How We Think

I felt compelled to write this page down from the awesome book "The Supernatural Ways of Royalty" by Kris Vallotton and Bill Johnson. It has really been speaking to me a lot lately. I keep coming back to this one passage every time I open the book; I've read it three or so times already haha. The way they word things... often times makes things just click in my head. It is like my head can finally get over all the confusion and come into agreement with the truth my heart has already accepted. I have found this to be the case with every book that I've read from Bethel, which is why I keep buying and reading them hahaha. I believe God has given a lot of wisdom to the leaders in Redding. One thing I really love about reading the books is that it confirms to me that there are people out there living as I desire to live. In devotion to the Lord, living in constant relationship with him and constantly listening to his Spirit's voice. It gives me great courage to step out of the norm and just love and live in the true freedom.

How We Think

The mind set on the flesh is death and at war with God. That is the "unrenewed" mind. In essence, the renewed mind is the mind of Christ. It is able to demonstrate the will of God, which is best described in the prayer, "Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." (Matt 6:10). The exhortation of Scripture is clear, "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 2:5 NKJV). The renewing of the mind begins with our new identity obtained at the cross. We were once slaves of sin, but are now slaves of righteousness. Our thought life must support that reality. The apostle Paul emphasized that in his letter to the church at Rome, saying, "Even so, think of yourself dead to sin" (Rom 6:11). It's an attitude... a way of thinking... an evidence of repentence.

The mind has a power to affect our behavior either positive or negatively. But it does not possess the power to change our nature. That alone is accomplished when we are born again. When people are born again, they are transformed from the inside out. It is not the external things that are likely to change first. God takes up residence in our hearts, transforming us, as it really is an inside job. On the other hand, religion works on the outside. While it can bring conformity, it is powerless to bring transformation.

"For as he thinks within himself, so he is" (Prov. 23:7). When we are charged to think of ourselves as dead to sin, it is more than a suggestion to think positively about our conversion. It is an invitation to step into the momentum of a reality made available only through the cross. The supernatural power released in this way of thinking is what creates a lifestyle of freedom. It is able to do this because is it TRUTH. To say that I have sinned is true. To say that I am free of sin is truer still. The renewed mind is necessary to more consistently taste the supernatural life, which God intended to be the normal Christian life.

~~Bill Johnson, The Supernatural Ways of Royalty; page 56.