Join us in this inspiring episode as Charles Stanley explores the critical role of renewing one’s mind in the life of a believer. Through biblical examples and metaphors, learn how transformation is not just a one-time act but a continuing process of aligning one’s thoughts with the mind of Christ. The episode encourages Christians to be vigilant against the world’s influences and to steadfastly renew their commitment to a God-centered life. Sound biblical teachings and practical steps are offered to help listeners protect their spiritual walk, preventing relapses into past sins. By focusing on divine truth, individuals can experience
Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Friday, January 2nd. Were you once on fire for God, but now lack a hunger for spiritual things? Refresh your desire for the Lord as you listen to today’s lesson.
SPEAKER 02 :
When a person is saved by the grace of God, what happens? They are saved by the Holy Spirit coming into their life and they receive, the Bible says, the life of Christ. The man’s spirit is made alive by the presence of the Holy Spirit and we become the possessors of the life of Christ. If a man has the life of Jesus Christ living within him, and this life which is perfect and holy, and in this body, this body goes back into the world system. Paul says, listen, you are not what you were before you were saved. You can’t ever be what you were before because the redeeming grace of God has made you what you were not. You can’t ever be what you were because you have been regenerated. You have been born again and you have been born a new creation. Now how does a person like that relapse back into sin? Is this relapse absolutely necessary for every believer? Is there going to come a time in every believer’s life when they fall back into sin? No. But all of us will sin at times in our life, but we don’t have to be entrapped and ensnared what Satan had us ensnared with before. So the question is, how do we prevent that? And that’s what I want us to discuss today. And if you’ll turn to Romans chapter 12, verses 1 and 2, when Paul says, I urge you, that is a term used by a general oftentimes before they sent their troops into battle. He says, I urge you, I am encouraging you, I’m challenging you therefore, brethren, speaking of believers now, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living, holy sacrifice acceptable to God, which is your personal or your spiritual service of worship. Now watch this. He says, stop being conformed, assuming an outward appearance that is unlike the real you on the inside. Now watch that. Stop being conformed to this age, but be transformed. That is, let the outward become like the inner. That is, the transformed life, which is a continuing process, is a process whereby the Christ who is within us is continually expressing itself through us so that the life of Christ is seen through us, the power of Christ is seen through us. It is Christ living and expressing His life within us and through us. Now he says… by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect. Now, what do we mean by renewing and what is the objective of that? Well, if you notice what he says here, the objective of that is a transformed life. He says, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Now, we’re coming to the renewing in just a moment, but I want you to see what he means here when he talks about a transformed life. That word, metamorphosis, we think about that we think of let’s take for example the caterpillar let’s say here’s a caterpillar who crawls up the tree dies, so to speak, in that cocoon. Before long, out of that cocoon comes what? Caterpillar? No. Butterfly. Gold, black, blue wings, beautiful. No longer now crawling on the earth, but doing what? Just flying. So here’s beautiful butterfly just flying around and everything is gracious and beautiful and fly high and then fly low. Coming down on a beautiful flower with that particular odor to it, all of a sudden he sees a bunch of his old caterpillar buddies over there and they seem to be having a big party. So he just folds his wings and comes down and walks up and says, how you doing? Well, we’re just having a great time. We’ve been missing you. Where you been? Oh, man, I’ve just been sailing. I’ve been flying. I’ve been having the time of my life. Well, listen, let me tell you what you’ve been missing. Well, after a while, a little partying going on among the caterpillars. And after a while, he says, well, I think I better leave. I’ve got some more work to do. Oh, come on, stay in here with us. I mean, after all, you don’t know what you’re missing. Let me ask you a question. Because he stopped flying and began to fellowship with the caterpillars, has he ceased to be a butterfly? No. What he’s done, he’s given up this beautiful life of freedom to go back to creeping and crawling on the earth. So what does he do? He has to fold his wings to fellowship with that crowd. Now, you can take that butterfly and cut off his wings. Does he become a caterpillar when you cut off the butterfly’s wing? No. He’s a butterfly. He’ll always be a butterfly. He died in the caterpillar life. And to be down there fellowshipping with the caterpillars when God’s made him a butterfly indeed is absolutely against nature. Why? Because, listen, he is a butterfly at heart. His nature is butterfly nature. His nature isn’t. His nature isn’t caterpillar nature. We’re the child of God who’s been liberated and freed by the grace of God and can touch heaven. And we can touch God and talk to God. What do we do? Enticed by the world’s crowd, we fold our wings and we come back down to the caterpillar life. And listen, after a while, after a while, lose our capacity to fly. You’ve been saved by the grace of God. He gave you wings to fly to liberate you out of what you were living. And listen, you’ve been enticed and you’ve taken a nosedive and you begin to say, well, this church business and this preacher business and this reading the Bible, all that’s excess baggage. I want to tell you, my friend, the day you dump it, you’ll be sunk. And that’s exactly why some of you living in bondage, you are estranged from God because you have been willing to give up your wings in order to have the acclaim and the praise and the fellowship of the world that can only do what? take you back and introduce you once again to caterpillar living. That’s all they can do. That’s all they know. That’s their nature. A believer is a butterfly by nature. A lost man is a caterpillar by nature. And how did a caterpillar become a butterfly? To die. Die to the caterpillar life. How does a man get freed? He has to die to the caterpillar living and he becomes a butterfly. You see, it’s a transformed life. We don’t have to, you don’t have to go back to that life. Now watch this. Not only is it a transformed life, it’s a triumphant life. Listen to what he says. He says now in verse 2, Don’t be shaped by this world’s pressure, but be transformed, metamorphosis, by the renewing of your mind that you may prove. That means, listen, to prove in battle. document so to prove in battle that is to prove by testing by trial by fire by battle that you may prove by what kind of battle the battle of temptation the battle of inducement to evil that you may in the battle prove what the will of God is that is what that listen that God’s will for your life which is butterfly living is not only good but But it’s perfect and it’s acceptable. God’s life for us is a life of freedom and liberty, not creeping and crawling, enslaved in the bondage of sin. That’s not what God has provided for us. But the question is, how is it? Let’s say, for example, you came out of a life of sin and there were habits in your life and enticements that were really difficult and God just reached down to His sovereign grace and snatched you out of that and saved you. And now, for some reason, whatever the situation may be, you’ve seen yourself in those steps for the quickly all over long period of time. There you are. You don’t want to be there, but there you are. I want to tell you, my friend, you don’t have to fall. You don’t have to go back to that. Listen to what Paul says. He says, be transformed, the continuing process. Be ye being in the continuous process of transformation. What is that? That is because, because, listen, because you are no longer a caterpillar but a butterfly. The process with a butterfly takes place over a short period of time. The transforming experience. Watch this carefully. When you were saved, you received the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior. What happened? Your life turned around. That is, you turned around the inside. You became a new creation in Christ. Now, the outward man, the body and the soul, all of that did not turn around quite that fast. Because when you were saved, what was the first thing that was affected when you were saved? What was it? Your spirit. Your spirit was made alive by the presence of Jesus. Okay, that’s on the inside. Now what happens? It is the will and purpose of God that you begin to operate from the inner man, not from the outer man. Before you were lost in sin, you lived by your senses, the outer man. Dead on the inside. Now, what happens? On the inside, God turns you around when you trusted Him as your Savior. But the transforming experience whereby the inner life of Jesus Christ is seen by other people is a gradual process, more gradual in some than others. And what His process is, the transforming process is that our life which God turned around and made new in Christ Jesus, that the expression of our life by conversation, character, and conduct will be the life of Jesus Christ. It is a transformation that takes place. Now how does that transformation take place? That transformation is part of the preventative maintenance from keeping us going back where we were. Now let me show you what’s very, very important at this point. Notice what Paul says. He says, stop being shaped in the world’s image. Be transformed. Be being transformed by what? This is the whole impact of what I’m going to say. By the renewing of your mind. Now watch this carefully. As you and I read the Word of God, the mind absorbs that. When we read the Word of God, we get God’s viewpoint. We begin to see things from God’s perspective. We begin to think as God thinks. And somebody says, well, I don’t believe so and so. You get in the Word of God and God says, here’s exactly what I believe about this. Here’s what God says. If that’s what God says, that’s what I believe. Then I begin to believe about that the way God believes about it. You see, if you let God renew your mind, how does He renew it? He renews it primarily through the Word of God. It may be through reading the Scripture, listening to a sermon, watching a sermon, whatever it might be, but it’s always the Word. It’s always the Word of God. The renewing process is the Word of God. Now watch this. For example, in Colossians chapter 3, here’s a beautiful example of it. In Colossians 3, turn there if you will, and then also I want us to turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 4 because he says something a little similar here. In 2 Corinthians chapter 4, Verse 17 says, Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. Now watch. But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image. Here’s what he’s saying. As we behold Jesus. As we focus upon Him, as we think upon Him, as the Word of God begins to be rich within us, and the Word of God begins to be a vital part of our daily diet, what happens? Well, I’m looking at this Word, I’m looking at Him. I’m seeing Him. And what’s going to happen is that my countenance and my image is going to begin to be transformed because I am renewing my mind to think the way God thinks. And if I think the way God thinks, then the whole being is going to be an expression of the life of Jesus Christ. In Colossians chapter 3, look in verse 1. If then you’ve been raised up with Christ, keep on seeking the things above where Christ is seated, the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. If you set your mind on the things above, you begin to think heavenly thoughts. You begin to think the way Jesus thinks. He said, “‘Abide in me, and I in you.'” As I abide in him, he abides in me. As I focus on him, read on down here if you will. For example, he says in verse 5, Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desires, and greeds, which amount to idolatry. These things you once lived and walked in. Verse 7. Put them all aside, he says in verse 8 and verse 9. Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self, what you were before you were saved, with its evil practices, and have put on the new self, the new person, Christ, who is, listen, who within you is being renewed to a true knowledge, that is, because Christ is within me, I am being renewed to what? I’m beginning to think the way he thinks. That is, I think the way he thinks, The outward expression of my life is going to be consistent with the inner expression, who is Jesus Christ within me? How does the renewing of the mind take place? Focusing upon the Word of God. How can I prevent myself? How can I protect myself from falling back into the same old snares and the same old entrapments? And everybody has his or her weakness. How can we stay out of that stuff? I’ll tell you how. By the renewing of the mind. Listen, we are bombarded with thoughts. All kinds of sensual thoughts and all kinds of materialistic thoughts, all kinds of secular thoughts, all kinds of ungodly thoughts are continuously bombarding our minds continuously. All right? If my mind is not renewed by that which is righteous and holy and good, After a while, I’m going to begin to listen to some of this, and as I listen, after a while, if it keeps coming, my feet are going where my ears began to listen and my eyes began to watch, and I’m going to be right back where I was. The renewing of the mind is God’s work of the Holy Spirit by His Word within us to protect us by a continuous cleansing and a continuous molding and shaping into our thought patterns, those things that are consistent with the life that is within us, so that… Renewing of the mind is a protective shield from relapsing back into the old way of life. Listen to what he says, putting it all together. Don’t allow the world system, the philosophy of this age that’s ungodly and un-Christ-like to shape you back into a mold that God redeemed you from. Don’t go back to caterpillar living when you have become a butterfly. And the way you do that is by focusing upon the Word of God and renewing your mind consistently and constantly, you begin, listen, it becomes natural for you to look at things the way God looks at them. And friend, when you’re seeing things from God’s perspective, things in your life in the past you would have nothing to do with. Because you see, God, listen, has transformed you and is transforming you and has renewed you and is renewing you and it is a lifetime process. It is like a continuous cleansing of the mind, sifting out that which should not be there. The renewing of the mind is God’s preventative maintenance. to prevent us and protect us from relapsing into our old way. Now let me ask you a question. Are you one of those persons who would have to say, that’s what happened to me. I knew that I was saved. but I’ve relapsed back to my old way. Then I want to tell you, my friend, you can be freed and liberated from that right now. If you’re willing to ask God to forgive you, to name the sin, ask, tell God that you’re repenting of that sin, that you’re trusting in His grace to deliver you and not yourself. You’re trusting in his supernatural power within you that you’re taking your position of who you are as a child of God. You’ve been disobedient. You’ve been a renegade, but you’re still a child of God. And your position is that you’re in Christ and he’s in you. He that’s within you is greater than he that’s in the world. And by faith, you are claiming your victory and you’re repenting of that sin by faith and claiming your victory. And you’re stepping out today by faith in the power of God to release you and liberate you from what has ensnared you. And friend, you can step out of it right now. God will free you. And for all of us who continuously struggle in our lives, the renewing process is the thing that takes the pain out of the struggle and the battle is triumphant and victorious. It doesn’t mean that you’ll never fall, but the failures will be less and less and the sense of God’s victory and the freedom and the liberty of butterfly living becomes yours. as a gift of God. That’s what renews the mind. Meditation, absorption, digestion, application, sharing, searching, questioning. That’s what renews the mind. And that renewal will save you from a lot, listen to me carefully the way I say this, from a lot of hell on earth that comes from falling back into what God redeemed you from. Father, we just thank and praise you for your patience and goodness and love and mercy and kindness. And thank you for the work of the Holy Spirit within our hearts to renew us moment by moment, day by day. And now we ask in Jesus’ name that those who are enslaved, those who’ve never been saved, might fall upon their face wherever they are, saying, Lord Jesus, I’m trusting in your death on the cross. I’m believing in your death as adequate, sufficient payment for my sin. And I receive you here and now by faith as my Savior and my Lord. I pray Father for those who have been entrapped. They’ve been saved but ensnared once again. That confession and repentance and the recognition once again of who they are as the children of God. And trusting by faith that you will deliver them. The moment they’re willing to cry out in repentance, you will deliver them. And to accept that by faith their freedom is theirs in that moment. And they can once again fly like a butterfly. Let there be no pride, no egotism, no false sense of security. Lest we lose our wings. as it were, and begin to creep and crawl like caterpillars. But keep us ever conscious of the fact that thy word has a supernatural, renewing, holy work going on within us that’s keeping us cleansed, thinking your thoughts, doing your thing, being what you want us to be because you’re expressing your holy life through us. We pray that the Holy Spirit will gain victory today for every single person is my prayer in Jesus’ name. Amen.
