O Lord my God, when I am on the
water, come save me from the world my path hath laid. I see the Lord, I hear the Holy
Father, I'm going to walk, though you
never can say. ♪ I thank God for thee ♪ ♪ How
great thou art ♪ ♪ How great thou art ♪ ♪ Then sings my soul
♪ ♪ I thank God for thee ♪ I'm. Went through the woods, and for
his place I wandered. I heard the birds sing sweetly
in the trees. When I looked out from the beam
of the tranquil I feel the truth, I feel God's
hand on me. How great Thou art, how great
Thou art. Then sing, my soul, my Savior
God to Thee. How great Thou art. And when I think that God is
on the prairie, listen to my prayer. I can't take it in That
on the cross My burdens deadly carry Even I To take away my
sin This thing I know I'll praise the Lord, I'll praise
the Lord. Then say, Lord, Lord, thank you
God to me. I'll praise the Lord, I'll praise
the Lord. you When Christ will come, with
sound of her purring song, and greet me home, what joy will
fill my heart. Then I shall bow in humble adoration, And there proclaim, My God, Thou
great Thou art. Then sings my soul, Thy Savior
God to Thee, Thou great Thou art, Thou great Thou art. Then sings my soul, Oh. Oh. I feel welcome here. Yeah, I
really do. We all make one feel greatly
loved here. I appreciate that. Turn with
me in your Bibles this morning to the book of Ezekiel chapter
11. Ezekiel chapter 11. I want to begin the message by
asking you a question. I want to ask you what's on your
mind this morning. And I ask that knowing, knowing
that there's a great deal that could be on your mind. I remember
the last time I was here, it wouldn't have surprised me if
the only thing on dear Brother Henry's mind was the price of
gasoline. Boy, those were tough times. They were tough times. I suppose
he thought there needed a full-time man to just run out there and
change that price up every few minutes. And I know that the
cares of this world are much upon all of you. There's a lot
to have on our minds. Our responsibilities and our
problems and our children and our families and ourselves and
all the things go with this life. Our Lord warned us, your time
here will be short and full of trouble. And it seems that the
more troubled I am, the more something is on my mind. And I'm afraid, too, that there's
so much foolishness on my mind, perhaps on yours, too. And I
don't know what's on your mind this specifically. But I want you to realize something
here, and I'm going to show it to you in God's Word about what's
on your mind this morning. If you look in Ezekiel 11, in
verse 5, this is a Scripture that ought to sober us up a little
bit. Ezekiel 11, 5 says, And the Spirit
of the Lord fell upon me, and said unto me, Speak. Thus saith the Thus have you
said, O house of Israel." Now listen to me. This is God speaking
here, and He says, "'For I know the things that come into your
mind, every one of them.'" I suppose it would be embarrassing
if I did know what was on your mind this morning, or if you
knew what was on the mind of anyone around you. And we'd probably
all be embarrassed if we thought anybody knew what was on our
mind. And yet, it says right here, God Almighty knows not
just some of what's on your mind, He knows every single thought
that runs through our mind. Understanding that, look at Romans
8. Turn over to Romans chapter 8. Some might reply, well, so what
if he knows what's on my mind? How important is it, what's on
my mind? I'm going to show you that, too,
in God's Word. Just how important the state of our mind, the condition
of our mind, how important it is. In Romans 8, look at verse
6. Romans 8, 6. For it to be carnally
minded. Now, that means fleshly minded. That means to have the things
of this world on your mind. To have ourselves on our mind.
To have sin on our mind, it says, is death. Oh, it's pretty important
what's on our mind, isn't it? But to be spiritually minded
is life in peace. Oh, if we can have the things
of God on our mind, that's life in peace. Because the carnal
mind, verse 7, is enmity against God. The natural mind, you know
what the natural mind's attitude about God is? That we hate God. that we despise God. It says, "...the carnal mind
is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the law of
God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the
flesh cannot please God." The state of mind you are born with,
the way you and I come into this world, we cannot please God.
We just can't do it. And that's our state of mind
this morning. And it says here, we're going to die if we keep
that state of mind. If something doesn't change our
mind, you know how hard it is to change somebody's mind. That's
the toughest thing. My pastor says the hardest thing,
and I suppose it's true with all pastors really, he said is
somebody who comes in under the disguise of asking advice, but
in fact, they've already made up their mind what they're going
to do. And they just want you to say, yes, go do that. He said,
you've got about as much chance of changing their mind, no matter
how badly it needs to be changed. He said, you just got no chance
of changing somebody's mind. That's because that's how we're
born, with one mind, and that's hating God. All the thoughts
we have this morning. Look, just a few pages over to
Ephesians chapter 4, and I'll show you here That the way we're
born is with a man that said against God. Ephesians chapter
4 verse 17 says this, I say, therefore, and testify in the
Lord that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk in
the vanity of their mind. Now, vanity means thinking only
of self. You know, someone who a girl
who gets in front of the mirror and does this. and spends hours
and hours. We say she's vain, don't we?
We say she's full of vanity. Why? Well, all she's thinking
about is herself. How do I look pretty? Do I have
on the right dress? Do I have my hair looking good?
Do I have the right earrings on? Do I have enough makeup on?
Do I have... You see, that's vanity. And it
says here, doesn't it? What's it say here? It says that
we all walk in the vanity of mind. You see, I really do know
what's on your mind. And you really know what's on
my mind. I've got myself on my mind. You think I didn't sit
down here and pray for myself? I'm grateful. I'm grateful that
Rick prayed for me. I really am. But you see, we've
all got our mind on ourselves. And I don't think there's anything
wrong for a man who's getting ready to preach to have himself on
his mind if the motive is the glory of God. Now, if my motive
is to sit down and say, God, don't let me get up there and
embarrass myself. Because that's what I'll do if he leaves me
alone. Get up and make a fool out of myself. That's what we'll
all do if we're left alone. But we know what's on our mind,
don't we? It's ourselves. Vanity. Having the understanding. Why are we got vanity on our
mind? Our understanding is darkened. Being alienated from the life
of God through the ignorance that's in them because of the
blindness of the heart. You see, you know what's wrong
with our minds? They're blind. You don't have any trouble understanding
why a blind man runs into the wall, do you? He's blind. You
know why we think about ourselves? Our minds are blind. And you
know what? You know what makes this mind
so dark? What makes us think? You ever
wonder what makes you think such dark thoughts? I mean, what makes
it, what makes us, somebody just says something to us we just
don't like, and we just, this dark thought comes on. I'd like
to slug you in the face. I hope you get what's coming
to you. What wells up those dark thoughts,
those evil things to our mind, we might just think those things.
It says right here, it says, because of the blindness of your
heart. It's out of the heart that the
mind thinks these things. What's wrong with our mind is
the same thing wrong with our heart. You see, when Adam, in
the Garden of Eden, God said, Adam, get all these trees. Do
what you want with them. They're good for you, but leave
that one alone. As soon as Adam ate of that fruit,
you know what happened? His mind went dark. His heart
went dark. The only thing Adam, Adam got
what he wanted. Adam said, I want that tree to
be mine. I want to be like God. And Adam's
heart and mind went blind, went dark. That's what's wrong with
us. And you see, the root of that is in Titus 1. I'll just
read it to you, is that Adam said, I don't believe God. And
Adam, you see, the problem here is it says, under the pure, all
things are pure. But under them that are defiled
and unbelieving is nothing pure. But even their mind and conscience
isn't defiled. Our minds are defiled. You want
to really know what's wrong with us? A good way to describe what's
wrong with us, and it's been wrong with everybody from Adam
up till now. I know what's wrong with this
man, Sodom Hussein. You know what everybody wants
to say about him, the politicians, but they won't. We say it to
each other, don't we? We say he's out of his mind. Isn't that
what we think about him? We think he's out of his mind.
Who would sacrifice 500,000 men? He must be out of his mind. Do you know we're out of our
mind? Every man and woman and child,
every man born since Adam has been out of their mind. Why would
we do the things we do? Why do we do such self-destructive
things? We're out of our mind. That's
what's wrong with us. We're out of our mind. Because
in our minds, we don't believe God. Look at Leviticus 24. Leviticus 24. It's unbelief. You see, it's our unbelief. Because of our unbelief, the
Lord has allowed Satan, the god of this world, to blind the minds
of them. You remember this scripture over
in Corinthians? The god of this world, to blind the minds of
them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel
of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
You know what's on our mind? By nature this morning, except
for the grace of God, there's only one thing in our mind, and
that's sin. That's all we think about, is sin. And you can trick
yourself and convince yourself that's not what's on your mind,
and me too, but it is what's on our mind. And by nature, all
our motivation is self and sin. And our unbelief has left us
depraved, lost, and dead in trespasses and sin. Now let me ask this,
what's God think about what's on our mind? What's on God's
mind about us? I'm going to show you. Would
you like to know if somewhere in the Bible it told you what
God had on His mind about us and what's on our mind? It's
clear as a bell right here in Leviticus 24. Look at verse 11.
Leviticus 24 and verse 11. It says, And the Israelitish woman's son
blasphemed the name of the Lord. Now, when he blasphemed, it means
he cursed God. And it may have been... Do we
hear that in our day? A man slams his thumb with a
hammer and he says, Jesus Christ. Doesn't he? Oh, oh. Just, I mean,
we curse God when we do something to ourselves, don't we? Just
blaspheming God. Yesterday I was at a basketball
game and this lady's son missed a shot and she went, Lordy, Lordy. Why can't he hit those shots?
Bless her heart. Do we all see we're right here
like this Israelitish woman's son blaspheming the name of the
Lord and they brought him unto Moses. Now look at verse 12.
And they put him in the ward. They bound him up. It's like
they put him in jail that the mind of the Lord might be showed
them. They wanted to know what was on the Lord's mind about
this. And he showed them, look, and the Lord spake unto Moses.
God told Moses what was on his mind about this. He says, Bring
forth him that hath cursed without the camp, and let all that heard
him lay their hands upon his head, and let all the congregation
stone him. And thou shalt speak unto the
children of Israel, saying, Whosoever curseth, his God shall bear his
sin. He that blasphemeth the name
of the Lord, he shall surely be put to death." You see, nothing's
changed since the Garden of Eden. God told Adam, He said, you get
it in your mind to get to that tree now and you'll die, Adam.
Nothing's changed now. God says right here, it's on
my mind. If you get it on your mind to not believe my word,
to sin against me, He said, I'll kill you. You'll die. You'll
die. Now, that's where we are in this
life. Okay, having established that, what should be on our mind? Turn over to Matthew chapter
22. What ought to be on our mind
this morning? And indeed, what ought to be
the primary thing on our mind always? Well, we can find the
answer to that in the answer that our Lord gave to a question
some religious Pharisees asked Him. You know, there was a group of
men who tried to play. Anybody ever try to play mind
games with you? You know, you wind up shaking your head going,
what are they saying? You know, they're talking double talk or
something to me. They're playing with your mind.
It was a group of foolish men tried to play mind games with
the Lord Jesus Christ. Can you imagine? He who is knowledge
and truth. They tried to play mind games
and they tried to trick him. They asked him a question here.
Look at Matthew 22, verse 37. Verse 37 of Matthew 22, it says
in verse 36, you see, it says, Master, which is the great commandment
in the law? Now, they thought they'd trick
his mind here. They'd trip him up. And look at his answer. Jesus
said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy
heart and with all thy soul. Uh oh, look, and with all thy
mind. Oh, that's what ought to be on
our minds this morning. That's what Jesus Christ said.
And look at verse 38, he says, This is the first and great commandment,
and the second is like unto it, this ought to be on our mind
too, that thou shalt love thy neighbors thyself. Now there
it is, folks. There it is. If you want to know
what, we've already said what is on our mind, now this is what
ought to be on our mind. You say, what ought to be on
my mind is that I ought to love God with all my mind and love
my neighbors myself. If you could keep that on your
mind, you'd be perfect. You'd get along just fine in
this world, wouldn't you? Huh? Yeah. But look at Philippians
2. Philippians chapter 2. And I wonder, can we be honest
enough to admit that because of our natural minds, we're not
able to meet the requirements of this holy law? God says, if
you don't want to die, this is what's got to be on your mind.
You've got to love me with all your mind. And you've got to
love your neighbors yourself. I don't know about you, but I'm
in a heap of trouble. I'm in a real mess. In fact, you see,
the only man who ever did meet these requirements was the God-man,
the Lord Jesus Christ, who for 33 years on this earth loved
God the Father with all his mind and his neighbors as himself.
That was always on the mind of Christ. Realize that? For 33 years, that's the only
thing that was on his mind, was loving his Father with all his
mind and his neighbors as much as he loved himself. Look at Philippians 2, verse
5. Here's what we need. Here's all
we need. Let this mind be in you, which
was also in Christ Jesus. There it is. There it is. I've
tried fixing up my mind before. Have you? You ever have one of
those thoughts and you go, I'm not going to think that anymore.
Oh, I'm not going to think like that anymore. And it may be 35
seconds. You're thinking just like that
again. Huh? Yeah. Yeah. You see, that's our
mind, isn't it? Yeah. We can't fix it ourselves,
can we? No. The only hope you and I have
of ever, ever doing anything with this mind of ours that we're
born with is right here. Let this mind be in you, which
was also in Christ Jesus. To get my mind fixed up, I've
got to have a new mind. I got to have the mind of the
Lord Jesus Christ, because His mind, all He did was love His
Father and His neighbors as Himself. Now, if I can get that in my
mind, if I can have that mind, all things are going to be better,
aren't they? Look at Romans chapter 12 real quick. My only hope of
deliverance from eternal death is to have the mind of Christ.
You see, I don't need my mind fixed up. Because I can't fix
it up, and you can't help me fix it up. Some psychiatrist
can't fix up my mind. Bless their hearts. I know why
these fellows that, bless their hearts, they go to prison, and
they say, we'll fix him up. You know, a guy kills 33 people,
and then they say, let the psychiatrist here fix up his mind. Bless his
heart. That psychiatrist can't fix up
his mind. He needs a new mind. A new mind. The only difference between that
killer and me is the grace of God. He restrains our minds to
keep us from going and killing. I mean, I don't look at Charles
Manson and spit on him and stuff. Bless his heart. The only difference
between him and me is God restrained my mind. The only difference
between you women and the worst streetwalker in Roanoke is God
Almighty has restrained your mind. You know? Bless his heart. And look here
at Romans 12. Now let me show you how we're
going to get the mind of Christ. If that's what we need, we need
to know how to get it, don't we? Look at Romans chapter 12. Romans 12 and look at verse 2. Romans 12 verse 2. And be not conformed to this
world. Don't let your mind be seduced
by this world. And boy, our minds can be, can't
they? You know, why is it that I can't remember the text that
Tom Harding preached from Wednesday night? I'm embarrassed to tell
you. It was a great message. I can't remember the text. I
can't remember. My mind won't bring it up. If
I sat down here and took long enough, I might get it and I
might not. But do you know? I can remember, my mind's plenty
good. I can remember the recipe of
my mother's pecan pie by memory. I didn't want to take a chance
that my wife might lose it. Why does my mind work like that?
Huh? Yeah. I suppose if you fellows
are like me, I mean, I bet you Henry has got all the octane
levels of every gasoline ever made, the additives and all that.
He can remember all that stuff. I mean, we can do that, can't
we? Our natural mind, I bet you girls can remember the name of
the five cutest boys in your school. I bet you can, yeah,
because that's our natural mind, you see? But spiritually, it
says, Be not conformed to this world. Our mind is bent that
way. It'll run to that, but not to spiritual things. It says,
but, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind that
you may prove that is, that prove what is, that ye may prove what
is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Renew here
doesn't mean, does not mean see a psychiatrist. It doesn't mean
Come down front and shake a preacher's hand and say, I'm going to get
a new attitude. I'm going to rededicate. You
can rededicate that old rotten mind all you want. Renew here
means new heart, new mind. That's what we need, a new mind.
Quit trying to fix up the old mind and ask God to give you
a new mind. You can't go in a funeral parlor
and say, let's fix up this dead body. Make it all better so we
can get up out of that casket and walk out of here. It can't
be done. No, we're going to have to have a new life. God would
have to do that too, wouldn't He? Same way with our minds.
We don't need fixing up. We don't need to be changed. We need a new man. God's got
to give us a new man. Do you hear that? And when the
Lord, by His Holy Spirit, reveals the gospel to a man, We know
he gives him a new heart, don't we? Well, he also gives him a
new mind. That's what I'm telling you. I mean, I know you've heard
messages about new heart, new heart, born again, new heart.
I'm telling you, you get a new mind, too. Get a new mind. I'm doing this to encourage you
now about dealing with some of the things that come in your
mind, if your mind's like mine. And turn a page over here to
Romans 15. You see, the new heart believes.
And in every new heart, faith is revealed. And the new mind,
you know what the new mind does? It sets about to exercise what
the new heart desires. To love God with all your heart,
soul, and mind, and your neighbor as yourself. Look at Romans 15,
verse 5 here. Now, the God of patience and
consolation grant you to be like-minded one toward another according
to Christ Jesus, that you may be that you may with one man
and one mouth glorify God, even the father of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Do you know why? When you have
a decision to make as a congregation or something, we don't have to
have a vote. You know why you don't need any
business meetings? I've never sat in a business meeting at
13th Street. Do you know why? If we know the
mind of God Almighty, if we know the mind of the Lord Jesus Christ
and what we're trying to figure out what to do, we're of one
mind. If the mind of Christ is in me
and the mind of Christ is in you and in you and in you, we've
got no disagreement. Because it's one mind, one heart,
and we're only going to do one thing, that which glorifies the
Lord Jesus Christ. That which reveals that our mind
is on loving our God and our neighbor as ourselves. That's
a motive. We got no problem. Do you see
that? It's one man. And it says here, Paul was writing
to the Romans, that God might grant you that one man. It's a grace. It's a great gift
of grace if we become of one man. Now, hear me on this. Listen
to me. I'll concede to you, admit to
you that in this life, We're not going to honor God's commandment
perfectly. We're not going to do it. You
know why? Even though we get a new mind, the old one's not
gone. It's not dead. The new heart's not dead. And
you see, that mind won't allow us to honor God's commandment. But, now listen here again, neither
are we any longer going to blatantly disregard God's commandment.
The new mind and the new heart won't go for that, won't have
that. Is there any wonder? Paul said,
there is a war against the law of my mind. He said, there's
a war going on up there. He said, O wretched man that
I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Who indeed? Someday the Lord Jesus Christ
will deliver you from that war in your mind, and then will be You see, He'll let us ask Him
for more. When He gives you more light, say, Oh, thank you, Lord.
Give me more light. Give me more light. You see,
let's try to set our mind on Christ all we can. All we can. You say, How can I do that? First
thing is get under the light. You want some more light in that
dark mind? Get under this Word. Bowman,
the doors of this place are open. Get here. Get here. God, I mean,
I know there's occasions you can't. Oh, let's set our mind
on Him now. Let's get on to the Word. Get
in the light. And until we go to be with Him,
we're going to endeavor to be like Him, even though people
in this life are not enabled to love Him with all their mind
and the neighbors themselves. The new mind demands that we
love as much and do what by grace we're enabled to do. We want
every day to have more and more the mind of Christ in us. I'm
going to show you, sometimes I suppose that us grace speakers
are criticized, they say, we don't have any—I heard a man
one time say there's no practical godliness in what is being preached. Well, if you're pointing me to
Christ, that's practical enough. But I do want to show you in
God's Word just four or five things here that are very clear
about this business of having the mind of Christ. And it's
not so much something for you to do as it is to show you this
is the grace God bestows on His people. And if perhaps we hear
these things this morning and we listen and say, well, that
doesn't sound like me, maybe we ought to say, do I have the
mind of Christ? If I don't want to live in a
false refuge, do you? You know, it never does any harm to examine
our mind and our heart and say, do I love the Lord or no? It
never concerns me, a man who expresses some concern and some
doubt. It's presumption I'm much more fearful of. So let me show
you these. First of all, and I won't have
you look them all up, but I'm going to show you that God's
Word reveals what it reveals concerning what the new man,
the man of Christ and the man, what the new man will desire
to do. And there's five specific things here, and these will go
quickly. First of all, we're exhorted.
And these are scriptural terms to lowliness of mind. This is
from the book of Philippians. Lowliness of mind. And let me
show you, there's two ways each of these applies. One in terms
of loving God with all our mind, and the other is loving our neighbor
with all our mind. In loving God, lowliness of mind
means worshiping at his feet. You know where to worship with
lowliness of mind? It's at the feet of Christ. You go through
the scriptures, where did everybody who came to Christ wind up? Oh,
there was a woman anointing his feet. There was Mary who sat
at the feet of Jesus. There was the woman with the
issue of blood who crawled on the ground and touched the hem
of his garment. Get at the feet of Christ. That's
lowly. You say, that sounds like I've got to get down on my knees
and cry. That's pretty much against our nature, isn't it? Maybe you
do. On the other hand, Zacchaeus
was up a tree, and yet he was at the feet of Jesus Christ.
So you see, it's not all physical. But it's in your mind, be willing
to get down at his feet. All right? And loving your neighbors
yourself. Boy, listen to this. This is
so clear and so easy and so simple. Let each one of us esteem other
better than themselves. Boy, that's simple, isn't it?
We wouldn't have much trouble in this life, wouldn't we, with
our minds, if we just treated everybody else like they were
better than mine. esteem the other better. Secondly,
the second thing is, I'll have you look this up, Colossians
chapter 3, Colossians chapter 3, and this is humble, humbleness
of man, humbleness of man. The first one is lowliness of
man, and secondly is humbleness of man. And in terms of loving
God, He must increase, I must decrease. He must have the preeminence. Do you see that? If I have humbleness
of mind, my desire is that Christ just gets bigger and bigger and
bigger and more and more and more and greater exalted, and
I just get less and less and less and less. The less somebody
sees me and the more they see Christ, I'd be all the better.
Yeah. I tell you what, if you love
somebody, you want the best for them, don't you? Yeah. And that's
what this is saying, humbleness of mind. And then loving your
neighbor, how does humbleness of mind deal with that? Colossians
3. Look at verse 12, "...put on, therefore, as the elect of
God, holy and beloved, vows of mercies, kindness, humbleness
of mind," you see it there? "...meekness, longsuffering,
forbearing one another, and forgiving one another. If any man have
a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you, so also do
ye." And above all these things put on love, which is the bond
of perfectness, and let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to
the which also ye are called in one body, and be ye thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell
richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in
psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in
your hearts to the Lord." I tell you what, if we come together
in one man, worshiping the Lord Jesus Christ, I got a hard time
picking a fight with Henry. I tell you what, if the foremost
thing, the foremost thing on Ellen's mind this morning is
worshiping the Lord Jesus Christ, I guarantee you she got a hard
time picking trouble with Virgie. They can't be in the same mind,
can they? Huh? Oh, and that's what it says here.
Subject ourselves to the other in humbleness of mind. All right? And then the third thing, and
this is a term taken from 2 Timothy, I want to have you look it up,
but it's be of a sound mind. Scripture says if you want the
mind of Christ, be of a sound mind. Loving God with all your
mind means exercise moderation, self-control and discipline.
so as not to bring reproach on the name of our God." If there's
ever a question in your mind, is the glory of Christ at stake
here? Well, if it is, we'd just best not do that. Okay? That's a sound mind that's going
to do that. And loving your neighbors yourself, now listen to this.
Be ye doers of the word, not hearers only. You know what a
hypocrite is? is somebody who's not a sound
mind. They deceive their own mind. Don't deceive your own
mind. Don't sit out there and think,
I'm good. We're no good. And don't sit out there and think,
God's going to save me because I'm in church every Sunday. No,
he won't. And don't, you see what I'm saying?
And don't be a hypocrite. Don't tell your children one
thing and do another. Don't tell them they need to always be here
and then find every excuse in the world for us not to be here.
You see, a hypocrite's not of a sound mind. And Scripture says
the man of Christ is a sound man. All right, the fourth thing,
turn over to Acts 17 with me, Acts chapter 17, and I'll give
you the fourth thing quickly here. Acts chapter 17, and this
is readiness of mind, readiness of mind. Acts 17, verse 11. These were more noble than those
in Thessalonica. Acts 17, verse 11. in that they
received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures
daily, whether those things were so." You see, loving God with
all your mind is loving his word. Put more stock in the word than
in tradition or anything else. I heard of a woman who one time
said, on hearing the gospel, said, well, if that means that,
that means my mother went to hell. And the man who preached
said, well, I didn't say that. You reached that conclusion.
And she said, well, I'll not have that. Bless her heart. If anything's more important
than the word of God, our minds, we just better let go of it. We better have a readiness of
mind to receive the word of God above all else. That's if we
love him. And then if you love your neighbors
yourself, listen here now. Be ready always to give an answer
to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is
in you. If he wants to know how come
your mind works the way it does, be ready to give him a reason.
I've got the mind of Christ in me. And here's the fifth and
final thing. And I want to have you look this
up. It's from Acts 20, verse 19, where it says, serve the
Lord with all humility of mind. And what this means is have the
mind of a servant, the mind of a servant. You see, loving God,
whether it's... Did you ever hear the story about
two angels? God called two angels before him, and he said, now,
fellas, he said, I've got a job, two jobs down on earth. He said,
I want one of you to go down there and sweep the streets,
and I want the other one to go down and rule the kingdom. Do
you know the two angels didn't care which one did what? They
didn't care. Do you know why? They're of one
mind, one mind. brings greater glory to the Lord
Jesus Christ. That's the mind of a servant.
Do you see that? And that's the mind we need.
Listen, I know if they gave us a choice of living in the biggest
mansion in town, in the county, and driving the finest car, or
having a 16-year-old Chevrolet living in a shack down on the
river, which one most of us would take? Maybe all of us. And there's
nothing wrong with that at all. But I'm saying, if the glory
of Christ becomes the issue, well, whatever the Lord deems
best, that's what I need to do. That's what needs to be on my
mind. Not saying, I'm going to have that house. No, that's not
in the mind of Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ never had
a place to lay his head, never had a house or anything to call
his own. That's because he loved God the
Father with all his mind. All right. loving your neighbor. Well, let me tell you what this
is. If our mind is truly that of
a servant, we want others to have the mind of Christ. And
what that means is being prepared, being prepared with the mind
of a servant to do whatever it is that causes others to see
how great our God is. If you really love your neighbor
as yourself, You want his mind to come onto the same thing that's
changed your mind, in Christ. And that's from your family as
far out as extends your neighbors do. And let me repeat, having
the mind of Christ in us, we desire to do these things, but
the old mind hinders us. It wars against us continually.
We're not able to obey the commandments perfectly. But our Lord Jesus
Christ, on the other hand, during his earthly life, He did do all
that perfectly. Do we understand that? He did
do those things perfectly. Let me show you. Lowliness of
mind, He came from glory. He condescended to be a man.
He was born in a cow stall, had no place to lay His head. But
on the Sabbath, He was always worshiping His Father, honoring
God. Soundness of mind, He prayed
to the Father, always seeking His Father's will. There was
no hypocrisy, no unsoundness, no fault in him. Readiness of
mind, he rebuked Satan. How? How did he do it? With the
Word of God. See what was on his mind? Huh?
And the mind of a servant? Oh, he served with humility of
mind. He says, I must be about my father's business. He washed
his apostles' feet. He endured death, the death of
the cross. Christ fulfilled every jot and
tittle of the law and the spirit of the law. How? He had a perfect
mind. We need the mind of Christ. If
you and I are ever going to stand before God Almighty and not have
to suffer the punishment for what our mind has thought, it's
got to be put away. And Christ did that at Calvary
for his children, and we've got to have a perfect mind. And we
have that in Christ, if we have the mind of Christ in us. Now
listen, the Lord Jesus Christ obeyed the law perfectly. He
loved God with all his heart, with all his soul, and with all
his mind. And he loved his neighbors and himself, and he did that
so that we, his people, would be saved. We, on the other hand,
endeavor to honor the command of our Lord, not so that we can
be saved, or not so that we will be saved. The only person who
wants the mind of Christ is somebody who has been saved. Do we see
that? It's not a means to get saved.
It's a result of being saved. We're not going to have the mind
of Christ until we meet Him, until we meet Him, until we ask
God Almighty to show us His Son. You see, at Calvary when Christ
was putting away, I want to show you the results. We talked about
what's on your mind this morning. I want to show you the results
of what was on our minds this morning. Do you know what the
result was? It's easy to say the Lord Jesus
Christ took our sins, that he suffered at Calvary. Do you know
what it led him to do? Having to take on his mind what
you and I think, the thoughts of our mind just this morning.
Do you know what it caused him to do? My God, my God! My God, why have you forsaken
me?" He was out of his mind. Do we see he lost his mind of
Calvary because of what I think, because of what you and I have
thought just this morning? It caused Jesus Christ to have
to lose his mind, to suffer. separation from his Father, whom
he loved with all his mind. It caused him to lose his mind
for those he loved as himself. He so loved us, he
gave himself. He lost his mind so you and I,
his children, could have the mind of Jesus Christ. Now the question is, let me,
I'll close with this illustration, turn to Mark chapter 5. You say,
is there any hope for me? Is there any chance I'll have
the mind of Christ? Hmm? Well, let me give you an example
just to show you how good he is. Mark chapter 5. Look at verse 1 here. And they came over unto the other
side of the sea, unto the country of the Gadarenes. And when they
had come out of the ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs
a man with an unclean spirit, who had his dwelling among the
tombs, and no man could bind him, no, not with chains, because
he had been often bound with chains and fetters, and the chains
had been plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broke in pieces,
neither could any man tame him." What's wrong with this fellow?
He's out of his mind. He's plumb out of his mind. He's
running around a graveyard naked, screaming, tearing himself, cutting
himself with rocks and stuff. And always, night and day, he
was in the mountains and in the tombs, crying and cutting himself
with stones. But when he saw Jesus afar off,
he ran and worshipped him, ran and fell at his feet, and cried
with a loud voice and said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus,
thou Son of the Most High? I adjure thee by God that thou
tormentest me not." that we may enter into them.
And forthwith Jesus gave them leave, and the unclean spirits
went out and entered into those pigs, and the herd of the pigs
ran violently down into the deep sea. Placing the seed, they were
about two thousand and were choked in the sea. And they that fed
the swine fled and told it in the city and in the country,
and they went out to see what it was that was done. You see
what happened here was the man was out of his mind. So full
of sin, he had like two thousand devils in his head. Two thousand
pigs it took to hold that devil in his head. You ever feel that
way? You ever feel like you got a thousand demons in your head
and make you think the things you think and do the things you
do? That's how we're born, just like this man. That's how we
act. The only difference is we keep our clothes on. And what happened? Verse 15,
And they come to Jesus to see him that was possessed with the
devil and had the legions. You know how they found him?
Sitting. Sitting. Where was he sitting?
I guarantee you it was at the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And it says they found him clothed. You know what he was clothed
in? I know it! Where do you suppose they got
some clothes for this fellow? Huh? He was naked running around
there. I don't suppose any of them brought
an extra change of clothes with them. I know exactly where he
got his clothes. The Lord Jesus Christ took his
off and put them on this man. If we ever get the mind of Christ,
He'll put away our old mind and give us a new mind. He'll clothe
us in His perfect mind, in His perfect righteousness. And look
at this. They found Him sitting at the
feet of Christ. They found Him fully clothed and in His right
mind. Do you see that? You know what
the right mind is? It's the mind that's at the right
hand of God Almighty. It's the mind of Christ in you,
in you. I tell you what, if there's hope
for some wild maniac running out in the tombs of the gatherings,
naked, cutting himself in, everybody's trying to chain him up, nobody
can do him any good. And who can fix that situation? The Lord Jesus Christ. Now, if
you're naked and wild as a buck and running around a bunch of
dead people, and out of your mind, there's only one person
that'll help us, and that's the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the only
one that can help us. Yes, he is. And I'm going to
close and read you this one scripture here. I'll just read it to you. 1 Corinthians
2. But the natural man receiveth
not the things of the Spirit of God. It's not going to happen
just because we're good people. Our natural mind is just not
going to get well on its own. For they are foolishness to him. The mind of Christ is foolishness
to the natural man. Neither can we know them, because
they are spiritually discerned. We've got to have spiritual life
before we understand the mind of Christ. But he that is spiritual
judgeth all things, yet he himself is judge of no man. For who hath
known the mind of the Lord? Who's known it? Huh? That he
may instruct him. But we have the mind of Christ. It says, ask the question here,
those who have the mind of Christ, you know where they got it? By
the answer to that question, who hath known the mind of the
Lord that he may instruct him. You know who knows the mind of
the Lord around here? Your pastor does. That's why God Almighty
sent him to you. It's the greatest gift God Almighty
can do for a people, is send you somebody who's got the mind
of Christ that he might give it to you. That's why you're
helping to support a missionary in Africa. is you send a man
who has known the mind of the Lord that they may instruct him
over there. Ken Wymer does. Walter Gruber does. And you see,
you want them to go there and do it. You want them to do it,
so that someday they might say, We have the mind of Christ. Thank
God we have the mind of Christ. Well, I hope that by His grace
it encourages you if you have the mind of Christ, and that
if we don't, by His grace you'll see the need to seek the Lord
Jesus Christ while he may be found. We need the mind of Christ. Now, I want us to sing a song
this morning. Somebody has already read the
Scripture and wrote a song about it, even. I think there was somebody
who found out the same thing we heard about this morning.
On page 333, you look at it with me, and we'll sing all the verses
of this song, May the mind of Christ May the mind of Christ my Savior
live in me from day to day. Let's stand together and sing
number 333. May the mind of Christ my Savior
live in me from day to day. By His love and power controlling
all I do and say. May the Word of God dwell richly
in my heart from hour to hour, so that all may see I triumph
only through His power. May the peace of God, my Father,
rule my life in everything that I may become to comfort sick
and sorrowing. May the love of Jesus fill me
as the waters fill the sea, In exulting, self-abasing, this
is victory. May I run the race before me,
strong and brave to face the foe, looking only unto Jesus
as I onward go. May his beauty rest upon me, The line of that last verse bothered
me the first time I ever sang this song, May His Beauty Rest
Upon Me, As I Seek the Lost to Win. Boy, that bothered me until
I read the rest of the line, which said, And may they forget
the channel, seeing only Him." The man who wrote this song had
the mind of our Jesus Christ. Well, may the Lord bless you
today. I rejoice that He brought me this way to be with you.