Overcoming Subjective Thinking by Bill Hall

The speaker discusses the dangers of subjective thinking using examples from the Bible. He highlights how subjective thinkers filter God's commands through their own intellect and emotions, accepting what aligns with their views and rejecting what doesn't. Examples include King Saul disobeying God's command to destroy the Amalekites, Naaman almost rejecting Elisha's instructions, and Peter obeying Jesus' command to cast his nets despite initial doubts. The speaker warns against shaping religion to fit personal preferences and emphasizes the importance of letting God's word guide beliefs and actions. Well, if you'd like to turn in your Bibles, let's go to Proverbs, chapter 14. We have all of you here, whether you are members of East Albert Hall or people who have come from other churches around to be with us. Some of you may be from the community. And we're glad especially that you've come. And hope that you will consider carefully what we have to say tonight as we study the Word of God together. People have come quite a distance to be with us tonight, and the same was true last night. And it just means a lot to us. We're talking about overcoming subjective thinking. I don't know about you, but I don't use the word subjective every day. But I think we'll have a pretty good idea of what we're talking about just by reading one verse from the book of Proverbs. That's chapter 14, verse 12. There is a way that seems right to a man, but the end of the way is death. It seems right to a man. The subjective thinker likes to somehow inject what seems right to him, what he thinks is right, into what God has said in his Word. Robert Turner, who was one of my favorite preachers, used to talk about people that wanted to filter everything they read in the Bible through their own intellect and emotions and experience. And if it filters through, they accept it. If it doesn't filter through, they reject it. So they go through the Bible, and yeah, I accept this, and yes, I love this, and no, I don't agree with that. I just can't. And so they go through the Bible trying to determine what they're going to accept and what they're going to reject on the basis of what seems right to them. That's subjective type of thinking. It reminds me of an old illustration. Surely you've heard it somewhere down the way. That a man's going to leave the family, and he's got to be away for about a year. And he says to his son, Son, I want you to build a barn over here, and I want you to build a smokehouse over here. Anybody know what a smokehouse is? That's almost a thing of the past. And dig a well over here. And the son builds the barn just where his dad says. And he builds a smokehouse right where his dad says. But when it comes time to dig the well, he says, I don't know why Dad said to dig the well over here. The well needs to be closer to the house. So he digs the well where he thinks it ought to be. Has he been obedient to his father? No. He never has been obedient to his father. Why did he build the barn where he did? He agreed with his father. Why did he build the smokehouse where he did? Because he agreed with his father. And the first time that his thinking went different to his father's, he did what he thought was right. That's the subjective thinking. Let me give you some Bible examples. Let's go back to 1 Samuel chapter 15. 1 Samuel chapter 15. Let's begin with verse 1. God has some instructions for King Saul. Samuel also said to Saul, the Lord sent me to anoint you king over the people over Israel. And therefore, heed the voice of the words of the Lord. This is the law of hosts. I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel when he ambushed him on his way when he came up out of Egypt. Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have. And do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey. That made no sense to Saul. Why would he kill King Agag when he'd be such a tremendous trophy of his victory? Why would he kill all those sheep and oxen when he could bring them back and they could just have the greatest sacrifice that had ever been had in all of history? That just didn't make any sense. So he did what he thought ought to be done. He spared King Agag. He spared the sheep and oxen. And the Lord sent Samuel to rebuke him for that. I'm sorry, I'm having trouble seeing tonight. Maybe we'll do it. Verse, well I'm not sure. But anyway, we'll just read it. Then Samuel went to Saul and said to him, Blessed are you of the Lord. I have performed the commandment of the Lord. But Samuel said, What then is this bleeding of the sheep in my ears and the lowering of the oxen that I hear? I have obeyed the voice of the Lord. He had obeyed the voice of the Lord. Well then Samuel talked to him further. And now look at verse 19. Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you swoop down on the spoil and do evil in the sight of the Lord? And Saul said to Samuel, But I have obeyed the voice of the Lord. That's one of the interesting things. So often when you come across people with subjective thinking, they just know they've done the will of the Lord. Tell them you're not doing what's right and they just cannot accept it. Why sure I'm doing the will of the Lord when they're not obeying the Lord at all. And here's King Saul. He's a subjective thinker. Let me take you to another one. Go to 2 Kings chapter 5. This time we're talking about Naaman. Naaman had leprosy. He was captain of the host of the king of the country of Syria. A great man, but a leper. And he had learned through an Israelite girl whom they had captured that there was a prophet in Israel who could heal Naaman. And eventually he got to Naaman. And Naaman came out and sent a messenger and gave him instructions. Look at verse 9. Then Naaman went with his horses and chariot and he stood at the door of Elisha's house. And Elisha sent a messenger to him saying, Go and wash in the Jordan seven times and your flesh will be restored to you and you shall be clean. Well, you can almost see Naaman just kind of filtering that through his own mind. And that doesn't make any sense. Are not Abena and Pharpar the rivers of Damascus better than all the waters of Israel? Can I wash in them and be clean? And the Bible says he went away in a rage. Naaman almost went home to die a leper because of his own subjective thinking. Filtering through what Elisha said through his own intellect and experience. And he was just ready to throw it all out until his servants came and persuaded him. Now, in contrast to those two men, I want you to go to Luke chapter 5. Luke chapter 5, start with verse 1. So it was, as the multitudes pressed about him to hear the word of God, that he stood by the lake of Genesaret and saw two boats standing by the lake. But the fishermen had gone from them and were washing their nets. Then he got into one of the boats, which was Simon's, and asked him to put out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the multitudes from the boat. When he had stopped speaking, he said to Simon, launch out into the deep and lay down your nets for a catch. But Simon answered and said to him, Master, we have toiled all night and caught nothing. Nevertheless, your word will let out the nets. There again, when the Lord said to Peter, let out your nets for a catch, that didn't make any sense to Peter. They had been working all night and caught nothing. They were already washing their nets. Think about how inconvenient it would be to go out there with their nets when they had already washed their nets. And they're tired. And Jesus says, go out into the deep and let out your nets for a catch. That makes no sense. But Peter got to think about who said it. The Lord had said it. At your word, we'll let out the nets. There may be times when we study the Bible and come across some particular thing, and we may wonder, why would the Lord command that? Or, why is that said? It may be that we may have some subjective thoughts, but we must always let the Word of God prevail over our own subjective thinking. Maybe a good motto would be, at your word. At your word. I may not understand why, but at your word, we'll do whatever you say. Get rid of our own subjective thinking. Now, let me suggest to you that subjective thinkers come in two different categories. One is a category in which a person wants religion. He wants God, but he wants God on his own terms. Somebody said, that's a pretty strong statement. Well, that's not my statement. I got that out of a newspaper article in the Birmingham News telling what religion is like in the 21st century. Let me just read some of this for you. For one thing, the move toward cafeteria Christianity that appeared at the end of the 20th century. Believers picking and choosing. Well, that sounds like the same thing as filtering through our own minds, doesn't it? Cafeteria thinking, I'll have some of this. Yes, I'll have some. No, I don't believe I want any of that. And so, they go through the Bible picking and choosing what they want to accept and what they don't want to accept. That's in the Birmingham News. Now, let me read something else. In other words, what you believe matters less than ever. This phenomenon is especially prevalent among the baby boomers, these 76 million Americans who began turning 50 in 1956 and started looking for God, but on their own terms. Yeah, God, I want you. But let me tell you what I want with you. I'll tell you what I really like. They're just going to do it on their own terms. Ask a person like that, what kind of church are you pleased with? What kind of church do I like? Well, he'd probably answer, well, I like a church that has plenty of recreation for the young people and a lot of good activities for the senior citizens, and I'm looking for a church that is involved in fighting crime and poverty and other things like that. That's the kind of church that I think is really a good church. I really admire a church like that. Ask them, what kind of worship do you like? Well, I like excitement. I like emotion. Somebody that can just get me just all emotionally built up. But they never thought to open their Bibles, like we talked about last night, to see what the Lord wanted in regards to his church. It's just subjective. It's what I think. It's what I want. It's what I think ought to be. Now, that's one category. Now, the second category would be those who really believe that God is speaking to them, or the Holy Spirit is speaking to them, separate from the Word. The very words that we're talking about, subjective thinking, they would say, is the Holy Spirit speaking to me? Well, that raises a question. How do you know? Do you ever have a subjective thought? And you believe the Holy Spirit is speaking to you. But how do you know whether this thought that's come into your mind is really the Holy Spirit putting that thought in your mind, or whether it's just some subjective thought that's come into your mind? How do you know? I have a book called, Is That You, Lord? It's written by a man named Gary Gilley. Gilley is an evangelical who believes that all of our teaching, all of our instruction, comes from the Word of God. That we don't have any of this direct speaking of the Holy Spirit to ourselves. He believes that the Word of God is the whole thing. And he's challenging his fellow evangelicals who believe that the Holy Spirit is directing them in a direct way. And he raises this question. How do you know when it's subjective thinking and when it's the Holy Spirit speaking to you? Listen to some of the quotes from some of these very people. Dennis and Rita Burnett. We're not expected to accept every word spoken through the gifts of utterance. But we're only to accept what is quickened to us by the Holy Spirit and is in agreement with the Bible. One manifestation may be 75% God, but 25% the person's own thoughts. We need to discern between the two. Do you see where the problem lies? We can't be absolutely sure whether it's something from God or something that's just come from our own minds. 75% probably has come from God. Here's a quote from Wayne Gruden. Did the revelation seem like something from the Holy Spirit? Did it seem to be similar to other experiences of the Holy Spirit which he had known previously in worship? Beyond that, it is difficult to specify much further except to say that over time a congregation would probably become more adept at making evaluations and become more adept at recognizing a genuine revelation from the Holy Spirit and distinguishing it from their own thoughts. That's a pretty big problem, isn't it? So here's a person and he admits, yes, sometimes I have my own subjective thoughts, but then I believe the Holy Spirit speaks to me, but I'm not too sure whether any thought that comes to my mind might be from the Holy Spirit or might be my own thoughts, but over time maybe we can get better and better at discerning. And one question I'd like to ask you, how is it that you have people all saying the Holy Spirit is giving me direct guidance and they're going in a hundred different directions? Is the Holy Spirit the author of confusion? 1 Corinthians 14 says he's not. When I was in Australia, I don't know that I've mentioned that, but we spent three years in Australia, I got to study with some German-speaking people. They spoke excellent English, but they liked to worship in German for some reason. And they made arrangements for me to speak with the group that they worshipped with, and I spoke on how to establish a church by the New Testament pattern. After it was over, here came everybody gathering up wanting to talk to me, and there were two men who obviously were the leaders of the group. One of them said, would you let a man preach for your church that's never been baptized? That was his wording. I said, no, the Bible teaches that we're to be baptized. Well, he said, you see, the Holy Spirit told me that I did not need to be baptized. Well, the other person spoke up, and these are the two leaders of the group. He said, well, the Holy Spirit told me to be baptized. I said, now, wait a minute. The Holy Spirit told one of you not to be baptized. The Holy Spirit told the other to be baptized. I know this book is the product of the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit teaches us that a person is to be baptized. You see, the problem of subjective thinking, when people are just letting their own minds of what seems right to them guide them instead of turning to the Word of God and letting the Word of God give us the answer. Well, somebody says, it just doesn't seem fair to me, though, that people in the first century all received direct guidance of the Holy Spirit, and we don't receive direct guidance of the Holy Spirit. Well, the truth is, all of the people of the first century did not receive direct guidance of the Holy Spirit. Rather, they were specially chosen ones to whom the Holy Spirit revealed truth, and all others learned from them. Turn to John chapter 14. John chapter 14. Look at verse 25, the beginning. These things I have spoken to you while being present with you. You know, that tells us a lot right there, doesn't it? This isn't speaking to me. I haven't been present with the Lord. The Lord is speaking to people with whom he has been present, and of course what we know is he's in the presence of his apostles. The next day, he'll be on the cross. This is just before the denial of Peter, just before the betrayal of Judas, that he says this to his apostles. All right, so he has been with them. He's been present with them. But look at the next verse. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you. To whom is he talking? He's talking to his apostles. He's talking to people that he's been teaching, and he's going to bring to their remembrance the things that he taught them. I sure am glad. Do you ever have any problem with your memory? Do you ever let your memory kind of trick you a little bit? Every once in a while, well, I'll give a specific. I was sitting in an audience one time in Florence, Alabama, and a fellow was up in the pulpit and he pointed at me and said, I remember something Bill Hall said 20 years ago. I shuddered, scared to death of what he thought. Maybe he remembered that maybe I said it 20 years ago. Our memories do tricks on us. Jesus didn't trust their memory. He said to these apostles, I'm going to send the Holy Spirit, and he'll bring to your remembrance all those things that I've said to you. All right? Turn the page over to the 16th chapter. Now, verse 12. I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when the Spirit of truth has come, he will guide you into all truth, for he will not speak of his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will tell you things to come. All right. So here are the apostles. Jesus is promising them, I'm going to teach you all things. The Holy Spirit's going to come. He'll teach you all things. He's going to bring to your remembrance everything I've taught you. Now go to Acts 2. From the preaching of the gospel, 3,000 people were baptized. Now look at verse 42. And they contended steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine. You may add the word teaching. They continued steadfastly in the apostles' teaching. Now, if all of them were receiving direct guidance of the Holy Spirit, why would they have to continue in the apostles' teaching? Can't you see? The apostles were sent the Holy Spirit. They were being guided into all truth. The Holy Spirit was bringing to their remembrance all that Jesus had said to them, and the others are learning from them. Now go to Ephesians chapter 3. I'm going to start, I think we can get the idea if we start with verse 3. Of course, we're talking about the apostle Paul, who is the writer. Ephesians chapter 3. Look at verse 3. Now that by revelation he made known to me the mystery, as I have briefly written already, by which when you read you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ. Paul, how did you get it? I got it by revelation. It came to me directly. Paul, how can we get it? I wrote it down. And when you read it, you can understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ. Well, Paul, are you alone in all of this? Look at verse 5. Which in other ages was not made known to the sons of men, as it had now been revealed by the Spirit to his holy apostles and prophets. Now we know those who were specially chosen to receive direct revelation from the Holy Spirit, it was the apostles and prophets, all others learned from them. That's how we learn. We learn exactly the same way as those first century Christians learned. They learned by listening and reading what those apostles and prophets taught, and that's how we learn. We have the teaching of the apostles and prophets in our Scriptures. And that's the means by which we know truth. If we will separate all of our individual thinking, our subjective thoughts, get them out of the way and just let the Word speak to us. So we face a challenge. Am I going to build my convictions on my own subjective thinking, or am I going to build my convictions on a careful study of the Word of God? Surely we can see the problem of subjective thinking. It tries to filter through our finite minds the things of an infinite God, and we can't do that. I tried to come up with an illustration of it. I've been to Niagara Falls, especially on the Canadian side. We lived about 45 minutes from Niagara Falls. And you stand there on the Canadian side and there's this huge rush of water. There's no one that can describe that unless you've just seen it. Can you imagine a person out there with a drinking straw trying to get all the waters of Niagara Falls to come through that drinking straw? Well, it's not going to work. But I just as soon tried to get all the waters of Niagara Falls through a drinking straw as to filter the things of my God through my mind. As one lady said to me one time, if I could filter the things of my God through my mind, I would serve a very small God. Well, of course that's right. Who do we think we are that we can decide for God what we're going to accept and what we're going to reject? Meanwhile, we have the Scriptures. Turn to 2 Timothy chapter 3. 2 Timothy chapter 3. We look at verses 16 and 17. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work. The Scriptures make us complete. Well, if the Scriptures make us complete, we don't need anything else. We don't need any direct, which we've already shown doesn't take place. We don't need our subjective thoughts. The Word of God, the Scriptures, are complete. And we must just simply be satisfied with them and bow to them, the Scriptures, completely. Well, somebody said, but we can't understand the Scriptures. Back to Ephesians 3 that we read just a moment ago. Paul said, whereby when you read, you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ. What then do we have in our Bibles? We have that which is complete. Everything we need to know in order to get to heaven. And Paul assures us that we can understand it. Well, then why do I need anything else? We have everything we need. We don't need our own subjective thinking. Now, somebody said, well, surely you believe the Holy Spirit speaks to us today. I sure do. Through the Scriptures. Are you aware of the number of Scriptures that just credit what is being said to the Holy Spirit? Turn to Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1, look at verse 25. I'm sorry, verse 15. And in those days Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples, altogether the number of names was about 120, and said, men and brethren, this Scripture had to be fulfilled which the Holy Spirit spoke before by the mouth of David concerning Judas. Who spoke? The Holy Spirit did. Through whom? David. But when Peter made this statement, he was making a statement which he had read from the Holy Spirit. Now, turn to Acts chapter 28. Paul has spent the day with the Jews in Rome and having various discussions with them. Now, look at chapter 28. Look at verse 25. So when they did not agree among themselves, they departed after Paul had said one word, the Holy Spirit spoke rightly through Isaiah. Who spoke? The Holy Spirit through Isaiah. I'm going to take you to one more. Go to Hebrews chapter 3. Look at verse 7. Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says, today if you will hear any quotes from the 95th Psalm, when I pick up the 95th Psalm, who's speaking to me? The Holy Spirit. When I pick up any passage and read it, who's speaking to me? The Holy Spirit. And if we can ever get into our minds that whatever we read in the Scriptures, that's the Holy Spirit speaking to us. And we don't put in our subjective thinking. We simply accept it. This is the Holy Spirit speaking for us. Somebody said, oh, the Holy Spirit. No, here's how the Holy Spirit speaks to us. Right through his Word. Now, turn to Acts chapter 17. I want to start with verse 10. Acts chapter 17, verse 10. Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. Now, that would be the brethren in Thessalonica sending Paul and Silas to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica. That is, the Jews of Berea were more fair-minded than the Jews in Thessalonica, in that they received the Word with all readiness in mind and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether those things were so. Therefore, many of them believed, and also not a few of the Greeks, prominent women as well as men, they searched the Scriptures. And verse 17 says, many of them believed. Who were the believers in the city of Berea? It's those who searched the Scriptures, who looked for truth. They did not place their own subjective thinking and traditions into it. They just searched the Scriptures. And when they found truth, they simply submitted to truth and obeyed truth, and they became the believers in the city of Berea. Who are the believers in the city of Albertville or Hartsville, where I live? It's people who have respect for the Word of God, who search the Scriptures in order to try to find out what God's will is. They refuse to inject their own subjective thinking or traditions or whatever. They simply submit to whatever God says in His Word, and they obey it, and they are the believers, whoever they are. They are the believers in Berea, in Albertville, in Hartsville, or wherever. That is accepting truth without our own think-souls, our own subjective thinking. And that's what the Lord wants from us as we serve Him. Do we understand subjective thinking now? I think so, hopefully so. As we serve the Lord and simply accept whatever the Lord says. Well, I appreciate the careful way you listened, and sorry my eyes were kind of faded a little bit tonight, but I think we got the message across. I hope we did. And what I'm hoping, always, and I'm preaching some extremely basic lessons this week. Some of you have already commented about that. But I'm trying to stir us and help us to understand basic truth, and whether we've been Christians for 25 years or 50 years, we need to know basic truth and have it reviewed in our hearing. But then we never know what young people may be present, what people may be coming from the community, and I want them to know some of these basic facts that we're trying to teach this week. And if there's somebody here who understands the gospel of Jesus Christ, you believe it. You're not wanting to put your own subjective thinking in it. You just want to believe what God has said, and you're willing to turn from your sins and to confess Jesus as the Son of God and to be baptized in obedience to the Lord. He who believes and is baptized shall be saved. I would like to just urge you, don't put it off any longer. Tomorrow's sun may never rise. The best bless thy long deluded sight. This is the time. Oh, then be wise. Be saved overnight. Go home a Christian, saved by the blood of Christ. We'd love to see you respond, or if you've been negligent in serving the Lord, come back, start again, ask His forgiveness. He'll forgive you, and you can go on your way home thankful to have the change that God has brought about in your life.