Just a few thoughts my friends:
I don't mean to question the Lord, but I often wonder why certain things occur. If I am so desperate to live my life for him. If I truly hunger and desire after his holiness. Why must I suffer from: disturbing thought, images, memories. Why do I battle with anger, impatience, unkindness. I hate it when I really want to please him and I am bombareded with disturbing thoughts ( not necessarily lust or sexual related thoughts exclusively) however, just things that are extremely against every ounce of what I truly believe in.
1) How do you deal with these thoughts?
2) Do they also disturb your spirit?
3) Why does God allow us to experience this when we WANT to please him?
Hi Timahani, I'm very sorry to hear about your struggles and I can relate, because I struggled with the very same thing early in my Christian walk. My "thought-life" was, in a word, painful (which on many days would have been quite an understatement
).
As for question #2, yes, my thought-life was disturbing in a number of ways, and I was rarely at peace.
As for question #3, God knows what is best for us, and He always wants what is best for us. If He did not, He would have never sent His very Best here to die in our places. He has promised to grow us up in His Son, and to see us safely through this life to Glory, but the path we need to travel on is not the one we would choose for ourselves, because it involves suffering, so He chooses the path for us, the one He knows we need to take. He, for instance, is well aware of our slavish love of this world and its lusts, so He uses the fittest means possible to draw our attention away from all of it and back onto Him, and to our future lives with Him, which is where our attention needs to be!
Always remember too that He can and will bring good even out of bad for all of us who are His, even when we can't see how that can possibly happen .. e.g.
Romans 8:28.
As for question #1, the remedy,
@longwait has given you some great advice already
(edit: and I see
@mukk_in has as well)
Know that you have an enemy, that he is coming for you, and that he means to do you harm if he can, because he hates the One you love and serve. The good news is, you have a loving Father who is '
for you' ..
Romans 8:31, and you are indwelt by the HS, and
greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world .. 1 John 4:4 
So, no worries, just do what the Bible tells us to do and you will be fine
Saints Peter, Paul and James each have something helpful to say about this. For instance:
Ephesians 6
12 Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.
James 4
7 Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
1 Peter 5
6 Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time,
7 casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.
8 Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
9 But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world.
10 After you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself perfect, confirm, strengthen and establish you.
11 To Him be dominion forever and ever. Amen.
The first thing to do
@longwait has already suggested, take these terrible thoughts you are having "captive" to Christ, rebuke them, and give them to Him to deal with .. e.g.
2 Corinthians 10:5. Do so again and again and again if necessary (though I know how wearying it can be, this is an important part of resisting the devil).
If you feel like you've sinned, then do not hesitate to ask the Lord to forgive you and He will, just like He promised us He would ..
1 John 1:9. And if you sin again and again, even if it's the very same sinful thought, ask Him to forgive you again and again and He always will (70 x 7 times is how often the Lord told us to forgive others who are seeking forgiveness from us, how much more our loving Father towards us ..
Matthew 18:21-22).
The Lord is also there to help us with the temptations of both the devil and of this world (and of our own lusts), so always be aware of that fact and look for the way of escape He provides before temptation becomes sin ..
1 Corinthians 10:13.
All these things will help, and they are all things that I continue to try to remember to do today when the flaming arrows (
Ephesians 6:16) are coming my way, but what really ended the thing I describe as my horrible "thought-life" (basically once and for all), was Scripture memorization
I don't mean memorizing the entire Bible, or even entire books or chapters, rather, I memorize key verses and passages and my mind became filled with them (so to speak). By doing so, I left no room for all of the bad, stinky garbage that I still had up there in my noggin from my former life before Christ.
Through memorization, His word becomes the thing that is always in the front of your mind. Memorization pushes all of the garbage towards the back of your brain, and it will eventually push it out altogether, and it won't come back (as there only seems to be room for more Scripture and other good things after that .. strange, but true
)
Also, the HS really has quite the tool to work with then as He teaches, guides and comforts you in your daily walk with Him. And whenever you consider sinning, you suddenly have two or three perfectly memorized verses in the front of your mind telling you why you shouldn't.
I will not kid you, it is a lot of work, but the spiritual benefits FAR outweigh the time and effort needed. So, if/when you become sick and tired enough of your lousy thought-life, so much so that you just can't stand it anymore, give Scripture memorization a shot. If you stick with it I guarantee you will not be disappointed (and if you'd ever like to know how to get started, just PM me as I'd be happy to help).
In Christ,
David
p.s. - here are some verses for you to consider ..
Joshua 1:8; Psalm 1:1-3; 2 Timothy 3:16-17.
Psalm 119:9,11
How can a young man keep his way pure? By keeping it according to Thy word. Thy word I have 'treasured' in my heart that I may not sin against Thee.
.
