It’s different.
It’s a different frame of mind.
Roman’s 12.2
[Rom 12:2 NASB] 2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
My favorite verse, it always has for various reasons. Paul makes a very bold statement in the first of the verse, it’s more of a stop sign to most of us. But what does it really mean? What does conformed mean? to this world, what world are we supposed to be conformed too?
These are some good and serious questions to be asking ourselves in our day of time, let alone in Paul’s turbulent era. First,let’s tackle the era of Paul and understand why he said it. As usual there is alot of backstory to all of Paul’s narrative, he was a very accomplished man with alot of knowledge of his time and of the past too.He was a Jew, He was a Roman citizen, a Pharisee, a tent maker, a sojourner, a leader of people, but probably the most tell tale sign that He was full of knowledge was his encounter with God. This was one for the ages, meeting God on his own terms, right in the middle of road, where else!
God’s singling Paul out for an encounter, one on one is like getting called to the principal’s office! God in his unconventional way of grabbing one’s attention, was confronting Paul to get him to actually go on the right road(yes, a pun). He was persecuting the people that he was soon going to be in charge of! Paul was about to be schooled himself about what God the creator had in store of His people, and him.
God was changing course the road of his people, that would be a treachous, but very rewarding to their future. This was going to be changing of the mind for his people. From their mind, to His.
This was the issue for mankind from the very start, their mind. Man was subjecting everything thru his mind to the way that the world was to be. It would be up to him to decide what was good for him or bad for him. He was to be the king of his domain, the alpha and the omega, the king.
The narrative of mankind has for it to make all the decisions on everything that it came across, to reign on the judge,jury, and police. After all, what could go wrong? He was the man(kind). Man equipped with the brains,(that the creator gave him) why couldn’t he make the right decisions,why wouldn’t everyone else be the same way? Man is king!
Man has been hurting itself ever since it was alive,(just ask Able) but why do we continue to think that this hereditary trait would go away? We just can’t get along with each other. We devalue ourselves and others to a subservient man that we then have issue compounded on top of each other.
We can’t ‘create’ that perfect world that we are in no matter what program, constitution, leader, or location we try, it just doesn’t work. I am talking about mankind, but it sorta sounds like what we as christians are calling ‘church’, which doesn’t sound good either. which brings up the notion of where as christians got there ideas to reach their audiences? What could go wrong with this?
It is with paul that he says that we must leave this world’s realm of life’s ways that just like in the Israelites narritive that they were with the plight with being filled with corruption, even more being under the influence of the torah that they were incapable of following it their life.
It was and is that we must change the mind’s concept of life by reknewing (understanding that we we once in God’s mind)our minds to God.
The Eternal Purpose 