“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God – what is good and acceptable and perfect.” When I hear these words I always remember Mt. Level Missionary Baptist Church in Durham, NC. This is the church I attended for the whole last semester of my seminary days at Duke University. The head pastor is Rev. Dr. William Turner, my preaching professor and the one who also taught us about the history of the Black church in America. While I attended Mt. Level I joined an adult bible study class focused on the Mind of Christ. This twelve-week course is devoted to helping Christians learn to think the thoughts of Christ, to have the mind of Christ as we are instructed to do in Philippians Chapter two, “Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus.”
The authors, T. W. Hunt and Claude N. King see three scriptural stages in developing the mind of Christ. First we set our minds, as Colossians 3:2 says “Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.” Philippians 4:8 also shows us that we have the ability to set our minds. “Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things.” Hunt and King call this stage the Will Principle. “[We] must set [our] mind. [We] must decide, choose, or determine the focus of [our] mind. That is where [we] start in developing the mind of Christ.” Unlike animals, we human beings have the will to control what we do. This enables us to obey God in spite of our feelings or intuitions.
The second stage Hunt and King call the growing stage. This is when we are transformed by the renewing of our minds. After we give our will to God, we “must continue to allow [our] minds to be changed (transformed) by a renewing process.” This is when we, as disciples of Jesus, grow. When we are in this transformational stage we experience newness; new thoughts, new insights, new strength and energy, flowing ideas, new ways of looking at the same old problems, and new ways to resist our temptations.
The third stage is when we become ready for action. This is when we gird up our minds so that we are ready to move. Men and women wore long robes in Jesus’ day, and if they wanted to run, they would have gird them up, or lift up the edges and tuck them into their belt. I often think of girding up, being in a state of readiness as keeping my tennis feet. Remembering that the ball might come from any corner and being ready to move quickly and agilely to face and meet whatever comes my way. Jesus was like this, mentally ready and alert at all times to meet challenges of life, such as the shrewd questions of the scribes, chief priests and Sadduccees, without getting flustered, or unduly angry.
I agree with Hunt and King that when our wills are set and our minds have grown through constant renewal, we will be ready for any test God allows to come our way. It is also important to remember that we are not expected to do this on our own. Paul doesn’t tell us to go transform ourselves, right? He uses the passive voice, be transformed, that is, let God transform you by renewing your mind. “God wants us to develop the mind of Christ. He causes you to want it. He enables you to do it. Then one day Christ perfects the work that God began.”
Our stories from Exodus show this principle at work. Though the main characters in Exodus may not have known Christ as Jesus, we can trust that since Jesus assures us that he is one with the Father, Christ was at work in their lives helping them to have his mind and to do the risky will of God.
First we have the midwives. I love these two women, Shiphrah and Puah for their faithfulness in the midst of adversity. While last week we left Joseph in Egypt reuniting with his father and brothers and protecting them from the famine in the land, now we have jumped many, many years, until the Egyptians have forgotten Joseph, and the children of Israel have multiplied in the land. Like many powerful governments, the Pharaoh started to become fearful, even paranoid of the immigrant population, and this fear propelled a policy of greater and greater oppression. But God was good to his people, and the more they were oppressed by Egypt the more they multiplied and spread. This increased Egypt’s fear and the Israelites were enslaved, forced to do the hardest work and treated ruthlessly. Such hateful measures never work, the king was still afraid of the Israelites and ordered the Hebrew midwives to kill all the Israelite boys at birth.
Shiphrah and Puah knew better, they knew God and they knew that killing babies was never God’s will. It was such a daring act for them to disobey the king, that they must have had their minds set on God, allowed God to renew and transform their minds. They clearly discerned the will of God and were ready to meet the king’s challenges. With their minds set, transformed and ready, Shiphrah and Puah were enabled to disobey the king’s command, and continue their work as midwives should, striving to help all the mothers safely deliver all of their children. Their state of readiness is seen in their answer when the king asked, “Why have you done this and allowed the boys to live?” “The Hebrew women, they are not like the Egyptian women. They are vigorous! Before the midwife can get there, they’ve already had the baby!” God was pleased with the midwives and because they honored God, they were blessed with families of their own.
Next we are introduced to three more heroines in Egypt, two Israelites and an Egyptian princess. The Hebrew mother gave birth to a fine baby boy in the time when the king made it a policy to drown every boy child in the Nile river. Knowing that it was God’s will for this child to live, the baby’s mother disobeyed the law of the land and kept him quietly hidden for as long as she could. After three months she was inspired to give her son up to God’s care alone. Like Noah, she made a boat, just big enough to protect her boy from the deadly water, and placed it among the reeds along the riverbank. In this case the mother didn’t just have to break the laws of the world, she also had set her mind upon God’s will to even be able to fight her own maternal instincts of trying to keep her son safe with her. With nothing but trust in God’s mercy, she let him go in his little boat.
The other Hebrew heroine of this story was a girl, the baby’s sister Miriam. She was brave enough to stand by the river and watch and see what would happen to her brother. And her mind was ready for action, so that when the princess found the basket, Miriam bravely appeared, encouraged the princess to keep the child, and shrewdly offered the baby’s own mother as a nurse. If this mother and daughter had let their minds be conformed to the world, they would have never in a million years thought it would be possible for God to use the Pharaoh’s own daughter to keep their boy safe from harm. Not only did the princes adopt the baby, name him Moses, and unwittingly pay his own mother to nurse him. She also insured that he would have a fine education, enabling him to do the work God ordained for him of helping lead the Israelites to freedom. Our minds are not big enough to fathom the ways of God. But when we allow ourselves to be transformed by God so that we can discern and do God’s will we can be sure that blessings will follow.
And even the Egyptian princess, in some way, must have been open to the transformation of her mind in the act of defying the laws of her land in order to save one precious life. Her willingness to take a holy risk, inspired by God, enabled God’s plan for the salvation of his people to unfold.
American history is very similar to the history of Egypt found in Exodus. Like the rulers of Egypt, the white rulers of this land became fearful of the immigrant workers they had “imported” from Africa. In 1740, in the colony of South Carolina, a law called the Negro Act was passed that made it illegal for slaves to gather in groups, earn money, raise food and learn to read. The act permitted slave owners to kill any slave that rebelled. Similar laws were adopted in many other parts of this country. In spite of terrible oppression, through what can only be the miraculous working of the Holy Spirit, many black people in this country accepted the religion of the white oppressors and came to Christ. As they did so, they came to know the mind of Christ, which made them strong enough, and free enough to defy evil civil laws. Many black Christians would give up precious hours of sleep in the evenings to gather for worship. And there were many Americans, black and white who defied the prohibition of teaching slaves to read and write.
Sophia Auld was one such woman who taught her slave Frederick the alphabet when he was about twelve. When her husband Hugh discovered this, he strongly disapproved. But Sophia had opened the door for the boy who was able to continue his education by trading bread to the poor white boys of Baltimore in exchange for their knowledge of reading, and by carefully observing the writing of the white men where he worked and copying the letters in his dictionary. Frederick latter wrote, “I wished to learn how to write, as I might have occasion to write my own pass.”
Upon finally learning how to hold a pen, his immediate response was to write three passes for himself. One pass stated, “I, the undersigned, have given the bearer, my servant, full liberty to go to Baltimore, and spend the Easter holidays. Written with mine own hand, &c.”
Frederick Douglas went on to teach other slaves how to read the New Testament at a Sabbath school on a plantation. As word spread, the interest among slaves in learning to read was so great that on any week over 40 slaves would attend lessons. For about six months, their study went relatively unnoticed until one Sunday a group of white men burst in on the gathering, armed with clubs and stones to disperse the congregation permanently.
But Douglas’ writing career did not come to an end. After he escaped to freedom, Douglass wrote a book about his life as a slave, which was promoted by the abolitionists until he became famous. Fearing the publicity would draw the attention of his ex-owner, Hugh Auld, who might try to get his “property” back Frederick’s friends sent him on a book tour to Ireland and England. The people there were so inspired that they soon raised the money necessary to pay Mr. Auld, who gave a signed manumission to Douglas in return.
This story is just one example of how God will bless us when we refuse to be conformed to the ways of the world, and let our minds be transformed to have the mind of Christ, so that we may both discern and do the will of God – those things that are good and acceptable and perfect. Can you think of example in your own life when God has done this work in you? When have you set your mind to doing the risky will of God, which defies the ways of the world?
Two cases I can think of in my life are the choices I had of which college and which seminary to attend. In both cases I had safer options. I could have gotten my degree from an Ivy League university that cost less and was closer to home. I could have attended seminary where I was pretty sure most people thought and felt the way I did about the world. But God also gave me options with more risks; an expensive but innovative college where I would be free of tests and grades could design my own major; a seminary where I would be forced to consider very different points of view and stretch in new directions. Through careful consideration and prayer, after weighing the risks I could see, and listening to the tug of my heart I opted each time for the risky choice; the choice which would push me farther, give me more opportunity to grow, and stretch in new directions. Both times I was strengthen to take these calculated risks in favor of what most seemed like God’s will by the assurance that God would be with me, and that God was arranging my life so that I would meet fellow brothers and sisters in Christ who would help me overcome the challenges involved. As a result both educational experiences offered me far more blessings than I could ever have imagined. In college my faith was challenged in a way that made me both much stronger, and wiser and I began to face the ugly, judgmental part of myself and be transformed. In seminary, not only was I stretched in ways that made me much more balanced as a pastor, but also I was given the blessing of spending a whole year of study in Germany for free. Something I would never have imagined beforehand.
The next time you are faced with a choice about what to do, remember to let your mind be like the mind of Jesus. Stop and pray about which choice is most in line with the teachings of the Bible. Remember that the will of God often seems risky from the perspective of the world. “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God – what is good and acceptable and perfect.” When you open yourself up to the risky will of God you will be amazed at what the Lord will do with your life.
Let us pray.
Lord Jesus, we are hungry and thirsty after Your righteousness. We do want to be like You. You are the Bread of life itself. Fill us with Yourself so that we may experience the abundant life You came to give. Give us the ability to set our minds, to allow you to transform our thinking and our actions and help us to be ready to meet any challenge or test that comes our way. Lord Jesus Christ, give us your mind so that we may more fully live our lives according to your will. We ask all this in your precious name, together with the Father and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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