The professor was giving his final lessons of the year. He was trying to rally us as we headed out into the world to do ministry. My friend was sitting beside me with his notebook open, soaking it all up. When the professor reached the end of his series of encouragements, advice, and wisdom, he launched into one final challenge. He told us that the greatest tool we have is our brain, and we need to learn to “think for ourselves.”

I looked over as my friend grabbed his pen and jotted in large letters, “Learn to think for yourself.” I saw it and started to giggle to myself. He saw me, furrowed his eyebrows, as I was being disrespectful in the moment, totally missing the irony of writing a note about thinking for “ourselves.”

That moment is lodged in my brain because I have so often wanted to scream at people, “Would you think?” It could be about their marriage, parenting, finances, or even their behavior in public. Use your brain, people.

I have concluded that my professor was wrong in one aspect of what he said. We should not make it our goal to learn to think for ourselves; instead, we should learn to think Biblically.

Learning to think in ways aligned with God’s will is incredibly hard. It usually goes against culture, it runs contrary to our feelings and flesh, and it does not always seem like common sense.

Thinking for yourself is not a bad idea, as long as you use your freedom of thought to lead you to Jesus and his way of thinking.