The Mind!

Text: Philippians 2:5  Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.

Mind in this verse is from the Greek word which is phrone’o, meaning to exercise the mind; entertain or have a sentiment or opinion; be of one; be the same; savour; think.

Paul was writing from prison to Christians in Philippi.

The theme of this book is the joy of Christian grace and experience in all life and death.  Christians are to rejoice in fellowship with one another in afflictions of the gospel, in the ministry for saints, in faithfulness of ministers, in the Lord and not in Judaism or in the flesh, in unity, and always in all things.

Apostle Huntsman was on point last Sunday with the message “I know that greater is He that is in me, than he that is in the world”! (1 John 4:4)  It’s a “mind set”!  A knowing!  No doubting!  No wondering if but a knowing!

It is essential that we let Christ’s mind be in us.  If it was not important, Paul would not have mentioned it!  

• Philippians 2:5  Let this mind (phrone’o) be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus!  

Nor would he have mentioned Romans 12:2.

• Romans 12:2  Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind [nous meaning intellect; divine mind; thought; feeling; will; understanding].  

This is vitally important or Paul wouldn’t have warned us about the carnal mind.

• Romans 8:6-7  To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.  Because the carnal mind is enmity (hostile) against God:  for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.  
• 1 Peter 1:13  Gird up the loins of your mind [dian’oia meaning deep thought; the mind or its disposition].

Because your “mind” has loins, reproduction can take place in your “mind” and bring you into the total of who Jesus is in the earth!  

• 1 John 4:17  As he is, so are we in this world.   

Not up beyond the blue, but “in this world”!

It all starts in the “mind”!  

• Mark 15:38  And the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom.
  

In Romans 12:2 - the “mind” is the intellect; mind or nous meaning divine or human; in thought, feeling or will; understanding.  Intellect is the ability to not only understand knowledge but also to accept knowledge!

1 Peter 1:13 - “mind” deals with “deep thought”.  With deep thought, the scriptures are more to you and for you than just “information”, but it is “revelation” such as John received while on the Isle of Patmos!  It’s more than a “story book”, but a “revealing” [disclosure; manifestation; exposition; unveiling] of the total of Christ in us and the total of us (the church) in Christ!!

• 2 Corinthians 5:17  Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

So there are two kinds of “mind set” -  the “natural” and the “spiritual”.  In order to flourish and come to full maturity in God, we must be “spiritually minded”.  That which is first is “natural”.  This is how we operated before we were knowledgeable of the “Spirit”!  We talked negative and were death minded because we were under Satan’s control.  

• Proverbs 23:7  For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he.  

Our thought life affects everything about us - how we feel, live and act!  If you think negative thoughts, you will act in a negative way.  

• Matthew 12:37  For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.

We must put on the mind of Christ!  We can’t win trying to do it on our own.  For this is a spiritual warfare:  

• Ephesians 6:12  For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.

It is a battle between good and evil for our lives.  Since it is spiritual, we must fight with spiritual resources!

How can we let “Christ’s mind” be in us?

1. The first step is “salvation” and being “filled with the Holy Ghost”, which indwells and enlightens us with wisdom and the mind of God.  

• Matthew 9:16-17  No man putteth a piece of new cloth unto an old garment,  for that which is put in to fill it up taketh from the garment, and the rent is made worse.  Neither do men put new wine into old bottles: else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish:  but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved.

2. We must study [meditate; research; examine; investigate] the Word of God.  

• 2 Timothy 2:15  Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing [separating; dissecting; anatomizing; examining; analyzing] the word of truth.

3. We must meditate.  

• 1 Timothy 4:15  Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy

profiting may appear to all.

4. We must act on the Word of God.  

• James 2:26  For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

5. Be prayerful.  

• Ephesians 6:18  Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and

watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints.

6. Give God praise.  

• Psalm 150  Praise ye the Lord. Praise God in his sanctuary: praise him in the firmament of his power.

2 Praise him for his mighty acts: praise him according to his excellent greatness.

3 Praise him with the sound of the trumpet: praise him with the psaltery and harp.

4 Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise him with stringed instruments and

Organs.

5 Praise him upon the loud cymbals: praise him upon the high sounding cymbals.

6 Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord. Praise ye the Lord.

7. We must allow the Spirit of God to transform and renew our mind.  

Romans 12:2  Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.  

As we begin to do all of the above, we will find ourselves being renewed and transformed.  Your walk is different; your talk is different; even our thought processes will be different.  

Because of the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, we are able to pull down strongholds, casting down imaginations.  Imaginations is from the root word meaning to take an inventory, estimate, conclude, despise, esteem, impute, reason, thought.  It’s from another Greek word log’os, which is something said (including the thought)!  This all has to do with “the mind”!  

• 2 Corinthians 10:4-5  (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.

Jesus did this in Matthew 4:3-4 when He was tempted by the devil (Belial) in relation to the lust of the flesh and bodily appetites.  He was tempted by Satan in vs 5-6 in relation to “spirit and mind” control.  He was tempted by Lucifer in verses 7-10 in relation to the “soul” (emotional control).

• 1 John 2:15-16  Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.  If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.  For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

In all of this, the devil was tempting Jesus by trying to deal with His “mind”.  If Jesus overcame it - and He did - and with Jesus being our example, we too can overcome the battles the devil brings against us and have the victory in our mind as well!  We have to!  We must do it!  For 1 John 2 (above) speaks of all three of these things that we can and must overcome through Christ - the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life which is not of the Father but is of the world (the things that pertain to “men” or the systems of men).

In Genesis 3:6, the Woman and her husband failed the test, but in Matthew 4:1-11, Jesus passed the test!!!  Therefore we, “the sons of God”, shall pass the test because we have the mind of Christ, and when tempted by the devil, we will speak the Word of God and defeat the enemy!

With having Christ’s mind, your way of thinking has changed!  

• 1 Corinthians 2:16  We have Christ’s mind!  
• Philippians 2:5  Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.  

We won’t think as common people think.  Common people talk about people!  By having Christ’s mind, our minds have become great!  Great people think about great things, have great ideas, or think on whatever is good!  You will never progress as long as your continuous conversation all day long is about somebody that did something that you didn’t like.  When we let Christ’s mind be in us, we know who we are and whose we are, “for we are more than conquerors” (Romans 8:37).  We know we are Him in the earth, because “as He is, so are we in this world” (1 John 4:17).

We know that we are kings and priests.  King Uzziah was a “king” not a “priest”!  When he tried to take on the role as “priest”, he was struck with leprosy!!  Leprosy was a slow, debilitating disease that finally consumed the body.  King Uzziah had “leprosy” in his “forehead”.  Remember Revelation 14:9 and 17:5 make mention of the “mark in the forehead”.   We are still talking about the “mind”!

In the physical structure of the “cerebrum” (which is Latin for “the brain”), there are several “lobes” (frontal; parietal; temporal; occipital; insula), but I want to briefly touch on the “frontal” in relation to its position (front-al; the “forehead”), which deals with “speech”.  Its function is with voluntary motor control of skeletal muscles; personality; higher intellectual processes (concentration, planning, and decision making); verbal communication.  

King Uzziah had stepped out of his place, and God dealt with him.  Here we are dealing with a “name” in the “forehead” [sickness; bondage; ignorance; misery; destruction; death], in the “minds of people” which is what is keeping the majority of Christians from receiving the vision of us being “overcomers” NOW in this life, not after you die and go “up yonder”! “Leprosy” spiritually is a “disease” of the mind called “ignorance” in relation to the things of God!!  

• Hosea 4:6  My people are destroyed, for the lack of knowledge!

To overcome, we must “live”!!

• John 10:10  The thief cometh not but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy:  I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly!  

We know that without a vision the people perish.  And to receive the vision, King Uzziah has to die.  Just like the Rich man in Luke 16 had to die to see the vision.  Many have and many now will die in order to see the vision because they won’t accept the “truth”!

• 2 Thessalonians 2:10-12  And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved.  And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion (imposters – people that will preach to them what they want to hear), that they should believe a lie:  that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.  

He (Uzziah) was a good King, but he could not go into the temple and go to the altar as a priest.  A lot of people go to the altar and have authority, but to go to the holies of holies, you have to be more than a ”king”.  You’ve got to be a “priest”!  

• Revelation 5:10: God hast made us “kings and priests”!!  

Uzziah was a good king and did what was right in God’s eyes,and he was marvelously helped by God and became strong, but at some point in his success he got the “big head”!  Does that sound familiar (Isaiah 14 with Lucifer, who had an “I”-disease and was brought down)?  They both forgot where their help came from and began to turn from God or shall I say, they “journeyed from the East” and began to trust in their own strength!  It’s called “SELF-EXALTATION”!  Prosperity and success blurred the king’s vision.  As God prospers us, we have to continue to maintain the “mind of Christ”!  Tell yourself, “I have the mind of Christ”!

We are more than just “kings”; we are “priests” as well!  We hold both offices because we have the mind of Revelation 5:10.

• Revelation 5:10  And has made us unto our God kings and priests:  and we shall reign on (over) the earth!  

Not up yonder beyond the blue, but “OVER THE EARTH”, right here and right now!!!

When we let Christ’s mind be in us, we can say we are “Alpha”!  All the “Alpha” people shout Hallelujah!!!

When we let Christ’s mind be in us, we will be like Enoch of whom scripture says,

• Genesis 5:24  Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.

God did not conform to Enoch, but Enoch conformed to God!  We must conform to God!  The word conform means to “jointly form; be similarly fashioned like unto!  

• Romans 12:2: And be not conformed to this world:  but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.  
• Romans 8:29 For whom he did foreknow, He also did predestinate (ordained) to be conformed to the image of His Son!

So let Christ’s “mind” be in you!!  When we let His mind be in us, we will know that our attitudes and actions will be motivated by service to others instead of “self-love”!

We will be submissive to those in authority and will always portray humility.  We will not be judgmental, but judge righteously!  We will be compassionate and be prayerful for others when we let Christ’s mind be in us!

• 1 Corinthians 2:16  We have the “mind of Christ”!  

By having the mind of Christ, we shall rule in and over the earth as God!!

~ Evangelist Mary Perry