The Importance of Relentless Mind Renewal in Your Life

I've been studying a pastor from Bethel named Steve Backlund, and he has a series on Relentless Mind Renewal that I'd just like to walk out here because it's had such a huge impact on my life already in just over a week.

I had a chance to hear him speak right before the RAIN conference. And it's awesome when God is ready to introduce higher levels of his will and thinking in your life, because that weekend I was bombarded with the same messages from two completely different, unrelated areas. So when truth hits you in the forehead at 90 mph from two different directions, it gets your attention. :-)

Many Christians think that once they become saved, we are just going to radically change - and many times we have the mindset that God is going to do it all on his end, that we just have to sit back and enjoy the ride.

Romans 12:2 says "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." The Lord wants to make dramatic transformation in our lives, and the basis for that is our mind.

Ephesians 4:23 says "...and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds" and he gives us the way by which we do this in v. 22 "...put off our old self.." and v. 24 "...put on the new self.."

Hosea 4:6; my people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge (or wrong knowledge). John 10:10; the thief (Satan) comes to kill, steal and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. The devil's only hold on us is deception, and we have to come into agreement with him for his power to take hold. But through the renewal of our thoughts we begin to take hold of what Jesus accomplished for us on the cross.

Joshua 1:8 says, "This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success."   The word meditate means mutter - start muttering on my promises, (through Christ I can do all things; I am strong in Christ; I am more than an overcomer; the devil is defeated; I resist him, he must flee in the name of Jesus). These get into your heart/spirit; you'll obey.

2 Corinthians 10: 3-5 says, "For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds (lies within the mind). We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ...". We recognize our Christian battle is in our thoughts. If we can win in what we think, then the devil has no hold on us.

What we believe is what we experience. The word is our chief weapon (the armor of God; shield of faith, and take up the sword of the spirit which is the word of God). Our power is in our words - what we speak over our lives is what controls our path. When we equip ourselves and speak the truth of the word over our lives, we make our way prosperous and experience good success.

So our primary battle is to break down strongholds in our mind and replace it with truth. Our truth must be rooted in a vibrant love relationship with Jesus.

Proverbs 23:7 says; As a man thinks in his heart, so is he. So who we are is the accumulation of our thoughts and beliefs about God, ourselves, about life and is the essence of who we are.

Philipians 4:8 says; Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

God is telling us here that we are to fill our minds with thoughts worthy of praise.


Tracing the fruit of a thought is the best way to discern its origin; ask yourself:

Does that thought help me to respect and fear the Lord and depart from evil?
Does that thought increase my faith in and or knowledge of God's word?
Actions taken by listening to this thought, will they bring purity, peace, and fruit of the spirit?
Will this thought help strengthen me in all my might to help my endurance?
Does this thought bring joyfulness and bring thanksgiving to my spirit? 

If not, then that thought is either from your flesh or from Satan. He is constantly whispering in our ears; baiting us, waiting for us to come into agreement with any of them so that he has an invitation to come in. We can and must control our thought life. And we are called to do so through repentance.

Matt 3:1-2 

In those days John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."

Repentance is a decision that results in change of mind and in turn, leads to change of purpose and action.

Jesus, after being tempted by the devil, began his ministry and his first words were, in Matt. chap. 4, verse 17 "Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."

Changing our minds is the first step in God - repentance isn't going to the altar and shedding tears; it's setting our minds intentionally on if we don't change the way we think, we are not repentant - we are not actually agreeing with and walking out the changing of our mind in that area. 

Common Lies Christians Believe:

1. I do not want to move forward in God, because the enemy attacks me when I do it; something bad always happens. People who believe that are putting more faith in the power of the enemy to attack them than in their belief in God's power to protect them. If you believe things are going to get worse for you, that will be your experience. 

What to say instead: as I move forward in my faith, God's protection moves with me and covers me and my family. I am blessed and favored by God. 

2. Being in the ministry is hard; or doing God's will is hard. Your belief determines your experience. Matt. 11 says my burden is easy, my yolk is light. Romans 5: Talks about what happened in Jesus is much more and greater than (the impact of) what happened in Adam's sin. Verse 17: For if, because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ. Chapter 5 says "much more" like 5 times - there's a greater force towards good and obedience and power through Jesus because of what he did. To reign mean to rule; this is a declaration, a promise that we must take hold of to activate in our lives. 

3. I will not receive honor in my hometown or home church - yes Jesus said that; but we can't take one verse to lock ourselves in an experience. Jesus' sacrifice on the cross made ALL of God's promises in the bible available to us. 

The Path To Renewing Our Minds.

1. We must increase in our understanding of the goodness of God.

We serve a good God. God is for me, not against me. He loves us, wants to bless us, "If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, then how much more will your Heavenly Father give good things to those who ask". That revelation has not been predominant in the body of Christ. People with a poverty spirit, have a difficult time conceiving of a God who is good, they think God wants them to suffer - they see themselves as little fish struggling against the current; whereas, one with a prosperous spirit believes that God's purpose is to bless us and channel blessing through us, seeing themselves in a stream of favor and blessing. How we view this area and the goodness of God and to what level you attack to that is going to be the level that you are able to impact others. 

"Matt. 6:22-23 The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy (good), your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!" What we see and how we see affects everything. Tying this verse into the concept of the goodness of God; if you see God as good, as your source of blessing, then the light that comes from that in through your eye and filters through your life in a positive way; if what you see through your eye is darkness, then that affects how you see and feel about every area of your life, what you expect to happen to you, what you expect the outcome to be. If you expect yourself to be undervalued, persecuted, treated with disrespect, unloved or any bad pattern of perpetual encounters or outcomes in your life - you are opening the door to those and manifesting those experiences in your life because that's what you expect to happen. If you are stuck in that, then your view of God is not based in the truth of who he is and what his word says about him, but is based on wrong religious beliefs passed down from whatever sphere of influence you've been subjected to. 

And verses 25-26 say to not be anxious about your life, what you'll eat or drink or your body or clothes. The birds of the air neither sow nor reap nor gather food, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? If you do not believe God's promises, that he is your source, then you're depending on yourself to provide and that is the root of your anxiety. Our greatest opponent in life is what we beleive. Worrying is meditating on the lies of the devil. The devil has no power over us unless we believe one of his lies. Jesus is tying faith into how we see his goodness. This worry, this fear, this anger is just proof that I believe I have to take care of myself and that God is really not that good of a God. Verse 33: But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. We need to refocus our eye on God's goodness and his promises. 

2. God's promises (just a taste)

Psalm 34: "I will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul (which is my mind, will and emotions) makes its boast in the Lord; let the humble hear and be glad." We're speaking out boasting how big God is, how great he is, how wonderful his promises are, and how abundant his blessings are. The humble out there are going to hear your boasting and be glad and encouraged, because we have good news to share. 

One way to magnify God is to get to know his names, which talk about his character - my healer, my provider, my peace, my victory, my breakthrough, my banner, my hope - Psm. 34:4, I sought the Lord and he heard me and delivered me from all my fears - when you really seek God and touch him then you know you're delivered internally. He doesn't say we'll be delivered from all our negative circumstances; but from our fear. 

Further in the psalm, first he delivers David (us) from our fear, then from our troubles. 'The angle of the Lord encamps around those who fear him, and delivers them. O' Taste and see that the Lord is good. O' fear the Lord, you his saints, for those who fear him have no lack! The young lions suffer want and hunger; but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing. Come, O children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord. What man is there who desires life and loves many days, that he may see good? Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit. (stop speaking the lies of the devil - negativity) Turn away from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it (internal and relational). The eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous and his ears toward their cry. The face of the Lord is against those who do evil (he lifts his blessing), to cut off the memory of them from the earth. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.'

We have to break the flow of negativity, past lies, past experiences in our lives. We must learn how to encourage ourselves in God in those moments of small issues so we can be prepared to use those tactics on the big stuff. Small things like discouragement, I'm bummed, that person didn't treat me right, etc. give us an opportunity to train ourselves, like spiritual boot camp, where we break off the lies in our minds; because God is preparing us for something big. That's why the bible says we should welcome difficulty - because it's our opportunity to exercise the weapons God's given us. 

Philippians 4:4 - rejoice in the Lord always; again I said rejoice. 3:13 - ...for one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. 

God's call for us isn't just to go to heaven; he wants to pull us up into greater usability, he wants us to walk in great influence. 

1. Forget past. The only thing in the past you need to remember are testimonies of God's victories in your life. 2. Forget failure. 3. Reach forward - I don't have time to go backwards because I have something forward calling me; then press in.

Praying and speaking aloud God's promises to us will help us to repent to what we want and not just repent from what we don't want. A right view of God is essential to breaking strongholds in the mind. As God in your prayer life to reveal his nature to you; seek out scripture that talks about the attributes of God, study them and then use them to debunk lies that are trapping you in wrong modes of thinking. The reason God says to take captive our thoughts is because he knows that our thoughts establish our beliefs, our beliefs impact our experience, and ultimately, define who we are. As a man thinks in his heart, so is he. So who we are is the accumulation of our thoughts and beliefs about God, ourselves, about life and is the essence of who we are. 

Freely Receiving from the Spirit and Walking Free of Legalism

Listening today to Mike Bickle teaching about Freely Receiving from the Spirit and Walking Free of Legalism. We hear that term a lot - and I thought I knew what that meant, but today I'm getting a new perspective on that. A simple definition of legalism is: engaging in spiritual activities to earn God's favor. Praying, fasting, giving, serving, outreach, bible study - we can engage in legitimate, necessary spiritual activities, but when we do them based on favor we seek from God, we are practicing legalism.

Ask any Christian and they'll tell you they know they can't earn their salvation, that it's a free gift from God. But our natural mindset automatically kicks into the gear of wanting to earn God's favor and God's blessing. Even though we know better, we all naturally do this. Verbally we acknowledge God's grace is free; but at the emotional level, we don't really buy into it.

One of the main reasons we struggle with this is because there's no natural occurrence of this in the earth. Isaiah 55:7-8 says "God's ways are higher than man's ways, as high as the heavens are above the earth; God's ways are as superior to and different from man's ways as the heavens are from the earth." He's actually talking about His tenderness towards our brokenness - the way that God offers mercy is so superior to any human beings' ability to show mercy - there's nothing on earth to compare it to. It takes the revelation of grace to understand. This comes down to us trapping (or trying to) God's love into the same box ours is contained in; changing to definition of God's love to mean what man calls love.

God's righteousness, blessing, and favor are given freely to those who have faith or confidence in Jesus' work on the cross and in His deep love for His people. (2 Cor. 5:17-21) says anyone in Christ is a new creation... that Jesus became sin so that we might become the righteousness of God in Christ. God releases His power by faith - faith is having confidence in our agreement with the Spirit and the Word of God. That means we operate in our faith from the standpoint that Jesus paid for every sin, and that we stand spotless before God as Christ does. That means we operate in the confidence that when we repent of sin, it is gone and forgotten; that we cast off our natural spirit of shame after we repent and set ourselves before God with confidence that we are blameless.

Many find it easy to believe that their initial salvation is a free gift; but then believe that God listens to them, desires them, and uses them based on how well they are performing in their spiritual life. "Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law [earning it], or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh [earning it]?...He who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does He do it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?" (Gal. 3:2-5) 


There are 2 different expressions of pride that tempt God's people; the pride that seeks to gain man's praise and the pride that seeks to earn God's favor. Many of the activities related to serving God are the same - the legalistic man will pray, fast, tithe, make time commitments to God just as the man empowered by grace does. It's not the activity but the motivation behind the activity that determines legalism.

Well, why is that such an issue? Both are serving, both love God. Because if we serve from a desire to earn God's favor or from a fear of God rejecting us, we are actually trusting more in our commitment to God than in God's commitment to us. God's love and desire for us existed before we acknowledged Him; God thought of us long before we thought of Him. Jesus is the author and finisher of our faith (Heb. 12:2). God's desire for us doesn't change based on what we do and don't do as believers; God's desire is for us to "take and say thank you" for all that He gives us. (Ps. 116:12-17).

When we operate in our faith with a legalistic mindset, our eyes are on ourselves (and how well we're performing) instead of on Jesus, and our motivation is based on doing enough to earn God's favor instead of simply receiving it freely and thanking God for it. And focusing on ourselves as the source leaves us preoccupied in measuring our dedication, our calling, and our relationship with the Spirit and comparing it with others. But when we operate in our faith with a supernatural revelation of God's grace, we are confident that in every season of our walk, God is paying attention, desires us and is waiting to release blessing on us. Even when we fail, God will still answer our prayers and still wants to use us; He still wants us to talk to Him with extravagant language of love. We can't pray and fast and tithe our way into God's love; but those activities increase our capacity to RECEIVE the love He already has for us.

We can have seasons where we faithfully keep all our commitments to God and then slip into seasons where we fall short - but God's reaction to us is still the same, it doesn't change. We are still the righteousness of God through Jesus; we are still set before God as spotless as the Lamb of God!!! But our connection to Him is based on US. We can fail - and either fall into our shame, put ourselves in a kind of spiritual detention, and change how we relate to God because of that - OR - we can fail - have legitimate shame; repent of our weakness and walk away from that for good and set our hearts back to God in wholeheartedness, talking with Him in confidence in His love. But if we are proud when we do good and feel shame and depression when we do bad, we are operating in our own confidence in OUR commitment to God, not His commitment to us.

How are you emotionally responding to God in your walk? Is your faith based on your ability to stick to your commitments to God or based on freely receiving and accepting with thanksgiving God's commitment to you? The righteousness you received as a free gift on your bank account in Heaven, the day you were born again, can never ever be improved upon. A million years from now, you will never have more righteousness in God's eyes than you did the moment you were born again. It's the righteousness of Christ; it can't be improved upon. You didn't receive a 10% part; you received all 100% the first moment. All the hinderance from God's standpoint is gone; His heart is wide-open, there's nothing stopping Him from expressing His love for you - the only thing stopping you is your ability to receive it. Christ's desire is to guide us to maturity in our love for God. Focusing our thoughts, our feelings, our desires on Christ and not on our own morbid introspection will free us from our own emotional traffic and clear the way for God to communicate to us.

Paralysis by analysis grips us when we are focused on comparing our walk, our blessings, our gifting with others. We are engaged in a continuous conversation with ourselves; "why is this person receiving more than me, are my motives right, is the Holy Spirit really touching me, my ministry is as good as theirs, he seems more dedicated than me" - the Lord says, "ok I want you to hang the phone up on that conversation with yourself, I can't get a word in edgewise". "OK, Lord, hold on while I talk to me about me, just give me a minute, I'll be finished." We're trying to sort it all out. The Lord says - just talk to me. I'll tell you where you are at, why you're receiving what you're receiving, what my plan is for you, why your blessings look different than my blessings to someone else. Stop talking to yourself and talk to me; stop taking personal inventory of how many times you fail. When you fall short, repent, push delete and talk to Jesus.

God as Our Source

Nobody starts strong in God. The maturity of our faith has less to do with how much time has passed since we were saved, and more to do with how much time has passed since we were saved that we've spent going deeper into the things of God. What does that even mean? What does it mean to have God as our source, and how does that affect our maturity as followers of Christ?

We have seasons of plenty, and we have seasons of need. We have times when it seems we're on top of the world, everything is going our way, and then times of trouble when our world is falling apart around us. But it is our heart response to God during each of those times that determines our blessing. Our culture promotes such romantic ideals about life, and when we embrace Christianity, we bring our romanticism with us. Our expectations are that once we choose God, we expect Heaven - we believe we'll be somehow automatically transformed, full of God; that once we've chosen God, he'll do all the work in us. But in reality, we're still angry, full of lust, drawn to the things of our flesh and at odds with each other, reacting at the wrongs inflicted on us. And just as the choice to choose God is ours and ours alone, the choice to pursue him is also.

Part of those idealistic expectations, we set upon each other as the body of Christ, when we receive those new in the faith. We teach them to cultivate their works for God to establish their place in the ranks of God's people. We take the bible stories of Jesus' life and his service to others and we try to apply it to ourselves. And those are biblical concepts; but without a growing intimacy with God, without an ever-increasing fascination with Jesus, we are doomed to fail. We serve out of an obligation placed on us by each other, or from a wrong paradigm that our salvation is related to our works - not from a place of overflowing joy inside from the love of Christ. And after a season, we drop like flies, burnt out, saying "I've served and served, now I want someone to serve me".

God's purpose in our lives is to expose our sin and weakness, not to promise us a perfect, easy life. But we're offended by that - we assume that because he wants us to be transformed that he'll just do it - with or without our help. And that is the conundrum that so many live in and struggle to get out of. And many of us resent God for that or think he's mean; "well if God loves me so much, why doesn't he just make everything better in my life; I'll serve him better when everything is as it should be" - and that is wrong. We do not have an accurate picture of how much sin and entitlement is in our hearts, how prone our flesh is to seek its own reward, how fleeting the days of our existence are. We truncate God's love for us to fit our own sphere of understanding of what love looks like to us, through our broken and selfish eyes. And when God acts in our life outside of what we feel those parameters of love should look like, we stop trusting him at the heart level.

But God knows that the only way to bring us closer to him is to reveal the sin and weakness that separates us from him. And all the seasons of plenty in our lives won't motivate us to seek him out; only in our pain and weakness and misery do we finally break down, after turning to everything BUT God and failing, and call out for him. And it is by seeing God as our source for everything that will empower us to walk through every season of life, abounding in joy. Happiness is not joy. Happiness is having your every whim fancied; it changes with the fading of color, the changing of weather, the smile or frown of another. It is fleeting, momentary, and satisfying only for a time, then it is gone. Our happiness is subject to the randomness of our universe, to the whims of our fickle associates, and to the temperament of our own desires.

Joy is a biblical term that refers to many different principles. Christ is the source of our joy; and tapped in deep enough, we are promised it as a wellspring that will flow for eternity through Christ to us. That means the attributes of Christ are available to us through his joy, not to wipe out our dissatisfaction but to calm our minds, steady our thoughts, bridle our tongues, heal our hearts and our bodies, and offer us peace and rest - regardless of our outward circumstances. That means when someone hurts us, the joy of Christ gives us power to forgive, to heal our wounds, and to reach out in love back to the person who hurt us. That means when our financial situation changes or we are stricken with illness, the joy of Christ gives us the power to heal, the strength of heart to weather the storm, and the assuredness of his hand holding us up during our crisis. When we understand God as our source, we have assuredness that his strength is mighty enough; that he is the source for every blessing in our lives. No boss or church leader can take away any favor he puts upon you, no family member can remove his love for you; and he promises that if you see him as your source, you will walk in confidence that his favor will be upon you in this life and the next in fullness.

God is our source. He's the source of our salvation, the source of our person, our talent, creativity, ability, life. He's the source of our strength, he gives us every breath; the power of his name casts out demons and moves the spirit realm at his command. But if you are looking for happiness instead of joy, you'll be disappointed and not understand how he's moving in your life and your intimacy with him will suffer. If you can completely accept in your heart that he is is perfect, that his ways are righteous, that he is always right, that he desires good and magnificent things for your life, and that his love for you is unfailing, then you are on your way to walking in his joy. In every moment of your life, believe him for full blessing - when it comes, bless him as the source; when it doesn't come, believe him for it anyway in the next breath and watch and see how your attitude, your heart, and your faith are transformed by his abounding joy.