April 6

Transforming the Mind

April 6, 2008 David Stewart

As we are starting this series about spiritual formation I think we could easily talk about spiritual transformation or spiritual reformation, but for our purposes they are all going to be the same. Here is my agenda for this morning; and yes, when I stand up here and there is a microphone in front of my face, and I hate these microphones, I feel like Brittany Spears, I swear. Like, I want to start singing, like “Baby, Baby” or whatever; or Madonna. I just feel so goofy wearing this thing. But here is my agenda. I want us to think critically about spiritual formation. I want us to see the beautiful simplicity that spiritual formation embodies. I want us to see the desperate need we have as Christians to take on the task of transforming our minds because here is the truth friends; if we don’t as Christians take hold of it, there are a million other groups in this world that will help people become something. Yesterday I was running around Lake Calhoun and there was this group of people offering spiritual wisdom and spiritual direction. I was like, man. “Friends we got to rise up and we have to do something about this because if we don’t meet that need, if we don’t do something about it, there is a world out there that is going to do it. So I think that we need to start thinking clearly on this.

My goal is to see how spiritual transformation affects us on a holistic level. In the coming weeks, next week, Buck is going to talk about our emotional life. This week we are talking about our thought life. We are going to talk about our spiritual life and our physical life and really, that language is so artificial because we are whole integrated people. We can’t separate our thoughts from our feelings from what happens in our physical bodies. It just doesn’t work like that. So it is going to be convenient for our conversation for this sermon but really it is artificial, indeed.

And finally at the end of the message, at the end of our discussion, we are going to look at a few things that we can do in the moment that we are in to begin to cooperate with God in this abstract amorphous, but really important thing called spiritual formation. One note of caution as we move forward, don’t move to personal application too quickly. I say that because when we move to application, when we just say, “What does this mean for me?” It is a great and important question to ask, but when we do that too quickly we end up with applications like this: “Well Stew says we should read our bible more.”- Which is a great and lovely thing. “Stew says we should pray differently.” - Which I might say that. “And we should be nice to our neighbors.” - Well, dah. “And we should be nice to our enemies.” - Well of course, you can just pick up the bible and read that. Don’t just boil it down to something so simple. Instead of finding trite personal application, let’s see the implication of the big picture story. The implication of the big story is this – God cares deeply about the kind of people that we are, and God cares deeply about the kind of people we are becoming. So friends I ask you this question right off the bat. What kind of person are you becoming? ….an interesting question to be sure.

To begin to explore that, we are going to look at two texts from Paul in the New Testament and one from Exodus in the Old Testament. Here is the first one we are going to dive into, Paul says this: (Romans 12:1-2)

Therefore I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, -- and this is your true act of worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is -- His good, pleasing and perfect will.

Let’s just agree that if it is just a good talk from Stew this morning, if it is just some eloquent words that tickle our ears, then we might as well just pack it up and go outside and enjoy the weather. We don’t need a good talk. What we need this morning is to be aware of God’s presence because He’s here, right? Amen. He’s in this place and all that we need to do is to attune ourselves to His presence. So let’s just agree as we pray this morning that we are not looking for good words; we are not looking to just be entertained; we are looking to be transformed. So as we pray, can I ask a couple of you throughout the sanctuary to commit to listening to the message; and also just be praying that the words I say have power and authority; be praying that I cannot stumble over my words; and be praying that I speak clearly and think clearly. So maybe can I just have a couple of you agree do that as we get started this morning? Very cool. Thank you very much.

Let’s pray real quick.

Lord, Jesus, if you do not make yourself known in this room right now, if you do not take these words, then it’s all just religious worthlessness and it is not going to matter. So you need to just come and make us aware of your presence and take these words, Lord, give me clarity of speech and thought and give these words power. Let them be your words. Let me say no to the temptation to try and be impressive and try to gain love by being up front; but just let us give ourselves to this idea this morning. We pray all these things in your name Lord, Jesus. Amen.

Now as another disclaimer, gosh, I love disclaimers this morning, I guess, it is so important that as we move forward that we don’t lose sight of the simplicity of spiritual formation. Let me also say that there are some messages that are more geared toward like inspiring you and telling stories and stuff like that. This is a teaching method to be sure. This is a message that you need to think about and since you are here you might as well be present with your minds. So that being said, I really ask you to just engage for the next twenty minutes or however long I end up talking, just be present in the moment here. I say that at the beginning of the sermon and I remind us that this is actually a very simple thing, for a couple of reasons. First if I say it at the end you might completely disagree and say “You made it too complicated.” And secondly I just think we have to be aware that this isn’t rocket science. This is nothing new. This is firmly rooted in the Old Testament, in the New Testament, in the church Fathers; and if we make it too complicated, which sometimes as Christians, let’s be honest, we do sometimes, if we make it too complicated then we are not going to give ourselves fully to it. If we make the process of becoming like Jesus too complicated, we are not going to do it.

That being said, spiritual formation though it is really simple in the end it doesn’t mean it won’t take a considerable amount of well intentioned effort on our part. It surely will. Spiritual formation is not complicated, but my friends, it does not mean it is easy. And let’s also just a minute, right off the bat, be talking about our minds and thoughts and all that kind of stuff. It is kind of weird. It is kind of like a fish trying to talk about water. It is like how do you talk about your mind, like apart from using your mind? It’s like our thoughts are what they are. They are our thoughts, so what else do we need to say.

Well I think here is what we need to say. If our rebellion as humans against God began in our minds, which it did, we are going to get to that, then the redemption of our lives, our entry into this thing called abundant life that Jesus wants us to live, must begin in our minds as well. Think back to that familiar scene in the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve were walking with God and the serpent came and tempted them. Now this is what Dallas Willard says about the temptation. “When they were tempted, the serpent didn’t come and smack them in the back of the head with a stick or something like that to tempt them; he told them a lie. He presented to them an idea, something that happened in their minds. The idea that was started as an abstract proposition was this. God doesn’t want you to eat the fruit because He knows that if you eat it, you will become like Him. You see, God is threatened by you, that is why. He is a killjoy. He doesn’t want you to be like him.” Can’t you see Adam and Eve just sitting there listening to the serpent, listening to the idea that the serpent is giving them? I can see Adam and Eve like listening to this and then having this concrete idea in their mind like what it would be to be like to be like God. Then that quickly forms into feelings and emotions and it moves them to literally pick up the fruit and eat it. You see this idea which started as an abstract proposition moved into a concrete reality, a concrete experience, which then moved them to behave in a certain way.

So my friends, if we want to behave like Jesus, if we want to experience real transformation, we have to undertake this thing called transformation. We have begun the renewal of our minds. For those of us, like me, who do not experience a miraculous and instantaneous renewing of the mind, the moment that you begin to follow Jesus, this becomes very important. I don’t know about you guys but maybe when you began to follow Jesus, or gave your heart to him, like he immediately took away all your addictions, all your angry thoughts and everything that was bad; but for me it’s like I followed Jesus and then I became aware of all the crap in my life. Then I saw how absolutely necessary it was to take those thoughts that are not in line with reality, like the thought that I need to be up here and impress you guys, that is a thought that desperately needs transformation because if I hold that thought in my mind – that I need to stand up here and impress you in order to be loved and feel adequate – then I am going to behave in a certain way and I am going to act in a certain way and that is not the way God wants me to act. You see my thoughts influence my life, my behavior.

Now some of you are probably saying, “This is way too philosophical for a church service, for a sermon. It is great and it belongs in some books on a Christian bookshelf. It’s probably a nice paper for you to write in your seminary experience. It’s just good ideas; but what does it have to do with my concrete, day-to-day existence?” The reality is this, my friends. Everything that we experience as real from our emotions to physical sensations that we experience, it happens in our minds. Reality, like it or not, reality that we experience happens in this eight pound sack of noodles stuck between our ears. We have to realize that. So what is at stake in this conversation? My answer is this: everything. You see if we are given the false ideas about who God is, like Adam and Eve were, we will miss out on so much of the life that Jesus has for us. If we are given to skewed ideas about who we are as individuals, about who we are in relation to God, then maybe we will miss out on ideas like, God loves us. Seriously that could just remain an abstract proposition and we will never experience it as a beautiful concrete reality if we don’t think well and think correctly about this. I could go on and give you more examples, but….I’m not going to.

One thing we also need to be clear about is that we are rarely, if ever, moved as people. We are rarely moved or changed by abstract ideas. We are always drawn; we are always gravitated to that which is concrete. It is not a bad thing. This is the way God made us. We can’t just say “Oh it is our culture” or “You know we have to fight against that.” No, this is a good thing. This is how God made us. It is to be celebrated; and to illustrate this point, I am going to ask you this very simple question. What is in the backseat of your car? Seriously, what is in the backseat of your car? O.K. Now as you formulate your answer to that question, I am willing to bet, that none of you, O.K. who watches CNN or ESPN news? Anyone? You know at the bottom how they have the little ticker and it just scrolls information? I am willing to bet when I ask “What is on the backseat of your car?” You did not see at the bottom of your eyes a ticker tape piece of information, going “There is empty trail mix. There is Febreeze. There is smelly baseball stuff.” I mean that is what is in the backseat of my car. I don’t know what’s in yours. I love Febreeze and my daughter spilled the trail mix everywhere. So I just haven’t cleaned it up. When I ask you “What is in the backseat of your car,” you see a picture in your mind of the back seat of your car and then you can say, “Oh yeah, look at all that trail mix everywhere. I should vacuum it up. Oh, look at those stinky shoes. Oh, that’s what the Febreeze is for.” So you represent it as this concrete reality in your mind, that’s how we work. Or if I ask you this question, “How do you get home from church?” You don’t see the little ESPN news ticker at the bottom. What you do is you put yourself and your brain in your car and you say, “O.K. you go out of the church and you take a right. You go down two stop lights. You take a left and you are home.” We deal with life in concrete realities in our brain, not abstract information. So doesn’t it follow that we should experience God in concrete real ways? Doesn’t it follow that the way we concretely represent or even the way we fail to concretely represent and perceive God in our minds is the key to this thing called spiritual transformation? It is the key to our holistic spiritual life. And that is to say this, guys -- What we think about God matters a lot.

Dallas Willard says this, and he is one of my favorite authors, he is absolutely brilliant I think. Much of what I am saying is stolen from him. He says this, “The ultimate freedom we have as human beings is the power to select what we will allow or require our minds to dwell upon.” Here is what he means. You can’t choose your feelings. Seriously, you can’t choose your feelings. Next time you are sad, just choose to be happy. Right? It just doesn’t work like that. Next time you are cut off in traffic, just choose not to be angry at that person who does not know how to merge. Seriously, if it were that simple, like if someone would cut me off like I am always cut off in traffic, and I would do like, “Oh I’m just going to choose to not be angry with that person.” The reason I get frustrated when people cut me off is because I have a thought that that person is doing something that is unfair to me, and that thought produces an emotion, and that emotion produces behavior. You see we are to a large degree formed by our thoughts. We can’t choose our emotions; we can’t choose our circumstances; we can’t choose how tall we are; we can’t choose the color eyes we have; we can’t choose our families; but what we can choose is what goes on in our minds. Even there I guess we are not totally free to choose without influence from outside, but that is a sermon for another time. Maybe Buck will let me give that sermon too sometime. I love giving that sermon too.

Now, I love how I have to prod and poke you guys to participate. Feel free, I know in the bulletin it says: Scripture, Response, Message. But feel free to respond like any time, like, “Yeah God.” Or “Boo, Stew,” or something like that. Let’s not take it too seriously. Feel free to interact, and all that.

So let’s also draw attention to a lie that is so pervasive in our culture and particularly with students and I think that this is a lie that a lot of us believe because it is so easy to believe, and it is this: That what we watch, what we hear, what we see, what we behold does not affect us. We can watch any movie, we can watch anything on T.V., we can listen to any type of music and we will be wholly more or less unaffected. Think about this, though. Doesn’t the fact that advertisers are willing to spend millions of dollars to give you a thirty second glimpse of their product during the Super Bowl when they know you are watching; doesn’t that kind of show that some in this country at least not only hold the belief, but are willing to spend millions upon the belief, that what you see matters, that what you behold in your eyes and your mind has the power to transform you into something other than what you are now. That is faith. Those advertisers have amazing faith that what you see transforms your life. Now, as Christians, we have to embrace that. If we fail to do this, if we fail to understand that what happens in our minds, what happens in our thoughts, what we behold, what we dwell our minds upon, as Dallas Willard says, “If we fail to see these things as the driving force in who we are becoming then we have lost. Then we are already in the process of becoming something that we don’t intend on becoming.” We are believing a lie like Adam and Eve did and that is why Paul said, “Be transformed by the renewing of your minds.” Because he knew if we weren’t transformed by the renewing of our minds we would be transformed by the pattern of this world. Like it or not, we are being transformed into something. So here are the three things we need to conclude at this point.

Redemption, abundant life, transformation begins right here in the sack of noodles between your ears. We are moved by concrete images and not abstract ideas. In our faith, our spirituality will be wholly unsatisfying to you, I promise, if it remains in the abstract. Finally, what we behold, what we see, what we dwell upon, what we think, to a large degree, determines who we are becoming. That being said we must refuse to settle for anything but the most concrete experience of the living God. Amen.

We must find a way to make this God that we can’t see and feel and touch and hear real and concrete; and we have to find a way to do that every day and every minute, especially on Sunday mornings; and I have no definitive formulas or how-to’s for you. I’m sorry. I can’t just give you three steps to say “here’s all you have to do.” Dallas Willard calls this process “a relentless seeking” and I think that is so true. This is a lifelong process that we embark upon, but let’s not make it more difficult than it has to be. Let’s keep it simple.

Here’s another thing Paul had to say and we are going to start cruising here. He said this to the church in Corinth. In 2 Corinthians in a discussion about the supremacy of the glory of something he calls the new covenant over and above the old covenant, but don’t worry about this. He says this: (2 Corinthians 3:12-18)

We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the glory was fading away. But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. But we all with unveiled faces, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are literally being transformed into that same image from one degree of glory to another, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.

Now to really get our minds around this, we have to jump back a couple thousand years and examine why Paul is referencing Moses. And here is where everything becomes clear. Exodus 34, the scene where Moses is up on Mount Sinai getting the revelation from God. (Exodus 34:29-35)

When Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tablets of the Testimony in his hands, he was not aware that his face was radiant because he had spoken with the Lord. When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, his face was radiant and they were afraid to come near him. But Moses called to them; so Aaron and all the leaders of the community came back to him, and he spoke to them. Afterward all the Israelites came near him, and he gave them all the commands the Lord had given him on Mount Sinai.

When Moses finished speaking to then, he put a veil over his face. But whenever he entered the Lord’s presence to speak with him, he removed the veil until he came out. And when he came out and told the Israelites what he had been commanded, they saw that his face was radiant. Then Moses would put the veil back over his face until he went in to speak with the Lord again.

Now among the many issues and questions that this raises, here is what it says to me. When Moses was in God’s presence, God’s presence rubbed off on Moses. When Moses beheld the glory of the Lord, literally when he was in God’s presence it transformed him in a very real way. It makes me think of a time I was sitting at home, sitting on my couch, reading the bible and just kind of praying a little bit and my roommate, Chris Smith, is he in here? There he is back there—the big panda. He walked in and I turned around and I looked at him and he just had this terrified look on his face. I’m like, “Dude, what’s wrong?” He’s like, “Your face, it is glowing.” O.K., that totally never happened. That’s a complete lie. But seriously, that would have been awesome. I could have just told you it did. You would have believed me, right. You think I’m really spiritual. It raises this question. When we spend time with God, can people tell? Can people tell? When we spend time with God, does it rub off on us? You see, when Moses beheld the glory of the Lord, he became transformed by it and this is exactly what Paul was getting at in 2 Corinthians. This is what we need to wrap our minds around. Would you follow me here? How in the world are we going to do this because we can’t climb up Mount Sinai? I don’t see God. Like, really, I can’t like touch Him; I can’t smell Him; what are we supposed to do?

Paul says this, “Behold the glory of the Lord as in a mirror.” What in the world does that mean? Paul, could you be any more cryptic?” What do you see besides a bunch of lovely, beautiful white people? Come on what do you see? What do you see? Yeah… well you guys ruined my illustration. You were supposed to say, “We see ourselves, Stew.” Then I would say, “No, you don’t see yourselves. You see a representation of yourselves. You see a reflection of yourselves. You are not looking at yourselves; you are looking at a representation of yourselves.” So when Paul says, “Behold the glory of the Lord as in a mirror” - the New Living Translation translates “contemplate the glory of the Lord.” Where does that happen, my friends? --In your brains. --In your imagination. It is the only place that we today can literally dwell upon the glory of the Lord. It is the only place where we can take an abstract proposition about God and move it into a concrete experiential reality in our brains, in our minds. You see Paul understood before the advertising industry understood that what we behold, what we see, transforms us. Paul understood that what we dwell our mind upon to a large degree determines who we become. Paul understood that spiritual transformation, the process, the lifelong process of becoming like Jesus begins with our thoughts.

So what do we do? What do we do with that? Well, I guess I don’t have formulas. I have a couple suggestions though. We need to do anything and everything possible to move our experience of God from abstract to absolutely one hundred percent concrete; and when we do that, we are not just creating new realities in our mind, we are lining up with the reality that is real. If we fail to experience God in this room right now as concrete, that is pretending; that is pretending because the reality is God is here. God is with us wherever we go. So to act otherwise is pretending; to act otherwise is believing a lie; and here is what I think we need to do. Here is how it works for me. Invest in community. It’s this, it’s simple. I can’t tell you how often I experience the reality of God through other people, through people who represent Jesus with skin on. I can’t tell you how the phrase “God is love” has been really concretely present to me when I am with people who are representing God’s love to me. It is not some mystical magical thing, but there is something amazing and mysterious that happens when we do life with other people. It transforms us.

Second and maybe the most important when we pray, when we worship, when we serve, when we do anything like that, when we live we need to engage our senses and our imagination. We can’t settle for an abstract worship experience. We can’t settle for an abstract prayer life. So here’s what I do and this might work for you, this might not. When I am worshipping, I close my eyes and I imagine that I am in God’s throne room. I’m imagining that I am in His presence, like “better is one day in your courts.” When I was singing that, I wasn’t in that front pew right there, I was in God’s throne room and I could see Jesus sitting on the throne and could see the multitude of people gone before me singing with me. And I tell you what my friends that has the power to transform us; because when we do that, when we line up with that reality, we move beyond just an abstract religious something to a real concrete experience of God.

Here is the other thing I do. When I pray, I sit on this little ledge in my bedroom and I put a chair like right here and I just say, and this might sound a little hokey or cheesy, I say. “Jesus you can sit down if you want.” And I have a conversation with Jesus. No flowery religious language. I don’t thee and thou him…he doesn’t like that anyways, I don’t think…just kidding. I just talk to him and tell him what’s on my mind, then I listen. But when I listen it is not just me coming up with things. It’s like he’ll say, “You know what, others may leave you or forsake you, but I won’t.” He’ll say, “You know what, my Spirit I’m giving it to you to lead you on to all truth.” He’ll say, “You know what, I’ve given you the Spirit as a pledge of your inheritance.” Everything that he says is like scripture and that is why it is so important for us to get into the word. There is that personal application that we don’t want to move to too quickly though.

So we need to do something like that, like putting a chair, engaging our senses or using your imagination when you are praying and when you worship to take these abstract things and move them into a concrete reality. See it’s not complicated. But it is not easy either because Paul knew that the temptation would be to be conformed by the patterns of this world, not the renewing of our mind. We have to do that. It is not just going to happen on accident. We have to be intentional about beginning this process.

So as we close the discussion this morning, I want us to become a people who are wholly dissatisfied with abstract experiences of God. I asked my students, “Like how many of you guys have been able to sit down and watch the Lord of the Rings?” Every single one of them raised their hands. I don’t know if you know the Lord of the Rings is three hours long. It is a great movie. That is not the point though. The point is this. I then asked them this, “What is the longest you have ever sat down and prayed?” And the point is not to guilt anyone. The point is to reveal something about the way we think about God. The answer is maybe three or four minutes, which may even be a lie, and the reason that is is because when we pray we too often relegate it to just making speeches into the air, which is completely not what God has in mind. See when we engage our imagination, like we do when we watch a movie, like what we do when we play Guitar Hero, like we do when we are having a conversation with friends, it becomes something that we can do for more than two minutes. It becomes something that transforms us.

So let me ask you this, my friends. What is your mind dwelling upon? What is transforming you? Who are you becoming? Amen.