The Renewing of your Mind

“And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:2)

“be renewed in the spirit of your mind,” (Ephesians 4:23)

Early in May whilst away on holidays I awoke one morning at 2:30am when I was immediately stirred in my spirit by the voice of a scripture that began to come to me, “Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus.” (Php 2:5) I was taken by the simplicity in which it came and by the fact that it kept coming again and again for 3-4 minutes. I clearly felt the Lord was wanting to emphasize something to me. I also noted that it came with a strength and firmness. It wasn’t wishy washy but rather it was firm and it was strong. I clearly felt the Holy Spirit was speaking to me and I was not to ignore His voice. As I lay there sort of half-asleep I was startled and aroused in my spirit and I responded and said, “Lord, I do want Your mind to be in me.’ And then I asked this question, ‘Lord, what is it about Your mind that You want to be in me?’ Then straight away it came back very clearly, ‘To be sanctified Allan, to be sanctified to Christ, your whole life to be fully sanctified to Christ. I want my people to be sanctified as I am sanctified.’ (John 17:17-19) I replied, ‘Yes Lord, I do want to be sanctified, I do want to be wholly Yours.’ And that was the end of the encounter. Later that morning when I arose I sat and read the book of Philippians (especially Chp 2) which is the context of the verse, “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” Is our mind sanctified to Christ? Is the way that Christ thinks the way that we think? Our aforementioned scriptures refer us to the fact that our minds are in need of renewing. We need to be transformed from the way the world thinks to the way Christ thinks. Often when the seed of God’s Word comes to us it lands on the hard, stony and thorny ground of our pre conceived ideas, of a mind already made up. It falls on a mindset of a life’s experience that has formed the way we think. My prayer is that the Holy Spirit would come to each of us with powerful conviction and that His thoughts for our life will fall on the good ground of an open and receptive heart so that our minds might indeed be transformed to the mind of Christ.