My alarm clock ticked and it’s already 10:30 in the morning. Work kept me awake past midnight. As I got out of bed, I felt the satisfaction and pride. I am sure that through hard work and dedication, climbing the ladder of success would be easier. “I am on the right track,” I whispered to myself.
Work defines me. Thinking about it and the pressure it puts on my shoulder makes me tickle and feel excited.
That was months ago.
A sudden shift in my situation made me reflect on the days that I have lived in the past. Now, it’s a totally different journey. I felt that I was literally dragged from the outside to the inner world where I should be. A complete adjustment is what I need to focus on. I felt the need to purify my entire being from being exposed to the world. There, I found a familiar verse that I kept on ignoring in the past, “And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.” (Romans 12:2)
What does it mean to be transformed and to renew our minds in Christ?
As a believer, it is an evident in your life that when you accepted the Lord Jesus Christ and believed on Him, you are already a new creation – old things are passed away and all things become new (2 Corinthians 5:17). Does this mean that once a person becomes a Christian, he will immediately be transformed? No. Reverend Bryan Hudson explained it this way:
“To be transformed is to be changed in a progressive manner. It would not be wrong to think that becoming a Christian is the moment that produced all the change. However, becoming a Christian was the beginning of change and growth.”
This is basically true in the Christian life. You will never be sinless, but by renewing your mind, you will experience the newness of life in Christ. Everything becomes new. A person who is born again becomes a child (again) in the spiritual realm. Therefore, constant change and growth should be manifested. A child who grew up to be a teenage would most likely to manifest changes physically, emotionally, and even psychologically. Imagine if you see a thirteen-year old boy still sucking, crying, and acting like a child, is it not a problematic one? You might wonder what happened to this boy. You then start to question and speculate. In the same way, a Christian’s way is to grow and mature in the faith. If people would not see any changes in a professing Christian’s life, then they might also start questioning the authenticity of his salvation.
According to Paul in Romans 12:2 we are to be transformed by renewing our minds. Our mind is the battleground where our thoughts are conceived. “Mind” by its Webster’s definition is “the part of a person that thinks, reasons, feels, and remembers”. The Bible provides us many references to the word “mind,” but I would like to use Mark 12:30 as an example, “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.” Thus, our mind is our self-consciousness that allows us to connect with God by means of thinking, reasoning, feeling, and remembering. Therefore, renewing our minds involves “the conscious effort” we do in exterminating worldly concerns to focus on God and its heavenly things. When we are able to correct our thinking, reasoning, feeling, and memory in line with the Lord, then we are renewing our minds in Christ and the experiences that we encounter in our Christian lives will follow.
Renewing our minds, I believe is not a one-time deal. It is not easy to leave and forget all the things that we have acquired before we came to know the Lord. That is why it is important to always be like the Psalmist who meditates the Word of God day and night (Psalm 1:2-3). Let us hide His Word in our hearts that we might not sin (Psalm 119:11).
How then, are we able to renew our minds?
Learn from God’s Word
The world taught us that in order to learn, we must first commit mistakes. But the Word of God says otherwise. It is” learn and live,” and not “live and learn.” Proverbs 7: 1-2 emphasized to keep God’s Words and commandments, and live. We learn from God’s Word, so we can live accordingly. As maturing Christians, our responsibility is to dig into God’s Word as much as we can and store God’s Words in our hearts. Our daily priority must be reading and meditating the Word of God.
Unlearn the World’s System
What are the principles, beliefs, system, knowledge, and false way of life that you have acquired that contradict God’s Word? Is it a false view of success? Shallow view of relationship? Fake worship? Erroneous view of life’s values? These are things that we need to unlearn in accordance to renewing our minds. The bible tells us in 1 John 2:15-17 that if we love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. We live in this world, but not of the world.
Apply All That You Have Learned
We don’t stop by learning God’s Word. As what my mentor always tells me,” learning without application is not learning at all.” The true test comes through application. Let us then be a doer of the Word, and not just hearers (James 1:22).
His Word is the best armor that we need to put on daily (Ephesians 6:11). Our Christian life is a constant battle. If you believe in that, then you must prepare!
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