December 16

Ephesians 4:23 is a short verse that leaves room for contemplation. Here Paul writes to the believers. “Be continually renewed in the spirit of your mind.” We think of spirit and mind as separate entities, and perhaps they are essentially, for one is associated with spiritual revelation and the other with worldly knowledge

But here Paul is indicating an aspect to the essence of who we are that he identifies as a ‘spirit of your mind.’ What he seems to be saying is that there is a connection between what we think and what we espouse in the realm of our spirit.

Perhaps it is this correlation that causes some individuals to be so different in their thinking and in their perception of life in general and of God’s requirement of man in particular. Could it be that the spirit to which we surrender ourselves has a profound impact on how we think? On what we consider to be reasonable? Most people in the Western world base their world view in Christian thought. Acts of violence are repugnant to them.

An extreme example of an opposing view might be a suicide bomber. Is it mere coincidence that someone who has opened his mind to extreme hatred for those whose convictions are not his own would have the capacity to commit murderous acts? Had that same individual surrendered his mind to thoughts of love and peace, the spirit that drove him would have had no power over him. Our spirits become the captive of our thoughts. We must guard them well.