Repent: Part 1: Change Your Mind
Once again the season of Lent is upon us. In six weeks we will celebrate Easter again. Over the years, what I have noticed is that Lent is observed, Easter is celebrated, and on the Monday after Easter Sunday, life goes back to normal. Does anything really change in your life because of Lent? For most people, the answer is No.
If you really want Lent to become a life changing experience for you this year, you have to diligently cooperate and actively participate in Lent for 40 days. You cannot let the Lenten fervor disappear as soon as the ashes on your forehead is washed away. You cannot remain a casual participant or a sporadic disciple and expect anything life changing happen to you on Easter morning.
So what are we supposed to do during Lent? You hear the familiar question:what are you giving up for lent? Lent is not about giving up chocolates, or stopping a bad habit like smoking or drinking or gambling. That is a good start but we have to do something more.
So let us start with some basics. The reading for the first Sunday of Lent has a very important word in it. The word is “repent.” That is the first word John the Baptist uttered when he asked the people to prepare the way of the Lord. That is the first word Jesus himself used at the beginning of his public ministry. Jesus said:
The time has come. The kingdom of God is near. Repent.
As far as Jesus is concerned, if you want to turn your life around from being an exhausting struggle in this valley of tears to a a joyful enterprise, in the kingdom of God, you have to start with repentance. What is repentance? It does not mean what you think it means. It is the most misunderstood word in the religious vocabulary.
Most Christians would say that repent means, feeling sorry for their sins. Dictionary definition is “sincere regret or remorse.”That is not the biblical definition of repentance. The dictionary definition of repentance has dominated our preaching and discussions that we have forgotten the real meaning of repentance.
If you can get that one word right with its deeper meaning and implications for life, your life will change. It changed for me. So I am going to do a Lenten series of 5 sermons, starting today, explaining the real meaning of Repentance.
The New Testament Greek word for repent is METANOIEO. It is a combo word, META (different), NOUS (mind) — a DIFFERENT MIND!
So repentance has something to do with your thinking. Something has to happen in your brain and in your mind before it can be translated into a behavior.
Somebody came up with a nice acronym for lent. It stands for Let’s Eliminate Negative Thinking.
It is a good start. See the word thinking is in it.
So the first thing Jesus wants us to do is to have a different mind. If you want to have a different mind, you may have to change your current mind, about a lot of things.
Are you willing to re-examine your thinking about topics such as God, Jesus, faith, bible,church, politics, abortion, guns control, poverty, inequality, injustice,war, immigration, etc. What you think about all these issues may not be in alignment with the mind of Christ. If not, are you willing to change your mind? Believe me, changing your mind about something that you have believed for a long time is very hard.
Our thick skull and narrow mind which is wrapped around a proud ego, will not easily budge on issues that we believe in. Since changing our mind through prayer, reflection and humility, is much harder to do, we would rather give up some chocolates for lent and go thru the motions. And that is why Lent comes and goes, Easter comes and goes, and noting really changes, because we have not changed our thinking.
If you are serious about changing your life from being a lethargic existence to a thriving life, you have to use your brain that God gave you to navigate your life. You must focus first on you thinking because all of your experiences originate as a thought in your brain and is processed in your mind.
What consumes our minds, controls our lives; Our minds create our reality. In fact, there is no external reality that was not created in the mind first.
That is why the book of proverbs says “As a man thinketh, so is he (proverbs 23.7)
So, if there is one activity that is crucial to a risen life filled with joy, hope and peace, it is our thinking, but unfortunately, many people do not engage in the act of clear and right thinking, period.
In an episode of Dr. Phil on teen parenthood, I saw the troubling sight of a 17 year old boy and a 16 year old girl with their one month old baby, in the boy’s lap. I consider it troubling because, these teens have callously forfeited their opportunity to be children and have forced themselves to the roles of parents, for which they are neither ready, nor prepared. It portends trouble both for the teens and the child and society at large.
An incredulous Dr. Phil asked them: What were you thinking? The boy sheepishly answered: I guess we were not thinking…At least that is an honest answer. Of course, as the hormones took over, they were not thinking about the ramifications of their behavior which resulted in their unplanned pregnancy. When hormones rage, neurons fade. When hormones run the show, neurons leave the scene.
I would like to ask that question to Parkland Shooter Nicholas Cruz. What was he thinking when he walked into his former school carrying an AR-15? Obviously he was not thinking right. His brain was firing hate-neurons, flooding his body with stress hormones and contaminating his mind with anger, resentment and bitterness, and all that ugly stuff, spilled out through the barrel of a gun into the bodies of 17 innocent victims and into the lives of thousands of people who loved them. But the seeds of that terrible carnage of February 14th 2018 were sown and germinated in his mind months before that.
Since our brain is the most important organ of our body, how we use it determines the quality of our life in all areas, personal, social and spiritual.
According to Ken Keys, your bio-computer with which you are equipped is the most remarkable instrument in the universe. Your only problem is to learn to use it properly. It operates with enormous power primarily on unconscious levels — with only a tiny portion of its activity rising to the level of consciousness. …your journey into higher consciousness is a matter of your learning how to properly program your remarkable bio-computer. When you really learn to operate your exquisite machine, you will be able to fully realize your potential for a happy life.
Our brain has a very important role to play in our spiritual life. However, when it comes to religion and faith, many people are reluctant or even afraid to use their brains. I hear people say, we have to take it on faith; we are not allowed to ask questions or challenge our sacred traditions. Many, people live with bumper sticker faith. It goes like this: God said it, I believe it and that settles it.
Speaking of bumper sticker faith, let me tell you a story about what one of our church members did last week. She was driving into the parking lot of Walmart and noticed that two drivers were waiting for the same spot from which a shopper was pulling out. One of them dashed into that spot although the other driver was closer to the spot and had waited longer. Rose noticed that the offending driver had bumper stickers like “Jesus Saves” and the fish symbol and a sticker from his local church. Rose told the driver that what he did was wrong and that he should remove those stickers from his car!
A bumper sticker faith is often a dead faith, which rarely transforms life, because such a believer has not seriously thought about the meaning of what he believes. We should strive for a faith that seeks understanding.
If you don’t understand what you believe, you are unlikely to have experienced it, and if you have not experienced it, it is unlikely to change your life.
Socrates said that an examined life is not worth living. I believe that an examined faith cannot be life changing.
For many people their mind is like society’s waste basket. Preachers, politicians, friends and neighbors throw stuff into our minds and very often we believe them without engaging in prayerful reflection and processing them using our brains. In this age of unrestricted and unregulated social media, our minds can be filled with so much garbage. You must stay vigilant and process everything in your brain using the mind of Christ as a filter.
The other day I went to see a hospice patient. A deacon from her church was visiting with her. He had the bible open. They were discussing, heaven and hell. So the deacon asked me: “Chaplain what do you think of heaven? and I said: “I don’t think heaven is a gated community beyond the clouds that we can locate on a Google map.” He was not happy to hear that. He said, but Jesus ascended into heaven, and descended into hell and so heaven must be up there and hell must be down under.
And I said; but the notion of ascending and descending is based on the assumption that the earth is flat. The biblical authors who lived more than 2000 years ago were not privy to the discoveries of Copernicus and Galileo who proved that the earth is round. How can we speak of up and down on a round earth, because today’s up is tomorrow’s down.
A flat earth theology will not fit into a round earth cosmology.
Besides, Jesus also said, don’t look here and there for the Kingdom, because the Kingdom of God is within you. The deacon said I was arguing with the word of god, and I said: I was only arguing with the words of men. Because the bible is the word of God in the words of men. Word of god is transmitted thru the words of men-with all their limitations, biases, prejudices and preconceived notions. The deacon said I was stressing him out and left the room.
Now, if that deacon were willing change his mind about heaven being a place of residence above the earth, to a state of being down on earth, he would have a better chance of experiencing heaven on earth and he is likely to try to create heaven on earth.
Remember, your thinking creates your reality!
God gave us a brain to use it, to figure out life, including our spiritual life. You cannot shut off the engine of your car and expect to ride on the road. Similarly, you cannot shut off your brain and expect to enjoy this roller coaster ride called life.
I don’t draw a line between my regular life and spiritual life. I don’t compartmentalize my physical life, my emotional life and my spiritual life. Each one flows into the other and impacts each other and the engine that drives, regulates and and process my life is the brain, which creates my mind, which ultimately shapes my life.
In order to do have a peaceful and harmonious life, we have to have a healthy and open mind. Our mind is like a parachute. It works only if it is open.
Cultivate a mind that is open, flexible and adaptable to include the ironies, the mysteries and the contradictions of life; a mind that can engage beyond binary thinking of black and white and either or, a mind that is not afraid to think outside the box. A mind that is not afraid to ask serious questions about life.
A mind that is bold enough and yet humble enough to ask serious questions about the future of our church at this time of transition. I will talk more about that next week. A mind that can hold the natural and the supernatural aspects of our lives in a unitive whole. That is the only way we can be agents of wholeness in a fragmented world.
That is why the first thing Jesus wants us to do during this Lent is Repent..change our thinking so that we can have a different mind.
True repentance is about examining your mind, engaging your mind, nurturing your mind, opening your mind, changing your mind , cleansing your mind and ultimately renewing your mind.
And that is exactly what apostle Paul meant when he said:
“Put on the mind of Christ; be not conformed to the patterns of this world: but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” (Rom. 12.2)
I pray that you set apart some serious time during the next 40 days for serious prayer and reflection and regular communal worship.
