Association and Influence, Part 2

May 20, 2022
KSAM: Association and Influence, Part 2

One of the greatest challenges we ever face is the choice of those with whom we choose to associate. Probably some of the most traumatic circumstances I have ever faced in my life are dealing with the impact of those with whom I have chosen to associate. Here are a few:

  1. My Church – The Church I grew up attending
  2. My Friends- Many I had known most of my life
  3. My Work- It did not take me where I believed God wanted me to go
  4. My romantic attachments – lovely and beautiful, but not who God had chosen for me
  5. My Pastor- a man I loved, believed in and cared much for, but his heart was unclean and his motives impure
  6. Family members – Sometimes may have difficulty seeing who we have become because they remember who we were

And there are many more. How many traumatic experiences have you had because it was necessary to change an association?

With whom we associate is very, very IMPORTANT. It influences and directs and determines our DESTINY, and the destiny of posterity. Examples – Good and Bad:

  • Adam/Eve – ultimately everyone born after them
  • Moses/Joshua
  • Elijah/Elisha
  • Paul/Timothy
  • Jonathan/David – Mephibosheth
  • Samson/Delilah

What is our belief? Where did we get our belief? What is an Idea? Where do our beliefs and ideas come from? What makes us who we are?

Dr. Myles Munroe, the late master teacher of the Kingdom, provided his thoughts about our ideas and the source of our beliefs. These observations are worthy of consideration and evaluation. They are as follows:

Our beliefs are developed by the ideas to which we are exposed. The process can be outlined like this.

  1. An original thought is a precept
  2. A conceived precept is an idea
  3. A conceived idea is a concept
  4. An accepted concept becomes a conviction
  5. An accepted conviction becomes a belief
  6. An accepted belief becomes our ideology
  7. An accepted ideology becomes philosophy
  8. An accepted philosophy becomes a lifestyle

Understanding the source of our beliefs is very, very important. It is so easy, so natural to absorb our beliefs almost as if by osmosis from our surrounding – our Family, our Friends, our Church, our Schooling, our Government, the Media. Many people do this and never consider if what is being said or portrayed is correct. Why? It was what my Parents believed, and they did alright.

But sometimes it becomes necessary for us to step back, take a full account of the beliefs of those around us, and make the decision of whether to continue to allow those beliefs and people to influence us, or to move on from those associations.