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Sunday 03/30/25
Title: Sin & the mind of the believer
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Sin & the mind of the believer
Last week we began looking at the role of the mind in conforming to the image of Jesus Christ -which is to say bearing fruit from our union with Him.
The scriptures we examined were Romans 12:1-2 which says, [I’m reading from the J.B. Phillips translation]
Romans 12:1-2, (J.B. Phillips)
“(1) With eyes wide open to the mercies of God, I beg you, my brothers, as an act of intelligent worship, to give him your bodies, as a living sacrifice, consecrated to him and acceptable by him. (2) Don’t let the world around you squeeze you into its own mould, but let God re-mould your minds from within, so that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all his demands and moves towards the goal of true maturity.”
Then we went to James 1 which addresses the overcoming of temptation and most of the guidance offered centered on the attention of the mind.
James tells us to not be deceived into thinking that any good gift can come from the things of this world. That temptation only draws you away from God Who is the ONLY giver of all good gifts.
He also counsels us to be much quicker to listen and less driven to speak and to be very slow to indignation and outrage BECAUSE they work against the formation of Christ in us in that they promote unrighteousness.
Then James gives us a key which is not so clearly stated anywhere else in the whole of the New Testament – he instructs us to HEAR, which is to say receive (or Shema), the word of God with a submissive heart which is quick to take action regarding what it hears.
He says that a child of God who hears the word and does not act on it, is like a man who looks at his physical face in the mirror, then upon walking away forgets what he looks like.
The idea being that the child God who looks at God’s word is looking into a mirror which reflects back to him WHO he really is in Christ. Where the things of his old nature have died and have been replaced with the character of Christ – all things are of God! 2 Corinthians 3 says it this way, “But we all with unveiled face looking into the mirror of the perfect law of liberty see the glory of God reflected back to us.” But if we do this, but then walk away from this time of intimacy with God and His word and live as we did before we came to Christ – that is to say, like the world, we have effectively forgotten who we really are!
According to Romans 12, we are allowing ourselves to be conformed to the fallen world around us through their incessant external pressure to conform to their evil standards rather than allowing our outward life to reveal the Glory of God which is within us and is indicative of our true, new nature! We have forgotten who we are.
2 Peter says that when we do this we are nearsighted having forgotten that our old sins have been forgiven.
The unavoidable teaching here is that ALL of this takes place in the MIND! Seeing who we are, forgetting who we are, being quick to listen and slow to speak, choosing to not act out in wrath… all of it occurs in the MIND! The very thing Paul tells us in Romans we need to renew and the thing James says the word of God can save.
Now the impactful thing here which is 100% necessary to grasp before we go further is that there is clearly a difference between WHO we are, and HOW we act when we are living carnal lives. Every single sin committed by a Christian is actually two! First is the individual sin they committed, the second is the fact that such actions are lying against the nature of Christ within them. They are claiming, through their actions, that they have not sustained a core change in their nature. That all things have NOT become new. That they are NOT reconciled to God and are not branches connected to their Vine Who is Christ!
So before we move on to Romans 8 which addresses the Mind and how to renew it by the word and Spirit of God, we will examine this dual nature and attempt to bring that into better focus by reading through Romans 7. By doing this we will be far better equipped to understand this process working through our dual nature.
I hope you will indulge me in the use of yet another less known translation because I think it better illuminates the key points we need to focus upon. I’m using the Weymouth translation for Romans 7.
I would imagine most sincere Christians can quote large sections of this chapter due to its being instrumental in grasping how sanctification works. As such, we are most likely overly familiar with how it reads in whatever translation we most frequently use. So using another translation forces you to hear and consider these words with fresh ears.
Romans 7:1-25, [Weymouth]
“(1) Brethren, do you not know–for I am writing to people acquainted with the Law–that it is during our lifetime that we are subject to the Law?
(2) A wife, for instance, whose husband is living is bound to him by the Law; but if her husband dies the law that bound her to him has now no hold over her.
(3) This accounts for the fact that if during her husband’s life she lives with another man, she will be stigmatized as an adulteress; but that if her husband is dead she is no longer under the old prohibition, and even though she marries again, she is not an adulteress.
(4) So, my brethren, to you also the Law died through the incarnation of Christ, that you might be wedded to Another, namely to Him Who rose from the dead in order that we might yield FRUIT to God.
(5) For whilst we were under the thraldom of our earthly natures, sinful passions– made sinful by the Law–were always being aroused to action in our bodily faculties that they might yield fruit to death.
(6) But seeing that we have died to that which once held us in bondage, the Law has now no hold over us, so that we render a service which, instead of being old and formal, is new and spiritual.
(7) What follows? Is the Law itself a sinful thing?
No, indeed; on the contrary, unless I had been taught by the Law, I should have known nothing of sin as sin.
For instance, I should not have known what covetousness is, if the Law had not repeatedly said, “THOU SHALT NOT COVET.”
(8) Sin took advantage of this, and by means of the Commandment stirred up within me every kind of coveting; for apart from Law sin would be dead.
(9) Once, apart from Law, I was alive, but when the Commandment came, sin sprang into life, and I died; (10) and, as it turned out, the very Commandment which was to bring me life, brought me death.
(11) For sin seized the advantage, and by means of the Commandment it completely deceived me, and also put me to death.
(12) So that the Law itself is holy, and the Commandment is holy, just and good.
(13) Did then a thing which is good become death to me?
No, indeed, but sin did; so that through its bringing about death by means of what was good, it might be seen in its true light as sin, in order that by means of the Commandment the unspeakable sinfulness of sin might be plainly shown.
(14) For we know that the Law is a spiritual thing; but I am unspiritual–the slave, bought and sold, of sin.
(15) For what I do, I do not recognize as my own action.
What I desire to do is not what I do, but what I am averse to is what I do. (16) But if I do that which I do not desire to do, I admit the excellence of the Law, (17) and now IT IS NO LONGER I THAT DO THESE THINGS, BUT THE SIN WHICH HAS ITS HOME WITHIN ME DOES THEM.
(18) For I know that in me, that is, in my lower self, nothing good has its home; for while the will to do right is present with me, the power to carry it out is not.
(19) For what I do is not the good thing that I desire to do; but the evil thing that I desire not to do, is what I constantly do.
(20) But if I do that which I desire not to do, it can no longer be said that it is I who do it, but the sin which has its home within me does it.
(21) I find therefore the law of my nature to be that when I desire to do what is right, evil is lying in ambush for me.
(22) For IN MY INMOST SELF ALL MY SYMPATHY IS WITH THE LAW OF GOD; (23) but I discover within me a different Law at war with the Law of my understanding, and leading me captive to the Law which is everywhere at work in my body–the Law of sin.
(24) (Unhappy man that I am! Who will rescue me from this death-burdened body? (25) Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!)
To sum up then, with my understanding, I–my true self–am in servitude to the Law of God, but with my lower nature I am in servitude to the Law of sin.”
Romans 8:1-39, [Weymouth]
“(1) There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus; (2) for the Spirit’s Law– telling of Life in Christ Jesus–has set me free from the Law that deals only with sin and death.
(3) For what was impossible to the Law–powerless as it was because it acted through frail humanity–God effected. Sending His own Son in a body like that of sinful human nature and as a sacrifice for sin, He pronounced sentence upon sin in human nature; (4) in order that IN OUR CASE the requirements of the Law might be fully met. For our lives are regulated not by our earthly, but by our spiritual natures.
(5) For if men are controlled by their earthly natures, they give their minds to earthly things.
If they are controlled by their spiritual natures, they give their minds to spiritual things.
(6) Because for the mind to be given up to earthly things means death; but for it to be given up to spiritual things means Life and peace.”
Thus Colossians tells those who are Christ’s to seek those things which are above rather than things of the earth.
“(7) Abandonment to earthly things is a state of enmity to God. Such a mind does not submit to God’s Law, and indeed cannot do so. (8) And those whose hearts are absorbed in earthly things cannot please God.”
This accords with James which says, “Adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.”
And 1 John who says,
“(15) Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
(16) For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world. (17) And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.” – 1 Jn. 2:15-17
We will continue on in Romans 8 next week.
Blessings!
Tri
