We Have The Mind Of Christ

We have the mind of Christ:

Devotion for Men’s Breakfast: Dec. 5th , 2009

Some of you may be aware that I have just succumbed to a sickness shared by several of you here today. I just purchased my first Apple I-phone. I supposedly did it for the purpose of gaining internet access, texting, and e-mails … along with using it as an actual phone.

But if the truth were known, it was so I could download all those marvelous “apps”. With the applications I’ve added to my phone I now have the whole world at my fingertips. Along with the apps that came bundled with the phone, like messages, calendar, photos, camera, Youtube videos, stock reports, maps, weather, voice memos, notes, clock, calculator, e-mail, I-pod, Safari, internet access, I-tunes, and the App store. I also added these apps: Bump, TweetDeck, Urbanspoon, Flashlight, Paper toss, Soduku, Euchre, Solitare, Clear Channel radio stations all over the nation, USA Today headlines, Logos Bibles, I-translate, Ben Stein’s Trivia Lite, E-reader, and Cows in Space!

Just think of all the possibilities that have opened up to me! I can waste time in any of a dozen ways now. And at the staff meetings at church, I too can have my head down and my nose in the calendar app … as I text entries into my phone with my thumbs … and look like I’m not paying attention to what’s going on in the meeting. Oh, how productive I’ll be able to be now, yes sir!

But I said all that about phone apps to get you to thinking with me about our topic today. One of the apps I downloaded is my wife’s Google Calendar. When I’m making an appointment, I can look at my wife’s Google Calendar and see if we have anything else scheduled on that day or not. In a way, it’s like having the mind of my wife right there with me …

Think with me for a moment … what it would be like if my I-phone had an app. called “The mind of Christ” If I could just punch a button and instantly, on the screen would appear instant wisdom from the Master himself. If I had an app that would allow me to ask questions of Jesus and then get his instantaneous answer, perhaps as a text message or an e-mail, or even… dare I suggest it… a voice mail?! Wouldn’t that be something else? To have the mind of Christ just the touch of a finger away! Could that be possible?

Well, yes, actually it could --- but not from your I-phone apps.

This amazing feature of our connection with Christ came bundled with our salvation. It is part of what God did when He planted within you the Holy Spirit (“Christ in you, the hope of glory”). Along with his presence came something amazing all for your benefit … and closer than an app on a phone … this feature of your relationship with Christ is safely tucked inside your head. You, friends, have within yourselves, “the mind of Christ.”

Just so you’ll not think I dreamed this up, the scripture text which attests to this is found in 1 Corinthians 2:16 (NIV) "For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him?" But we have the mind of Christ.

If you take a look at the whole second chapter of First Corinthians, Paul is doing a compare and contrast between the wisdom of the world and spiritual wisdom from God. He talks about the kind of wisdom that God imparts through the Holy Spirit to our spirits. This is a kind of wisdom that doesn’t make sense to people who don’t have the Holy Spirit living inside them. In fact, they think it is all foolishness to them. But the wisdom God imparts only makes sense to Holy Spirit indwelt people.

Now guys, wouldn’t that include us? We have access to a wisdom that is superior to an I-phone app. And just as instantly available. In fact, It is better, because God has already approved of anything coming from the mind of Christ. And we have that mind within us.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that everything we think in our brains comes from the mind of Christ. In fact, much of what originates in our minds is quite different than what might proceed from the mind of Christ. Still, the mind of Christ is available if we choose to access it.

And how would we do that? I believe it is a matter of focus. If we focus on ourselves, our own resources, our own talents, our own knowledge, our own will, our overactive egos, our interests and hobbies, our commitments, our accomplishments, our schedules --- in short, if we have a “self-centric focus” then nothing from the mind of Christ will come through.