nation’s, ultimate crash, we can at least measurably slow that down, and protect our families, while we are bound for eternally optimum, intimate fellowship with our loving Programmer, the Lord Jesus Christ.

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