Imagine, if you will, a man who was reared in a jungle village in the deepest parts of Africa or the Amazon.  Imagine that he has grown up in a small village of hunter-gatherers in which mud huts or basic lean-tos are the structure in which he and his immediate ancestors have lived, and imagine that minimal clothing, short lifespan, day-to-day existence, and a cycle of hunting and warfare has marked his existence for the years of his life.  He has never seen an airplane, a cellphone, knows nothing about the internet, and has never tasted the benefits of electricity or any of the niceties which typify our civilization.

Now imagine this man miraculously transported to Times Square.  Imagine as he peers up at skyscrapers, sees flashing lights, is surrounded by automobiles, and is nearly mauled by the crush of people heading in every direction.  Imagine as his feet touch concrete.  Imagine as he sees glass storefronts.  Imagine as he hears horns, and looks in vain for a tree or bush behind which to hide just long enough to compose himself.

Imagine how he must feel....

Do you think that he would feel like fleeing?  Do you think that he would feel like fighting?  Do you think that he would be incredibly disoriented?  Stressed?  Confused?  Fearful?  Frustrated?  Might he turn to violence or self-destruction out of desperation?

Back in his own village and his own country, he was likely a man who was perfectly comfortable with existence.  He may have been respected and considered wise.   But in this environment he is presented with a reality that he does not understand and in which he cannot function effectively.  How soon do you think that he would begin to show one or more of the "emotional disorders" that plague our society generally?

One of the reasons why modern man is so spiritually, emotionally, and intellectually afflicted and conflicted is because he does not live in reality.  Society tells him that there is no reality.  Postmodern society tells him that the very category of "reality" is illegitimate - everything is just as we perceive it, and everybody's opinion matters equally, and there is ultimately no objective reality that any of us can respond to or internalize.  And like our mythical man transported out of his country, modern man simply does not know how to exist in the unfamiliar (and unreal) surroundings in which there is no truth or fact or reality.  Especially when deep within he knows that assertions that truth does not exist must necessarily be false.

Yet every single time one of us comes to a stop light while driving, we behave as if the theory that "truth is as I perceive it" is wrong.  We all recognize "red" as "red," and interpret it to mean "stop."  Can you imagine the chaos and destruction that would ensue if we all believed that "the only truth that exists is what is true to me" when we drove?

Yet, we accept society's false assertions about reality (it is necessarily false to say "There is no absolute truth" because that statement itself is a statement of absolute truth), and allow those false assertions to organize our thinking, while at the same time living in a world of objective reality.  And the farther man gets from objective reality in his thinking culturally, the more emotional disorders of every type proliferate.

The Bible says that God is the ultimate reality.  All reality is grounded in Him.  "In [God] we live, and move, and have our being" says Paul in Acts 17:28.  And the character and Person of Jesus Christ is considered the ground of all morality, salvation, and truth (John 14:6).

It can be easy to ignore the fact that we need to change our thinking - after all, almost everyone around us believes exactly as we do!  Yet the Bible, over and over again, tells us that a crucial aspect of becoming successful in life and learning to live the right kind of life is molding our minds to fit reality.

* "We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ."  (II Cor. 10:5)

* "And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind...."  (Romans 12:2)
 

* "Finally brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good report, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, think on these things." (Phil. 4:8)

To the extent that our thinking fails to anticipate actual reality, we are commanded to change our thinking.  In fact, the New Testament word for "repentance," metanoia, literally means "to have a change of mind" or "to have a change of heart" about the way that we are living or about the things that we are doing.

Many years ago, Dr. Maxwell Maltz, a plastic surgeon, wrote Psycho-Cybernetics when he noticed that many of his plastic surgery patients maintained their negative self-image long after he had "fixed" their appearance in whatever way they had requested.  His solution?  In order to change one's self-image, it is first necessary to change one's thinking about self-image.

In that same way, the Bible teaches that before we can overcome negative behavior patterns, emotional disorders, or chronic frustrations, we must first change our thinking.