How Our Mindset Affects Our Vision

When we talk about vision, of course we talk about our eyes, but I'm going to talk about mental vision. Eventually, we're going to talk about spiritual vision. To put it simple, your mental vision is what you see the future. We all have some thoughts of the future. Now, some people live life so much day by day that if you said, what's next week supposed to look like, they would say, I don't know. Now, if you ask me what next week is supposed to look like, I would visualize my day planner and I could already tell you what I have planned for Sunday, Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday of next week. Because, you know, at least most of it, because I haven't written down my day plan. Some people live so much of the day, but we still have some mental picture. I'll give you an example. You hate your job. You hate your job. So, you get up in the morning and the first thing that you visualize is, I gotta go to work. I hate this job.

I hate what I do. It's so boring. Everybody there is so grumpy. Of course, they're all saying the same thing about you. It's drudgery. I don't want to do this. And so, you're visualizing today. Not only are you visualizing today, you're actually planning it to turn out badly. You're actually planning it in your mind. It's going to turn out the way you see it. Now, you say, well, okay, I guess I don't plan. I do plan some. But how you plan, what you visualize creates a mindset.

We're going to talk about mindset today. What I visualize creates a mindset.

Now, if you don't believe that, think about this.

In fact, I was up at the home office last week and we were doing some TV programs and a snowstorm was coming in. One of the guys said, he says, I love my job. I absolutely love my job. I love coming here every day, but they just announced that they're going to shut the office down at three o'clock today because of the snowstorm. And he says, I feel like a little kid when he found out school is canceled for the day. He says, I'm all excited. I'm going home two hours earlier. He was talking to himself. I'm going home two hours earlier, but I'm all excited. You know, like I get a gift or something. He visualized going home. And all of a sudden, even though he liked his job, he was excited. So if you get up in the morning and it's Friday, and you hate your job, Fridays are somehow better than the other days. Why? Because you're visualizing the weekends about to begin. The Sabbath is going to begin. I'm going to get a weekend off, and I'm going to get some rest. I'm going to see everybody at church. And you're visualizing that future, and Friday is the best day of work. So what we visualize determines, eventually, determines our mindset, how we actually think and feel during the day. I'm going to talk a little bit about a young man who was given a vision by God. And this young man was living the vision, I mean living the dream, as we say. And then a series of bad things happened to him. He ended up estranged from his family. He ended up in absolute poverty. And then he ended up being put in jail for something he didn't do. That wasn't what he thought God was going to do in his life.

And yet, he had a mindset that God was still able to work through him, even to those difficulties. We'll come back to him in a minute. That's why we must have a clear understanding, and this is what the Holy Days do for us. The Sabbath and the Holy Days bring us back into this closeness with God so that we have a vision of what he's doing. When we come up to Passover, we get the vision again. Oh yeah, he's pleading us. He forgives us. He loves us. I mean, the Passover is all about God's love for us. The Days of Unleavened Bread are all about growth and overcoming and the positiveness of becoming more and more like Christ. And sin is removed from us. And what is put into us? So the Spirit of God is the blood of Christ. So what do we do? We have a vision. The problem is you can get up in the morning and vision how the day is going to be, but it doesn't work out that way because of things that keep happening to you, right? Many times, happiness and success is based not on what happens to us, but how we respond to what happens to us. Because you and I don't have a lot of control over what things that happen to us. And so we have this vision. God wants me to do this, this, and this, and you can get up saying, okay, God, I see the vision for my life today, and this is what's going to happen. And then something terrible happens, and suddenly that whole vision of God is gone. And you're trapped in the moment, what's happening to you in the moment. Your mindset, then, is not just your vision. It is your vision, but it's something else. Now we talked a lot about vision when we talked about the Holy Days, especially the fall Holy Days, right? The return of Jesus Christ, and looking forward to that. But something else has to happen. How you view the future that God has planned for you has to create a mindset that is today. Now many psychologists will say that there's two mindsets, negative and positive, but I'm going to say there's, I'm going to go through today, two biblical mindsets that aren't negative and positive. They're what the Bible says about two mindsets. They're mindsets. They are not only, the mindset isn't just your vision of the future, but it contains the collection along your beliefs about life, your assumptions about life, and your attitudes. So here we have your attitudes, beliefs, and assumptions all coupled together with what you think the future should be.

The truth is, folks, most, many of our beliefs and assumptions and attitudes about life are not in line with God's vision, or we have a different vision than what God wants. So we can't figure out how this is supposed to work. And let me give you an example. Young Nan decides what's going to be the perfect woman, so he creates a vision of the perfect woman. She's beautiful. She is a, yep, five foot six. She's got black hair. Her eyes look a certain way. She's a certain shape.

She's funny. She thinks he's the most incredible being God ever created.

She dedicates her life to making him happy, to waiting on him hand and foot, to serving his every need, submitting to him the way God says a woman should submit to him. Now, everybody's saying, boy, is that guy in for a real bad time, right? But that's his vision. Now, his beliefs, his attitudes, his assumptions about life are all tied up in that vision, aren't they?

That's what he believed God wants. That's what he believes he wants. That's what he believes this woman is going to want. So his attitudes and his beliefs, the assumptions are all tied up in this vision. So he finds the girl that seems to meet the bill and he marries her. And when she doesn't meet the vision, he's angry and he's frustrated and he treats her terribly. Why is she treating her terribly? His mindset and his vision don't meet reality. So we're talking about the vision God gives us, especially through the Sabbath of the Holy Days. But what's our mindset? Because God can give us the vision and we don't get the vision because of our mindset. He says, okay, you're going to talk about being positive, being negative. No, I'm not going to talk about the psychological definition of mindset. I'm going to talk about the biblical definition.

Let's take a look at the young man I talked about. His life vision was given to him by God.

He knew what God wanted for his life, probably as intently as any young person has ever known.

He knew it. His family, even his parents, believed that God has special purpose for him. He was excited. He was happy. Then Genesis 37.

And let's pick it up in verse 3. We all have to have the right vision, but we have to have the right mindset. Now, I'm going to break down what a mindset is in the middle, admitted here, in terms of the biblical description of a mindset. Genesis 37 verse 3. Now, Israel loved Joseph more than all of his children, because he was the son of his old age. Also, he had made him a tunic of many colors. But when his brother saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him and could not speak peaceably to him. Okay. We know that Joseph is chosen by God. In fact, we're going to see in a minute where God... You know, it's nice we get our visions through the Bible. God actually gave him a vision.

God gave him an actual vision where he saw what his life was supposed to be like.

That's pretty powerful. Joseph was the apple of his dad's eye, but it says his brothers could not even deal with him peaceably. So this was happening, but it didn't take him away. He knew the vision. He knew what God wanted for him. He's living the right way. He's got this down. He's got the vision God wants for him. And he's a young guy. Probably, at this point, he's been the late teens.

Now, verse 5. Now, Joseph had a dream. He told it to his brothers that they hated him even more. So he said to them, please hear this dream, which I have dreamed. Oh, I get a vision from God.

The kid just won't shut up.

There we were, binding sheaves in the field, that behold, my sheaf arose, and also stood upright, and indeed your sheaves stood around and bowed down to my sheaf. Now, they all knew what this meant. This was a vision from God. Verse 8, and his brother said to him, shall you indeed reign over us? Or shall you indeed have to beg it over us? So they hated him even more for his dreams and for his words. I mean, he was just a little guy that just drove the older brothers crazy. Well, there was Benjamin was younger, but, you know, most of them were older. He drove them crazy.

And he, you know, he gets special favors from God, he gets special favors from Dad, and he lets us know, I have a vision, I have a purpose. Come on, guys! Someday, I'll be the most important guy in the family. Right? Then he dreamed his other dream. And he told his father and mother, verse 10, he told him to his father and his brothers, his father rebuked him, saying, what is this dream that you have dreamed? So your mother and I, your brothers and Dean come down, bow down to the earth before you? Even his dad now is getting tired of this.

Okay? You're taking this vision a little too far, son, on your mindset. Now he's being a little cocky here, he's being, you know, but he's excited! God's telling, revealing things to him.

He has a good future ahead of him. Verse 11, and his brothers envied him, but his father kept the matter in mind. He was dead, said, well, okay, maybe this is his vision for the future. Maybe this is what God wants for him. But his brothers hated him and they envied him.

You imagine the shock of having your own brothers throw you in a well. He probably thought it was a joke. Okay, guys, I've been down here long enough. It's a dry well, but, you know, out in the desert, I throw him down in a dry well. Okay, the joke's over. I get it. Why do I tell dad?

Okay, guys, I won't tell dad. Just let me out.

And then he's dragged out, and here's his brothers arguing, a couple of them with a couple of traitors, and they're giving him coins. And finally, he finds himself tied to the back of a camel, being, you know, running along, being dragged along. And they're going not towards his home, or he had never left home. He had never been away from home. He's being dragged out into the desert. He's going west. He's going away from home. And then, you know, a few hours later, he begins to think, maybe it's not a joke. The next day, he realizes his vision is gone.

Absolutely gone. What God had told him must not be true. Then he gets to Egypt, where he lives in absolutely... he lives in poverty. He is a slave. But he lives in a rich person's house. Well, that's not too bad. The rich man's wife tries to seduce her, or seduce him. He stands up and does the right thing, and for that he gets falsely accused and put in jail. He's in jail for years.

There's no nice house. Mom and dad aren't around. There's no laughing with the brothers sitting around the campfire. There's nothing. There's living in a prison in Egypt. There's no wife. There's no children. Ah, you know, there's no big glass of goat's milk and some goat's cheese.

There's none of the stuff he grew up on. It's all gone.

Now we're going to see in a little bit what it was about Joseph's mindset is why he did not give up, because the vision became very, very muddy at this point.

And there are times in life when God's vision for us becomes muddy.

What God is doing in our lives can become very muddy, very, very hard to understand.

At that point, we have to go back and say, what is our mind? What are our attitudes, beliefs, and assumptions about life? So why didn't he give up? Why didn't he give up?

Okay. Talk about mindset. Let's look at a slide here. I'm breaking down biblical mindset into simple concepts. Now, I could have put these in different orders, but I just started here.

Okay, you see up here, our mindset, what I do every day. I have a vision of what this day is supposed to look like. But what happens in my emotions and my thoughts, what happens in me during this day, even though I might have a great vision? Because, man, you know, you have a great vision. I can remember getting up. I was working in a radio station. That day, I had two clients that were going to make huge, you know, we were going to renew these huge contracts. And I was going to walk in, and I was going to be the hero of the radio station. And you get up, and one of them is sick and cancels. The other one you go to talk, and he says, look, I'm cutting my advertising budget. You know, he's going to be owning a fourth of what it was last year. Public vision of this day, right? And there's discouragement. Everybody suffers discouragement. Everybody suffers changes. But what in your mindset keeps you going? Our mindset every day starts with our motivations, actions, and emotions. Now, what's so difficult here is this is sort of ambiguous, right? We all have emotions, and those emotions are jerked around by what happens to us every day.

All of us are being jerked around by what happens to us every day. We have actions. Those actions have to adapt every day to what's happening every day.

And we have motivations. Why we do what we do. Most of the time, we don't know why we do what we do.

Part of our examination of ourselves has to be, why do I do what I do?

That's part of the core of what Christianity is. Christianity doesn't just change our actions. God's Spirit changes our motivations. It doesn't just change our actions. It changes our motivations.

So, we have motivations, actions, and emotions, and those are very ambiguous, but those are part of our motivations, right? If you are very, very happy one day, you're motivated by that emotion, and you treat people differently.

If you're very depressed one day, you're motivated by that emotion, and you treat people differently.

But we also have, and here's what's very important, these things cannot be trusted all the time.

You can't always trust your emotions, your actions, or your own motivations.

So, if we can't always trust this, we have to have criteria which we judge ourselves.

That means our value system and our decision-making process. Now, over the last year, I gave a couple sermons on value systems.

And I talked about secular humanism, comparative to Christian value system. Okay, you have to have you have to think through your value system.

I've had crisis in my life that struck at my Christian value system, and I had to make decisions. And I've spent two months at a time fasting once a week, and praying and asking God, help me, because I cannot trust these. But I must have a value system and a decision-making process that gives my mind to... because my vision is gone. Okay, I don't know what you're doing. I don't know what to do. So, what do I do? Well, then I must seek God's value system and decision-making process, which brings us to this next quadrant down here, is what is our source of knowledge. Now, you see, every one of these quadrants can be good or bad, and they can be different in each person and not necessarily be good or evil. In other words, every one of us have different personalities. And we have to tell the difference between a personality difference and theater, something like that. I mean, we all have different personalities. And some people's personalities are happy all the time, which is sort of nice for a while, but every once in a while it's like, don't be so happy. Then we have people that are sort of just...

their personality is such they're just sort of melancholy. There's people that go back and forth between those things. There's people that are extroverts. There are people that are introverts. Those are all issues of personality. Those are not issues of good and evil.

So, that's another issue here, is that we have our personalities. So, what we have to do is have some criteria, and that means we have to have a source of knowledge and authority.

We have to have some source of knowledge and authority. Now, we're going to go through the two different mindsets in the Bible, and both of them have different sources of knowledge and different sources of authority. And then we have relationships. Now, this is all part of our mindset. So, you wake up with a vision that today is going to be a certain way, and your motivation, action, and emotions will be driven towards that vision. Your value system and decision-making process will try to fulfill that vision. Your source of knowledge and authority will give you the criteria by which to face that day, and how you treat other people then will happen is you go towards your vision. To tell you the truth, a lot of people go through life with no vision at all except, I want to get through the day, come home, and have a beer.

For some people, that's what life is. And so, during the day, what do they do?

They go through work not really enjoying it, just waiting for it to be done so they can go home and do what? Have a beer with their buddies, or watch television. That's all life is, and I know people like that. And, you know, in this case, we know what their motivations and actions are, their emotions are using very, very detrimental self-depreciation and self-destructive. They don't have any really value system. Their decision-making process is, I just want to get through the day and have a beer. You know, source of knowledge and authority is themselves. Relationships don't work very well with these people. You really don't have much of a friendship with them unless you're a beer-drinking buddy. That's it.

So, what do you have here as an alcoholic? And what's the other people he has relationships with?

Alcoholics.

So the mindset is very important. As you work through and help people go through the difficulties we have in life, you always have to sort what's your mindset.

It's not just, here's what God says, because here's the vision of God, because many people can't see the vision because of their mindset. Or if they see the vision, they still won't go there.

Or, they see the vision, just like Joseph did, and then get hit by a truck.

And now they've got to try to say, okay, I have the vision, but it's gone. What am I supposed to do?

When we look at the biblical mindsets, it's broken down into two categories. Like I said, most psychologists will say, well, there's two mindsets. One is positive and one is negative.

That's too simplistic. If that was true, if everybody just takes nice, positive thoughts, everything would be good in the world. And you and I both know that's not real.

So what are the two biblical mindsets? Let's go to Romans 8.

This is the hardcore Christianity we're talking about here.

It is easier to do the letter of the law than it is to do what we're talking about today.

Romans 8 verse 6. And I thought this was a little complicated for young people, but I was surprised how many of them came up and talked to me over the weekend when I did this and benefited from it, because they were able to do some self-analysis from it. Romans 8 verse 6.

For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. There's two mindsets. The problem is you and I are a mixture of both.

Here's the problem that you and I have to face. We have to face it. There are two mindsets.

One is to be carnal, which means to be meaty.

So one is to be a meathead, and one is to be spiritually minded.

One is to think like a human being in a biological way, in a non-spiritual way. And the other is to think in the way God wants us to think. So there's only two.

Now here's the problem. You and I go back and forth between those two all the time.

But eventually, one will win out.

Eventually, we will become carnally minded, or we will become spiritually minded, because you can't live both and not and be sane.

A lot of the stress that we suffer as Christians is because we have two mindsets at the same time.

And we suffer a lot of stress because of that. That's part of the Christian growth process.

Part of the… Wouldn't it be nice to be baptized, receive God's Spirit? Oh, good. From now on, everything's just… My vision is I get baptized, and I have no problems and no sins for the rest of my life.

And that lasts about five minutes.

Your vision is all messed up, you know.

But, you know, a lot of times people will come and say, I was baptized. I didn't know I had this many sins. I was baptized six months ago, and my life has fallen apart.

Yeah. We have to have this big vision for the future.

But between A and B, we have to understand the mindset it takes to follow the vision.

And to go from being carnally-minded to being spiritually-minded is a hard process that everybody goes through. It's not easy. It's difficult.

And you have to do the self-examination, because the carnal mind will fight against the spiritual mind. But once you receive God's Spirit, the spiritual mind is being developed in you.

So, you know, you have a war inside yourself.

The more carnal, or human, your mindset is, the more your life will reflect certain characteristics.

So what we're going to talk about here in a minute are characteristics.

Okay. How do I know if I'm more carnal than spiritual?

Well, each mindset produces certain characteristics. In other words, you can't look inside the person. You can only judge by what you see on the outside. And of course, any one of us, remember this, folks, every single one of us at any given moment is acting carnally-minded.

Because none of us are 100% spiritually-minded yet.

It's at any given moment. That's why we have to forgive each other so quickly.

Because the next moment it may be your turn to meet carnally-minded, okay?

This minute may be somebody else's turn, and your turn may be the next minute. So we understand that. But we also have to understand what's happening.

We also, inside ourselves, and even sometimes when we see other people, we see certain characteristics.

That's why this vision God gives us to obtain that vision. That vision has to become so much part of what we are that it affects our mindset. So let's look at the second slide here.

Because on this second slide, we'll look at what is the carnal mindset. And every one of us still fights with this. And this is where you're going to have to be really honest coming up to the Passover and looking and saying, okay, God wants me to be different. The whole purpose of the Passover is not to discourage us. It's to do the opposite.

Oh, I see what God's doing in me. I still have room to go. I still have places that God wants to take me.

So where am I in this? Yes. Hardly-minded, we are selfishly motivated.

Almost everything we do is about self. It's about me. You see yourself as the center of everything.

Other people are always judged by how they treat you. Other people are always judged by how they treat you.

Or what happens to you.

Your actions are based on immediate gratification. In the Carl Mindset, you just want to have fun. Right now, all the time, every moment. Responsibility, serving, giving to others, self-sacrifice is very difficult for the Carl Mind to do. Now, that doesn't mean it can't. It doesn't mean it can't, but it's difficult. And there's a lot of negative emotions. The Carl Mind has a lot of envy. It is easily offended. The Carl Mind is offended by everybody. Why is the Carl Mind offended by everybody? Because life is based on how other people treat me.

And there's a lot of envy. There's a lot of anger. There's an awful lot of frustration. Now, all of us experience those things, don't we? The more spiritually minded we are, the more we're able to either not have those things in their lives, or the more we're able to control them. You're never going to not have frustration. As a human being, there are certain things we're just going to experience.

It's what we do with it, how we control it. Are we controlled by the frustration, or do we learn to control that? But the more the negative emotions control us, which is what we're facing in society. I know many of you, you've talked to me about it. I have found myself sometimes, over the last couple of years, having to fight being controlled by negative emotions, because it all seems so overwhelming. Well, we have to realize that's the carnal mind.

Now, the value system, the value system of the carnal mind, is unable to discern good from evil. Now, that doesn't mean the carnal mind is 100% evil. The carnal mind can say, I don't steal, because stealing is bad. Okay? That's good. Now, I did bring home that office chair, because the company I work for is so expensive. They're so rich, it's an office chair. I didn't steal. I mean, come on, I work for them.

They owe me something. But they would never steal. They'd never do armed robbery or something. So, or, I'm not paying my taxes. Well, the Scripture commands us to pay taxes. I don't like that anymore than you do. I like benefits, by the way. I like roads, stuff. Actually, I don't mind paying a certain amount of taxes, because I get a benefit from it.

I don't like the way that taxes are used evilly. But if Paul could tell people to pay their taxes when Nero was in charge, this is not that bad yet. As bad as this is, it's not as bad as Nero. So, okay, if Paul says to do that, I'll do it. The carnal mind says, no, I'm not going to do it. So, the carnal mind, it's not that you're totally evil, or it can be totally evil, but it's such a mixture of good and evil that many times it can't tell the difference.

It also can't tell truth from error. And this is real important, too. Wisdom from foolishness. You might have a great, doctrinal understanding, but if you keep making bad decisions all the time, they keep ruining your life, you may have to stop and ask yourself, what's the problem I have in my value system? Because God's way is a way of goodness and wisdom.

Wisdom produces good results. So, if your life is constantly bad results, there's a point you have to say, maybe I have a problem with my value system. And as I said when I gave the Sermons on value system in secular humanism, this is the greatest issue our young people face today. They are taught a value system that is absolutely anti-Biblical. And they're taught it in college, they're taught it in high school, they're taught it in grade school.

Absolutely anti-Biblical. When I went to school, education was basically religiously neutral. Well, they had a Christmas party and an Easter party, but okay, you don't believe in that. Go to the library or something, you know. No play for an hour. It was to a great extent biblically or religiously neutral. It is no longer religiously neutral.

Sexular humanism is anti-Biblical. You have to understand that. So then we have the source of knowledge and authority. The carnal mind denies God as the ultimate source of knowledge and authority. The carnal mind accepts themselves, or whoever they elect, or whoever they put a charge, whoever they choose to follow, that person, that party, whatever, that is the ultimate authority. Most people go through life thinking they're the ultimate authority.

Most relationships for the carnal mind is what's in it for me. Now, once again, I'm not saying everybody without God's Spirit is completely this way. That's not possible. You will find many people. I've met people who were agnostics, who were very unselfish, had a pretty decent value system, but they did not acknowledge God as their ultimate authority. And they were pretty good in their relationships. The thing is, once you break down one of these quadrants, you will not be in the right relationship with God.

So they say, well, someone is pretty good at two out of the four quadrants. They still have a carnal mind. But you and I are still fighting the carnal mind in all these areas. Okay? This is the mindset. You give this person the vision of God's future, and they might find it interesting, but that vision will not motivate their lives. They're the people who will show up at church. In the Protestant world, they're called the Easter Christmas crowd. I call them the Holy Day crowd. They show up on Holy Days. And the rest of the time, their value system is basically worldly.

We all see that. We all fight this. We all still fight the carnal mind. And so what's happening is, we're trying to be both. And you and I can't be both. So if you look at yourself and you start seeing any of these issues as central problems, which if any of us examine ourselves, we're going to find some of the central problems, we've got to say, okay, that's the wrong mindset.

Something has to change in my mindset. Is it an emotional problem? Is it a selfishness problem? Is it a value system problem? Is it that I'm not submitting to God? Is it that I really have... What did it for me?

I'm not really approaching my relationships properly. Or is it, you know, I'm just so based in this immediate gratification, which is our society. I mean, every time my... I will tell you the... who I have as my server on the web, because I'm so mad at them all the time that I can't say them without grimacing. But they slow down on a regular basis. And I'm so used to what?

Almost a medium internet action. I just go bonkers. My wife will say... She'll come in and say, What's wrong? Not working again? She'll hear me just, AHHH!

She'll look in.

My wife says, Is that being very Christian today? Are we? No, she doesn't.

But she does have ways to just... She's so nice about it.

So, we have to look at this. If we think Christianity is simply, I don't steal, don't worship idols, and I go to church on Saturday, it's more than that!

As I've said before, there are Jews who deny Jesus Christ who do that. And the Bible says they will even have salvation.

So we have to understand, we're being called for more than the letter of the law. And that's what I was trying to stress to these young people. Yes, we should keep the letter of the law. But Christianity is actually a lot more exciting than that. Because if Christianity comes down to the letter of the law, you know all it is? Don't do this, don't do this, don't do this. And that's what a lot of people think Christianity is. Well, there's a list of don'ts, there's a list of do's, and there's a list of benefits.

So this is the carnal mindset.

Let's go back to Romans 8 per minute, and let's look at where Paul compares these two mindsets. We read verse 6. Let's pick it up in verse 7. Romans 8.

Romans 8 verse 7.

This is what I wish it was a seminar because... Well, let's read through this a minute.

Verse 7, we read, Because the carnal mind is enmity against God, here's what you have to realize. The natural way you and I tend to think and feel is the entity of God. That's a strong statement. It's against God. We think it's good. I think it, it must be good. I feel it, it must be good. In fact, you know what we use as our criteria for truth much of the time as human beings? I thought it, it must be true.

Think about it. We do that a lot. Oh, I thought it, it must be true. Oh, my.

I felt it, it must be true. I've actually counseled people and said, What do you use as your criteria for truth? And the response is, if I, my feelings. If I feel it, I know it's true.

Oh, boy.

I can't, that's not the way this works. But I understand it. The reason I understand it is I've done it. Right?

You know, I've done that before. I understand. But he says, because the carnal mind is enmity against God, it is not subject to the law of God nor indeed gambling. The carnal mind hates God's law. The carnal mind sees it as oppressive.

The carnal mind just doesn't want to do what God says.

Now, I can understand, because if I have, well, we don't have to go back there, but if, you know, if we were looking at those quadrants again, the law of God affects all four of those quadrants. It tells us, look, it tells us about relationships, right?

It tells us about service.

If we're not spending, our lives, or part of our lives, is spent in service towards others, then we're being carnal. You know, selfish motivations, immediate gratification. Negative emotions. God's law deals with those things. The value system. This is where the law helps define our value system.

It's big time where the law comes in. And, of course, the law says God tells me how to live my life, not me.

Now, God gives us a great deal, by the way, of leeway when it comes to our personalities.

In other words, if you're an engineer, God says, go be the best engineer you could be.

If you're... we tend to grade people, or evaluate people, by things that God does not.

So I'm just a waitress. I'm not an engineer. And God says, no, you're a good waitress. Go be the best waitress you could be.

God doesn't evaluate us by how much money we make, or how much status our job gives us.

God evaluates us by us doing whatever abilities He gave us.

And when we fulfill the abilities God gives us, we're happy.

So we sometimes have measurements on ourselves that God does not have.

Oh, God must not be happy with me. This person makes this amount of money, and I only make this amount of money.

That's how God judges you. Now, if you're lazy, God judges you. Okay? You see what I mean?

Now we have a character issue, but He evaluates us by a whole different set of standards. These are the standards He evaluates us by.

Now let's go back to Romans.

Let's look at verse 8.

So then, those who are in the flesh, if we have this carnal-mindedness, this sort of normal human way of thinking, He says, we cannot please God.

How much time are you wasting in your life being frustrated? Because really, you're not pleasing God.

And you're really not thinking about pleasing God. We're just thinking about pleasing ourselves.

How do we please God? That's an interesting question.

What changes in our mindset when we get up every morning and say, God, help me to please you today?

Now, when I usually get up the first day of the morning, I say, God, man, I'm tired and all my joy is hurt.

Help me to get through this day. Right?

I think I spring to muscle getting out of bed.

Well, what is the first thing we ask, God, help me to please you today? That's what I want to do.

Help me to please you today.

So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You know why? It's not the thought process.

The thought process is always, what is it for me? God, what are you going to do for me today?

Now, it's not wrong to ask God for blessings and help. I mean, we're supposed to do that.

But it's a different mindset. Verse 9 says, But you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit. For if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you, Now, if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not his. And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is light because of righteousness.

Let's go down to verse 13.

He says, For if you live according to the flesh, this carnal-mindedness, you will die.

But if by the Spirit you put the death, the deeds of the body, you will live. In other words, this carnal-mindedness has to change if you want eternal life.

Now, you and I are fighting both, you know. We're in the midst of having both. But he says, one has to win. Eventually, one wins. Eventually, you and I give in to the carnality, and we just become flesh. Or, a new mindset is created in us.

And that vision of God drives us.

Verse 14, For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.

We can have God's Spirit and not be led by it.

You can have God's Spirit and not be led by it. Now, why would a person not be led by God's Spirit?

There's only one way you're not being led by God's Spirit.

You're resisting it.

That's it!

God doesn't say, okay, I'm going to give you my Spirit, but I'm not going to lead you.

The only way that you and I, when we find those times in our lives we're not being led by God's Spirit, is because we're resisting it.

Because Ani says, verse 15, For you did not receive the Spirit of bondage again to fear, but received the Spirit of adoption by which we cry out, Abba, Father, Personal, Close relationship with God.

This is the Spirit mindset.

Close personal relationship with God.

He says, the Spirit, verse 16, Himself bears witness that our Spirit, that we are the children of God, and if children, now He gives us the vision. He started with the mindsets, okay?

All I did today is basically take a part of Romans 8, Romans 8, put it into modern English.

If you have this mindset, this vision will be the vision for your life.

He said, well, wouldn't it be great if God gave us a vision like He did Joseph? I don't know. He ended up in a well, being sold as a slave, dragged across the desert, lived as part of his life as a slave, part of his life in a prison, and basically lost his entire young adult life.

But he didn't lose it. We'll see why he didn't. But that's how human beings would see it. I lost the best years of my life!

He says, and if children then heirs, heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.

For I consider that the suffering of this present time is not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us, for the earnest expectation. See, this is a vision. I see this. I expect it.

Boy, that's hard sometimes. It's our mindset that brings us back to this. To be spiritually minded means we earnestly expect the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God. See, he says there's two sets here, two mindsets. And you and I fight them. And the more you give in to the carnal mindset, the more you have negative emotions, the more selfish you become, the more everything becomes about you. But your world gets real small, by the way. You only think about the things right around you. The more your relationships break down, it seems like you don't get along with anybody. The more distant you feel from God, the more you start to compromise with your value system, and pretty soon you're really disobeying certain laws. The easy ones. You're not out killing people, right? You're not... The easy ones are... well, taking God's name and being. The easy ones are being a little bit dishonest. The easy ones aren't... well, I'm not committing adultery, I'm just looking at porn. The easy ones are... well, I'm not going to really keep the Sabbath. I just... let's see, I won't work on the Sabbath. But it will be a holy day. Those are the easy ones, because you're around the edges. It doesn't look like you're openly doing it, but what's happening inside your mind? That's carnality. That's what that whole word means. Carnality is a mindset. And as you do that, God has become less and less the authority in your life. And so what happens is you begin to hate all authority. A carnal mind hates all authority. At the core of that is a hatred of God's authority. At the core of the hatred of authority is the hatred of God's authority. And so we see here, he says, let's move... the spiritual mindness moves us towards this expectation, this vision. So let's look at the spirit mindset now. So let's look at our third slide. And we'll look at the spirit mindset. Motivation is based on love of God and neighbor. The more we are driven by God's spirit, and we have to ask for this, and you have to think about this. You have to work at this. You're driven by a motivation based on love of God and neighbor. Because you love your neighbor, you sometimes give in to your neighbor. It'll become a doormat, but you know what I mean. Sometimes you sacrifice for your neighbor, whether it's your wife or your children, or the people in your congregation, or the people you work with, or the neighbor next door in the next apartment in your apartment complex who's just an obnoxious person. You try to do what's best in every situation. Because you're motivated by a love of God and neighbor. Your actions are based on a desire to do good. And you have a lot of positive emotions. That doesn't mean you never have negative emotions. Jesus as a man had negative emotions, but He always controlled them. He always controlled them. So you see, this now at your very core begins to change. These issues that, remember I said these are ambiguous issues when we talk about mindset, these actually become more and more clear in your mind. So that you have, maybe you have some greed, or some envy, or some jealousy, or some lust, and because you're becoming spiritually minded, guess what you think? Well, that's a real greedy thing to think.

You actually begin to become sensitive to your own motivations. That's an unloving thing to think.

That's an untearing thing to think about that person.

This begins to change.

Now remember, positive emotions doesn't mean you're happy all the time. That is physically impossible. So understand, I see people, they're pretty happy people. Be frustrated because they're not happy all the time. Nobody's happy all the time. I hate to tell you that, but it's just the truth. Maybe you feel better now, okay? Because nobody's happy. You physically can't do that. There's chemicals in your body that won't let you be happy sometimes. So that's just the way it is. Now we look. Spiritual mindset has a value system that is very sensitive to good and evil. If you find yourself just running with a crowd, if you find yourself doing things that are later saying, that wasn't the right thing to do, you're losing your sensitivity between good and evil. The problem with the carnal mind is not that it rejects good or accepts evil. Now sometimes it does. Hitler accepted evil, rejected good. That's the ultimate carnality. Most people aren't that carnal. They live in the middle. Sort of good and sort of evil. Sort of good and sort of evil. And it's okay to be sort of evil. See? It's sort of okay to be sort of evil. So the more we have the spiritual mindset, the more sensitive we are to discerning good and evil, the more sensitive we are to discern truth from error. This is real hard in today's world. Do you know why? I don't know what's truth and error. You know, I can watch, I'll watch Fox News, see an end, and then read ten articles on the Internet. And I don't believe ninety percent of any of it. That might be a slight exaggeration. I don't believe half of any of it. And then part of it, I have no idea whether it's true or not. Because it's people's viewpoints. So the bottom line is, we become sensitive to find the truth. Truth and error isn't just the truth of the doctrines of the Bible. You know, if someone came up to you and told you something really bad about another person, do you automatically accept it or do you go try to find the truth? Truth and error, truth seekers, I hate that term, I mean it's a new age term, but there's certain, it's a good term in some ways, seek the truth in everything. What is the truth? We just don't accept bad things about everybody. What is the truth? That's even your enemies, by the way. That's even your enemies. We also, spiritually-minded, source of knowledge and authority submits to God as the ultimate authority. There's a trust. God knows what He's doing. This is not easy, but it is what a spiritual mindset is. And then, our relationships are based on serving others. Our relationships are based on serving others. Two different mindsets, of which you and I struggle because we're part of both. The vision won't get us there in itself because it's a spiritual vision. The spiritual vision is not enough. It's the mindset that gets us there. This relationship serving others doesn't mean you don't let others serve you. If nobody allows somebody to serve them, nobody can ever serve. But the idea is, when it's my turn to serve, I serve. When it's my opportunity to serve, there's times when all of us, in pride sometimes it's hard to do that, but all of us at times have to step back and be served. It's okay. We're giving another person an opportunity. Then we turn around and serve that person at another time. That's the need to think about foot washing and Passover, isn't it? One person washes your feet, and then you wash their feet. You both serve, and you both have to be served.

The problem with the carnal mind is, of course, with relationships, that the carnal mind is always trying to control everything, because we're always trying to get people to treat us the way we want to be treated. The spiritual mind gets hurt when somebody treats us poorly, or we expect somebody to like us and they don't. All of us get hurt when people don't act the way that we want them to.

That's just normal. But the spiritual mind, as a mindset, is concerned about how they treat others. The carnal mind, as a mindset, is how others treat me. The spiritual mind, to be spiritually minded, it gets pretty hard to be offended.

You can be, and that's not always wrong. They're not easily offended people. Because their main concern is, what am I doing here? How am I doing here? How am I affecting that person? How am I treating that person? I've seen truly spiritually minded people have people do things to them that I'm thinking, wow, and they didn't even notice how badly they were being treated. Because their mindset is outward. Now that doesn't mean a spiritually minded person doesn't feel inward. Because that's impossible.

I'm going to love, and I'm going to never expect love. No, we all need to be loved, too. We all need to be loved by God. We need to be loved by each other. Those needs are real. They're designed to do us by God. So I've had people say, well, I try and try and try to be loving, but when does somebody love me?

Well, yeah, that's the point. We're supposed to do this with each other. So it's not selfish to need to be loved. It's not selfish to need help and comfort from others. It's that we're supposed to take turns. We're supposed to do that. Sometimes it's your turn to give comfort, and sometimes it's your turn to be comforted.

The spiritually minded person is involved in that and understands that. The spiritually minded person not only comforts other people, but goes to other people and says, I need comfort. They're not afraid of that, because there's not a lot of pride in a spiritually minded person. I need help. They give help and they'll ask for help. Let's go back to Romans 8.28. Then I'm going to go back and just take another look at Joseph's example to wrap things up.

Romans 8.28. Here is what the mindset does. You know, when I prepared this, I did not know this is where it would take me. Every once in a while, I'll do a sermon and end up with a surprise. Usually I sit down and outline a sermon, and I figure out what's going to happen and where it's going to go, and I prepare a message. Every once in a while, I'll work on a message, and I'll be going through the Scripture, and the Scripture takes me to a place I did not know I was going to go, or it takes me to a place I didn't want to go.

Sometimes I just take it to a place I don't want to go. God, I don't like that answer. But in preparing this sermon, when I gave it last year at the regional weekend, it was that one in Houston, this took me to a place I was not prepared to go. So what is the driving force of the spiritual mindset? Romans 8 and 28. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.

When we're spiritually minded, we see that we're heirs of God. We see the vision. We see that the spiritual mindset is being developed in us. But sometimes we're in the prison. Sometimes we're in the well with our brothers laughing at us. Sometimes we're being dragged through the Sinai, tied up to the back of a stinking camel.

Sometimes we're standing on the block, and people are arguing over how much they're going to pay for us. Right? Sometimes that's where we are. Okay, I see the vision, but how in the world am I going to get there? I'm trying to be spiritually minded. So when Joseph ran away from Potiphar's wife and did the right thing, and didn't give him an adultery, the last thing he thought would be his reward would be thrown in prison.

That's the last reward he thought he would get. You know, God's going to give you. God will reward me for this. Yeah, I'm going to send you to prison for years, son. We say, I don't get it. Now, at that point, he didn't give up his vision. So as I went through and I prepared this, and I looked, okay, here's the mindsets. But what is it that carries us through to the vision? And it's this. It's the belief that God is working something in your life, and He gets you there.

That has to be at the core of who we are. Now, let's go back to Joseph. Genesis 45. You know, you've heard of the rags-the-riches story. Joseph is riches-to-rags-to-riches. Okay? Genesis 45. Verse 1. Here Joseph has become what God's vision for him actually was going to be. Years later, years of going all over the place, and he never gave up, and he always kept doing what was right.

He kept obeying God. So much so that even in the worst situations, other people around him said, you're different. And they meant it in a positive way.

And now he is the second most powerful man in the most powerful empire in the world. You could make this story up. This is a musical fairy tale, if it wasn't true, that you'd see on Broadway. But it's true. And now his brothers are bought before him, and they bow before him. Just like his vision. He has the perfect chance to stand up and say, nah nah nah nah nah, guess who I am? Remember me, boys? Remember what you did to me? He has the power to do anything he wants. He could throw them all in jail. He could have them all killed. He could say, by the way, boys, you're no mind-slays. We'll see how you like prison for a while. He has all the power. The vision is there.

Verse 1, That Joseph could not restrain himself before all those who stood by him. Then he cried out, Make everyone go out from me. So no one stood with him while Joseph made himself known to his brothers. Then he wept aloud, In the Egyptians and the house of Pharaoh heard it.

Now that's a shock. Everybody gets out. You're ten brothers at this point that are there. I can't remember if Benjamin is with him or not. They're all there. Probably he is at this point. I have to go look at the story. They're all there in front of him. Because he took Benjamin away from him for a while. But they're all there in front of him. They're all absolutely frightened. They can't figure out what's going on. Why is this powerful man paying attention to them? He sends everybody out. He says, I have Joseph. And instead of punishing them, he cries.

Verse 3, Then Joseph said to his brothers, I am Joseph. Does my father still live? I want you to understand, he had no idea over these years when his dad had died or no. He didn't grieve. He didn't know what happened to his father. He had to fulfill his dream, or God's vision for him. And God's vision for him was to save the world. And that cost him, his dad, for years, his mother and his father.

But his brothers could not answer him. This is another one. There's little understatements in English, or they were dismayed. No, there's a scared they can't talk.

This made it his presence. And Joseph said to his brothers, Please come near to me. So they came near. Then he said, I am Joseph, your brother, whom you sold in Egypt. Look at me! Look at me real close. Look at my eyes. A little bigger now. Been through a lot. I'm here. This is who I am. But now, do not therefore be grieved or angry with yourselves. Wait a minute. Whoa, whoa, whoa. How did he come off saying this?

Do not be grieved or angered with yourselves.

Because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. He said, I'm here because of God's vision.

Because your lives were supposed to be spared.

We just did it the hard way, guys. God could have done it the easier way. We did it the hard way. But look, you're all going to live. I get to save you now.

How do you come to that conclusion?

Because of what Paul said thousands of years later. We have to believe that God had worked it all out for our good.

Joseph got through all those years of being sold, having his brothers hate him, being sold into slavery, being jailed for something he didn't do. He would do all that because he believed, huh, what's God going to do today? That didn't mean he didn't get discouraged. He got depressed. He got down. He got worried. And I can tell you, he had to have moments where his faith was really, really tested.

There were probably in the middle of the night, he's crying out to God, wait a minute, did I get the vision wrong?

You know, maybe that wasn't a vision from you. Maybe I just had too big a bowl of chili and onions. Okay? Maybe that wasn't the truth. That's not what happened. I mean, he did feel that way. He had to go through times like that. As he lost what appeared to be the best years of his life, of course, when they find him, he's married, he has kids, all these other things happened. Remember, he didn't know that for all those years. Just like you and I don't know what God's going to give us as heirs, we just know that sometimes between A and B, we have the vision. And if we stay currently minded, we will lose the vision. If we stay spiritually minded, God will give us what he promises at the end. He'll work it all out for good. Well, how are you going to work this out for good? And God's answer is, just wait and see. Our answer is, no, I want the good now. I want the good right now. That's my request. Maybe yours is a little more different than mine. My request always says, give me the good right now. I want the good now. Wait, wait and see. Watch how I work this out. No, no. I want you to work it out right now. In fact, here I have the four steps you should do, God, that I would like you to do. That's my approach. It's never his. It's never his approach. But you only will only do this if we're more spiritually minded. If we're more carnally, the more carnally minded we are, we can't live by this. And this is what he did. And this is what's so amazing. Look what he says in verse 7. God sent me before you to preserve a posterity for you and the earth and to save your lives with a great deliverance. So now it was not you who sent me here but God. And he has made me a father to Pharaoh and Lord of always house and a ruler throughout the land of Egypt. He said, look, guys, it wasn't really nice, but God was going to get me one way or another. I was supposed to be here because he was going to work out what was good. And by the way, you can get off the floor bowing down to me like my vision said.

God has a vision for each one of our lives. It's a little different for each other. Some things are the same. Some of them is different, each one of us. That vision's out there. And we talk about it all the time. But you and I have to have a mindset. And it's not the negative positive mindset that psychologists talk about. It's either carnal or spiritual.

And you and I are fighting inside of us because we're both carnal and spiritual at the same time. The more spiritual we are, the more our mindset every day comes down to one conclusion. And that is that God is going to work this out. God is going to work this out for our good. God is going to work this out for what is best. In the end, it works. In the end, you receive everything that you need and want a desire that is in accordance with His will. And His will is actually greater than ours and proves what He wants for us. What He wants for us is actually better than what we could come up with. That's what He wants for us. That's what He has for us. We have to believe it then. So that the end, our mindset is, when we get through every day, is, God, I don't understand. God, this is hurtful. God, but I believe you will work it out for what is best. So let's see what you're going to do in my life.