1 John 3:16


"By this we perceive the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren."

Sunday 4 July 2010

Mindset Change

Israel never really changed this mindset. They never really got it out of their system. They came out of Egypt, but Egypt did not come out of them. Mindset change is so important. We can change to the right religion, to serve the true God, but still serve Him with our old mindset. Unless this mindset is also changed, it will bring us back to serving our old gods, whether these gods be witchcraft or materialism.

They feared the Lord and served their own gods, after the manner of the nations whom they had carried away from thence. (2 Kings 17:33).

When Assyria carried Israel away from Samaria, they brought in foreign peoples to populate the land. Lions ate them and so they asked about the gods of that land so that they could appease them. They were told the Lord of Israel is the God of that land. So they feared (meaning they appeased by ritual) the Lord, but still walked in the ways of their own gods.

World view

A common mindset of religion is appeasement. This leads to ritual and spiritual warfare, rather than to love and truth. It leads to sacrifice: heathen type prayers that Jesus spoke of (Matt 6:7), fasting and sowing of seeds. It believes that personal cost and effort will bring deliverance. It does not lead to repentance, because payment is the focus, not change. This mindset hinders the transformation of people, families and nations.

We once visited Roman temple ruins in England. The museum authorities salvaged old prayers Romans inscribed on stones. They inscribed a prayer (all of which were either for healing, prosperity, promotion, or against an enemy) and then tied money to it and put it before the god. The similarity of this with practice today struck us. This was their only focus in “prayer”. This is the mindset that the prophets of Israel faced.

No matter how much Christian doctrine we have, our cultural mindset (world view) will not change without new birth. We will go on believing in curses and in humans that change to animals and in witches that can fly. We will believe that this is the cause of our problems, rather than our stealing, lying and fornication. We will believe any lie told us by spiritists, because of our fear of death.

No teaching can change this mindset. No amount of “prayer” can change it. No Christian doctrine can change it. There is only one way a person can leave his culture behind and be renewed in the spirit of their mind – new birth. Only then do we love the truth more than a lie. Only then are we crucified to the world: our culture (Gal 6:14).

We have seen thousands of people trained diligently for many years in the word of God and found that this alone cannot renew the mind of a man. Only when we are touched in our heart by the Spirit of God and renewed in our inner man, will we not be bound by our culture. All people in all cultures are the same, because of the nature of man and the nature of religion.

The prophets pointed out the problem. Jesus Christ came to fix it by giving us a new heart. The prophets warned Israel not to follow the ways of the nations around them. This is where we are most likely to stray, by copying others.

When the Lord your God shall cut off the nations from before you, where you go to possess them and you succeed them and dwell in their land; take heed to yourself that you are not snared by following them, after they are destroyed from before you; and that you enquire not after their gods, saying, How did these nations serve their gods? even so will I do likewise. (Deut 12:29-30).

The issue here was not just the idols the heathen served, not just their evil practices of child sacrifice, but the root of their religious mindset. The issue with human nature is that we do not like being different. It makes us feel that there is something wrong with us, that we do not measure up. So we look at those around us and lean from them instead of learning from God. This was one of Israel’s greatest problems.

This is why they wanted a king, to be like the nations. They started off worshipping God with the mind of the people around them, before eventually taking their idols as well. In Judges and throughout Kings they worshipped God on every green hill as the heathen did (1 Kings 14:21-24). God knew that in following these ways they would turn away from Him. He told them not to in His law, but Israel did not hear.

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