All your mind...

Week 18:

Mark 12:30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.

As I stated last week, I believe that we have mind and strength down well when it comes to applying this passage to our lives. We looked at strength from a perspective of being a doer for God. This week we look at the mind.

Again, coming from a western perspective, our society is very much a thinking society. If we can think it, then we can do it. If we can discipline our mind, then we can control our lives.

From a Church and Christ-follower perspective, we have worked hard at knowing God’s Word. We are great at quoting scripture (and misquoting scripture…and quoting out of context). In many ways we look at our lives and see if life matches up with what we know in scripture. If we see something is out of place in our world, we go to scripture to find out how to get it back into place. Scripture is taught in our churches. Bibles are printed in several languages and versions. We have worked hard at the knowledge of scripture.
I came to know who God was by knowledge. If I had not been taught the Bible, I don’t think I would have known God. Scripture also gave me a guide to know that my sin separates me from God. Scripture also told me how to come to God. Knowledge is an important trait listed in 2 Peter 1:5ff. In Colossians 3:2, Paul talks about setting our minds on things above. And in Romans 12:2 he talks about the renewing of our minds.  

For us to love God with all our mind, we must shift our thinking toward having the mind of Christ. 1 Corinthians 10:5 reminds us to take every thought captive and make it obedient to Christ. Our knowledge of scripture helps with that very thing. I have always said that a lot of my morality was based upon scripture. I could not always tell chapter and verse when it came to discerning between right and wrong. However, I could tell you that making many choices about right and wrong came from my base knowledge of scripture.  

Our mind helps lead us in our strength. To serve others and God, we must first realize what needs to happen. It takes our mind and knowledge of what God wants us to do in order to bring our strength on line.  

It is important for me to stay in the Word so that I am renewing my mind. I also find that God reveals new things to me through passages I have read many times before. I am sure that some of that comes from age and maturity as I look at the word through different filters than I did when I was younger. That is part of the reason I must be renewing my mind regularly. In order for me to love God with all my mind, I must keep exercising my mind.  

However, I cannot be wholly like Jesus with just my mind and my strength. At this point, I am only two-dimensional. I need more…

Questions/challenges:
1. When you hear, “all my mind”, what stands out for you?
2. Where in your life do you need to strengthen loving God with your mind?
3. Where are you strong in your knowledge of God?
4. Where in your life does this knowledge get in your way? How does it hold you back?
5. Pay attention this week to the renewing of your mind. Where do you need to improve?

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