The Plumbline

But it was to us that God revealed these things by his Spirit. For his Spirit searches out everything and shows us God’s deep secrets. No one can know a person’s thoughts except that person’s own spirit, and no one can know God’s thoughts except God’s own Spirit. And we have received God’s Spirit (not the world’s spirit), so we can know the wonderful things God has freely given us. (I Corinthians 2:10-12) Why did God send his Spirit to indwell believers? It may have something to do with us gaining the mind of Christ - seeing what he sees, understanding his ways, and learning to lean upon that understanding more than our own. What are the advantages to having the mind of Christ? If we allow the Holy Spirit to actually fill us up with his presence, there is very little room for the fleshly desires and thought patterns to exist. Essentially, when we allow the mind of Christ to be our guidance, we are shutting out the appeal of the flesh. The mind of Christ is what helps us have a determ

Do you have a close friend, or perhaps a spouse, who you often find yourself almost "filling in the blanks" with something they were about to say - almost like you could "read their mind"?  Indeed, you are not a mind reader - you are just close enough to this individual to understand how they think, almost anticipating their responses.  There is a difference between "mind-reading" and just being totally aware of how someone thinks. In fact, scripture tells us WE are the only ones who know our thoughts - the things deep within our own minds.  Somehow, in time, others can actually appreciate "how" we think, but they aren't actually "in our minds".  Now, knowing the mind of God, that seems like a daunting thing, right?  It seems like it would almost be an impossibility, right?  Well, without God's Spirit in us, it would be, but we have been given his Spirit to abide within us so that we can fully get to know the mind of Christ.