A natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned. ¹⁵ But the one who is spiritual discerns all things, yet he himself is discerned by no one. ¹⁶ For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he will instruct Him? BUT WE HAVE THE MIND OF CHRIST. (1Cor2:14-16)

There are certain spiritual truths that only those whose spirits have been united with Christ’s can discern (1Cor6:17). Now if as Paul writes, the Christian has the mind of Christ (v16), it follows that he or she must also have the mind of His Father. Clearly that cannot apply to God’s omniscience or power of thought – only He could create a universe and He did so through the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ (Eph3:9). However, if Christians have the mind of the One who in turn has the mind of God it does mean that God’s nature is neither alien nor entirely unknowable. So, when a Christian knows in his innermost being that it is cruel and unkind to punish someone for failing to do what they are incapable of doing, that will accord with Christ’s own instincts and in turn with that of His Father. Yet that same Christian, for example if he or she happens to be a Calvinist as I was for 25 years, must believe that God intends to do exactly that; namely that our Creator is predisposed to bring eternal misery upon those who fail to do what both Jesus and Paul repeatedly affirm is quite impossible – to come to Christ as Lord and Savior unless God has predetermined it and subsequently enabled them (cf. Jn1:13; Jn6:44 & numerous Pauline texts). Whatever else He might be, such a God would not be kind or loving, let alone a God who could be depicted as love personified (1Jn4:8) – a quality that is itself defined in Scripture (1Cor13).

The mind of Christ

The potential meeting of minds should be no surprise since mankind was created in God’s image, a depiction that cannot relate to appearance but to nature and (ultimately) to function. At least the latter shall be the case providing the ravages of a sinful nature resulting from the Fall can be rectified. Thanks to Jesus Christ they can be, and in the Christian that process has already begun. He or she already partakes of the divine nature (2Pet1:4) but something more is required before any mere mortal may be adopted into the Divine Family, namely the redemption of the body (Rom8:23). That shall occur at resurrection, or for those living at the time at the coming again of Christ. As for the aforementioned “tension” between how the Bible describes God’s character and what many Christians currently understand to be His intentions towards the bulk of humanity, that is primarily what these posts and The Little Book of Providence** are endeavoring to elucidate.

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Related post: God's intelligible goodness