Thursday, May 08, 2014

Being Heavenly Minded Changes You

Have you ever heard the saying you can be so heavenly minded that you are no earthly good? This week I sat before and pondered the tangible benefits of being heavenly minded as well as the detriment of being eternally illiterate. What comes to mind for you? Here is my short list of how being heavenly minded changes you:


  • Enhances Hope: 1 Peter 1:13 Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 
  • Increases Joy: Hebrews 12:2 …fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 
  • Boosts Faith: Hebrews 11:13-16 All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own.  If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return.   Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.
  • Fuels Obedience: Hebrews 11:8-10 By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.  By faith he made his home in the Promised Land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise.  For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.
  • Fosters a Distinct Christian Grief: 1 Thessalonians 4:13 Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope.


C.S. Lewis said it this way:
If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were precisely those who thought most of the next. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. The Apostles themselves, who set on foot the conversion of the Roman Empire, the great men who built up the Middle Ages, the English Evangelicals who abolished the Slave Trade, all left their mark on Earth, precisely because their minds were occupied with Heaven. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this.  (CS Lewis, Mere Christianity, p. 118)

Want to grow in your heavenly mindedness? Go to our All Things New link on our website for a plethora of tools to grow you in this regard. May we all keep our focus, intellect, and affection centered on Heaven.

I love being your pastor!