Ninjas

By Odon Bulamba

Proverbs 4: 23, “Watch over your heart with all diligence, For from it flow the springs of life”.

The root of our message is from this verse.  The title for today’s message is “Ninja”.  We all know ninjas.  A ninja is a human being but is different from other human beings when it is time to operate.  They disguise themselves to make them to be called ninjas.  What does the ninja’s face look like?  They wrap cloth around their eyes.  They hide their entire body, you can’t see their skin.  The only place seen is their eyes.  Without the outfit, you will never know the person is a ninja.

 

The Bible says in Proverbs 4:23 to keep your heart with all vigilance because from it flows all life.  Another version says, be careful what you think about because your thoughts run your life. 

 

Ideas that we have run our lives.  That is one of the biggest tools that God has given to us to run our lives.  You go to your office in the morning and an idea pops up, I will do a, b, c today and you tell your boss who says good idea.  Your ideas will run your kitchen.  I’ll organise the kitchen with this over here and this over there.  Our ideas tell us what we want to wear today.  Our thoughts tell us this is what we want to eat from the restaurant.  Ideas will even govern a country.  This tool which is the ideas we have is so strong that when an idea comes in your mind it is like a ninja, quietly and disguises itself and is coming for action.

 

You can be sitting here but ideas can come into your head and push you to judge, minimise people, hate people and also push you to love people.  Ideas are like ninjas because when a ninja comes they wear black outfits and carry a sword on their back and you can be surprised that the ninja can pull the sword from back and attack.  Why don’t they put the sword in front or on their hip where you can see it but instead they put the sword on their back where you can’t see it.

 

When ninjas come in, they come in quietly and you won’t notice them.  When ideas come into your life, they start quietly and attack, e.g. “look at Ange, nice shoes but she must have stolen them from somewhere,” and the ideas grow big.  Ninjas have tactics they use.  They can come in through the window and destroy the inside and leave without leaving a mark that they were there.  This is like when ideas raise up in your mind and take you far away.  The sword is the Word of God and should be used for a good purpose.  Your words can be used sharply like a sword.

 

Imagine if you were given an opportunity to use your ideas every day.  How great will you be?  From someone’s idea, we have houses, microphones, we build new things that never existed but when it comes to the Word of God, people don’t want to use ideas.  People don’t’ want to do more research or be committed when it comes to reading the Word of God.

 

A ninja is a human being but the difference is that they are trained to kill, destroy or save.  Your ideas are trained by someone, me and you.  When an idea comes up, you can decide what to do with it.  You can accept it or reject it.  If you allow your idea to take control, that idea will lead you to something stupid.  Sometimes in groups you will see people’s ideas become acceptable, for example, a preacher can have a glass of bear while preaching instead of water and the congregation finds it normal.  I’ve seen a preacher take a puff on a cigarette while preaching.  The congregation finds it normal because they are familiar with the idea.

 

My ideas can hurt and harm others, especially if you don’t think carefully you can end up destroying many people. 

 

When you train your ideas they can jump in two places: (1) your head and (2) your hip. 

 

(1) The ideas go to your head and make a contract with you.  For example you have an idea to marry someone. and you give a ring to that person and your agreement backs your ideas.  You see people stand firm in their ideas no matter what people say and they defend the ideas even if the ideas are wrong, “This is what it is and it must be like this”. 

 

Sometimes your ideas may make you doubt and ask, does God really exist and you wonder where that idea comes from.  Sometimes your ideas can push you to think, I don’t look good, I should look like someone else.  Those ideas will create this big monster in your life and start to destroy your life (like a ninja).

 

Your ideas start to blame others.  Ideas will push you to suspect anything.  My child is not here, he must be there and you stick on that and your child may come back and you ask where they were and you may push them to lie because of fear. 

 

Ideas make a commitment with you. 

 

1 Corinthians 2:10, ideas are killing the church and destroying people.  Our thoughts are the centre of everything.  One time there was something strange in a country where many people were thinking about God.  To think about God, you need faith.  When ideas come they come in human wisdom very often.  Meaning that you have to act like a human being. 

 

For example, there was a man who loved a woman and they collected money, $2.4 million was collected and saved to plan a big wedding.  As they were planning, they went to a beach and decided this is where our guests will stay for two weeks so we can enjoy and share the wedding. Before the wedding, the husband and wife decided to surf and the wife fell into the water and people tried to save her and suddenly blood everywhere.  Those coming to save her turned back and shouted for help.  The man was taking photos and couldn’t do much.  Someone took the body out of the water and her legs were gone and she passed away.

 

The man and lady had a good idea to join people at a beach for the wedding and they worked hard for that but everything changed.  Most of the times, our ideas are not God’s plans.  Your ideas are nothing if God doesn’t put his hand on it.  Don’t tell people your ideas are the right one until you know God’s will in the situation. 

 

David was a good friend of Johnathon.  Their love was so strong and powerful.  Someone came running, Saul and his son Johnathon is killed.  This poor nurse looking after the son of Johnathon (Mephibosheth) who accidently dropped him trying to escape from those who might kill him.  The boy after falling became lame. 

 

In those days, if you are the king, your son becomes king.  Johnathon should become king but God prepared David instead.  Although Johnathon passed away, his son Mephibosheth was alive.  Why didn’t he become king?  That is the idea of the time.

 

Those ideas live in us and we believe this is how it should work but sometimes God changes them.  Whatever you are doing, whatever you are thinking, let God be a part of it.  Show me God the right way so I can do things correctly. Sometimes I can think negatively about someone, and I can stop and ask why and where is God’s glory in this.

 

I have a friend who grew up in a family where no one trusted him or accepted him.  Everybody will say he is wrong.  When he tried to read to his dad, his father will say, “go away, you know nothing”.  In him, he believed that everybody hates me and up to the age of 46, he believed that he was not loved until the day that God came close to him and said, I love you as your God.

 

The love of God for you is so big. 

 

(2) Your ideas will be like this bright belt that I wear around my hip and your body is like my black clothing.  E.g. “If I do this, I will get money.  If I use this strategy, I will get glory”.  Ephesians 6, the belt is the truth and ideas come like the truth and the ninja that is entering your mind is the only truth in your mind and those ideas won’t stop there and will start to send signals.  The ideas will go up to your neck and nothing works a part from this idea.  “This idea doesn’t want to leave me, I can’t forget about it”.  Your husband, wife, friend and neighbours will explain to you 600 x and you will continue to believe they are wrong and you are right.

 

You will put yourself in this big couch, I am reigning now, I’m controlling but where is the will of God in all of this.  You can see your brain become squares which are small ideas mixed with your faith and it becomes a struggle.  I have an idea, I’m 70, what will happen tomorrow, fear starts and you start a battle with yourself because your thoughts start to lead your life like a bowtie around your neck and when you have a bowtie around your neck, it stops your neck making a good contact with your body.

 

A leopard will jump on your neck because it is easy to kill from the neck.  When ideas sit down in your body as the truth, they send signals to your neck.  Ephesians 6 doesn’t talk about the protection needed for your neck.  How to protect ourselves when ideas want to harm you?  What to do when bad ideas destroy your peace. 

 

Ninja ideas will knock at your door and you open your mind and ideas will take you left and right.  Maybe your husband is sleeping next to you but those ideas don’t care, they start to play with your mind.  They will make you judge, laugh, and become sick because of ideas.

 

We have to be careful with our thoughts.  We have to be careful in the way we think because they can lead us to please God or make him unhappy.  How do you think?  How do you know that what you think is good or true ideas?  What do you do with your ideas?  How many ideas could you store since you were born?  God is teaching us today, we are free in Jesus but we should also be free from our thoughts.  Whenever thoughts come that don’t please God, call on Him and ask for his help so they don’t destroy your family, yourself, or your faith.

 

Ideas can push ourselves to compare ourselves to others and jealousy comes in.  The boy who became lame, David one day asked whether any of Johnathon’s family had survived.  The boy did nothing wrong to become lame but God wanted him to be that way. By a child falling down, it usually wouldn’t make him paralysed.  The boy’s life was completely changed.  The boy asked how David could call a man like him who is like a dog but because David loved Johnathon, he wanted him.

 

Think about the love you have for your family and friends, work, church, faith.  What are you going to give back when one of your gifts is in front of you with weaknesses?  Yesterday you used to sing, but today you don’t because you are lazy and now you can’t stand properly anymore, your legs are lame.  Will you pick up the gift and give it back life?  Will you help others with their weaknesses to fix the situation? That can only happen when the bad ideas are put aside.  Then you will see God’s glory.

 

What breaks your heart?  Ideas.  Depression, rejection, sickness are caused by ideas.  Ideas destroy your life.  The more you store the ideas, the more you feel sick.  Kingdom of God looks like children.  Children don’t care about ideas.  They express them and then forget but us adults keep them forever and create problems.  We hate others and judge others because of someone’s ideas.  Who supplies the food for your ideas and helps them to grow to the point that you are separated from God?

 

Let’s pray and ask God to change our way of thinking so we can live in unity and joy.