The Bible Doesn't Cancel Out Everything Else You Consume

Scripture quotations are from the New International Version (NIV).

I got to visit my daughter's church this morning and watch my granddaughter, Ember, be dedicated.

The sermon was called Still Transforming (Part 28), and it was built around Romans 12:2 and James 1:2–8.

And y'all, I'm still thinking about it hours later.

James begins by telling believers to consider it an opportunity for joy when trials come because the testing of our faith produces endurance. Then he says that if we need wisdom, we should ask God, who gives generously.

But James tells us something important about how we ask.

Our faith must be in God alone.

The person who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. James calls that person "double-minded" and says they are unstable in everything they do.

And that one word, double-minded, sent me straight down a rabbit hole.

Two Cookies or Two Stomachs

The pastor used two cookies from two different jars to illustrate double-mindedness.

Both cookies looked good.

And honestly, I laughed a little because in real life, both of those cookies are probably bad for you. That is not much of a choice. 😂

So in my head, I started changing the illustration.

What if one thing tasted really good and nourished you, while the other tasted amazing but slowly made you unhealthy?

Now we have a decision worth making.

Then I started imagining having two stomachs.

You feed one stomach things that nourish and strengthen you. You feed the other things that satisfy you in the moment but do nothing good for your body over time.

Both may taste good.

Both may satisfy a craving.

But only one is helping you become healthy.

But...

Feeding the healthy stomach does not undo what you fed the other one.

Eating the salad does not cancel out the pizza and large Pepsi (and everything else) you ate.

In the same way, reading the Bible does not cancel out everything else we continually consume.

We can fill part of our minds with Scripture while filling another part with videos, posts, music, shows, books, conversations, and relationships that teach us the exact opposite.

We tell ourselves the good balances out the bad.

But both are feeding us.

Both are shaping us.

And eventually, both come out.

I know this personally because I have lived it.

I loved God. I read my Bible. I listened to sermons.

But I was also feeding myself social media, conversations, music, movies, books, and company that taught me a completely different way to think.

I wanted God's peace while consuming things that fed anxiety, anger, pride, lust, bitterness, and selfishness.

I wanted to think like Christ while continually exposing myself to messages telling me to put myself first, follow every feeling, hold my grudges, and do whatever made me happy.

Then I wondered why my reactions did not look like Jesus.

Romans 12:2 says:

“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”

Reading God's Word is necessary. God uses His truth to renew our minds.

But the Bible is not a magic eraser.

We cannot spend a few minutes reading Scripture and assume that it automatically removes the influence of everything else we willingly feed our minds for the rest of the day.

God's Word transforms us as we believe it, submit to it, and live it.

James says later in chapter 1 that we should not merely listen to the Word and deceive ourselves. We must do what it says.

What “Two-Souled” Really Shows Us

The Greek word translated double-minded is dipsychos.

It combines the idea of “two” with “soul” or “self.” It gives us the picture of someone divided internally, pulled between two loyalties.

That is stronger than simply being indecisive or wishy-washy.

It is like trying to run two operating systems inside the same person.

Two ways of deciding what is true.

Two voices competing for the final say.

Two loyalties pulling the same life in different directions.

No wonder James says that person is unstable.

If God's Word is one source of truth but everything else gets an equal vote, we never have settled ground beneath us. We move with whichever voice is loudest, easiest, or most comfortable in the moment.

That does not mean Christians never ask questions or wrestle with doubt. God is not threatened by sincere questions.

The problem is divided loyalty.

It is asking God for wisdom while quietly keeping another plan warm, just in case we do not like His answer.

It is wanting God's promises without becoming convinced that God's way is actually best.

What We Feed Will Come Out

This is where it got uncomfortable for me.

I remembered another illustration I once heard from Priscilla Shirer.

If you squeeze an orange, orange juice comes out.

But if someone injected that orange with black ink first, squeezing it would produce orange juice mixed with black ink.

The good juice would not cancel out the ink.

Both would come out because both were inside.

Life squeezes us too.

Someone cuts us off in traffic.

Our children do not listen.

A friend disappoints us.

Someone speaks disrespectfully to us.

Our plans fall apart.

We are tired, overwhelmed, inconvenienced, or afraid.

Then whatever has been filling our hearts starts coming out through our mouths.

Jesus said:

“For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.”
Luke 6:45

Pressure does not always create what comes out of us.

Often, pressure reveals what has been growing inside us.

Who You Are in Traffic Is Still Who You Are

I was talking with a friend last week about how much people in traffic get to her.

And listen, my mom is a truck driver. Even today, if I ride with her, she is laying on the horn and letting people know exactly what kind of drivers she thinks they are. 😂

I told my friend:

“Who you are in traffic is still who you are.”

That sentence stayed with her. She brought it up again the next day.

Because we love to separate those moments from who we believe we really are.

“That is just how I am in traffic.”

“I only talk like that when I am angry.”

“I would not have said it if they had not pushed me.”

“That is not the real me.”

But it came from somewhere.

Traffic did not place that impatience in my heart. It squeezed me and gave it a way out.

Now, one bad reaction does not tell the whole story of who someone is. We are all still being transformed. We all have moments when we respond badly, repent, and need God's grace.

But repeated reactions can reveal an area of the heart we have ignored, excused, or continued to feed.

Annoyance.

Attitude.

Impatience.

Cursing.

Yelling.

Entitlement.

Loving one person while treating another with contempt.

Being kind when everything goes our way but becoming someone else when we are inconvenienced.

Those moments show us where God still wants to do His transforming work.

Praising God and Burning Down Relationships

James returns to the mouth later in his letter:

“With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God's likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be.”
James 3:9–10

There are the two sources again.

One mouth.

Two completely different things coming out.

We can lift our hands and praise God on Sunday, then use that same tongue to burn down a relationship on Monday.

We can sing about His grace and refuse to extend grace five minutes later.

We can thank God for forgiving us and then tell everyone who will listen what somebody else did wrong.

We can worship God with our mouths and use those same mouths to gossip, insult, embarrass, manipulate, and destroy people made in His image.

That is not two different people.

That is one heart producing evidence of the different things it has been feeding.

Our worship songs do not cancel our gossip.

Our Bible reading does not cancel our cruelty.

Our church attendance does not cancel the way we speak to our families.

Our Christian posts do not cancel the people we tear apart in private conversations.

God's Word is supposed to transform all of it.

But transformation requires more than hearing the Word. We have to allow it to confront us, correct us, and change what we continue feeding.

The fruit of the Spirit is not only supposed to appear at church.

It should still be recognizable when we are behind the wheel, surrounded by strangers, and convinced that none of them know how to drive.

When God's Word Becomes Optional Advice

I think there is an attitude beneath much of our double-mindedness.

We are not completely convinced that God's way is best.

So instead of treating God's Word as something we obey, we quietly downgrade it to something we consider.

We treat it like human advice.

Helpful.

Worth thinking about.

But ultimately optional.

Advice is something we consider. God's Word is something we obey.

When we treat Scripture like advice, we reserve the right to reject it whenever another voice tells us what we would rather hear.

That is what makes us like a wave.

We are moved by the latest opinion, the strongest emotion, the most persuasive friend, or whatever feels easiest right now because nothing has been fully settled inside us.

The double-agent picture from the sermon helped me understand this too.

A double agent tries to operate between two sides. They gather information from both and reveal enough to remain useful to each.

That is divided loyalty.

And that is what it can look like when we try to live with two sources of truth competing for the final say.

There cannot be an absolute, settled direction for our lives when we keep trying to serve both.

How Long Will You Keep Wavering?

That took me to 1 Kings 18.

Elijah stood before Israel and asked:

“How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.”

Elijah was not asking them to feel a little more strongly about God.

He was telling them to decide.

Stop limping between two sides.

Stop trying to keep access to God while maintaining loyalty to something opposed to Him.

Jesus says in Matthew 6:24 that no one can serve two masters. In that passage, He is specifically talking about God and money. But His warning exposes the impossibility of divided mastery.

We cannot give two opposing masters the final authority over one life.

Habakkuk 2:4 says the righteous will live by faith. Paul echoes that truth in 2 Corinthians 5:7 when he says we walk by faith, not by sight.

Live by faith.

Walk by faith.

Both describe a direction.

Faith does not mean we understand everything or never struggle. It means that when our understanding, feelings, or circumstances disagree with God, we have already decided who gets the final say.

Daniel Made Up His Mind Before the Pressure Came

Daniel understood this before the pressure ever arrived.

Daniel 1:8 says:

“But Daniel resolved not to defile himself with the royal food and wine.”

He resolved.

He made up his mind.

He decided before he knew exactly what that decision might cost him.

And much later, when praying to God could get him thrown into a lions' den, Daniel continued doing what he had already been doing.

The lions' den did not create Daniel's loyalty.

It revealed it.

That is the difference between a divided mind and a settled one.

A divided mind waits until the pressure arrives to figure out which voice it will obey.

A settled mind has already decided whom it belongs to.

When the pressure comes, there is nothing left to negotiate.

Maybe It Is Time to Make Up Our Minds

We cannot keep feeding two competing ways of thinking and expect only one of them to come out when life squeezes us.

We cannot keep one foot in God's way and one foot in the world's backup plan and call that faith.

We cannot keep praising God while using our tongues to burn down the people He created.

And we cannot call God's Word the truth while continuing to treat it like one opinion among many.

The question is not whether we are being shaped.

We are always being shaped by something.

The question is what we are allowing to shape us.

What am I feeding?

What am I starving?

What comes out of me when I am tired, angry, inconvenienced, or afraid?

What does that reveal about what I have been consuming?

Where have I been treating God's Word like advice instead of instruction?

Am I asking God to transform something I continue to feed?

Am I trying to live with two sources of truth competing inside me and calling it balance?

If pressure came today the way it came for Daniel, would it reveal a settled mind or a divided one?

Have I already made up my mind?

Or am I waiting until the pressure comes to decide whom I belong to?

What we consume in private will eventually come out when life applies pressure.

Maybe it is time to make up our minds.