Dear BPCWA worshipper, Last week, we saw how sin affected all of mankind with a hatred of God and everything that God says. Fallen man loves darkness rather than light. This darkness refers not just to death, but everything which is against the light of God’s truth. There is a natural aversion to what God says and wants. We saw how everyone who is born into this world has a mind that is alienated from God and needs the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit in our lives. In salvation, we become “in Christ . . . a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2Co 5:17). Does this then mean that the world’s evil and seduction around us which “shall wax worse and worse” (2Ti 3:13) will not affect Christians and we will always go towards God’s light? This is something that we must understand, both for the individual and for the parent desiring to bring up godly seed for Christ.

A battle for the mind. All around us, “the whole world lieth in wickedness” (1Jo 5:19) where the Christian fights against “principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Eph 6:12). Satan sought to poison Eve’s mind. He knows then and knows now that it is the most effective means to get us to fall. Every believer must be acutely aware that Christians are bombarded with the world’s ideas through being brought up and living in the world, as well as the call of our fleshly nature that remains in us. The world’s ideas and philosophies may even be so prevalent that they are already an integral part of our living in our homes and even church, and yet we are not aware that we are living them out in our lives. Every idea about life and practice must be mindfully compared to God’s Light, i.e. His Word. Parents will attest to the fact that even when our children go to school, we must be on guard against things taught that may be contrary to Christian values. This continues throughout our life, whether in university, in the workplace, or into senior age. Media propounds the world’s values to convince the reader to follow their view of things. There continues, just like in the Garden of Eden, the battle to convince the mind of what is “right” and “attractive” in the minds of man. With our fallen minds, man has set his own crooked standards for right or wrong, good or evil, true or false, and what is or is not sin. When Pilate asked in Joh 18:38 “What is truth?”, it shows the blindness of man. This question indeed expresses the battle to persuade (or like the serpent, seduce) one onto Satan’s side, away from God’s light. As Satan tries to change the world to follow his definition of what are “right” values, his propaganda machine constantly whirls all around us and has already affected many Christians in almost every aspect of our living. This can already be seen, for example, in how we keep the Lord’s Day, the family model, and man’s chief end.

We still need renewing. Regeneration does not mean that your mind becomes perfected in God’s light. It is precisely due to the need for the perfecting of the mind that God commands Christians to “be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God” (Ro 12:2). This means approaching God’s Word with humility of the mind so that God’s light alone is the compass by which we judge what is truth and what is good, even if it means that what we’ve been so used to and may have even come to like is actually contrary to God’s righteousness and holiness. It means accepting that God’s light is good and right, even if everyone in the world thinks, is used to, or does otherwise. Hence, we must test and undo what we may have imbibed of the world’s ideas and way of life by testing them and then putting off what is contrary to God’s Word. Without renewing our minds, Christians may continue to put on what we’ve grown used to. Even more frightening is when the believer ends up even believing that obeying to the jot and tittle of what God says in His Word is not practical, unreasonable, unnecessary, and even cultish falsehood. And when such Christians come across believers who hold on to the conservative values according to the Word, they are considered out of touch, not keeping up with the times, not progressive, and too traditional. All these can result when even believers fail to stop and think with our renewed minds. So, they have decided that what the world teaches is true. Eventually, they can end up battling against what is godly and call good evil. Having changed sides, just as how they themselves were influenced by those around them, they will also then begin to influence and persuade others against what is godly. All this is because they have lost to Satan in the battle for the mind.

God willing, we will see in the next pastoral regarding what we need to do, now that we know that man loves darkness and will naturally be drawn in their minds to darkness.

Lu 11:34   The light of the body is the eye: therefore when thine eye is single, thy whole body also is full of light; but when thine eye is evil, thy body also is full of darkness.

Yours in our Lord’s service,
Pastor