BE TRANSFORMED BY THE RENEWING OF YOUR MIND

          In today’s world, people are constantly trying to find out the root problem of people’s actions. Have you ever wondered why do people think, feel, and act the way they do? Well, I am going to share with you what the Holy Spirit has put on my heart.

          First of all, although we were created in God’s image, he gave us free will. And we all should be very grateful to Him for that, because He very well could have programmed us to be robots. But in my heart of hearts, I believe God felt it would be more satisfying if we could love Him on our own accord rather than his  forcing us to do it. Don’t you feel good when someone says I love you or highly respect you without any prompting or you asking? I know that when someone tells me, “I love you, brother”, it is music to my ears. I think that’s the way God feels also. Well, getting back on point, I feel that our free will has been misused by some. Instead of focusing on Godly things and our trying to please God and gain His favor, we have succumbed to the flesh with its various desires, emotions, and temptations. And since that has resulted in sinful behavior, those actions have alienated us from God.

          Secondly, mankind has been listening to the wrong voices, evil voices that have driven him even further from God. These voices have filled man with a prideful attitude that makes him think he is self-sufficient and that he can do things on his own. He is prompted to think that he doesn’t need God, or in some instances he may believe that God, heaven and hell don’t exist. Mankind is influenced by forces and authorities of the spiritual world which lead him to believe lies and cater to the desires of the flesh, and he does things that make his flesh feel good. Well, all this is bad because God can not associate Himself with sin. Mankind’s insistence on following sinful and satanic ways will only lead him to perdition (destruction).

          Up to this point, I guess you can see that I don’t like putting a bandaid on a boil. I like to get to the root of the problem. Mankind has to recognize, acknowledge, and understand some universal truths the most important of which is God is our creator, and He should be treated with the utmost respect. We should have a reverent and worshipful fear with awe when we look to God. I like the definition of reverential fear of the Lord found in Deuteronomy 10: 12 and 13 which says we should walk in his ways, love him, and serve him with all our heart and all our soul, and follow his commandments and statues. In Jeremiah 29: 13 Amplified version it says that we should consider God a vital necessity. In Acts it says that in Him, we live, breathe, and have our being. God has many names which address his being called the great I AM like El Shaddai Almighty God, Jehovah Jireh the God that provides, El Roi the God who sees all, Jehovah Shalom the God of peace, and the list goes on. The main thing to know is that without God we are nothing and can do nothing. When we are in trouble, it is God who rescues us or delivers us. When we go through rough times, it is Jesus that carries us like it says in the poem Footprints in the Sand. When we labor and are heavy laden, it is Jesus who is there asking us to give our burdens to him in Matthew 11:28-30, Psalm 55:22, and 1 Peter 5:7.

          God has been extremely good to us. He made us in His image, He gave us free will. He gave us wonderful body. He gave us a mind by which we could know Him and communicate with Him. He gave His God-breathed and inspired word to certain saints who wrote it down so that all could benefit from it. It later became known as the Bible, our Operation Manual. It tells us of what God expects from us. It tells us of the many promises He has made and intends to keep. It tells us in Numbers 23:19 that he is not a man that he should lie or the Son of man that he should repent. It tells us that we can feel good that God will protect the integrity of His word in Isaiah 48 so he will not give His glory to another which would happen if he reneged on any of His promises. It shows us that God can meet any of our needs through His son Jesus Christ who is at the heart of his grace (unmerited favor). We can also thank God for conceiving of His Plan of Salvation in which He offered up his son as His supreme sacrifice so whosoever believed in him should have everlasting life. And God continues to be our example for everything. We still haven’t grasped everything he has shown us. Take for instance, forgiveness. Man will say, “ I forgive, but I won’t forget.” But God says He will forgive us of our sins, AND forget them.[Isaiah 43:25] This is because He knows holding on to something will keep you in bondage. And He will not allow Himself to be put into bondage. Man should be thinking the same way. We should get on the same page with God and not expect the reverse.

          The things that I have mentioned all point to the fact that man needs to be reprogrammed. In Roman s 12:2 it says be transformed by the renewing of your mind. That’s what is needed in this country and the world. And it will begin by us having the courage to stand in front of the mirror and acknowledge that we have faults, shortcomings, and as Romans says, have all fallen short of the glory of God. And at this point we should ask God to help us fix our broken plumbing, so to speak. Until we get to that point, we haven’t even reached first base. We must first clean up our own kitchen before we can minister to anyone else. That is the real beginning of revival. And it is this honesty and sincerity with oneself that is the beginning of our transformation. There was a beautiful quote I remember which was this. “To thine own self be true,” That just rings in my spirit. The next verse that is applicable in this conversation is 1 John 1:9, that if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and cleanse us of all unrighteousness. And 2 Chronicles 7:14 where God says if my people who are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then I will hear from heaven, and forgive their sin, and heal their land. But as I mentioned before, people who think they’ve done no wrong are not motivated to repent or even see the need to repent.

So, this is the point where prayer without ceasing comes into play. We have to pray that God, who can do anything, will do a miraculous work and change the harden hearts of man. In Ezekiel 36:26 and 27 he says, “I will remove their hearts of stone and replace them with hearts of flesh, and then they will know my commandments and do them. This, indeed, shows us that it is only God that can change the hearts of man. We saints can try, and the best that we can do is to show others God in us. But, even then, it may be like we ‘re beating our heads against a stone wall. So, this is where we put our problems at the foot of the cross and ask the Lord to pick them up from there and bring things to a successful to conclusion. Our God, who is a God of possibilities, can do anything. And we must trust him and not doubt for one minute His ability to take care of business. For, if we doubt, we should not expect to receive anything from God. [James 1:7] Instead, we should show our faith and trust in Him, we should look to Him with great expectation for what He is going to do in our lives.

          Let us not underestimate the power of our thoughts. In James Allen’s book As a Man thinketh (So is he) addresses this. Our body follows our thought processes and we become what we think. Several ministers have said that Thoughts develop Patterns. Patterns become Habits, Habits develop one’s Character, and Character leads to one’s Destiny. If we hold Jesus in his rightful position as being higher than any other name, and one who perfectly pleased God the Father in thought, purpose, and action, we should consider him our role model and standard bearer and try to be more Christ-like. We should welcome trials and temptations because it is an opportunity for us to prove our faith, during which time, if we allow Him, God will develop our steadfastness, endurance, and patience so we will eventually become fully mature and complete. [James 1:2-4] Then when we have been tested in His spiritual kiln, we will be forged into vessels that he can use to accomplish His will according to His purpose.

CONCLUSION

After creation mankind has gone astray and misused his free will and has fallen out of the grace of God. Now man is at a tipping point where if he doesn’t change his ways he will invoke the wrath of God. And we should be concerned, because even though our God is patient and long suffering, He is weary of grieving as he said in Jeremiah 15:6.  But ultimately, it will be God who will have to change the hearts of man, so that there will be a transformation by the renewing of the mind. God in His own way and in His own time will act in away that will get man’s attention. And only he knows how, when, and where that will happen. The Bible says one day every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. And if God says it, it will come to pass.

Let me know what your thoughts are about this subject.