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[0:00] Well, it's good to see you all here this morning. My name is Dave Nannery. I am one of the pastors here at Squamish Baptist Church, and it is my joy and my privilege to bring God's word to us this morning.

[0:12] And I would love for us if we could begin with a word of prayer. So let me pray for us. Our Father, we know that apart from you, we can do nothing.

[0:25] We can only do what we see our Father doing. That is the only thing that bears fruit for us to keep in step with your spirit. So we pray, give us your eyes to see what you are seeing.

[0:37] Give us your ears to hear what you are hearing. Give us your heart to receive your understanding as we turn to your word. As we look at the world around us, our people around us, the relationships you've put us in, the opportunities you've given us, Lord, we want to come to them with a heart of wisdom, with the mind of Christ, and we don't know how to do that.

[1:01] So we humbly ask for your help, and I ask for your help even now as I have this opportunity to open God's word. That, Lord God, if there is more to be said or less to be said than what I've prepared, Lord, that you would guide, that you would offer help by the power of your spirit.

[1:21] We need you this morning, Lord. Give us help. Give us wisdom. Amen. Okay. Well, a few years ago, there was a major advertising campaign.

[1:33] Well, it started a few years ago. It's still ongoing. That was launched by a Christian organization in the United States, and this advertising campaign showed up on billboards, sponsorships, TV commercials.

[1:50] It even went so far, the people running the ad campaign even went so far to air advertisements during the last several Super Bowls. If you know anything about airing ads during a Super Bowl, it's terrifyingly expensive.

[2:04] And the total cost of this ad campaign ran over 100 million U.S. dollars. 100 million U.S. dollars was spent on an advertising campaign launched by a Christian organization.

[2:17] At the center of the ad campaign is the tagline, He gets us. He gets us. And this ad campaign is centered around showing the people who see these ads how Christ gets, how Christ understands the problems and questions that modern people face today, how he understands the mindset that we have toward our problems.

[2:41] For example, if you go on the campaign's website right now, you'll see it offering answers to questions that people have, such as, why is losing so difficult? I'm worn out.

[2:52] Has the world gone mad? I can't do it all. Why does it feel like we have to do it all? I want to be me. Am I even allowed to be the real me? And so on and so forth.

[3:05] Now, the purpose of an ad campaign like that is to show that Jesus Christ sympathizes with us, that he understands what we're going through. And there's truth in that. That is absolutely true.

[3:16] In Hebrews 4, verse 15, we read, We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

[3:31] So we have Jesus as our high priest, our representative before God. He is able to sympathize with our weaknesses. He does get us.

[3:43] But I want to propose that we need more than this to face the challenges of life that this ad campaign is addressing.

[3:57] We need more than just to know that, oh, Jesus understands us. Because the trials of sin, the trials of suffering, the trials of shame that every Christian has to face, we need more than just to be understood, as good as that is.

[4:09] We love to consider how Christ, how he empathizes with us, how he understands our minds, how he feels the pain we feel, and so we should. We should value that. But there's something I don't see many people considering, and I notice this in counseling a lot, is people are not often considering this question.

[4:31] Yeah, you want to know, does Christ empathize with me, but do you empathize with him? Do we understand his mind? Do you share his desires and his feelings?

[4:43] Do you understand and look at the world and look at people the way that he does? Have you entered the mind of Christ? That first sort of empathy, that desire to be understood, everybody wants more of that.

[4:58] You don't have to be a Christian to want that. I've talked, I remember once talking with a neighbor of mine who's not a Christian, and going through a hard time, and I asked her, you know, how are you doing?

[5:09] You know, what would be helpful? And she just said, I just wish people would show more empathy. Okay, yeah, you don't have to be a Christian to want that. But I've observed that few people seem to want the second sort of empathy, to understand the mind, the desires, the feelings of Christ to enter his world.

[5:26] I have only seen this desire show up in growing and maturing Christians. Those are the people who want to know the mind of Christ, who want to understand his heart, who want to see how does the world look to him and feel to him.

[5:46] He gets us, yes, but do you get him? Now, do you get him? Good luck selling that as an ad campaign. You know, I don't know that you're going to find many people willing to put up $100 million to fund that.

[5:59] And yet, the apostle Paul declares that this is the powerhouse of the Christian life, the ability to get Jesus Christ, the ability to get Jesus Christ, to know the mind of Christ, to act and speak from the mind of Christ.

[6:19] In 1 Corinthians 2, verses 15 through 16, which we read last week, Paul writes, the spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one.

[6:32] For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ. So this is part of that passage we encountered in our last week's sermon.

[6:45] And here, Paul declares there is a certain kind of person. There is a, what he calls a spiritual person. That's not what our culture means when they say, oh, I'm a spiritual person. No. Paul has something very different, something so much better in mind.

[6:59] A spiritual person is someone who has received the Holy Spirit from God. And now, because he has the Holy Spirit, this person is living his life in the wisdom, in the power of the Holy Spirit.

[7:13] This person makes good choices, good judgments, sees life accurately and well in both their intellect and their feelings. Why? Because this person has understood the mind of the Lord.

[7:29] And Paul says, this is what I'm experiencing, what I and my companions are experiencing. Paul says, we have the mind of Christ. And he's longing for the church he's writing to, to experience the same thing.

[7:48] Once again, this is the powerhouse of the Christian life. Honestly, being a Christian and trying to live like a Christian is miserable if you don't have this.

[8:00] If you have this, it's liberating. Empathizing with Christ, understanding his mind, his heart, his thoughts, his desires, his affections, and making them yours.

[8:19] That's what it means to be a spiritual person. Now, last week, we talked about the mind of Christ, and we use the analogy of AM radio and FM radio.

[8:33] When you're not a Christian, when you don't have the Holy Spirit, it's like you've got a radio that only brings in AM stations. Some of these stations are broadcasting a really destructive mindset.

[8:48] Others are a little more helpful, not as destructive. They can be of some value. But none of them are truly the mind of Christ. When God changes your heart, when you are born again to believe in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, it's like God has given you an FM button on your radio.

[9:09] That FM button is the Holy Spirit. You've received the Holy Spirit. For the first time, you can tune into the mind of Christ through the Spirit who communicates the mentality of Jesus Christ to us.

[9:25] Only the Holy Spirit can do that because only He knows the mentality, the mind of Jesus Christ. And the rest of your life is spent learning to get off of AM radio and to get onto AM, get onto FM radio, to get back to the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, which we often kind of forget and go back to our old ways about.

[9:47] And this takes time. This takes time and progress over the course of your life. You practice and you learn more and you learn how to hit that FM button, how to tune into the mind of Christ.

[10:01] Now, that, of course, raises the next question. How do I do that? It's nice to tell me that, but what does that actually look like in practice?

[10:14] Practically speaking, where do I find the mind of Christ? Where do I find the mind of Christ? Well, we're going to answer that question. Kind of the long-term answer to that question is BK is going to, in the fall, resume his sermon series on Romans.

[10:31] And we're going to look at Romans chapter 8. And Romans chapter 8 is all about this exact thing. We're going to spend, we're going to spend months probably. If we know BK well, we're going to spend months learning the mind of Christ.

[10:45] It's going to be wonderful, especially after spending a lot of time in Romans 7, where we're learning what AM radio living is like. Right? The mind of Christ. It's going to be great. I'm looking forward to it. But until then, here are four steps.

[10:58] We're going to go through four steps today that may help you find the mind of Christ so that you can learn to take on his mindset, his mentality, his personality, in the difficult challenges of your life.

[11:13] There's so much more that the Bible has to say than what we're saying today. But this might be a good way to start. And step one is easy to overlook. Ask. Ask for the mind of Christ.

[11:26] We saw last week that the Apostle Paul describes the mind of Christ as the things freely given us by God.

[11:38] Emphasis on the word freely. God gives freely the mentality of Jesus Christ. You don't have to pay. You don't have to earn it. In fact, it's offensive if you try to.

[11:52] Jesus himself says in Matthew 11, verse 28, come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

[12:02] He will give you this restful way of his FM radio mentality. It is so different from the toil, the burnout of your AM radio mindset, especially of trying to live the Christian life with an AM radio mindset.

[12:20] That's just miserable. No wonder people burn out and leave the church. He will give you a mindset where obedience to Jesus becomes easy and light.

[12:32] My yoke is easy. My burden is light. It's not hard. It's not exhausting the way it was before. It's a different sort of hard, oddly a restful sort of hard, where following him becomes life-giving, not life-draining.

[12:47] Come to me, he says. Come. Ask. As James 1, verse 5 puts it, if any of you lacks wisdom, if you don't have this wisdom from above, if you don't have the mind of Christ, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.

[13:10] Come to me. Ask. And God gives generously. He does not ridicule you and reproach you. He does not say to you, how did you not know this already?

[13:22] How did you not figure this out? That is not his heart. He is just glad that you are asking for the mind of his beloved son. He loves his son more than anything.

[13:36] And if you ask for the mind of his son, you're asking him to give you what he loves the most. So he gives freely and he gives generously. What does it look like to ask for the mind of Christ?

[13:49] Maybe it looks like this. Prayers that are simple like this. Lord, I've been quick to assume what I need from other people and what I need from you.

[14:00] But what am I really needing right now in this moment? Lord, what are my children needing today? What about my spouse? What part do you have me to play in their lives today?

[14:12] rather than just rushing in and assuming you know what they need and you know what you ought to be doing? Lord, what are you asking me to do and to think in this season of life?

[14:26] Lord, what are you wanting to teach me through this sermon? What are you wanting me to learn at church today? Lord, open my eyes that I may see the wonderful things in the Bible.

[14:43] You can see that what these prayers begin with is they begin by assuming that we don't know what to ask for. We don't even know what we really need.

[14:55] A mind apart from the mind of Christ is always assuming, oh, I know what I need. Other people need to behave better. I need other people to behave better. Or I need to do this and I ought to do this. And we have all these demands we place.

[15:06] the truth is we don't know what other people need. We don't know what our roles ought to be in their lives. It is good to slow down and ask God.

[15:16] It is not good to rush ahead and to make all these demands on ourselves, all these demands on other people, all these demands on God. God, I know what I need out of you.

[15:28] Will you give me what I need? The first step to finding the mind of Christ is to ask for the mind of Christ. In step two, we begin to listen to what God is saying.

[15:46] You can't know the mind of someone unless you listen to them. If you want the mind of Christ, the first place to go is where those who knew Jesus wrote about what Jesus said and did.

[15:58] If you want the mind of Jesus Christ, well, what did the people who knew him and were eyewitnesses to him say? So for step two, we read the Gospels for the mind of Christ. Read the Gospels for the mind of Christ.

[16:13] Open the four Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Now, I'm sure that many or hopefully even most of us here have read these accounts of the life of Jesus Christ.

[16:26] And what tends to happen when we do that is we read the Gospels both to learn the stories about Jesus, to learn what he did, and then to learn facts about what Jesus taught.

[16:40] So what did he do? What did he teach? What's the content that he delivered? Now, that is good and necessary. If you're not picking up on any of that when reading the Gospels, there's a problem.

[16:51] So you do need that. That's a great place to start, but don't stop there. The mistake we make is we stop there. If you stop there, you'll know, you'll fill your head with a bunch of information about Jesus Christ, but you won't really know him.

[17:09] You won't get him. You won't understand his mind, and that's actually the exact situation his disciples were in. They were always just baffled when Jesus would do things because they had all these facts and information about him, but they weren't getting him.

[17:26] They weren't on FM radio. If you want to understand the mind of Christ, slow down and pay attention as you read the Gospels. Pay attention not only to what Jesus says and what Jesus does, pay attention also to how he says it and how he does it.

[17:47] Let me give you an example from one of the story of Jesus' miracles in Luke chapter 7. So in Luke chapter 7, beginning in verse 11, we read, soon afterward, he, that's Jesus, he went to a town called Nain, and his disciples and a great crowd went with him.

[18:06] As he drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow, and a considerable crowd from the town was with her.

[18:21] And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, do not weep. Then he came up and touched the beer and the bearers stood still.

[18:32] And he said, young man, I say to you, arise. And the dead man sat up and began to speak.

[18:44] And Jesus gave him to his mother. Fear seized them all. And they glorified God, saying, a great prophet has arisen among us, and God has visited his people.

[18:56] And this report about him spread through the whole of Judea and all the surrounding country. Now sometimes, I like to take an account like this, and I ask people, what's the first thing that Jesus does?

[19:11] What's the first thing Jesus does here? And often the answer I get, kind of the quick, knee-jerk answer, is, well, yeah, he raised the young man to life. Okay, that's not a careful answer.

[19:24] If you really want to find the mind of Christ, slow down. A person may slow down, then they'll observe things like, well, Jesus touches the funeral beer that the man was lying on.

[19:36] Or, oh yeah, Jesus speaks to the mother, do not weep. But if you really want to know the mind of Christ, slow down. after Luke introduces the widow and the crowd, the first thing that Jesus does is this.

[19:54] The Lord saw her. The Lord saw her. And the second thing he does, he had compassion on her.

[20:08] And only then does he speak. Do not weep. To someone on AM radio, these seem like trivial observations. You just gloss over them.

[20:19] What does it matter? But on FM radio, little details like this mean the world. Because if you want to know the mind of Christ, he shows up in these subtle little ways.

[20:33] To slow, that he would slow down and he would see the widow. That he would take in her situation and watch and get to know her. That he would understand her plight.

[20:45] And then he let that move him to compassion. He let that sink into his soul until his heart was moved towards her. And only then when his heart was moved with compassion did he open his mouth and touch the man and raise him to life.

[21:04] That is the mind of Christ on display. He wasn't the kind man who would just waltz in. Boom! You're alive. He let himself be moved. He saw.

[21:16] He took the person in. That's what love looks like. It's not just that Jesus speaks and raises the dead to life. That's amazing enough. It's how he does it.

[21:31] That's what shows that yes, this power is from the spirit of God and that Jesus Christ has the very heart of God. He is the son of God. Another approach I like to take if I'm wanting to go to the gospels and find the mind of Christ is I put myself in Jesus' shoes.

[21:52] So imagine, I like to say, okay, how would I react if I were faced with this situation that Jesus put in? And boy, do people put Jesus in a lot of weird and awkward situations that would make me feel really nervous.

[22:06] Here's an example, Luke chapter 12 verse 13. Someone in the crowd said to him, teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me. Okay.

[22:19] There's a man in the middle of this crowd, everyone's watching Jesus, right? The whole crowd, hundreds, thousands of people have their eyes on him. As this man speaks up and this man says he feels like he is being treated unjustly by his brother.

[22:35] Perhaps you know a family or two who are torn apart by an inheritance dispute. It is all too common. And that, it turns out, is a 2,000-year-old problem.

[22:47] Old as the hills, okay? You know, you can, it's almost like you can hear this guy like, oh, I know a guy like this. I know a guy like this. And you know they're on the war path, aren't they? Maybe this man is.

[22:59] Maybe he is getting horribly mistreated by his brother. And he's begging you to help, help. Maybe, or maybe, he's trying to recruit you to help him cheat his brother.

[23:11] Maybe he's actually in the wrong and he's trying to get you to help him get some money out of his brother. How do you know? What would you do if someone looked to you as a wise authority figure and asked you to help mediate their inheritance dispute and did it in front of a huge crowd of people and everyone turns and looks at you?

[23:31] What are you going to say? Think for a moment. What would you say in reply to this man? You thinking?

[23:43] Got your answer in mind? Well, here's what Jesus says. Man, who made me a judge or arbitrator over you? Is that what you expected him to say?

[23:58] That's not what I expected him to say. Well, that tells me something. Oh, Jesus thinks different from me. He's on a different radio station than I am.

[24:13] Because Jesus is so in tune with his father's will, he understands that this man is trying to make Jesus take on a job that is not Jesus' job to do.

[24:28] He says, being a judge or arbitrator over you, that isn't my job, that's not what I've come here to do. What the man thinks he needs from Jesus is not what he actually needs from Jesus.

[24:43] Because then Jesus, he doesn't just stop there, he doesn't just dismiss him, not my job, go away. He actually goes even further, and he then proceeds to give the man what he actually needs.

[24:54] He said to them, take care and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.

[25:06] So Jesus is saying the reason this dispute has gotten so bad, why this family is being torn apart, is because of coveting. This neediness, demandingness, this man and his brother think that money and possessions, that's going to be their life, and they're so upset and angry when the other person won't cooperate.

[25:34] Jesus even then goes on to tell a parable warning about those who build bigger barns to accumulate wealth and get security for themselves that money can give them. Jesus doesn't give the man what the man thinks he needs, Jesus gives the man what he actually needs to hear, and gives the crowd around what they need to hear.

[25:57] Isn't that something else? Do you see how reading the Gospels this way helps you understand how Jesus is thinking? He is on a very different wavelength from you and from me.

[26:11] And how the way that we would love people is often very different from the way that Jesus loves people. I could spend the next hour going through story after story saying, okay, here's a guy coming at you.

[26:22] How do you think you're going to love them? Oh, Jesus does this. Does that surprise you? Over and over and over. It just astonishes everybody around them. He is gentle when people think he needs to confront them.

[26:34] He confronts people that people think he should be gentle with them. Step two is to read the Gospels for the mind of Christ. And as we read the four Gospels, we're going to discover that Jesus has already given us a hint about where we're going to go for step three.

[26:53] In John chapters 14 through 16, Jesus gives instructions for the time when he is going to leave the earth and return to heaven after his resurrection. Instructions for us and for the time that we now live in.

[27:07] It is a time when Jesus is not physically present here on earth, present for us to witness him with our own eyes and ask him questions the way his disciples were able to do. In John 16 verses 13 through 15, Jesus makes a promise to these disciples whom he's sending out as apostles.

[27:25] And he says, when the spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth. For he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears, he will speak.

[27:36] And he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

[27:48] All that the father has is mine. Therefore, I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you. Now, do you see what Jesus is promising his apostles?

[28:02] He is promising to send them the Holy Spirit, who he calls the spirit of truth. He says he's going to take, the spirit is going to take what is mine and declare it to you.

[28:15] He's going to take the mind of Christ and he's going to communicate it to his apostles. They are now going to write down, teach and write down words that are inspired by the spirit, words that now belong in the New Testament of our Bibles.

[28:35] And that is why the apostle Paul can confirm in 1 Corinthians chapter 2, we have the mind of Christ. This takes us to step 3.

[28:46] In this step, we read the epistles, the letters that the apostles wrote in the New Testament. We read the epistles for the mind of Christ. So epistle is just a fancy word for a letter, a letter that you send out to people.

[28:58] So if you've ever written out a letter, if you ever send an email, technically an email is an epistle, right? I mean, e-pistle, right? From Romans to Revelation, we read carefully to learn how the apostles that Jesus commissioned think about things like this.

[29:17] How do the apostles, how are their minds working? How do they think and feel? What are their desires and fears? What is their mindset and mentality? If you start asking those questions, it will change the way you read the New Testament.

[29:32] Paul, in particular, the apostle Paul, he is very keen to communicate his mindset in the epistles and the letters that he writes.

[29:44] So Paul spends a lot of time. So the book of Philippians is a great example. He repeats over and over that he's doing this. He's teaching them the mentality they ought to have that he has.

[29:57] He is encouraging them to have the same mind as Christ and the same mind as himself. To have the mind of Christ Jesus in the way that Jesus humbled himself.

[30:08] To learn how to experience the joy, the dependence, the peace, the contentment of Jesus Christ. And then Paul gives himself as an example of that mind. In Timothy, in Epaphroditus, he writes of these as men who are tuned into FM radio.

[30:25] Men who know the mind of Christ. And he's saying, he's trying to teach the Philippians how to have that same mind. He's trying to teach you how the mind of Christ thinks and sees and responds.

[30:38] First and second Corinthians, those are really helpful too. Not just because of what Paul writes, but how he writes it. Watch the way Paul expresses thanksgiving for the church in Corinth, which is wild.

[30:55] I don't think I would be very thankful for that church. It is one of the most dysfunctional churches I've ever heard of in my life. And yet Paul begins his letter saying, I thank God for you.

[31:12] Read it. Why? Why won't he give up on them? You read the emotional language, the language that he uses as he encourages them and confronts them. He pours his heart onto the page.

[31:24] You can just feel the agony as he writes things like in second Corinthians chapter six, when he says, we have spoken freely to you, Corinthians. Our heart is wide open.

[31:37] You are not restricted by us, but you are restricted in your own affections. In return, I speak as to children. Widen your hearts also.

[31:49] You see that he is saying, he's explicitly saying, I am writing with a wide open heart. I'm sharing my mind and my heart with you. I'm pouring them out on the page. And I'm asking you, please do the same for me.

[32:02] Speak openly with me. Stop being so reserved and irritable and avoidant towards us. That's the way Jesus thinks.

[32:13] That's the mind of Christ right on display in the way that Paul writes, the way he absolutely gets Jesus. Sometimes I've seen, just as an aside, I've seen people write, well, you know, Jesus is great, but then the apostle Paul stepped in and he kind of hijacked the Christian faith.

[32:30] And I'm like, are you kidding me? I don't think there's any, I don't know anybody who gets Jesus more than Paul does. The more that I read him, he gets him. He has the mind of Christ.

[32:41] He is in love with the mind of Christ. He is fully saturated with the way Christ thinks and feels and desires and perceives things. That's why he says in Galatians 2 verse 20, I have been crucified with Christ.

[32:55] It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.

[33:11] And so it is. Not just with Paul, but with Peter and James and John and Jude and the author of Hebrews.

[33:22] They get Jesus. They get him. They know the mind of Christ. They know him inside and out. They think and they write the way that Jesus would. And you can learn from the way they write.

[33:35] How to live. How to live with the love and the wisdom of Christ. the good and powerful life of the Spirit. A life that produces good words and good works.

[33:51] A life that is characterized by real love. Not the shallow counterfeit fake versions of love that we see floating around in our culture.

[34:01] This is what real love looks like. In a secondary way, you can also learn the mind of Christ, not just from the words on the page, but from men and women whom God has put into your life.

[34:17] Many of whom are sitting here in this room. Men and women who are very Spirit-led, who as you spend time with them, you're like, there is something. This is an FM radio person. Christians whose integrity and wisdom and love are exceptional.

[34:33] Look for people around you who are like that, especially within your local church. Spend time with them. Learn the way they think and process things.

[34:47] In addition to that, you can find books written by Christians, especially Christians of the past, whose pages drip with spiritual wisdom. people. Just a suggestion, one book you might find helpful is titled The Heart of a Servant Leader.

[35:02] The Heart of a Servant Leader. It is a collection, it's actually a collection of letters written by a pastor named Jack Miller. And it's wonderful because it is a, this book is a master class in how to encourage, sympathize with, correct, and confront people.

[35:18] These are real letters he wrote to real people in real difficult situations. And it's so good. It helps you learn how to speak to them, how to write to them in spirit-led love. And I found it very helpful to read in order to learn how to counsel people in a spirit-led, biblical way.

[35:36] So step three is to read the epistles for the mind of Christ. And as a bonus, read and spend time with other wise Christians too. Now on to step four, our final stop.

[35:48] Read the Psalms for the mind of Christ. Read the Psalms for the mind of Christ. Now that might seem a little odd, a little unexpected. It makes sense that you would find the mind of Christ in the four gospels.

[36:01] That's where we see Jesus speaking and acting. Maybe it even makes sense. Okay, I can see why you'd find it in the epistles where, you know, all these apostles who knew him in person, okay, they're, I get it, they knew him in person, so they're speaking.

[36:15] But the Psalms, they're written hundreds or even a thousand years or more before Jesus was ever born. How would we ever learn the mind of Christ from them? It's like you learning the mind of your spouse by reading something that was written in 1000 AD.

[36:32] Okay? Like, why would I do that? Well, the Psalms fill an important gap that the gospels have left for us. You see, there are all sorts of hints here and there in the gospels about the mind of Christ.

[36:44] But there's a lot about Jesus that are not recorded. And even the gospels themselves admit that. Prayers of his that aren't recorded. Inner turmoil that is mentioned but we don't have more than a couple of passing words about.

[36:59] His joy. His sorrow and distress. Jesus' desires. His faith in God. His hoping and waiting. How he was consoled. How he was strengthened. His turmoil and distress.

[37:12] His indignation and anger. His human perplexity. His human loneliness that he experienced. All these things that the gospels hint at.

[37:23] Sometimes mention briefly. But you read the gospel and you're like, ah, I wish there were more. I wish I could just really get inside of his head. Really get inside of his heart.

[37:34] And spend more time there. More time hearing how he feels and thinks and processes all that he's going through. Don't you wish the gospels gave you more? More? Well, the author of Hebrews gives us a clue that there is a place where this more can be found.

[37:50] In Hebrews chapter 2, verse 11 and 12, the author mentions Jesus and then he quotes a verse from Psalm 22. He says, for he who sanctifies, that's Jesus, and those who are sanctified all have one source.

[38:05] That is why he, why Jesus, is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, I will tell of your name to my brothers. In the midst of the congregation, I will sing your praise. Now, a lot in there that goes beyond the scope of what we're saying, but notice this.

[38:22] When the psalmist says, when the psalmist writes in Psalm 22, sorry, when the author of Hebrews writes, he is not ashamed to call them brothers.

[38:34] He is saying that Jesus is not ashamed to call us his brothers. He's not ashamed to call every Christian his brother and then he quotes Psalm 22. Now, notice, who does he identify as the author of the psalm?

[38:51] Jesus. Which is strange since Psalm 22 begins by identifying King David as the human author of the psalm. But we see the same thing happen again in Hebrews 10, verses 5 through 7.

[39:04] Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body you have prepared for me.

[39:15] In burnt offerings and sin offerings you have taken no pleasure. Then I said, behold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book. So here, it is Psalm 40 that is being quoted.

[39:30] And here, the author says, these are the words that Christ spoke. How can this be? Well, these two psalms, they are written by David.

[39:41] In fact, the whole book of psalms is, it's really, it's David's book, even if some of the psalms are written by other authors. Now, here's a question. Who is the one who inherits this book from King David?

[39:57] Is it not the son of David? Is it not Jesus Christ, our Lord? The truth is, the psalms belong to Jesus. They are Jesus' psalms.

[40:08] And you can tell because he quotes them himself. On the cross, Jesus speaks the words of Psalm 22, verse 1. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

[40:21] On the cross, Jesus speaks the words of Psalm 31, verse 5. Into your hand I commit my spirit. He claims these words as his own because they are truly his.

[40:36] They come from the mind of Christ at work in David. The psalms fill in the details of the mind of Christ that the gospels don't give us.

[40:48] The psalms show us the interior world, the mind and the heart of Christ. The commentator, Christopher Ash, writes, Unlike the gospels, which give us little more than glimpses, the psalms open a precious window into the emotional and affectional life of the Lord Jesus on earth.

[41:05] His feelings, his desires, and his aversions. In the psalms, we hear him at prayer. And that is why the psalms so often feature a king or a man who claims to be righteous.

[41:21] Ever read these psalms that talk about, I am so right, I am righteous, Lord, consider your righteous servant. You feel a little bit awkward saying it because I'm like, oh, should I be saying that? Well, Jesus is the king.

[41:33] Jesus is that fully righteous man. The only reason we claim the psalms as our own, you don't actually get to just claim them on your own just because. You claim them if you belong to Jesus.

[41:47] They are yours because they are his. Because, as he said, whatever is mine, I give to you. What is his becomes ours. The reason the psalms are yours are because they are Jesus' psalms.

[42:01] They are his. And then they become yours. Because every Christian is united with Christ by faith. We also find in the psalms there is a voice confessing and repenting of sins.

[42:17] That's not because Jesus Christ had to confess or repent of any sins, but because our sins were accounted to him. He was accounted guilty of our sins.

[42:29] Our sins were made his, as we read in 2 Corinthians 5 verse 21. God made him, made Jesus, who had no sin, to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

[42:46] In the psalms, Jesus is confessing our sins as his own. He is finding forgiveness for us from God. In the psalms, Jesus is accounting his righteousness to us.

[43:01] And so when you read the psalms, you learn the way his righteousness can be ours, his joy can be ours, his strength can be ours, his sorrow and distress can be ours, his anger can be ours, his faith can be ours, his hoping and waiting can be ours.

[43:18] You learn that they are ours. In a secondary way, you can learn the same thing by joining other Christians in worship. The psalms are an expression of worship.

[43:31] So in a secondary way, show up Sunday after Sunday to church. Be baptized, receive communion, join in with the people of God in singing and praying and encouraging one another.

[43:44] Whenever we join the people of God in worship, we are learning the mind of Christ because his mind is a mind of worship. That's what the psalms are. So where do you find the mind of Christ?

[43:58] Number one, you ask for it. Two, read the gospels for it. Three, read the epistles for it. And you can learn from wise and godly Christians too. Number four, read the psalms for it and worship together with his church.

[44:13] And then keep coming this fall as we learn from Romans chapter 8. what it means to receive the Holy Spirit and what it means to be filled with the Spirit who communicates to us the mind of Christ for our good and for his glory and ours.

[44:31] Let me pray for us. Our God and our Father, many of us have tried to live, tried to live, tried to be good people, tried to be good church going people, even tried to live the Christian life.

[44:50] And we tried to do it without the mind of Christ. Just trying to follow your law and your rules, trying to obey you. But without the mind and mentality and heart and the power of Christ given through your spirit.

[45:08] Oh, forgive us, Lord, for thinking that we could ever do that. It's impossible. And it's miserable. And it's exhausting. We need the mind of Christ.

[45:19] So come, Lord God. Fill us with your spirit. Teach us to tune in. Hit that FM button on our radios. As we read your word, Lord God, open our eyes that we may behold wonderful things.

[45:33] As we talk to one another, let us speak from hearts that are tuned into the mind of Christ. Transform us, Lord God.

[45:46] That is what we need more than anything, more than anything. Lord, we often think we know what we need, but you know. We need your spirit. Please give him to us.