Body

Devotions

THE MIND OF CHRIST

David Wilkerson

“Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5).

“But we have the mind of Christ” (1 Corinthians 2:16).

“Be renewed in the spirit of your mind” (Ephesians 4:23).

These all are exhortations from the apostle Paul. He’s telling the people of God, “Let the mind that is in Christ—the very thinking of Jesus—be your thinking also. His mindset is the one we all are to seek.”

What does it mean to have the mind of Christ? Simply put, it means to think and act as Jesus did. It means making Christ-like decisions that determine how we are to live. And it means bringing every faculty of our mind to bear on how we actually can have the mind of Christ.

Every time we look into the mirror of God’s Word, we are to ask ourselves: “Does what I see about myself reflect the nature and thinking of Christ? Am I changing from image to image, conformed to Jesus’ likeness by every experience that God brings into my life?”

According to Paul, here is the mindset of Christ: “[He] made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men” (Philippians 2:7).

Jesus made a decision while He was still in heaven. He made a covenant with the Father to lay down His heavenly glory and come to earth as a man. He would descend to the world as a humble servant and He would seek to minister rather than to be ministered to.

For Christ, this meant saying, “I go to do Your will, Father.” Indeed, Jesus determined ahead of time, “I am laying down My will in order to do Yours, Father. I subjugate My will so that I may embrace Yours. Everything I say and do has to come from You. I’m laying down everything to be totally dependent upon You.”

THE TRUTH THAT SETS US FREE

Gary Wilkerson

“Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes” (Romans 10:1-4, ESV).

“Do I need both sanctification and justification?” The way you answer that question will change your life. It will be the difference between bondage and freedom—bondage to the old way, or freedom to walk in newness of life. Your answer to this question is key to your success in overcoming sin, temptation, Satan, and the world.

If both sanctification and justification are required, do they come from the same source? That’s an important question. If both are required, are they attained in the same way? Think about that for a moment, would you? Because I believe many of us believe that justification comes exclusively by grace through faith from God alone. And many of us believe the second comes by man, through man, and man alone. Many falsely believe that it is God who justifies us, but it is now up to us to sanctify ourselves—that it is His responsibility to get us into the kingdom but our responsibility to stay and perform as godly people once we’re in the kingdom. Many of us are saying, “I’ve attained justification by grace and now I must strive day in and day out to get and stay sanctified.”

What we’re saying is, “Thank You, God, for justifying me. Thank you that at the cross You made me right. Thank You that You pardoned my sin and paid the penalty. You stood in my place and took my sin upon You. Thank You for the work of justifying me and now in return, I want to do you a favor and show you how well I can sanctify myself.

The truth that sets us free is not the law that we know or our zealous pursuit in trying to keep the law. The truth that sets us free is in a person, Christ Jesus. He is the only source of freedom from our sin. 

THIS WAS A GOD I COULD WORSHIP

Nicky Cruz

God has a way of taking our moments of deepest confusion and doubt and using them to strengthen our trust and dependence on Him. He takes our seeds of faith and turns them into a tower of conviction and confidence. When we are most perplexed, He is most in control. When we are weakest, He is strongest. When we need Him, He is always there.

David Wilkerson, my friend and mentor, is a living testament to this truth. More than any man I know, he trusts God implicitly. He never allows confusion or doubt or other people to steer his decisions. Every worry, every question, every moment of concern is placed at the feet of Jesus until he hears an answer. He listens to God and God alone. That is why God has used him so mightily in his life and ministry.

David Wilkerson was just a country preacher from Pennsylvania when God told him to go to New York and reach out to the gangs. He had been watching a news program that discussed the gang problem in the inner city when God spoke to his spirit and told him to go. No one could imagine this skinny preacher being able to reach such a hardened group, yet he obeyed and went.

I’ll never forget his boldness in the face of danger. We cursed at him, humiliated him, screamed in his face, yet he kept coming back. I would never have stepped foot into a church building had I not been so fascinated by his guts, his complete disregard for his own safety. What would make a man do such a thing? What kind of God would give a man such confidence, such trust, such gumption that he could walk into the middle of hell and stare down the devil himself? What would make a scrawny street preacher think he could come onto our turf and tell us what to believe?

I had to know, so I went to his service at St. Nicolas Arena. In front of hundreds of strangers and dozens of my fellow gang members, I fell to my knees before the altar and surrendered to Jesus. I cried out for Him to save me, and He did. I gave up trying to do it on my own. I looked at David Wilkerson, at the love in his eyes, at the peace in his spirit, at the courage in his heart, and I knew that I wanted what he had. This was a God I could worship. This was a Jesus I could relate to.

 

Nicky Cruz, internationally known evangelist and prolific author, turned to Jesus Christ from a life of violence and crime after meeting David Wilkerson in New York City in 1958. The story of his dramatic conversion was told first in The Cross and the Switchblade by David Wilkerson and then later in his own best-selling book Run, Baby, Run.

LIVING PROOF THAT JESUS IS ALL-SUFFICIENT

David Wilkerson

Where did the disciples start their ministry? Jesus sent them to the distressed, the poor, those who were bowed down with sin, bondages and life-controlling habits. “And the lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and the hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled” (Luke 14:23).

I think of the Teen Challenge drug and alcohol rehabilitation ministry, with its 1100 centers worldwide. And I think of scores of other reapers who have gone to other countries and seen miracles of salvation as they’ve ministered to the neediest, poorest, most devil-bound people. They’re starting to reap exactly where Jesus started His harvest: among the lost sheep, the captives, the brokenhearted, the prisoners, the lepers, the blind, the poor, those who mourn, those with a spirit of heaviness, those who are distressed and disconcerted.

Consider Paul’s words: “Ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not . . . that no flesh should glory in his presence” (1 Corinthians 1:26–29).

Dear saint, Jesus knew what we were going to face in these last days: a generation steeped in sin far more than any other; stress and loneliness such as has never been experienced by man; financial disasters; rampant divorce; militant homosexuality; immorality that would bring a blush to even the worst sinners just thirty years ago.

This is why Christ seeks laborers who have submitted to the fires and forgings. He wants a people who will stand before the world and proclaim: “God is with me! Satan cannot stop me. Just look at my life. I’ve been through fire after fire, pounded again and again. But I’ve come through it all more than a conqueror through Christ, who lives in me. What I have preached has worked for me. I am living proof that Jesus is all-sufficient!”

TIME FOR THE HARVEST

David Wilkerson

When Moses told Pharaoh, “Let my people go,” it was because God had announced the time for harvest. The moment had come for Israel’s deliverance from captivity!

But Pharaoh responded, “Who is the Lord, that I should obey his voice to let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go” (Exodus 5:2). Pharaoh represents Satan’s demonic system, including false religions and oppression that hold people under bondage.

Before Israel could be delivered, the powers of darkness had to be shaken. So God struck Egypt with nine natural calamities. Yet those nine disasters only hardened Pharaoh’s heart.

Finally, there came a calamity so devastating that everyone in Egypt—from the rulers down to ordinary citizens—knew this wasn’t just nature out of control. It was God speaking. The Lord had sent an angel of death, and in one night the eldest son in every Egyptian family died, including Pharaoh’s son. The very next day, Israel paraded out of Egypt. Here was the harvest that came just before judgment.

Centuries later, when Jesus announced the ripe harvest in Jerusalem, He knew judgment was about to come. Years hence, Titus and his army would invade the city, and 1.2 million people would be killed. Many would be hung on crosses, and the city itself would be burned to the ground.

This is why Jesus warned His generation, “You say there are four months before harvest. But I’m telling you, the harvest has to begin now. You have to be about the will of God, because the greatest calamity is at your door. I’m commissioning you now to finish My work. The time to start reaping is today.”

How did Jesus describe the calamity that was to come? “Then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be” (Matthew 24:21). Yet, before that calamity came, it would be time for the harvest.