Coming In Out of the Wind - Renewing the Mind

Discipleship to Christ cannot be described in merely negative terms.  “Do not be conformed to this world” is a necessary component of discipleship, but not a complete description.  Paul also says, “Be transformed by the renewing of your minds” in his letter to the Romans. The movement away from the world and its distractions must be matched by a corresponding move to Christ and his way of living. C. S. Lewis describes this movement well in this excerpt from Mere Christianity. Moving away from a life that is impossible – a sort of compromise with our old life and the new one – we find we can live a life powered by grace. We turn from our usual mechanisms for dealing with life to find that the kingdom of God is close at hand, utterly available to us. As Lewis says, “We can only do it for moments at first.  But from these moments the new sort of life will be spreading through our systems.”  Also he describes so well that such transformation often comes where we least expect it: “the very moment you wake up.”


The terrible thing, the almost impossible thing, is to hand over your whole self – all your wishes, and precautions – to Christ.  But it is far easier than what we are trying to do instead.  For what we are trying to do is remain what we call “ourselves,” to keep personal happiness as our great aim in life, and yet at the same time be “good.” We are all trying to let our mind and heart go their own way – centered on money or pleasure or ambition – and hoping, in spite of this, to behave honestly and chastely and humbly.

And that is what Christ warned us you could not do.  As He said, a thistle cannot produce figs.  If I am a field that contains nothing but grass-seed, I cannot produce wheat. Cutting the grass may keep it short: but I shall still produce grass and no wheat. If I want to produce wheat, the change must go deeper than the surface. I must be ploughed up and resown.

That is why the real problem of the Christian life comes where people do not usually look for it. It comes the very moment you wake up each morning. All your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals. And the first job each morning consists simply in shoving them all back; in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in. And so on, all day. Standing back from all your natural fussings and frettings; coming in out of the wind.

We can only do it for moments at first. But from those moments the new sort of life will be spreading through our system: because now we are letting Him work at the right part of us. It is the difference between paint, which is merely laid on the surface, and a dye or stain which soaks right through.

He never talked vague, idealistic gas. When He said, “Be perfect,” He meant it. He meant that we must go in for the full treatment. It is hard; but the sort of compromise we are all hankering after is harder – in fact, it is impossible. It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird; it would be a jolly sight harder tor it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.

(Smith and Foster, Devotional Classics, p.9)

A Life That Does Not Work - Conforming to This World

Standing opposite to being “transformed by the renewal of your mind” is Paul’s instruction “do not be conformed to this world” in his letter to the Romans. As we have been studying discipleship in our small group, we have found that conforming to the world is more than just doing the bad things everyone else is doing. It is trying to live a life that does not work. In this excerpt from Dallas Willard’s book The Spirit of the Disciplines, we see that conformity to the world not only corners us into moral ambiguities, it strikes at the very heart of who we are and what we are called to be.  It makes life a march instead of a dance, black and white instead of color, bound up instead of loosened. Discipleship is for life in all of its fullness, not just for church or charity.

The English philosopher and critic John Ruskin. . . said this of the human:  

His true life is like that of lower organic beings, the independent force by which he moulds and governs external things; it is a force of assimilation which converts everything around him into food, or into instruments; and which, however humbly or obediently it may listen to or follow the guidance of superior intelligence, never forfeits its own authority as a judging principle and as a will capable of either obeying or rebelling.  

Ruskin proceeds to contrast this “true” life with the “false” life that is possible, and too often reality, for human beings: a false life of custom and accident “in which we do what we have not purposed, and speak what we do not mean, and assent to what we do not understand; that life which is overlaid by the weight of things external to it, and is moulded by them instead of assimilating them.” How often do we feel like this in our day-to-day life, doing and saying things we don’t mean just to get along with the world around us?

 Once I counseled a sensitive and intelligent young woman who was quite miserable in her job at a department store. She told me that on the weekends she felt as if she had been “dug up” from being “buried” during the week. This graphically expressed the sense that her activities at work were not really hers, that she therefore was dead (“buried”) during that time, only to come to life (be “dug up”) on the weekends when her activities originated from within herself.

What constitutes the individuality and uniqueness that make living things precious? It is their inner source of activity. One brick or board may be as good as another since it has no inner life. But to treat one person as replaceable by another is not to treat them as persons at all. It denies the inner source, the originative power that is a human life. And that is why doing so is regarded as dehumanizing.

Some persons may indeed try to abdicate their life, disown their spontaneity, seek security by “conforming” to what is outside of them. But they don’t actually escape life or their responsibility for it. They only succeed in appearing “wooden,” unlively. We may know what to expect from them, but we have as little delight in them as they do in themselves.

Ever wonder why we love the frankness, the audacity of the little child? It’s because a child presents life in an unblushing directness that permits no mistake about its originality and therefore its individuality.

 It’s the same reason we delight in the frolics of a puppy or the lollings about of a panda. These are so utterly gratuitous that they could, we think, only be evidences of an inward life completely unrestrained. And we love them for it.

(Willard, Dallas. The Spirit of the Disciplines (pp. 59-60). Harper Collins, Inc.. Kindle Edition.)

The Devil's Best Work: Keeping God Out of Mind

The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis

It is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in reality our best work is done by keeping things out. (20)

[The Enemy] wants men to be concerned about what they do; our business is to keep them thinking about what will happen to them. (28)

The great thing is to direct his malice to his immediate neighbors whom he meets every day and to thrust his benevolence out to the remote circumference, to people he does not know. . . .  Think of your man as a series of concentric circles, his will being the innermost, hie intellect coming next, and finally his fantasy.  You can hardly hope, at once, to exclude from all the circles everything that smells of the Enemy: but you must keep on shoving all virtues outward till they are finally located in the circle of fantasy, and all the desirable qualities inward into the Will. (31)

Provided that meetings, pamphlets, policies, movements, causes, and crusades, matter more to him than prayers and sacraments and charity, he is ours - and the more "religious" (one those terms), the more securely ours.  I could show you a pretty cage-full down here. (35) 

You now see that the the Irresistible and Indisputable are the two weapons which the very nautre of His scheme forbids Him to use.  Merely to override the human will (as His felt presence in any but the faintest and most mitigated degree would certainly do) would be for Him useless.  He cannot ravish.  He can only woo.  For His ignoble purpose is to eat the cake and have it; the creatures are to be one with Him, but yet themselves. (38)

We always try to work away from the natural condition of any pleasure to that in which it is least natural, least redolent of it Maker, and least pleasurable.  An ever increasing craving for an ever diminishing pleasure is the formula. (42)

A moderated religion is as good for us as no religion at all - and more amusing. (43)

[When your patient realizes] that his own faith is in direct opposition to the assumptions on which all the conversation of his new friends is based, . . . he will be silent when he ought to speak and laugh when he ought to be silent. . . .  All mortals tend to turn into the thing they are pretending to be. (46)

If prolonged, the habit of Flippancy builds up around a man the finest armor plating against the Enemy that I know, and it is quite free from the dangers inherent in the other sources of laughter.  It is a thousand miles away from joy; it deadens, instead of sharpening, the intellect;  and it excites no affection between those who practice it. (52)

The safest road to Hell is the gradual one - the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.  (56)

The deepest likings and impulses of any man are the raw material, the starting point, with which the Enemy  has furnished him. (59)

The Enemy wants him, in the end, to be so free from any bias in his own favor that he can rejoice in his own talents as frankly and gratefully as in his neighbor's talents - or in a sunrise, and elephant, or a waterfall. . . .  When they have really learned to love their neighbors as themselves, they will be allowed to love themselves as their neighbors. (64)

The truth is that wherever a man lies with a woman, there, whether they like it or not, a transcendental relation is set up which must be eternally enjoyed of eternally endured. (83)

Much of the modern resistance to chastity comes from men's belief that they "own" their bodies. . . .  They will find out in the end, never fear, to whom their time, their souls, and their bodies really belong - certain not to them, whatever happens.  (98)

Prosperity knits a man to the World, He feels that he is "finding his place in it," while really it is finding its place in him.  (132)

Nowhere do we tempt so successfully as on the very steps on the altar. (172) 

The work of spiritual warfare seems to be more tactics than force.  According to Lewis, we find ourselves more outmaneuvered by Satan than overpowered by him.  In the end, we are defeated by our own desires.  It is this end to which the Devil works.  "Get behind me Satan!  You are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of men!"

What sorts of things keep my mind from being set on God?  Forgetfulness brought on by keeping God on the outskirts of my life through "great" causes, diminishing pleasures, trust in God "moderated" into mere talk,  being of the World, holding onto my body as if I owned it, etc.  The options are endless and yet surprisingly repetitive.

If I were to sum up Screwtape's strategy, it would be to keep God out of the mind.  He talks of the many ways of using the flesh (natural human ability, status, and experience apart from God) and the World (organized, historically-moving, institutional flesh) to keep God out of the picture.  The gospel is intended to "renew the mind" for the transformation of my life.  The good news is that I do not have to forget or neglect God, but can live with his continual presence in my mind, and also in my life.  The kingdom that Jesus rules is the continual, eternal, working influence of God in each life and outward into all the universe.

Satan's tactics certainly do make for a strong assault.  Through lies and temptation, I am easily led to destruction.  Without God to lead me elsewhere, I will go astray.  Unlike Satan, God does not intend to control me, but to influence me deeply, fill me, work in and through me.  He is a loving Father always near, not a calculating tyrant, always coercing and manipulating.  Satan's main lie and temptation is simple: "You can't trust Jesus.  Trust yourself instead."

Lord, it is one thing to talk about Satan academically and another to face his lies and temptation in my life.  Let me continually set my mind on you.  Let me not listen to those lies, but only to your truth.  "May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer."  Amen.


The small temptations and sins lead to bigger ones.  The battles begin with arguments and skirmishes before they become all out war.  I cannot patrol the borders of my life alone.  The Lord is my shield and fortress and an ever-present help in trouble.

Compassion and Giving

Devotional Classics, Elizabeth O'Connor, Excerpts from Letters to Scattered Pilgrims

We covenant with Christ and one another to give proportionately beginning with a tithe of our incomes.

Proportionate giving has kept us from mistaking our churchgoing for Christianity, and from looking at our neighbor to see what we should be doing.

It was not that our souls were so quickly converted, but that we sensed that something important was going on, and we wanted to be a part of it.  We had been captured by a man's vision of what community might do if it really cared about the oppressed and the suffering.

In a recent sermon on money Gordon [Cosby] said as forcefully as ever that to give away money is to win a victory over the dark powers that oppress us.  He talked about reclaiming for ourselves the energy with which we have endowed money.

Despite our corporate style and our exposure to the issues that are raised around the subject of money, we know  that we have not gained much "downward mobility."  While we have succeeded in stabilizing our standard of living, most of us cling to what we have known.  Though the budgets of our faith communities are large by traditional standards, we are fully aware that they represent only a fraction of the potential giving of the congregation.

Coming to know some of our suffering sisters and brothers in the Third World and in the ghettos of Washington has made all the difference in the way we view the earth.  The unemployment statistics are made up of people that we know.

Through we along with millions of other churchgoers are saying that Jesus saves, we ask ourselves if we are not in practice acting as though it were money that saves.

Do we believe that money and possessions have away of coming between people who want to be in community with each other?  Do we really believe that every life has resources more priceless that gold, and that our hearts, minds, and labor are adequate for any task?  What is the world is right and there are things that only money can buy, gifts of the spirit that only money can unlock, and blocks that only money can push aside?  (pp. 251-255)

You cannot serve both God and money.  (Matthew 6:24)

In the ways of money, I usually feel I am on the foothills of great mountains.  I glimpse the heights, but they seem so far off.  I give, but not with freedom and abandon.  I sweat out the times when money is tight and easily rejoice when we have a little extra to spend, showing that my viewpoint is still set much lower than it will be.  I have much climbing to do, and with faith and hope, much greater sights to see.

It is encouraging and discouraging at the same time to see people who have come a long way compared to "traditional standards" and yet still find there is much higher to go.  It is encouraging to know that my struggles and questions are not merely from my immaturity in this matter, but from the pervasive and powerful influence of money on people's lives.  It is discouraging because although there is a certain "stabilizing [in my] standard of living" I can anticipate, there is an uphill climb to let go of money and other temporary items and walk with Jesus in "downward mobility."

O'Connor puts before me the barrier that money and possessions are to community.  Money often works against sharing, relating, giving, and creating.  An interesting picture of this is the use of gift cards instead of gifts.  It is as if the most important part of a gift is what a person wants.  A gift card makes gift giving more impersonal, self-centered, and ritualistic.  It removes much of the warmth that other gifts could supply.

Money insulates me from other people.  I but things for myself instead of asking and sharing with others.  Money insulates me from life.  Instead of learning and building, I pay and try to manage.  Money insulates me from pain and suffering.  Instead of walking with those who suffer, I try to make them better with money.

Not that money is bad in itself.  It can do great good.  Because of my tendency to look to my own status and abilities apart from God (the flesh) to accomplish what I want, money often plays right into the hands of greed, fear, and worry.  In this sense, it is an oppressing power that I can become increasingly free from through generous giving.  There are vast resources of energy stored and wasted on money-making and gathering that I might tap into if I could just let go.

O'Connor gives some hints for such freedom.  First, there is discipline.  For my own good and the good of those around me, "proportionate" giving is a powerful tool.  It is not righteousness.  It is not something that will set me higher than others or give me greater favor with God.  It is a wisdom for living with God in his kingdom now and forever.  It is simply the guide for right investment of my money: rich toward God.

Along with such a discipline, perhaps even prior to it, a vision of being a part of "something really important" is essential.  The widow gave her last cent to the temple because of a vision of God's greatness, his goodness, and his generosity.  Such giving will bring about much greater things that larger gifts of money that had no hope, faith, or vision with them.  Giving money must be accompanied by a "given" life, or as Paul puts it in Romans 12:1, a "living sacrifice."  The vision of "something greater" is that of King Jesus and his kingdom in these days and into all eternity.

Also, the investment of money comes from really caring about the oppressed and the suffering.  Really, it is fundamentally why money has been entrusted to me.  The great vision of God is that all his children might be cared for, just as I would desire it for my own.  Coming to know those who suffer and are oppressed instills a greater sense of responsibility when I work with my money.  Granted, such a focus can become a mere guilt-trip and even become near-sighted enough to see money as the primary gift I am to give.

To keep such  things as guilt and mere social justice from warping compassion, I need to keep the "inward" journey balanced with the "outward" journey, as O'Connor's Church of the Saviour sought to do.  I must not mistake giving money as compassion any more than churchgoing is real Christianity.  Insightfully, she says I must avoid the practice of "looking at our neighbor to see what we should be doing."  To some degree, it is okay for me to be on the foothills of giving.

Lord, keep my eyes on the oppressed and suffering, my hand ever ready to give up and hand over my things, and most of all, my heart on that "something more important": you, your kingdom, your hope for a loving family in the likeness of Jesus.  Money is a "small thing" in your eyes, but it can be big enough to keep me from you.  Free me from its oppression today.  My hands are open before you.  Take what you will and leave me with you, Father.  Amen.


I want to deepen my vision of that loving community and family that the Lord longs for.  I want to seek this kingdom not as a dream or a project, but as a reality I have yet to see and encounter.  The kingdom is here and has so much more growing to do in God's time and by his power.  I will seek this kingdom through learning how to give more freely and with more abandon.  I believe I will discover that deeper community on the way.