The Mortification of Sin

"Thoughts are the great purveyors of the soul to bring in provision to satisfy its affections; and if sin remain unmortified in the heart, they must ever and again be making provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof.  They must glaze, adorn, and dress the objects of the flesh, and bring them home to give satisfaction; and this they are able to do, in the service of a defiled imagination, beyond all expression... The ambitious man must be studying, and the worldling must be working or contriving, and the sensual [old english meaning perceived by the senses, not necessarily sexual], vain person providing himself for vanity, when they should be engaged in the worship of God... mortification is the soul's vigorous opposition to self." John Owen in The Mortification of Sin in Believers

What is it that we think about?  All too often we cry out to God to deliver us from whatever it is that guilts us so that we can continue living our lives how we want to live them without the guilt associated with our sin.  In this way we are looking for a sin vaccination of sorts.  Just as I would get a typhus vaccination so that I could run around in the jungle without freaking out every time a mosquito landed on my arm, we look to God to give us a lust/envy/gossip/anger/put your sin and vice here vaccination so that I can continue living in that sin without actually "catching it."  Lets face it, more often than not we simply don't like the guilt associated with our sin nature, we don't actually hate our sin nature.  We want God to inoculate us so that we can continue living in the cesspool of our sin without getting infected instead of getting out of the pool.   

Thus Owen's point on our thoughts are quite poignant and relevant.  We think about things that our heart has affection for.  So the question becomes, if we were to keep a logbook of our thoughts, what would it say our heart has affection for?  This, perhaps, is the clearest answer to the question raised in the last post about whether or not we wage war against our sin nature or whether we treat our sin nature like a pet.  Does your soul delight in thoughts about the glory and grandeur of God?  Does our mind continually feed our soul with high and lofty thoughts about His nature and character?  Our thoughts and our hearts are intrinsically linked (Matthew 9:4; Luke 9:47).  To say I love my wife and then to think about another woman betrays the fact that I don't love my wife.  So it is with God.  To say I love Him and yet have my soul not delight in thoughts about Him, or to have my soul delight in thoughts contrary to His nature, speaks volumes.  Perhaps this is why Paul tells the Corinthians that in battle we are to take captive every thought for Christ (2 Cor 10:5) and why Jesus repeatedly goes after the thoughts of the religious leaders of his day (Matthew 9:4; Luke 6:8).