Monday, September 19

 

Monday, September 19


Psalm 45

Nahum 1:15-2:9

Ephesians 4:17-28


...be renewed in the spirit of your minds...


It is far too easy to read some of these Pauline lists of virtues and vices and feel like we have gone back to the dark days before the Reformation. The idea that if we behave ourselves then we can call ourselves “good people” is pagan, not Christian. Paul feels very strongly about how Christians behave, he “affirms and insists” upon it. But it is because of what has already happened that we should mind our step, not because of where we are going.


Christ's resurrection is many things, but one aspect relevant for Paul's teaching this morning is that it demonstrates to us the radical new reality in which we now live. We too have passed (spiritually) from death to life; therefore, we experience a “renewal of our minds”. Instead of treading water until we die, we live lives. Everything now makes sense: God has spoken, so we have logic. God made us in His image, so we have moral responsibilities. God made the universe, therefore physical matter has purpose and inherent beauty. Christ died for us and rose again, and so we can enjoy all these truths and live the way we should have been living from the beginning.


Those with “darkened minds” have “lost all sensibility” and are “ignorant”. This makes them “greedy to practise every kind of impurity”. If God hadn't made us, and died for us, and given us all the blessings and wonders we experience every waking moment, then this type of behaviour would be logical. But this lifestyle is living a lie; a way of living that is “in the futility of their minds”.


Thanks be to God for renewing our minds! The dirt on the inside of the windows has been wiped away; cobwebs swept; dust cleaned out: the light is shining into our minds, showing us the way of life, and giving us the reason to do so. Next time the Bible tells us to love one another, let's appreciate just how big that concept is. It is the very same power that brought Jesus from the dead, and us with Him.




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