“Those who are spiritual can evaluate all things, but they themselves cannot be evaluated by others. For, “Who can know the Lord’s thoughts? Who knows enough to teach him?” But we understand these things, for we have the mind of Christ.”
1 Corinthians 2:15-16 NLT
The “mind of Christ”? We need to let that thought sink in for a moment. Paul didn’t say that it was he, and him alone, that had the “mind of Christ”. There was a “we” involved, as he wrote to the Corinthian believers. He had just written that spiritual people, believers like him, could “evaluate all things”, and in addition, people who were unbelievers would be unable to evaluate the believers. In other words, the believers had access to the spiritual truths we read about in preceding verses, access denied to unbelievers who had no time for the spiritual world in God’s Kingdom anyway. In the second verse of our text today, Paul quoted from the Greek version of Isaiah 40, from a section entitled “The Lord Has No Equal” in my Bible. Isaiah 40:13 asks the questions, “Who is able to advise the Spirit of the Lord? Who knows enough to give him advice or teach him?” But Paul wrote to the Corinthians that they would know the answers to difficult questions such as these, because they have the “mind of Christ”.
The passage of Scripture in Isaiah 40 provides a glimpse of how wonderful it is to be able to have access to the “mind of Christ”. We, of course, know that in those pre-incarnation days, while Isaiah was writing, Jesus was still in Heaven with God. And as Isaiah mused in his writings, thinking Holy Spirit-inspired thoughts, he set down a series of questions that are relevant for both believers and unbelievers. Some he answered, but the remainder are left hanging in the air, unable to be answered by mere human beings. Questions such as, “Has the Lord ever needed anyone’s advice? Does he need instruction about what is good? Did someone teach him what is right or show him the path of justice?” (verse 14), or “To whom can you compare God? What image can you find to resemble him?” (verse 18). Then there is “Haven’t you heard? Don’t you understand? Are you deaf to the words of God— the words he gave before the world began? Are you so ignorant?” (verse 21). But the wonderful thing is that believers like us pilgrims filled with the Holy Spirit, know the answers to these questions, because we have “the mind of Christ”.
If we take the first question that I have quoted from Isaiah 40, “Has the Lord ever needed anyone’s advice?”, we know the answer because God is omniscient, meaning that He is all-knowing. So we pilgrims know we only have to go to God for answers to life’s difficult questions, such as what is the purpose of life? We watch the worldly people around us struggling to find an answer to questions such as this, as they thrash around, out of their depth. In answer to other societal challenges and problems, centred on their definition of morality, the politicians try and introduce laws to legislate an answer, helping people to live in the way they think is appropriate. Another topical question is about how gender can be defined, and in response, the secular leaders and other influential people in our society try and introduce a laughably false ideology which proposes that there may be up to a hundred different genders. Really? If only such people had the “mind of Christ” as we do, then they would know the answer. And then we have the question, “To whom can you compare God?”. Our medics will come up with their findings in medicine, our scientists in physics and chemistry. The geologists will refer to their understanding of the world’s origins through rocks and geological strata. The archaeologists will display their fossils and other ancient findings along with their definitions of age, and follow up with conclusions of how they got to where they were found. But none of them can answer Isaiah’s question, because they do not have the “mind of Christ”.
Jesus said to His disciples that when He had left this world, He would send them an Advocate, a Comforter, Someone who would bring to the disciples’ minds what they had been told. “But when the Father sends the Advocate as my representative—that is, the Holy Spirit—he will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I have told you” (John 14:26). Earlier in this Corinthian journey we read 1 Corinthians 2:10, “But it was to us that God revealed these things by his Spirit. For his Spirit searches out everything and shows us God’s deep secrets“. We must allow this revelation to sink deep within our spirits. Did Paul really mean that through the Holy Spirit we would have access to “God’s deep secrets”? That’s what he said, and he finished this passage with another revelation, that we have the “mind of Christ”.
Jesus said, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own but will tell you what he has heard. He will tell you about the future” (John 16:13). We Spirit-filled believers are in a powerful position because we can see the world from God’s perspective. We have access to absolute truth in a world that can only expose relative truths, and even then, only in the light of human understanding. As an example, some centuries ago, the general belief was that the world in which we live was flat. If you sailed too near the edge, then you would fall off into some void, never to be seen again. That was regarded as “truth” to the scientists and ordinary people of the day. But today, the old “truth” has been replaced by a new “truth”, that the world is in fact a sphere. When we consider the spiritual realm, though, truth takes on a different meaning. We pilgrims believe that one day, because of our faith, we will be received into our new home in Heaven. To us, that is the truth, revealed in God’s Word. Take, for example, John 3:16, “For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life”. Jesus said it, and because He spoke no lies, it must be truth, absolute truth. We can’t prove it to the unbelieving sceptics around us, but one day everyone will find out that this is indeed the truth. In His High Priestly prayer, Jesus said, “Make them holy by your truth; teach them your word, which is truth” (John 17:17). We know of course about what Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 4:4, “Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God“.
But we pilgrims are not followers of satan; instead, we are followers of Jesus, and we have the “mind of Christ”. We have been redeemed from the lies of this age and now can look forward to a time when only truth will prevail. I don’t know about you, dear friends, but sometimes when I see the state of the world around me, I can’t wait!
Dear Heavenly Father. One day, we will realise the fullness of life with You in a place we call Heaven. There will be no wars there between truth and lies, because You are truth, and there will be no sin in Heaven. And so we continue our journeys to glory, step by step, sometimes wearily, but always in the light of Your truth, revealed by the “mind of Christ”. Thank You. Amen.
Being a Pilgrim 