We live in a world that’s constantly shaping us. Every moment of every day, forces are at work molding our thoughts, attitudes, and behaviors. The question isn’t whether we’re being shaped—it’s what is doing the shaping. This fundamental reality lies at the heart of understanding genuine spiritual transformation and why so many believers struggle to experience the abundant life they know should be theirs.
The Hidden Reality of Your Inner Life
Here’s something remarkable: When you trusted Christ as your Savior, God performed a spiritual surgery on you. Colossians 2:11 describes it as “a circumcision made without hands”—a divine operation that fundamentally separated your soul and spirit from bondage to your sinful flesh. At the very core of who you are, in your heart, God placed His Holy Spirit. Romans 5:5 tells us that “the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost.” (See also Gal. 4:6, Eph. 3:17, Eph. 6:5-6)
This means something profound for the believer: Your “inner man,” the core of who you are, is completely good. The Holy Spirit dwells in your heart. The life of Christ resides in you. You are, at your spiritual core, a “new creature” (II Cor. 5:17)—not a schizophrenic saint with two warring natures, but a whole person with a completely new identity in Jesus Christ.
Yet if this is true, why do believers still struggle with sin? Why do old patterns persist? Why does transformation seem so elusive?
The Part That’s Still Under Construction
First Thessalonians 5:23 reveals that you are a three-part being: spirit, soul, and body. While your spirit—your “inner man”—has been made new, your body remains “sold under sin” (Rom. 7:14). Your physical body, including your brain, only knows how to operate according to the flesh patterns established before your salvation.
This is the missing piece in understanding transformation. Your brain—that three-pound organ in your skull—has been wired from birth by every sensory experience you’ve ever had. It’s been programmed by “the course of this world” (Eph. 2:2). Every habit, every addiction, every coping mechanism, every automatic response has created literal pathways in your brain, neural circuits that fire automatically without conscious thought.
Think about driving a familiar route. You arrive at your destination and can’t even remember the journey; your brain was on autopilot. That’s how deeply ingrained these patterns become.
The Choice Before You: Conform or Transform
Romans 12:1-2 presents a crucial decision every believer faces: “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.”
Notice the command isn’t about fixing your heart—that’s already been dealt with through your justification. The focus is on your body and your mind.
Here’s the unsettling truth: Conformity to the world happens automatically. It’s both passive and active. You can actively chase after worldly things, or you can sit back and do nothing—either way, the world is conforming you to its system. It’s the default setting. The culture, media, entertainment, and every influence around you are constantly shaping your thought patterns.
The only way to combat automatic conformity is through intentional transformation. And transformation happens through one specific process: the renewing of your mind.
What Renewing Your Mind Actually Does
When Romans 12:2 says “be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind,” it’s describing a metamorphosis—the same word used for a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. It’s a complete change of form.
But what exactly is being transformed? Not your spirit—that’s already perfect in Christ. Not your heart—the Holy Spirit already dwells there. What needs transformation is your brain.
As you renew your mind in God’s Word, something remarkable happens. You begin establishing new neural pathways. Imagine you have a well-worn path from your house to a barn that you’ve walked for years. That path represents your old way of thinking and responding to life. When you renew your mind, you start walking a new route to the barn. At first, it’s difficult—the grass is high, the way is unclear. But as you walk it again and again, a new path forms.
This is neuroplasticity in action—your brain’s God-given ability to form new connections and pathways. Every time you choose to believe what God says about you instead of what your feelings tell you, every time you act in faith rather than fear, every time you respond in grace rather than anger, you’re strengthening a new circuit in your brain.
Bringing the Life of Christ Into Your Mortal Flesh
Second Corinthians 4:10-11 captures the purpose of this process: “Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body…that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.”
The life of Christ is indisputably in you. But what’s stopping it from showing up in your daily experience? What’s preventing it from being manifest in your mortal flesh? It’s the old thought patterns, the stinking thinking, the deceptive brain messages that are still hardwired from years of living according to the flesh and the course of the world.
Your brain sends you constant messages: “You’re a failure. You’re not good enough. You’ll never change. Look what you did. You’re nothing like what God says you are.” These are deceptive brain messages, and they stand between the glorious reality of who you are in Christ and the lived experience of that reality.
The Battle and the Victory
Second Corinthians 10:3-5 describes the warfare: “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh…casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.”
Building godly character happens one thought at a time. Every thought matters. Every time you capture a thought and bring it into obedience to Christ, you’re winning a battle in the war for your brain.
The purpose of this transformation? Romans 12:2 tells us: “that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.” When you renew your mind, you’re not searching for God’s will—you’re proving it. You’re testing it. You’re discovering through experience that what God says is good, acceptable, and perfect.
Like David refusing Saul’s armor because he “had not proved it,” you need to test God’s Word in your own experience (I Sam. 17:39). And when you do, you’ll find it works. It’s true. It’s reliable. It transforms.
The Christian life isn’t about becoming a different person—you already are a “new creature.” It’s about allowing your brain to catch up with the reality of who God has already made you to be in Christ. It’s about establishing new routes to the barn, one faith-filled choice at a time.
Pastor Bryan Ross
Grace Life Bible Church
Grand Rapids, MI
Friday, December 12, 2025
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