Having a Thorough Renewal of our Mind to get Rid of our Natural and National Mentality

In order for the one new man to come into full existence, we all must experience a thorough renewal of our mind, which has been built up according to our nationality and culture.

The biggest hindrance in the way of the practical existence of the new man is not the outward environment but our natural and national mentality, our racial and cultural background which have been built up throughout our life on earth.

Therefore, the only possibility of God’s purpose being fulfilled in this age is that we all – the believers in Christ who have seen something of God’s eternal purpose – are willing to be renewed in the spirit of our mind.

Our God has a purpose, which is the purpose of the ages, the plan He purposed in Himself to gain a corporate man that would express Him in His image and represent Him with His authority.

The key to God obtaining the one new man, the corporate man in His purpose, is being renewed in the spirit of our mind. However, it is not easy to be renewed in the spirit of our mind, for this is a continual process – we need to continually be renewed in our mind.

For example, if we look at the apostle Peter, he clearly saw the vision of the one new man both on the day of Pentecost and in the house of Cornelius, but in Gal. 2 we see that he was not faithful to this vision.

Similarly, the apostle Paul also clearly saw the vision of the Body of Christ, the corporate Christ, when the Lord met him on the way to Damascus; however, he still compromised when he went to Jerusalem and had a Nazarite vow.

For the practical existence of the one new man, we all need to be renewed in the spirit of our mind.

We need to humble ourselves before the Lord and ask Him to continually renew our mind so that day by day we may have more of God’s element not only in our spirit but also in our mind.

The only way that the one new man can be realised practically is by our mind being renewed. If we are not actually and daily being renewed in the spirit of our mind, then the Lord has no way to have the one new man.

We need to daily drink the Spirit to be inwardly filled with the Spirit, so that the Spirit would spread into our mind and saturate our mind with the divine element. Our mind needs to be renewed not only for our spiritual conduct or for our personal, ethical behavior, but for the existence or the one new man.

We all need to experience a thorough renewal of our mind, so that what has been built up according to our nationality and culture would be washed away, Christ would be all and in all, and the Lord would have the one new man in practical existence.

The Focal Point of being Renewed in the Spirit of our Mind is the One New Man

After believing in the Lord and reading the Bible, we realize our need to be renewed in our mind by the word of God. We then want to be renewed in the spirit of our mind for our Christian behaviour and for our ethics.

We get into the word of God, we allow the word to fill us, possess us, and take over our mind, and the Spirit of God saturates us. The more we pray, contact the Lord, fellowship with Him, call on His name, and confess our sins, the more we are saturated with Christ, and the more our mind is being renewed.

This causes us to be transformed, and our behaviour changes because of the inward metabolic change. However, all this is not only for our behavior or ethical improvement, but for the one new man.

The focal point of being renewed in the spirit of our mind is the one new man, not any improvement in our behaviour or ethics.

Our being renewed in the spirit of our mind by drinking the Spirit and letting the word of Christ dwell in us richly is for the practical existence of the one new man, for in the one new man there cannot be Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, slave, and free man.

The renewal of our mind is for the practical existence of the one new man. We may still hold on to our natural, religious, and individual concepts because we don’t let the Spirit spread into our mind.

We all need to open our being to the Lord and tell Him to come in and fill, saturate, and permeate our inward being, so that we may be renewed in the spirit of our mind for the practical existence of the one new man.

When we open to the Lord and tell Him to renew us, the Spirit will slowly permeate our mind for the one new man. We need a thorough renewal of our mind for the one new man to come into existence practically.

When the Spirit saturates our mind and possesses our inward being, we will not care whether other are black, white, Chinese, Japanese, American, British, German, or any other nationality, neither will we emphasize our own nationality or background.

We will not care whether the meeting is noisy or quiet, whether someone speaks this or that language, but we will care for the one new man.

Today in this divided world where everyone wants to be united – yet they are more divided than ever, we need to be renewed in the spirit of our mind so that we may be transformed for the one new man.

We Christians are one and should be one; this comes about not by outward adjustment or correction but by the thorough renewal of the mind for the one new man.

Lord Jesus, we want to be renewed in the spirit of our mind for the one new man. May we not focus on our personal Christian behavior or ethics, but may we focus on the practical existence of the one new man! May we have a thorough renewal of the mind so that any racial ordinances would be removed, and we would get rid of the natural person. We want to call on Your name, fellowship with You, pray, and confess our sins so that we may be transformed by the renewing of the mind for the one new man!

Having a Thorough Renewal of our Mind to get Rid of our Natural and National Mentality

Throughout our life, our natural and racial mentality is being built up; “we are the product” of our background, upbringing, schooling, culture, national and natural mentality, and cultural background.

Even after we are regenerated, we still live our life according to the way we were brought up, the way we were educated, and according to our natural and national mentality.

When the Spirit comes into our spirit and spreads into our mind, it becomes the spirit of our mind; it is in such a Spirit that we are renewed for our transformation. We are under the control and direction of our mind; what we think, our opinions, our thoughts, and our thinking is what governs us.

Even after we have been regenerated by the Lord and love Him, we still are governed by our mind. The boss is our mind; our mind directs our actions and decisions. The Lord wants us to have a thorough renewal of the mind; He wants to come as the Spirit and saturate our mind for the real practice of the new man.

When we come together and we all have our ordinances and ways of living, our culture and our natural and national mentality, the one new man cannot come into practical existence.

The top hindrance to the existence of the new man is our natural and national mentality, which are a result of being educated according to our racial and cultural background.

For the one new man, we don’t need to regulate our behavior or change the way we are; what we need to do is to be renewed in the spirit of our mind. Merely changing outwardly or putting on some kind of a performance is not the renewal of our mind, and is not part of the new man.

Today in this age the Lord is arranging the outward environment and situation for the one new man to come into being; however, the outward environment needs to have a corresponding inward reality.

There has to be a thorough renewal of the mind taking place in all the saints as the members of the Body of Christ, so that our natural and racial mentality – which has been built up through our entire life – may be renewed (see Rom. 12:2; Eph. 4:23-24; Col. 3:10-11).

We need to get an education, and we all have a certain culture and background in which we grew up; these have become our constitution. But for the practical existence of the one new man, we need to cooperate with the Lord so that our mind may be thoroughly renewed.

When we preach the gospel, shepherd the saints, and coordinate to care for the things related to the church, we are exposed not only of how natural and individualistic we are, but also of our natural and national mentality.

Some of us may be naturally and by disposition more aggressive, while others may be by disposition more slow and reserved.

It’s not about being right vs being wrong, and it’s not even a matter of taking the best way of doing things; it’s a matter of having a thorough renewal of our mind to get rid of our natural and national mentality, so that when others fellowship or talk to us, they will not sense what we are by birth or education, but Christ.

The Lord will perform something to bring this one new man into full existence; He will do a marvellous thing with all the different races and cultures. For this to happen, we need to have a thorough, proper, and adequate renewal of our mind by drinking the Spirit to be saturated by the Spirit.

Lord Jesus, we want to experience a thorough renewal of our mind so that we may be the one new man in practical existence. Have mercy on us, Lord, and show us how much we still live according to our natural and national mentality. We want to drink the Spirit day by day and even moment by moment so that we may be saturated with the Spirit in our mind, and the one new man would come into existence practically. May we have a proper, thorough, and adequate renewal of our mind for the one new man!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message given by the brothers for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1977, vol. 3, “The One New Man,” pp. 509-517, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Goal of the Lord’s Recovery – to Bring Forth the One New Man (2018 ICSC), week 2, Being Renewed in the Spirit of the Mind for the Practical Existence of the One New Man.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # Transformed by beholding from glory to glory, / And from strength to strength on to Zion we go. / Constitute us with truth as daily we study— / Here a little there a little—Your Word to know. (Song on, Here a Little, There a Little)
  # Spreading outward from our spirit / Doth the Lord transform our soul, / By the inward parts renewing, / Till within His full control. (Hymns #750)
  # From the center to circumference / God would saturate each part; / Feeling, mind, and will renewing, / Making home in all our heart. (Hymns #1325)