Video Transcript: The Jesus Mindset

Well, we've made it to the final lecture in the PeaceSmart Relationships course.  I thank you for sticking with it.  And I pray the Lord's been speaking to you and encouraging you, and helping you to see this course as a blessing.  In this final session, we’ll do a quick recap of what we've covered, and talk about the unique mindset that a Christian leader requires, in order to live the smart way and in order to focus on PeaceSmart Relationships in their lifetime.  

We started off this course in the two fires of conflict.  And we talked about the dynamics of the Wildfire and the Peacefire and the choice we have in every conflict to choose which fire is going to ignite our response to conflict, and whether we're going to be motivated by what's happening in the Wildfire, or what's happening to Peacefire.

We talked about identifying the Lord's purpose in conflict and how it can change our priorities in responding to conflict once we know what the Lord's work is doing.  We talked about staying focused on the Peacefire and three things that help us maintain that focus on the Peacefire:  that the Lord is always at work, that the Lord correction is a path of life, and to give thanks in all situations turns our focus to the Lord.  

We talked about the dynamics of the battle between the kingdom of this world and the kingdom of God, and how that battle rages even in the desires of our hearts and when those selfish desires are not meant it gives rise to evil desires, and we take offense, when we don't get what we want.  

We talked about the trap of offense, and how that trap deceives us into elevating our self-interest and justifying the choices we make.  We talked about that no one can force us to take offense that we choose to take offense.  And that when we take offense we're in a trap.  And that Satan’s purpose at the trap of offense is to hinder us from following Jesus Christ.  And that the Lord's purpose at that trap is to deliver us from it, to transform us into the image of Jesus Christ, to restore and reconcile relationship with Him and with others, and to destroy the works of the devil. 

We talked about the various roles in conflict that we that we have; the role of the person who's taken offense of the person who's caused offense, the ambassador of reconciliation, and the intercessor. 

Then we moved on to the section of how God's power changes our possibilities in resolving conflict. And that God's power does not consist of us trying to do God's will our own way, what we called Strangefire. 

And we talked about Wildfire accelerants those fleshly responses to conflict that where we attempt to extinguish the wildfire and the power of the flesh through anger, to pride through revenge, through lying, through hatred, and so on.

We talked about God's power to extinguish the Wildfire, His love, confronting sin, confessing sin, and forgiving sin.  We talked about the dynamic of what happens when offense comes into those dynamics; how we can take offense even when we're trying to reconcile and what to do, how to respond when someone refuses to reconcile at the firebreak. 

We've talked about seeking God's presence and how, when we're in God's presence, it changes our perspective on a conflict.  We talked about the four attributes of a conflict firefight, or a person that God can use in the midst of conflict: humility, a desire to please God, faith and love, four things that none of us has but that we find that the Peacefire and the Lord gives us by His grace as a free gift.

And we talked about presenting a living sacrifice at the mercy seat, presenting our bodies that the Lord might fill us with his life each day, fill us with his Holy Spirit, and then use us as He sends us back into the Wildfires of conflict that we encounter as his Ambassador of reconciliation. 

Then we talked about PeaceSmart marriages, and the purpose of marriage and how marriage reflects the world relationship between Jesus Christ and the church, and the roles that husbands and wives play in that relationship and in that mystery.  That the husband's role is to love his wife and give himself or her as Jesus Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.  And that the wife's role is to submit to her husband as the church submits to Jesus Christ.  And how we are to submit to one another for the glory of Jesus Christ. 

We talked about marriage, conflict and marriage Wildfires and the opportunities that a husband has in the midst of a conflict with his wife to go before the Lord and lay it all out to say, Lord, how do I love my wife in this situation? We talked about the opportunity to the wife has to go before the Lord and lay that topic down before Him and say, Lord, how do I submit to this man in this situation? 

And we talked about Peace Smart Parenting, we talked about the dynamics of relationships between parents and children and the parents’ responsibility to raise up their children in the ways of the Lord and the discipleship opportunities that are presented from sunrise to sunset. And that it is a parent's responsibility to raise their child in the ways of the Lord, not the Sunday school teacher, the school teacher, or the youth pastor.  We talked about not provoking our children to anger, and not disciplining them out of anger, but out of love, with an attitude of serving. 

Then we talked about the PeaceSmart Relationships in organizations.  And we talked about the heat of competition and the three relationship engines that are running in every organization and every team and every ministry.  

The authority engine, which has the power to serve; the correction engine, the power to grow; and the conflict engine, the power to transform.  

And then we talked about the 1221 project, and PeaceSmart Evangelism and overcoming evil with good, and the opportunities presented to us when we have enemies or people who disagree with us, or people who consider us their enemy, and the opportunity to treat them the way the Lord Jesus Christ treated us when we were his enemies, to love them, to lay down our lives for them to overcome evil by doing good, and the opportunity to go before the Lord and pray for them and ask the Lord, Father, how do I love them? How do I bless them? How do I do good to them in this situation? 

Well, all of these topics that we've talked about, bring us to this final lecture and what I've titled, The Jesus mindset. To be a Christian leader who lives their life and seeks a PeaceSmart Relationship in all of their relationships requires a very unique mindset.  To be a Christian leader who seeks to pursue PeaceSmart Relationships in all of their relationships, requires a unique mindset.  All of the areas we've covered in this course, require a unique mindset. It's not a natural mindset.  

The Harbinger Institute is a secular institute that does consulting services with organizations and individuals.  And they talk about two types of mindsets that exist in most people.  And by mindset, I just mean attitude; the way we think about things.  And The Harbinger Institute identifies the inward mindset and the outward mindset.  

The inward mindset is focused on self and the leader who is focused on self makes decisions and treat people according to their inward focus, their self-interest. They sometimes use fear and intimidation to lead.  They'll use their authority as the power to control and dictate.  When goals aren't met, they'll blame other people. And they'll use other people to accomplish personal goals.  

From time to time, we all fall into the inward mindset. I can tell you quite honestly that even within the last year, as I've been studying some marriage material with my wife and focusing on that relationship, that I've come across some information that's caused me to recognize that in many seasons of my marriage, I have done things for my wife to bless her, to be a blessing to her.  So it looked like an outward mindset focus. But I recognized that the reasons I did all those things, was from an inward focus. What they meant to me that I couldn't check the box off that I was doing my husbandly duties. My focus was inward. 

Sometimes when we serve the Lord, our focus is not on the Lord, it's on ourselves and are we doing what the Lord has called us to do?  Am I accomplishing what I think the Lord wants me to accomplish. And we're very busy in the kingdom. We have our list of goals, we're pursuing them, we're achieving them.  We have what looks like blessing on our work.  But in the meantime, we haven't prayed in 30 days.  We haven’t spent any time at the Peacefire. And we're deceived because what we're doing is building the kingdom in our own mind and our own power, and deceiving ourselves thinking that we're being led by the Spirit without spending any time with Him.

So the inward mindset creeps up on us. And just like anything else, when it's exposed in you, take it to the Peacefire and confess it to the Lord.  Say, Lord, change me, I see that I'm operating from an inward mindset here and it’s not the attitude you want me to have. So the inward mindset is one focus. Another mindset is the outward mindset. 

This outward mindset is focused on others.  It's focused on the group or on the team.  A leader, a Christian leader, who has an outward mindset accepts responsibility for everything under their leadership.  They're using their authority as the power to serve.  They accept responsibility for everything that happens, they seek to understand and develop people under their authority, rather than blame them when goals aren't reached.  They look at processes that look at procedures, see how the organization can improve, what the Lord wants them to do to change, and they recognize and reward contributors to team success. 

And I think from time to time, we all have that outward mindset where we're serving, or we're focused on others, and genuinely so.  We're out of that inward mindset and we're focused on the team, we're focused on the organization, we're focused on achieving a goal, accomplishing a purpose, whatever the tasks may be, whatever the ministry programs might be, and we are moving forward.  And we're leading in the Lord's blessing. 

Both the inward and the outward mindset, we can go back and forth between those.  But I challenge you to think today that neither of those mindsets, as healthy as each one might be in its appropriate time and place none of them would enable you to walk through conflict at the Peacefire.  None of them will empower you to have PeaceSmart Relationships in all of your relationships. 

So, I hope there's one thing you've learned through this course and that is, in order to have PeaceSmart Relationships and in order to pursue peace, that transformational peace that exists in the midst of conflict, it requires a relentless reliance on Jesus Christ.  That not one of us, no matter how many classes we've taken, how much education, how gifted, how articulate, how winsome, how persuasive, how good looking how much money we have, none of us can do the things that we've talked about doing in our relationships without the power of the Holy Spirit and the relentless reliance on Jesus Christ in the conflict that we encounter.  It requires a third mindset and that is the Jesus mindset. 

During his earthly ministry, Jesus had a mindset.  We've talked about it. We haven't talked about it as His mindset, but He had one.  Can you guess what it is?  Jesus mindset was a relationship of relentless reliance on His Father.  Here's some scriptures that give us a glimpse of that relationship:

John 5:30, "By myself, I can do nothing:  I judge only as I hear and my judgment is just for I seek not to please myself, but Him who sent me."

John 12:49, "For I did not speak on my own, but the Father who sent Me commanded me to say all that I have spoken."

And John 20:21, Jesus said, “Peace be with you, as the Father sent me, I'm sending you.”

Jesus Christ had a relationship of relentless reliance on His Father, during his earthly ministry.  The Father sent him to maintain that relationship, to accomplish the Father's will, to go to the cross, to be resurrected, to send the Holy Spirit to you and I so that He would send us in the same way that the Father sent Him, to have a relationship of relentless reliance on Jesus Christ, that His will may be done through us. 

In order for that to happen, we have to know God's will, we have to desire to do God's will by faith, we have to know Him, we have to be filled with the Holy Spirit.  We have to rely on Him to empower us to do His will, to speak His word, to walk in His power the way that He walked in the power that His Father gave Him when He walked this earth.  That is a transformation process for all of us. 

None of us do that 24 hours a day.  We're all in the process of transformation, and we're all going to fail.  There are going to be moments when we take offense.  There are going to be moments when we offend someone.  And I hope that by now you recognize that every time that happens, it's an opportunity for you to go to the Peacefire and see the Lord do some astonishing things in you, and through you. 

As a Christian leader, our relationship can be one of relentless reliance on Jesus Christ. 

Here's what the Apostle Paul wrote to the Philippian Christians in Chapter 2 (5:13), about the mindset of Jesus Christ.  He said, “In your relationship with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus,” and then he describes that mindset.  “Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage.  Rather, He made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness and being found in appearance as a man, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.  Therefore, God exalted Him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth, and under the earth, and every tongue an acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. 

“Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed - not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence - continue to work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.”  

The Lord is at work in your life, to will and to do of his good pleasure to accomplish His will and His purpose in you and through you, and He calls us to work out that relationship.  And how do we work it out?  We present our body as a living sacrifice and we let Him.  We come before Him and present our body and we let Him change us.  When He exposes sin in our life, and He will, we bring it to Him, we confess it.  We let Him change it.  When someone offends us, we bring them before the Lord ask Him to give us the grace to forgive, and we forgive. 

And then we go and reconcile, out of obedience to Him to treat others the way He's treated us in our marriages, with our children, with our parents, with our boss, with our employees, every relationship in your life a Peace Smart relationship, every relationship in your life, an opportunity for the Lord to continue that transformational work in you.   

Every relationship and opportunity for the Lord to use you to bring blessing, encouragement, love into the lives of those with whom you have relationships.  Even with your enemies, the opportunity to do good, to bless, to love. This is the Jesus mindset: it’s the mindset that once the Wildfire ignites you’re reminded the Lord is always at work, and I need to give thanks. 

I need to present my body and ask Him what He wants me to do.  If I’ve taken offense, I know I'm not where I supposed to be.  I need to get out of this trap.  I need to get to the Peacefire, I need the Lord to teach me something.  It's an opportunity for me to grow here.  The Lord wants to continue His work in me.  He wants to will and to act, fulfill His good purpose through me.  And I work out my own salvation by coming and presenting my body and letting Him do it. 

Father, bless my brothers and sisters who have watched this course and made it to the end.  Bless them in their studies and more so, Father, bless them in their relationship with you continue to reveal yourself to them.  Continue to glorify Jesus Christ in them and through them and grant them the grace, Father, to walk in the Jesus mindset for Your Word tells us that you have given us the mind of Christ.  In Jesus name I pray.  Amen. 

God bless you.  Thanks for watching.