Have you ever felt conflicted and secluded on your own little island, surrounded by a sea of endless, puzzling opinions and questions regarding life and faith and what you should accept or reject? Possibly, you have tried to blend it all together into something that feels acceptable and comfortable. If so, you might be suffering from double mindedness.
God directed His accusation of double mindedness to the Church. So, what does it mean to be double-minded? The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines it as wavering in mind: undecided, vacillating, insincerity, and hypocrisy.
What is hypocrisy? It is claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one’s own behavior does not conform; it is pretense, which is the attempt to make something that is not true appear as true. It is a false display of feelings, attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, or intentions.
God has an immovable position regarding double minded Christians. “How long will you hesitate between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.” But the people did not answer him a word” (I Kings 18:21). Baal represents the influences of the world and all that it offers.
Jesus re-iterates God’s position when He clearly states, “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money” (Matthew 6:24 NIV).
What does it mean to serve? It is performing duties or services for a person or an organization. Every day we serve something or someone. Unfortunately, much of that service is self-serving to benefit one’s own pleasure, security, ego, greed, control, success, and gain. Conversely, in serving God, all focus is on Him and His economy. Yes, we must function in the world, but we are not to follow the world’s amoral standards. Our standards are predicated on scripture that is to guide and direct our lives.
How does God see His Church today? “[You] speak falsehood to one another; with flattering lips and with a double heart [you] speak.” (Psalm 12:2) “You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God” (James 4:4).
What is an adulterer? The obvious answer is a person who has relations with someone other than their spouse. As noted, “…friendship with the world is hostility towards God. But God also views fornication and various forms of sexual depravity as egregious acts of adultery against Him.
What other ways do Christians commit adultery against God? The answer: When love for the world has precedence over loving God, who says, “For your husband is your Maker, whose name is the Lord of hosts; and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel, who is called the God of all the earth” (Isaiah 54:5). Therefore, “Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him” (I John 2:15). We are also instructed “not to be conformed (fit in) to this world but be transformed by the renewal of [our] mind, that by testing [we] may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12:2).
God sees our heart and knows what we value and whether we are trying to “conform” to this world. He says, “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were cold or hot. So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth. Because you say, “I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,” and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor (in spirit) and (spiritually) blind and naked (exposed to God).” (Revelation 3:15-18). Simply stated, we are to decide between the world or God. Fence-riding (serving both God and the world) is indecision and double mindedness, which puts us in the position of being lukewarm—a very dangerous place to be.
You might be asking, “What are the signs of a double mind Christian?” Double mindedness is a spiritual disconnect with God. Double mindedness was a problem with the early Christians whom James addressed and chastised because they tried to worship both God and their idols.
What are today’s idols? Those things that we do in excess, which allow no time for God: Social media, excessive use of phones, various forms of entertainment that consume endless hours of time; the pursuit of money and materialism.
God instructs us to do all things in moderation. Unfortunately, we live in a society that promotes excess. For if we live a life of moderation, we are grateful for what God provides, and we happily seek Him above all other things.
Double mindedness is even more prevalent today among Christians. Those who are not Christian have already surrendered to the world with a single-minded purpose to follow the world and its godless standards. That is why God is calling Christians to repent and make a stand for their faith. Either those who claim to be Christ followers will choose the things of God and remain His faithful bride that brings His light and truth to the world, or they will be that adulterous bride who compromises and assimilates the world’s values and standards.
We plead with God to heal our land, yet if we want to see change and healing of our land, it starts with a change in the heart of each Christian. God is pleading with His Church (Christians) to surrender all to Him, to seek Him, and to pray. The world has already rejected God and unless the Church rises as Christ’s ambassador, then those who have chosen the world will never find a reason to choose Christ.
PRAYER: FATHER, I thank You for Your faithfulness in continually calling your Church to repentance. Help me to be Your faithful “bride,” who chooses You above all that this world may offer and teach me how to be sensitive to Your Spirit so that people can be drawn out of darkness into Your glorious light. In Jesus’ name, amen.