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We did Colossians 2 a couple of months ago, and in Colossians 2 we found that Scripture talking a lot about the two minds. That if you are the true Church of the Lord Jesus Christ, you have two minds. That is not to say that the people that are the true Church of the Lord Jesus Christ are better than anybody else. This gift is available to whosoever will. It is just a reality that, in this hour, some people have the mind of Christ, and some people do not. It is not a fixed amount of people that locks everybody out and makes the people who have it some kind of exclusive club.

 

Jesus said that this gift is for whosoever will. You just have to ask for it, and it is yours also. We found in Colossians 2 that here was a lot of talk about the two minds, the carnal mind, and the mind of Christ. Let me just remind you, for those of us in whom the mind of Christ has been conceived and is beginning to grow, we are unstable in all of our ways. Every time a choice is put to us, conscious or unconscious, we have a choice of whether or not we are going to respond with the mind that brings death or the mind that brings life.

 

The problem that we are in right now is that we have been living with this carnal mind all of our life, and that mind kicks in automatically. For the mind of Christ to be our thought, for the mind of Christ to respond to any choice that we have, it calls for a warfare. For that mind of Christ to...in this particular choice, you have to come in and knock out your carnal choice.

 

It is an extreme example. If you have been suffering from anger all your life, some one "gets" you, and you are ready to punch him. Your carnal mind is saying, "Punch him, punch him," and your Christ mind is saying "No." The question is, which thought will you listen to?

 

If somebody hurts you, and you hate them, or do not forgive them, the question is who will you listen to, that carnal thought that you have been living with all these years or the new mind of Christ that is saying "No, you have to forgive them?" There is life in forgiveness, but there is death in bitterness and unforgiveness. It will bring disease into your life.

 

We find that those of us who have received the seed of the mind of Christ, and in whom that mind is starting to grow and starting to function, it is not enough for it to be growing in you. It has to be operating in you. I tell you all the time, we have electric lights in this house, and if we did not turn the switches on we would be sitting in the darkness.

 

It is not enough to have the mind of Christ, we have to use it.

 

To use it involves a warfare, because your carnal mind does not want you to use it. Your carnal mind wants you to hate, your carnal mind wants you to punch that guy out. Your carnal mind wants to justify your bitterness, your hate, your anger against all the people who have hurt you and damaged you.

 

You have to activate the Christ mind. How? By saying, "Father help me, I want to obey your law, I believe this word, that there is life in it, that the right thinking is going to bring healing to my soul and my body. Help me." We cannot do it without His help. I know I cannot do it, I do not know about you.

 

I sin in my thoughts all the time. It is wonderful if you do not sin with your body, but the bottom line is, only by the grace of God, we must stop sinning in our mind if we want to enter into life. If you are happy with your condition of death, fine, but if you want to enter into life, if we want these bodies healed. I have told you I was dying. I almost died since I came to the Lord, the Lord saved me from death three times. Twice supernaturally, once He put me in the hospital, I needed an operation. There is life in His way of thinking.

 

This is the bottom line now that we have two minds, and we have a choice. The Scripture clearly states that if we are willing to wage this warfare, what warfare? The warfare of the two minds that are in your head. You know the old joke, the devil sat on my left shoulder, and an angel sat on my right? They used to make a joke out of it. It is true. The carnal mind is on your left shoulder, and the Christ mind on your right, but it is not a joke.

 

Every time you choose to think unrighteousness, you are going to reap what you sow. If you hate, you are going to be hated, if you are bitter, people are going to be bitter towards you. If you do not forgive, people are not going to forgive you. You have a choice, you have a book that tells you the right things to do. It is called the Bible. Then if you are blessed not only do you have His book written in front of you, but you have His spirit in your head, saying, "If you are willing to do the right thing, I will give you the power to do it. Just tell me that you want to do it, and I will help you."

 

That is what we are dealing with in Colossians. Also in Colossians 2, we are told that a lot of the carnality in the Church, and a lot of the religious bondage that so many Christians are in come out of the carnal mind. That is the reason so many Christians are in religious bondage and trying to put rules and laws upon people that nobody could keep anyway no matter how hard they try. It comes out of a desire to satisfy our flesh, a desire to satisfy our emotions. What do I mean? People like to do things that make them feel like they are righteous. Makes them feel good.

 

The problem with this, the problem with the feeling righteous that comes out of religious works is that while you are making yourself feel righteous because you do something, because you engage in a ritual, because you go to church every Sunday, whatever it is that you do that makes you feel righteous, the other side of the coin is that you condemn everybody that does not do it.

 

If you declare yourself righteous because you have not missed a Sunday of Church in a year, that means that everybody that has not been in Church on Sunday for a year is unrighteous. We see this all over the church. It is a spirit of condemnation, that is the flip side of self-righteousness. Nether of these things are of God. It is of the carnal mind of man that likes religion.

 

Man loves religion. They put on gowns, they burn incense, sometimes they play music, depends. I am not against anybody's religion, whatever your religion is, they do all kinds of things. They ring bells, they play music, they sprinkle you, they put on colored gowns, all kinds of religion, I am not against anybody.

 

All religions do that, they feel good, then they go out and sin. They kill people, they rob people, they hurt people, they are malicious towards people. Let me tell you that God hates their religion. Unto the Father that is a sin. All of your religion that makes you feel good, that condemns everybody that is not doing what you are doing. God thinks you are a bigger sinner than all of them, because that is all pride. The worst sin that anyone can commit, according to the Scripture, is pride. It is not murder.

 

You ask somebody, "What is the worst sin you can commit?" They say "Murder." No, it is not. David was a murderer, and he was the beloved of the Father. What made him the favor of the Father was that no matter what sin he committed, he was quick to confess it as sin, repent of it, and to ask the Father to have mercy on him. Pride stops you from confessing your sin, and repenting. That is why it is the most serious sin in the Bible. It will separate you from God. Pride will separate you from God. God wants you near to Him.

 

This is the hour that He is drawing the whole creation near to Him. He is calling everybody "Come closer." He wants you to come near to Him, He wants to help you, He wants to meet your needs, what ever your need is. He wants you to come close to Him. Pride will keep you away. That is why it is the most serious sin in the Bible. God wants you, He does not want you in religious bondage. The Scripture says "Where the spirit of the Lord is," there is what? Liberty.

 

There is freedom in Christ. There is freedom from religious bondage, there is healing of your mind, healing of your body, healing of your circumstances, healing from poverty. There are blessings from gifts and glory, but you have to get past the religious garbage that is out there in the world.

 

Find Him and what is He? He is spirit. He is not in a building, He is not on a cross, He is not in an album, He is not in a gown, He is not in music, He is not in a religious ritual. He is spirit. He is available to you, and at the moment you call on His name, He is there.

 

That does not mean He is going to answer your prayer at that moment you call on His name. If you call on His name, He is close to you, He is near. This was not always true. Since the man, Jesus Christ, gave up His life for us, it is true. You just call His name, and He is there. Sometimes He cannot answer your prayers right away. It is hard with our fallen minds to understand that.

 

Sometimes He has a reason for not answering our prayers right away. That does not mean He did not hear them, and that does not mean He does not fully intend to answer them. It must be according to His timetable, and His purposes, because He is God, and we are worms. The Scripture says we are worms.

 

His mind is so far beyond us that the very best human being produced by this earth is not anywhere comparable to God in any manner, shape or form. He has got a plan for you. He has a plan for anyone who has ever called on His name. He has not forgotten you, but sometimes we human beings, we end up getting all upset.

 

I want to tell you that when I wound up in the hospital, I thought for sure that He forgot me, because He did not do it the way I thought He was going to do it. I asked Him to kill me every night for almost two months. I said, "Let me die in my sleep, what do I need this pain for?" I did not understand Him, He had a plan for me, but I did not understand Him. I wanted to die, because I did not understand.

 

 

COLOSSIANS, CHAPTER 3

 

We are picking up in Colossians 3 after a deep study of two minds. This is what Paul has to say to us.

 

Verse 1, "If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above," we just came out of a big study on Christ, and when I look at this in the Greek, the article is in there, and it really says, "if ye then be risen with the Christ." What does "the Christ" mean? Anyone? "The Christ" means the glorified Lord Jesus Christ. He says "If you have been risen with Him," what does that mean? The Scripture says, "in Adam all died."

 

When the creation fell at the beginning of time, all of the potential human beings that had not even been born yet, died. Everybody who is born, and has been born in these past thousands of years are born dead. They have been born dead. It is a great mystery, but if you look up Hell in any textbook, it will tell you that it is a place where the dead go, where the dead continue to have existence. Death is not non-existence.

 

When the creation died, it died to righteousness, it died to life, and it fell down to Hell. That is where we are now, because Adam, righteous Adam, died. Paul says "If ye then be risen with Christ," but when the man, Jesus Christ of Nazareth, was risen from the dead, brethren, the whole creation was raised with Him.

 

I want to tell you, when the creation fell however many years ago, I am not going to get into that hassle, you can have your opinion. It was at least thousands of years ago, the creation did not look like this.

 

The creation at the fall was far superior to what we are now. We are really fallen, and we did not get into this condition until after the flood. Why? Because the life of God was so powerful in the soul in the creation that the soul died slowly. Can you hear this? The mind in the creation died, but the soul was so vibrant with life because of the mind of Christ that had been in it that the soul died slowly. These bodies that we are in now are the bottom of the line.

 

We have been dying for thousands of years, the body is getting weaker, and more subject to disease, weaker and weaker. What am I saying? If, when the Lord Jesus Christ was raised from the dead 2000 years ago, the whole creation is not going to jump up over night. I would tell you from personal experience that I have had the Lord living in me for fifteen years. This body gets stronger, and stronger, and stronger. It is a process, because the life inside of me, the life of God is slowly giving life to my soul, which is my emotions and this body.

 

What Paul says...there is no radical change that you can see by looking at me, people who knew me fifteen years ago can see. I was half dead, you remember me. The color in my face was gray, like walking death. Remember me looking like that? Paul says, "If ye be risen with the Christ," what that means is that potentially, does anyone not know what "potentially" means? Because the man Jesus was raised from the dead, it is now possible for everyone who will call on the name of the Lord, to be raised from the dead.

 

What does that mean? To have your human spirit raised from the dead, to get that life inside of you so that it can start vibrating forth, that it starts touching your soul, and your body, so that the healing from the inside can start. Paul says "If you have been risen with the Christ, seek those things which are above." If it has really happened to you, and it has happened because the Lord Jesus Christ was raised from the dead, every human being alive now has the potential to be raised from the dead.

 

Start seeking those things from above, stop thinking with your carnal mind because that is just undoing what Jesus has done for you.

 

Now that Jesus is raised from the dead, stop thinking those dead thoughts and start thinking those thoughts of Life. Which are what? Those are thoughts of this Bible. Love, and peace towards your fellow man. Forgiveness, confession of sin, repentance, mercy, all of the good things that are listed further down, we are going to get to them. He says to stop agreeing with the wicked thoughts that come into your mind, vengeance, hatred, retaliation. Resist it he said, and start thinking good things towards people. It does not matter what they do to you. It does not matter if they have mistreated you.

 

If you think evil, it is bringing death unto your flesh. He says to think good thoughts towards people. "Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord. I will recompense." Let God be your defense. You do not have to go out and fight with people, or murder people, or kill people. Jesus will take care of it. You just worry about your relationship with the Lord, and He is requiring of you to treat your brother as you would have yourself be treated. You do that, and He is going to take care of you.

 

What does it matter to you if that man is punished, if you are dying, and you are going to be raised from the dead? Who cares if God does not punish that man? Who cares? What good is the death or the punishment of that man going to do you? It is going to do you evil, because it is going to turn the healing of the Lord away from you. If you leave him to God, it is going to bring life unto you.

 

"Seek those things above where Christ sitteth at the right hand of the Father." What that means is that the Lord Jesus is up in heaven, and He has the authority to bring life to you and bring His thinking to you.

 

Verse 2. "Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth." We have just been talking about that. Do not concentrate on vengeance, do not concentrate on revenge, nether concentrate in excess on obtaining things of this world. Seek ye first the kingdom of His righteousness, and everything that you need will be added to you. The Father knows what you need. He knows that you need money to live on, He knows that you need a job. He knows what you need. He says, concentrate on Him, seek Him, and seek righteousness, and He is going to meet your every need.

 

Verse 3. "For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God." What Paul is saying here is that you are dead to your sins. Let me just put this on the board for you. We have been drawing our spiritual existence or our soul as a circle, and the Christ in us, our human spirit, is dead. In our mind is Satan, the unconscious part of the carnal mind, trying to destroy us. Now we have a new mind, and the God of that mind is that Father. Christ is present.

 

The Scripture says in another place that once you get this mind of Christ, reckon yourself dead. Act like that carnal mind is dead, because you have a new mind available to you. I just want to get that exact Scripture for you. "For ye are dead, and your life is hidden in Christ." Our true life is what? Out of this whole mind that we have, what is our true life? Somebody?

 

COMMENT: Christ?

 

PASTOR VITALE: No, we do not have Christ yet. Our human spirit is our true life. The human spirit is our potential for life. He died, but he is going to be raised from the dead. The instruction to us is reckon yourself dead and start reaching with your true life into Christ. He says your true life is hidden in Christ. We are moving just like the Hebrew children left Egypt and moved into the wilderness.

 

Our true reality, which is our human spirit, is transferring into Christ. Paul is saying to count yourself dead. Do not even use this mind, act like it doe not even exist. Only live out of that part of your human spirit which is out of Christ, because your life is hid in Christ. That is what he means, that this transfer has not completely taken place yet, but act like it has taken place, because as you act like it has taken place, it is going to take place.

 

As soon as our true reality, which is our human spirit, gets completely moved out of here, this mind which is called death, what is going to happen to this mind? It is going to be burnt up. It is going into the Lake of Fire.

 

We have what we call an imputed death. It has not happened to you yet, but act like it has happened to you. Do not use these wicked thoughts, deny them, then we are going to have the reality of the death. It is going to really happen, that wicked mind is going to die.

 

Our mind shall be righteous, and we shall not die anymore. Paul says, "Now that you have the mind of Christ, now that you have another thought in your mind, now that you have a choice, because when you do not have the mind of Christ you just think what you think, you only have one mind, but now you have a choice between good and evil."

 

It is the same choice the creation had at the beginning of time, when he made the mistake, and he could not tell the difference between good, and evil, and he died. You have experienced evil, and you can tell the difference between good and evil. Choose good and shun the evil, you shall live again. That is the message of the Bible.

 

Verse 4. "When Christ who is our life," remember He is coming up as our human spirit "appears." What does that mean? It means when Christ is raised from the dead out of our human spirit, when He appears in us, "then shall ye also appear with Him in glory."

 

When Christ arises from the dead in your human spirit, He is going to be the life of your flesh, when He appears in you. Then you, which is your true reality also will appear with him in glory.

 

Verse 5. "Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth." Mortify meaning kill, you may remember there are three Greek words that means dead. This is the word that means dead like a corpse. What are you members that are on the earth?

 

COMMENT: Your body?

 

PASTOR VITALE: No, it is not your physical body.

 

COMMENT: Your mind?

 

PASTOR VITALE: Which mind? Your carnal mind. Do not let it function. Why? Because it is killing you. Kill your mind, mortify your members. These are the thoughts of your mind that you have to kill, fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry. "Fornication," the Greek word translated "fornication" is different than the English "fornication." The English word "fornication" means sexual intercourse outside of marriage. The word in the Greek means much more than that. It means any form of perversion that comes out of your carnal mind.

 

Uncleanness is referring to your mortal impurity. That is talking about evil motives towards people. If you seek to cheat somebody, this is not sexual. It is mortal impurity lack of ethics, thinking evil towards your fellow man. Using people for your own purposes. Do not do it, it is coming out of your carnal mind. When you reap what you sow, it is going to bring death into your life.

 

"Inordinate affection," that is Strong's #3806. It is a Greek word "pathos" that is in a lot of our words, and it means sick. Pathology means sick, usually. It is talking about passions that can never be satisfied and will bring great suffering in to your life, that you are lusting, and lusting for something that you know you can never have. You cannot stop lusting for it, it brings torment to you. That is what this word, "inordinate affections" means. Desiring something to the point that it is an obsession in your mind, and you know you can never have it. You are unhappy continuously.

 

Then we have "evil concupiscence," that is Strong's #1939, that is a desire for that which is forbidden. That also will drive you crazy. If you want someone else's husband or someone else's wife. You know that there is not a chance, but you know you just want it. Anything that is forbidden. In other words, inordinate affection, you can be lusting for something that is not forbidden, but you know that you will never have it, and you are torturing yourself. The evil concupiscence is a desire for that which is forbidden. It is a similar thing but it is forbidden.

 

Covetousness is a greedy desire to have more than what you have. Be satisfied with what you have. The Scripture says be content with what you have. We are also told that covetousness is idolatry, to be greedy for more, and more, worship of self.

 

Verse 6. "For which things' sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience." What this is taking about is we will all reap what we sow. If we are all guilty of these sins, and we are all guilty of them, the whole world is guilty of them. The bottom line is when you have the mind of Christ you have the power not to yield to this any more. The whole world is guilty of this. Inside the Church, outside the Church, everybody except the Lord Jesus Christ has these types of problems.

 

If you have the mind of Christ you can start speaking death unto these thoughts, and following the rules of Christ. If you do not, if you yield to them, you are going to reap what you sow. That is what Paul is saying. It is not a threat, it is the truth that is going to set you free. Be aware that when you do these things, you will reap what you sow. It will come back on you. There is a better way. "Think with the thoughts of Christ," that is what he is saying, he is not condemning you. He is giving you information.

 

Verse 7. "In the which ye also walked some time, when ye lived in them." He is saying before you had the mind of Christ you did all these things. Now that you have the mind of Christ you should stop doing them. We have a whole Church world that have not stopped doing that, that think they are okay because they go to church every Sunday.

 

This is the bottom line, it is not going got get you in, going to church on Sunday or doing anything that you do, is not going to give you eternal life. There must be a change of mind. The mind of Christ, the glorified mind of the Lord Jesus Christ, has to get inside your brain and crush your carnal mind which is killing you.

 

It is nothing that you could do by yourself. That is why we are not saved by works. We are not saved by what we do, we are saved by grace. Salvation is a free gift of the mind of Christ to us from God. There is nothing we can do to get it. There is nothing we can do to deserve it, there is no way we can help ourselves or save ourselves. The all powerful, Almighty God has the power to do it, and He has decided to do it. Not because anything any one person has done, but because He loves us.

 

Sometimes we do not understand the way He goes about it, and we have trouble believing that He loves us, but He loves us. His purposes for us always end for the good.

 

Verse 8. "But now ye also put off all these." Stop doing all these works of the carnal mind, "anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth." All of these things come out of your carnal mind. He says, now that you have the mind of Christ start resisting these things, live another way. Anger is a passionate emotion that rises, and falls. It does not necessarily do damage. We know Jesus said be angry, and sin not. It is possible to be angry and not sin.

 

We have a lot of religious people in the Church. They do not want to see you mad. They will rebuke you if you get mad. It is all right to get mad if it stops there. Some people provoke you, and you get mad. We see in the next few words that very frequently that anger does not stop there. Sometimes, it becomes wrath which is the next word. That Greek word translated "wrath" means a stirring of your soul, which causes it to reach out and touch somebody.

 

Some people call it witchcraft of the mind. In some places of the world, or in some people this quality of the carnal man is so developed that it can reach out, and it can damage someone, get them sick or even kill them. We see that in extreme cases in countries that have a lot of witchcraft. In this country here people do not know that they are doing it. They are born with this condition of the mind, and when they get very angry at people, the person that they are angry at is having a nightmare.

 

Someone told me just a few weeks ago, they woke up in the middle of the night, and someone was choking them. This is a reality, if it is a condition of your mind you may not know that you are doing it. If you inherited it, if you were born with this, you have to start taking authority over it in Christ. Why? Because if your mind is hurting somebody it is going to come right back on you. You are going to reap what you sow.

 

We have to find out if we are breaking...if we are doing these sins of the mind, and we do not know it. You see it is very easy to stop smoking, to stop drinking, that is just the beginning, that is no big deal. Let us start dealing with what is in our heart, that is the real problem.

 

The next thing Paul says to give up is malice. Malice is the desire to injure somebody. Again it is not a sin to get angry. You can get angry, but if you get so angry that you desire to injure somebody then you are in sin. You cannot go around injuring people, God does not like it. If you injure somebody, somebody is going to injure you.

 

That is the way it works. That is the way the Lord set it up. He said also stop blasphemy. Blasphemy is evil speaking. That is speech that is injurious to someone's good name. Brethren, I am giving you an extreme example. If somebody steps on your toe and hurts your foot, you get really mad, It is okay to get angry. I ran someone down in the supermarket the other day, I ran into their foot. It is okay to get angry.

 

If you turn around, and say to that person, "I can see that you are a pretty stupid person, and I can see that you are very ugly," and whatever else they want to say about you, your anger has now become the sin of blasphemy. You are destroying their good name. It was an accident, or even if it was not an accident, we are not to destroy people's good name.

 

Paul says we are not to do these things. If someone hurts you, we are to forgive them. It is okay to become angry, but do not let that anger turn into wrath, malice, or blasphemy, or filthy communication which is speaking about low and obscene speech. Do not use obscene words to other people, because they got you mad. It does not glorify God.

 

He also says in verse 9, "Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds." Do not do these things. Stop lying to one another because that old man, now what is your old man? Your old man is the person that you are when your mind is fallen. The old man is the person that you are when your mind is carnal or your mind is death. All of the things that we just talked about that Paul says not to do anymore, those are the things that the carnally-minded man does.

 

He says do not do that anymore, and stop lying to one another. If you said you would do something with someone, and you do not want to do it with them, just tell them the truth. If you have hurt their feelings, apologize for it. Do not lie. He said, do not do it because you have put off the old man and his deeds. You have put on the new one. How do you put on the new man? You put on the new man by thinking with the mind of Christ. When your mind changes from carnal to Christ, you become a new man.

 

Every time you think with the mind of Christ and speak the words of that thought, at that moment you are the new man. You bounce back and forth for a while between being the old man and the new man. We can tell who we are talking to, whether it is the old man or the new man when we hear what the people are saying, and if we can discern what their motives are, we can tell whether it is the old man or whether it is the new man, which is in Christ. Everybody is two men for this whole season.

 

He says, "And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him." Renewed, there has been a lot of talk about renewing of your soul for those of us that have been in deliverance. We have sent angels out to get our soul back from idols that we worship, people that we were involved in. I guess that is okay if God honors it. I just want to make some comments on it right now.

 

Our soul is not solid like this body, and it is capable of vibrating forth from our body, and becoming entangled in other people's souls. It can become entangled, if you are an idol worshiper it can become entangled with your idol. If your car is your idol, your soul can become entangled with your car. Your soul does not take a form like a body does. It can get all intertwined with many, many people. That is called a soul tie, it ties up your soul.

 

There are Godly soul ties, and there are ungodly soul ties. If it is an ungodly soul tie, if you fell in love with someone, and you kept thinking about them, and the relationship is tormenting you, it is not a good thing for you. You cannot get them out of your blood, they may say, "What is happening to you?"

 

What has happened is that your soul has intertwined with their soul, it needs to be dis-intertwined. In the past, when we would pray for people with ungodly soul ties, we would send out angels to get back their souls. That is okay, but it is a little bit of a childish way of looking at it. I would like to give you a more mature understanding of it. He says the new man is renewed in knowledge.

 

I want to suggest to you that your soul is intertwined where it should not be. Your soul is all bound up where it should not be, because of the way you are thinking. It starts out with your thought. There is something in your brain that likes that person that is somebody else's wife. You know it is somebody else's wife, but you yield to the thought. The next thing you know is that your soul gets intertwined, and you are stuck there, and you cannot get out.

 

What I am suggesting to you is that ungodly soul ties originate with wrong thinking. That wrong thinking comes from this mind of death. When your mind is renewed, when you start thinking with the mind of Christ, when you start thinking with righteous thought, and your carnal mind or your fallen mind is dead, your soul that is intertwined with all these wrong things that is causing you pain is going to disentangle because we now have a new mind.

 

Does anybody not understand that? Ungodly soul ties result from wrong thinking. When you get a new mind in Christ, you do not have to send angels out to get your soul back. Your soul is going to automatically disentangle from all those women, all those men, and all those people that they should not be intertwined with. As soon as your thinking gets renewed. Everybody okay?

 

You have to change your thinking. Every problem originates with your thinking. He says, "And the new man is renewed, and this is how you get the mind of Christ in your head." This is how your person gets renewed, you get a new mind, you get the mind of Christ. You get the mind of Christ in knowledge. That word "in knowledge," it is really saying "in full knowledge by getting a precise and correct knowledge of God, the spiritual truth of our existence, the spiritual truth of the fall." When you really get an understanding of the kinds of things that we are preaching here, it will really renew your mind.

 

When your mind gets renewed, your thoughts will be changed, and when your thoughts change, your soul is going to get disengaged from all the ungodly soul ties that you have. It is also going to bring healing to emotional problems, poverty, to physical problems. Changed thinking brings healing to every aspect of your life.

 

The way you get a renewed mind, the way you get the mind of Christ is to listen to this kind of teaching, and let the Spirit that is present when this teaching is coming forth touch you, and effect a change in your life. It is not an intellectual change, it is not that you sit down in school, and you learn something with your mind. There is a Spirit present in this room tonight. His name is Christ, and He is reaching out to you.

 

We had that word just a while ago, "reaching out." That word "wrath" means reaching out. It can also be applied to God. When the spirit of God reaches out to you, He is going to give you life. When the spirit of a carnal mind reaches out to you, it can bring stress to you, it can cause illness, it can cause emotional distress, it can cause anxiety. When the spirit of God, the mind of God, reaches out to you it brings life.

 

That is how you get your mind renewed, and that is how you get your soul ties broken. The bottom line is you have to get the mind of Christ. How do you get it? You ask for it, because you cannot steal the mind of Christ. There is no way you can take it violently. There is no way you can take it of your own accord. You have to ask, because it is given as a free gift, and it is totally possessed by the giver. He will give it willingly to you when your heart is humble before Him.

 

You cannot go before Him, and say, "All right give me your mind I want all the benefits of it." When you humble yourself, and you say "Father, I acknowledge that you are God, and I am just a man. I do not have the power over my own life. I do not have power to help myself. I do not have power to break these ungodly soul ties. I do not have power to get wealth. I do not have power to enter into healthy relationships. I do not have the power to heal my body." When you can honestly humble yourself before God, He will reach out.

 

He will give Himself to you. He will plant Himself in your heart, and start healing you from the inside out. He wants you, and He wants you to ask, and He wants you to ask with a right attitude. What is a right attitude? It is an attitude that is not arrogant. An attitude that says "I know you are God, and I am man, and I cannot force you to give it to me, but I am asking you for it." That is the right attitude.

 

We are still on Verse 10. "And have put on the new man, which is renewed in," the full, "knowledge" of God, or "which is renewed in the full knowledge after the image of Him that created him." That is what we just said, the image of the new man is in the Father, the one who created man.

 

Verse 11. When you think with this new mind, "there is no difference between Greek nor Jew," or for our present world we can say there is no difference between Christian and non-Christian. There is no difference, we are all the fallen creation, there is no difference. As far as God is concerned. "Circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian or foreigner." What he is saying is there is no difference. The only thing that matters is that Christ is in this creation, and He fully intends to be in all of this creation.

 

Any man who lifts himself up above another man has an error in his mind, because anything that you have is a gift of God to you. To any man who raises himself up above another man, whether it is a natural gift, or it is because he is a Christian, whatever else he wants to call himself, anyone who makes himself better than his fellow man, that is a thought of the carnal man. It is an abomination unto the Lord. There are many false Christians in the world today. They are carnal, fallen men just like everybody else.

 

Verse 12. "Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy, and beloved," now he is saying live out of the mind of Christ. He just told you all the things that you should not do, which come out of your carnal mind. He is telling you if you live out of Christ, this is what you are going to do. You are going to be Holy, which means you are going to be pure. You are going to be beloved, which means you are going to be reconciled to God.

 

This is how you should act, you should have "bowels of mercies," which means you should live out of the mind or heart of Christ. If you do that, you will be kind, you will have moral goodness, you will have integrity. You will not mistreat men, you will treat men...how does the Scripture say we would treat other men?

 

COMMENT: Inaudible.

 

PASTOR VITALE: Even more so, He says to treat everyone as if they were better than you. That is what the Scripture says. Integrity, that means do not cheat people that you have the power to cheat. Just because you are stronger than somebody, you have more knowledge than somebody, or because you are wiser than somebody that does not give you the right to cheat them.

 

On the contrary, if you have an opportunity to cheat somebody, you have the power to cheat somebody, you have something that somebody needs, it does not mean a lot to you but it means a lot to them, you have the power to over charge them, and you cheat them, that is a much more serious crime in God's eyes than if you were equal with someone and cheated them. To have the power to make or break somebody and to break them, may God have mercy on your soul.

 

It is not very easy to be rich, or to have a government office, or any kind of office. There is such a thing as an abuse of power. To have any kind of authority at all, a father, or a mother, or a teacher, an elected official, or a minister, to have authority and to abuse the people that you have authority over is very serious.

 

What confuses a lot of people is that God's judgment does not necessarily fall quickly. Sometime it can fall years later. Sometimes it can fall in the next generation. People that do not understand think that there is no justice in God. There is justice in God. He just has His own ways of doing things. His ways are not our ways.

 

He says that if you are living out of the mind of Christ, you are going to have integrity towards your fellow man, "humbleness of mind." In the Greek that means a deep sense of one's moral littleness. That means, know that no matter what God has given you in the world, no matter how much money you have, no matter how much power you have, remember that you are nothing next to God, that He can wipe you out with one swipe of His hand. You better have mercy on the people that you have authority over.

 

He says if you are living out of Christ, you will be long suffering. That means you will give people many chances, you will work with them, you will help them to do what is right. You will, Verse 13, "forbearing one another," working with one another, bearing with them, helping them. "And forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you," forgive that man. You will be doing all of these things. You can tell whether your mind is Christ or whether your mind is carnal. By doing these things, you will know that you are in Christ.

 

Verse 14. "And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness." That Greek word "charity" is speaking about the agape love of the Lord Jesus Christ. What he is saying here is that the agape love is what binds you to perfection. Listen carefully. Paul is saying that you can do all these things I just told you about, you can do them out of your carnal mind. The carnal mind is the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. You can do good things, and you can do evil things.

 

The bond of perfection, if you want to be bound to perfection, these things have to come out of the mind of Christ. What does it mean to be bound to perfection? Perfection is the mind of Christ. When it is bound to your carnal mind, your carnal mind ceases to exist. He says if you do these good works out of Christ it will bind up your carnal mind, and you can count your carnal mind dead.

 

If you are doing them as a religious work out of your carnal mind it will not bring you into perfection. Does everybody understand that? That is really important. We have a Church world that is filled with religious works. In their heart they are hating you. They tell you they love you, they are giving you money. They are driving you here, they are taking you to the doctor. They are doing all the religious works. Their heart, Jesus said "is dead men's bones filled with sin and poison."

 

The perfection which leads unto eternal life is not good works that come out of your carnal mind, but the good works which are the natural expression of the mind of Christ. We have a whole church world full of religious works, and judgment is already falling. The Scripture clearly states, where will it begin? Where is judgment going to begin? With the house of God, and the elders thereof.

 

All these religious people that are filling the Church are about to have their false faces ripped off of them, and the Lord is going to show them what is really in their heart. They are going to have to repent, and they are going to have to face up to the fact that they are no different or no better than the man in the street. We all need a Savior, everyone, even the people going to Church. It is the Spirit of God that will save our life.

 

Salvation is through the union of our natural man with the Christ. Salvation is a spiritual event. It is an experience, it has nothing to do with a building with a cross on it. It is a spiritual experience which joins our fallen heart to the heart of God. In that union we are raised from the dead. There is nothing wrong with going to Church, but there is no salvation in it.

 

Verse 15. "And let the peace of God rule in your hearts," let Christ rule over your carnal mind. "To the which also ye are called in one body; and be ye thankful." He says when the peace of God is ruling in everyone's mind, if the mind of Christ is truly ruling over your carnal mind, it will bring peace amongst all men. Because the arguments, the fighting, the division is only in the death of your carnal mind. He says to let Christ rule your carnal mind, be at peace with all men, and be grateful for everything that He has given you.

 

Verse 16, "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord." He is telling you how to behave. Let the word of the resurrected Christ dwell in your heart, let His wisdom dwell in your heart, and let the teaching of the living Christ come forth in you. "Admonishing" means to exhort. To help one another, do not be an emery of one an other. Be a true friend, help them no matter what their problem.

 

Let psalms, singing, and good things come out of your heart and out of your mind. That can only come out of the Christ. If it comes out of your carnal mind, you are a phony. You are a phony if it is coming out of your carnal mind. At the moment the pressure gets put on you, it will be revealed what your true nature is, a carnal fallen man. The Christ mind must appear in you for you to have a true salvation experience.

 

For this type of behavior to come forth, it must come forth from the Christ in you if it is to save your life. If it comes forth from your fallen mind, it looks good. If you are doing good works for people, you will reap what you sow. They will be kind to you, but it will not give you eternal life. It is not likely to heal your body, your poverty, or whatever else your problem is.

 

Verse 17. "And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus." "Name" in the Scripture typifies spirit. Anything you do, we have just been talking about it, let it come forth out of the Spirit of Jesus Christ in you. "Giving thanks to God and the Father by Him."

 

Verse 18, "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord." We have had some recent teachings on that. The husband is the head of the wife and the children, he is the head of your household, he is not the head of your spiritual life. If he happens to be a man that does not know the Lord, and you are a woman of the Lord, when it comes to spiritual things, the Lord is your spiritual husband. The two must be interwoven. You are not to rebel against your husband, but if there is any type of disagreement, you turn to the Lord and He will work it out.

 

Verse 19, "Husbands, love your wives." If your husband does not want to go to church, that does not mean you should not go to church. That is the kind of thing we are talking about. "Husbands, love your wives, and be not bitter against them." Husbands love your wives, do not get frustrated with them when they do not understand, or when they do not think like you think.

 

Verse 20, "Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord." We know that the first commandment with the promise says, "Honor your mother and father, and you shall live long upon the face of the earth." Curses of premature death are associated with rebellion against your parents. It does not say here that your parents have to fit any standard for you to respect them.

 

You honor your parents no matter what they do. It does not mean that you let them burn you with cigarettes, we have some sick parents, it does not mean that. You do honor them, they are entitled to your honor. No matter what they have done to you, you have to forgive them. You have to forgive them. Like I said, if they are sick people you do not let them torture you. As soon as you come to a place where you can protect yourself, if it is necessary, you should forgive them and reconcile with them.

 

Have peace with them, there should be an open invitation. If they want to reach you, they should be able to reach you. You should call once in a while and ask how they are doing. Why? Because the Father has commanded it. It is the bottom line.

 

Verse 22, "Servants," this word "servants" really means employees. Employees "obey in all things your masters," or your bosses, in modern English. Employee's obey your employers. Do not argue with your employers, do not talk behind their backs, do not think that you know how to do the job better than they do. Brethren, they are paying you a salary, do what you are paid to do. Keep your mind on the things of the Lord.

 

If there is a problem, pray to God, and He will intercede for you. Do not rise up against anyone in authority over you. That is the bottom line. Why? Because if you do, that is rebellion, and you are breaking the law of God. No good thing can come out of it. You pray, of course people in authority make mistakes. You pray, ask the Lord to intercede He will work it out.

 

It says here do not obey them with eye services," as men pleasers." Do not be phony. Pray for them until you find some mercy for them and compassion. Try and like them. Obey them because you really believe that it is the right thing to do. Do it "in singleness of heart," which means do not do it with your carnal mind. Do it with the mind of Christ, obey and honor your bosses. Why? Because you fear God. If you do not do it, you are going to receive the judgment for rebellion.

 

Does anybody not understand that? Everything that God tells you to do is for your good and your safety. If He says do not rebel against your parents, women do not rebel against your husbands, if he says men do not mistreat your wives not matter how much they drive you crazy. If God says do not do that, it is because He is telling you that if you do, something unpleasant is going to come back on you. He is trying to help you. He is not a God that wants to torture you.

 

This is all advice. If you do not listen to it, something unpleasant is going to happen to you. Not that God is a vengeful God throwing lightening bolts down from Heaven on you. You are breaking one of the natural laws. When you rebel against authority, there is a reaping of what you sow. It is not a good thing. It cannot bring a good thing into your life. If you submit, it has to bring blessings into your life. Why? Because when you submit to authority, God will bless you. Why? Because it is one of His laws. He made it, and that is the way it is. That is what He said, do not rebel against authority.

 

Women, I am telling you, if you rebel against your husband your kids are going to rebel against you as sure as morning comes after night. I tell you the truth. Men you rebel against your boss, your wife is going to rebel against you, and your children are going to rebel against you. Rebellion reaps rebellion, disrespect reaps disrespect. You do not want to respect your parents? I guarantee you if you disrespect your parents and no repentance comes forth by the time you have children, watch out! Your children will never respect you. It will never happen. It goes right down the line. Respect reaps respect, honor reaps honor, Godly submission reaps Godly submission. I tell you the truth.

 

Verse 23. We are almost finished. "And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men." That is not a particularly good translation. What that is really saying is. "And whatsoever you do out of your carnal heart." In other words, there are things that you cannot do out of Christ. When you go to work and you are making up sodas and sandwiches because that is your job, that is not coming out of your Christ mind. That is coming out of your carnal mind. Why? Because we live in this world, and it is a carnal world.

 

He is saying that whatever it is that you have to do, it is a carnal thing but you have to do it, do it as unto the Lord, do it with a right heart. Do it with gratefulness, do it with peace, do it with submission, do it as if you are doing unto the Lord. Why? Because He wants to bless you. He is giving you all of these rules, He desires to bless you. If you do the opposite He cannot bless you.

 

Some people do not know. Some people really do not know, they do not know that if they do some of these things, difficult times are going to come into their life. God wrote a book, and He is telling you what to do that He may bless you. It is His desire to bless you.

 

Verse 24. "Knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance," do you hear this? He is saying do all of these things, follow all of my rules, knowing that your true inheritance comes from me. What is your inheritance? Anybody know?

 

COMMENT: Eternal life?

 

PASTOR VITALE: Christ in you, the hope of glory. The life of Christ growing in you, the hope of mankind, the resurrection from the dead, deliverance from every problem that we have, and eternal life.

 

Submit to authority over you, be good to your brother, do good to those that hate you. Pray for and bless those that hate you, and for those that despitefully use you, ask God to do good things to them. You will receive the inheritance of His life in you. Please notice this, Verse 24, the last phrase says do all these things for "ye serve the Lord Christ."

 

It does not say the Lord Jesus Christ, and it does not say the Lord Christ Jesus. I want to suggest to you that the reason it is so unclear is that the Scripture is saying no matter where you are, if you are not saved, or if you are saved and you have a basic salvation, if you have the Holy Ghost, if the seed of Christ is in you, it does not matter, you can have the most basic relationship with the Lord, this word is for you. This word is not just for the Sons. This word is not just for mature people in Christ. This word is for everybody.

 

We know that there are some instructions in this Bible that are just for the Sons. This word is for everybody. Do good to others that the Father might do good unto you. For ye serve the Lord Christ. "Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord, I will recompense." There is nothing that goes unseen. Every sin will have its just recompense. Every good deed shall receive good. Here it is in the next Verse 25.

 

"But he that doeth wrong," it does not matter if you are a Christian or if you are not a Christian, he that doeth wrong "shall receive for the wrong which he hath done." There is no such junk that you are under the blood, brethren. If you hurt somebody, you have to make it right. Do not tell me it is under the blood. If you stole from somebody, you better pay it back. If you made a mistake and you hurt somebody, you better go and say you are sorry.

 

Do not just pass it off and sweep it under the rug, because your pride is in the way. If you hurt them tell them you are sorry. Why? Because "He that doeth wrong shall receive for the wrong which he hath done: and there is no respect of persons." God knows that you are not perfect. You do something wrong, go make it right. Fix it up. There is a God in Heaven, and He is not blind.

 

Do not be deceived because lightening does not fall in five minutes, the next day, or the next week. Do not be deceived. Five years down the line, and you are going through a really bad time. You say "Lord what is going on?" He will say "Remember five years ago, you did that and you thought I was not looking." God is not mocked, brethren.

 

You shall surely reap what you sow. Sow good, and you shall reap good. Sow wickedness, and you shall reap wickedness. Sow a hard heart to people that you have the ability to help, and you will find yourself in a difficult situation with a hard-hearted person and refusing to help you. God is a just God. It is hard to see in a world like we have today. That is just because we do not understand Him.

 

God is not restricted to a 70, 80, or 90 year lifetime. He is eternal. He is looking into eternal purposes, He is looking into eternal generations. Believe me, every sin has its just recompense. God will do righteousness. Leave it to Him, bless you brother, and live in peace. That is the message of Colossians 3. Praise God.

 

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