Cast Down Imaginations!

1/7/1990

The things in Romans 12:1 and 2 are so applicable to what you just said. First it says to offer your bodies as living sacrifices. In other words, be willing to die for the sake of what God wants. But he said that “in view of God’s mercy”. That was how he introduced that in Romans 12. He said, “In view of God’s mercy, offer your bodies as a living sacrifice.” If you know the heart of God, then you are able to offer those things that seem costly, even to the point of death. “In view of God’s mercy, offer your bodies as a living sacrifice.” In other words, do the right things regardless of what the cost might be. And in this case it might be that opening up. But then here’s the aspect I wanted to mention, “be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” And there’s some choices that are made in that regard, too.

And I’ll just give you an example. Without a transformed mind, a renewed mind, you could have been overcome with the pain of, “Well here I am. I just opened myself up. And I probably did it out of order. Probably I just interrupted everything and everybody knows that...” Anybody ever felt something like that?? :) You just get overwhelmed with this flood of, “What did I just say??” You open yourself up and right behind that, to fill in the vacuum, come the accusations of satan. You open yourself up and then vroom, right behind that come in all the accusations.

What I want to suggest to you is that part of the “being transfigured” is by the renewing of your mind. When you just say, “God, I offered that as a gift to YOU. I don’t care what anybody else thought. (And I don’t mean that in a hard-hearted way.) But I offered that as a gift to You. We’re all just humans, we’re all just brothers along the way. So that’s a gift I offer to You. I refuse to be under any kind of bondage with all of this. I’m not going to let my mind be filled with imaginations. By the renewing of my mind I’m transfigured. I do offer my body as a living sacrifice, whatever the cost may be.” And then right behind that, my mind has got to be renewed about the truth of what’s really going on here. It’s a gift I offer to Jesus, and if I stumble over my words, so be it. I offered that as a gift to God. I wasn’t trying to impress anybody anyway. I didn’t do this for my own self-benefit or my own promotion. I did this as a gift for God alone. I’m not hardening myself to what people think. I might learn from it. And I’m open to do that, too. I’m not trying to protect myself or say, “Hey, listen. I did that for God and I don’t care what you think.” It has nothing to do with that.

It’s with a softness of heart that we offer ourselves as a living sacrifice to the point of death and also our mind is renewed right behind that. And in that process we’re transfigured. We’re brought into His likness with ever-increasing glory, by offering ourselves, no matter what the cost, and then by our mind being renewed about what all that means. “In view of God’s mercy”, offer yourselves that way, and then let your mind be renewed about the meaning of what that is. Don’t allow youself to be filled up with the imaginations of guilt and oppression.

I know how satan works, because I have been overwhelmed by it myself many, many times. Identifying what it is and then walking away from it in truth--”the truth shall set you free. You shall know the truth, the truth shall set you free.” That allows us to risk and to be free and to not wonder what people thought and to not try to produce anything or promote anything, but just to offer ourselves as a gift to God, rejecting anything else, rejecting our eyes rolling back in the back of our head and meditating on the deep meanings of all of this. And just rejecting that stuff. It’s a rejection of, “Hey, I am not letting this vaccum in my heart be filled up with satan’s lies. I’m going to fill it up with the grace of God, the kindness and the mercy of God. I’m not going to let my mind just be infiltrated with all this kind of stuff. I’m going to cast down those imaginations and live in freedom before a living Father--a living Father. Not a religious ideal, but before a living Father I’m going to offer these gifts to Him.”

In knowing that truth, there is definitely a freedom. You don’t look over your shoulder. You don’t run for the shadows. And that abiding in Him is what makes us full and free. And if we’re “schizos”, if we’re paranoid and fearful and running from our shadows, and today courageous and tomorrow blown away, it’s because our minds haven’t been renewed and we’re not walking in the freedom of abiding in Him. You may be entirely committed and yet, if your mind isn’t renewed and imaginations come in like a flood and you allow that, you don’t deny them a place, you play with them, you toy with them, you meditate on them, you compare thoughts to thoughts, and then you look back in your own history and you compare your life to other lives and you just go through all this stuff. If you allow that in your head, you will never be transfigured into His glory. Never. Never. NEVER. You can never know enough Bible or pray enough. You will never be transfigured into His image if you allow that stuff in your head. If you play with it, toy with it, replay it, compare it, justify it, if you go that direction you will never be transformed. The truth will never set you free if you don’t embrace it. If you don’t let it replace the empty thoughts in your own head, the fruitless dark thoughts of conjurings and introspection and comparisons and judgment and recoiling and thrusting forward in arrogance. If you won’t thrust those things out of your heart and your mind you’ll forever be a slave. Maybe you’ll be an arrogant slave that pretends you are better than everybody else, or maybe you’ll be a cowering slave that pretends you will never be anybody. You start rolling your eyes back in your head and reeling through the whole thing all over again--all you’re doing is sealing your fate deeper and deeper and deeper into powerless Christianity that’s a mirage rather than in truth. Don’t allow that stuff in your head. It has no place there.

“Offer your bodies as a living sacrifice.” And I think that’s kind of what we were talking about is, “offer yourselves as a living sacrifice”, lay it down and “in view of God’s mercy”, offer it to Him as a gift that which seems like it could be costly. And then right behind that, have your mind renewed by the word of God about what the meaning of those things are. Think God’s thoughts about it. Don’t allow all this stuff to come in and fill your head. Once you’ve been vulnerable, once you have offered yourself as a living sacrifice, then fill your heart and your mind with God’s view of that, rather than your history of it all. And in so doing you will know the good, perfect and pleasing will of God and you will be transfigured into His likeness. That’s a promise that has never ever been broken. Not even once. Never in all the history of mankind has that promise ever been broken. 100% accuracy for everyone that would live in that.