Renewing My Mind

Renewing My Mind

Romans 12:2

And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

   I always thought I needed to pray and wait on God to renew my mind.  I thought this was one of those “Divinely-given ” things God did to those who showed determination and spent time alone with Him meditating and focusing themselves to “get closer to God.”  I thought all I could do was pray and hope God would renew my mind.  I never realized renewing my mind was something that I could consciously do.  But when I read though this verse again, God through the pen of Paul tells me to be transformed by the renewing of my mind.  What a cruel god who would require me to do something and not give the way to do it?   The God I serve is not cruel nor is He unreasonable.  If He tells me to do something, He’s already given me what I need to do it. 

   As I study the four gospels and supplement them with the Book of Acts and the epistles, I become more and more renewed in my mind.  It is a natural consequence of studying His Word.  Another is that I see more and more how things written down all connect into one Gospel message and how Christ is the basis of all written there.  Hebrews 10:7 tells me that, “in the volume of the book, it is written of Me.”  When I first began studying the Word, I knew and accepted that this was true.  Over the past year and a few months of study, I can now tell you with certainty that this is so.  The Bible is written, in its entirety, about Christ.  

   This is one of those things that bring renewing of the mind and as you become renewed in mind you gain faith.  I used to pray, “God, give me faith.”  I know now that when I became born-again, the Holy Spirit came to live in me and I received faith.  I have faith, what I lacked was the confidence and the knowledge to stand in it.  

   So why am I learning all this at my age?  Why didn’t I see these truths years ago?  I’ve spent time studying God’s Word and I’ve sat under some pretty solid preaching and teaching.  What happened?  Well, I’m going to tell you.  It’s kind of a confession. 

   When the Sower came and sowed the seeds, the parable tells us that some fell among the weeds and the cares of this world choked them out.  In my life, there weren’t a whole jungle of weeds, but enough to distract me whenever I was close to growing too much.  This past year and a few months I’ve been in a very small, struggling church.  The Pastor has been preaching his heart to me week after week and I’ve struggled to assimilate what he’s been teaching.  I also dug into some teaching of some other men of God and, with encouragement from the pastor, I’ve begun reaching out and exercising my ministry to people I’ve met who were hurting. 

   Then the enemy came against me, and like the Bible says, he comes in like a flood.  I was hit with illness and discouragement and fear and other attacks to try to knock me down.  But what the enemy did in my life was violate one of the primary rules that outdoorsman learn.  When I was little, I lived at the foot of Mile Hill.  My backyard opened up to a woods area that covered a sizable amount of acreage on Mile Hill.  My three older brothers all knew the woods and wanted me to be safe.  One lesson they told me was if you spot something really dangerous, like a bear, DON’T attract its attention.  As one brother put it to me: if the bear is passing by, just let it go by.  I was passing through life thinking I was doing good for the Kingdom of God and really was passing through life peaceably and not really doing much.  When I stretched myself and growled at the enemy, it would have better if he’d let me just pass by and eventually I would have, knowing myself, gone off and slumbered again.  What happened was that he ran up to this bear and kicked me in the ribs. 

   One Bible teacher, whose recorded messages I’ve been listening to, said that a Christian will never be able to minister effectively until he gets fed up with losing to the enemy.  The last attack I went through combined with a Sunday morning attack on my pastor really got to me.  Figuratively speaking, my ribs hurt from that last couple of kicks.  But the difference is that I know just how his attacks are now, and I know he really doesn’t have the power to stand up against the power of Jesus’ name.  To quote this teacher, “God knows the devil is defeated, the devil knows he’s defeated, only you have to be convinced the devil is defeated.  What has happened in my life is that I’ve lost my fear of being attacked and I’m just getting mad.  I’m mad about losing so many fights and I’m mad about fumbling so many opportunities and I’m mad about all the wasted years in my life.  I’m mad about the weeds in my life and the teaching I’ve heard has given me a super charge of spiritual Round-Up®.  I’m going after those weeds and clearing the ground so the Word will grow bigger in my life and I will produce more fruit. 

Stephen Cram                                                              April 13, 2014     

Colossians 2:8 Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, following the tradition of men according to the rudiments of the world, and not in accordance with Christ. 

Visit my pastor’s blog at http://pastorjonrhinehart.blogspot.com/.

Unless otherwise noted all Scripture is from the New King James Version of the Bible.