While the world is thinking in one direction, it is imperative that you and I wash our minds and think differently about sexuality, family, finances, priorities, and life. In a powerful quote, CS Lewis rightfully attributes the impact of men and women who have made lasting changes on the earth to the fact that they thought differently than their neighbors and even family members.
Lewis states, “If you read history, you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next.”
In other words, these individual Christians weren’t thinking about “here” as much as they were thinking about “there,” and therefore, it affected everything they did.
Lewis continues, “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 took a mere 300 years for the Apostles and early Christians to totally transform the Roman Empire through the preaching of the Gospel.
The Middle Ages, also known as the “Dark Ages,” were changed by men like Wycliffe, Tyndale, Huss, and the men and women who were around them. These individuals thought primarily about Heaven rather than the things of the earth and were willing to risk their lives.
The English evangelicals who abolished the slave trade didn’t do so by socialism or communism but by believers like Wilberforce. William Wilberforce was a member of Parliament and led the Bible Society in England. Because he set his mind on things above and recognized the “Imago Dei”—that all human beings are made in the Image of God—he ended up being the catalyst to end the slave trade in the British Empire.
All of these people left their mark on this earth precisely because their minds were “occupied with Heaven.”
Listen, if you want to make an impact and leave a powerful and godly legacy, think more about Heaven, and it will impact everything around you.
CS Lewis concludes, “It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth ‘thrown in’: aim at earth and you will get neither.”
Aiming at the earth is precisely what the world does, and Satan laughs all the way to the bank. That’s why you and I need to think differently. When we think differently, we pursue differently.
Colossians 3:2 says, “Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.”
It’s imperative to always be thinking about the things above. How does God think about the things that are happening? What is the spirit of God grieved about today? Does God grieve over the lawlessness? We need to look Biblically and examine God’s thoughts on all the things around us in order to shape our thinking.
In Romans chapter 12, the apostle Paul says, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And 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.“
Mark Henry is an author, speaker, and the Lead Pastor of Revive Church in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota.
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