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Writer's pictureMichael E.B. Maher

Our thinking determines our behaviour

Romans 8:16 “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.”


As it pertains to free will, the third class of God’s creations that we will discuss is mankind. In the first section we have already seen conclusive evidence of man’s free will given to him by God. And so in this section we would like to more fully understand the function that the will of man plays in the lives of men. But in order for us to have a clearer understanding of how our wills function, we need to have an understanding of the make up of man as a whole. The scripture reveals to us that mankind has two basic components, i.e. the inward man and the outward man (2 Corinthians 4:16). The outward man refers to our physical bodies that our inward man lives in. Mankind understands that the physical body, i.e. the outward man, is made up of various parts and each part has its own function. In a similar manner however the inward man is also made up of various parts and each part has its own function. As we will see in this section, scripture reveals to us that the inward man is made up of four separate parts, i.e. a spirit, a mind, a conscience and a will, and each of those components of our inward man has its own function. The first component of our inward man is the spirit of man. Man is primarily a spirit being and it is the spirit of the man that gives life to the physical body of the man, for the scripture teaches us that the body without the spirit is dead (James 2:26). Believers are alive in spirit whereas unbelievers are dead in spirit. Spiritual death is not the same as physical death however, for spiritual death does not mean cessation of existence but rather a perverse state of existence, i.e. the opposite of spiritual life. And so we see that it is not the condition of the spirit that gives life to the physical body but rather it is the presence of the spirit that gives life to the physical body, which is why the bodies of both believers and unbelievers have life in them. It is the spirit of man that is born-again and thus becomes a new creation in Christ when we are saved (2 Corinthians 5:17). In the passage of scripture quoted above the apostle Paul teaches us that the Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirits that we are God’s children. So why does the Holy Spirit bear witness with our spirits? He does that because under the New Covenant the spirit of the born-again believer is created in righteousness and is thus free from all sin. It is because of this truth that the Holy Spirit can now reside in our spirits, thus witnessing with our spirits that we are God’s children. Because New Testament saints are born-again they are able to grow spiritually (1 Corinthians 3:6). Old Testament saints could never grow in their spirits, because they could not be born-again and so their spirits remained spiritually dead and thus separated from the life of God. There are many other references to the spirit of man in the New Testament, all of which point us to the fact that the spirit of the man is the primary part of the inward man.


Romans 12:2 “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”


The second component of our inward man is the mind of man. Unlike the spirit of man however which becomes a new creation when we are born-again, the mind of man remains unchanged. It is for this reason that the apostle Paul counsels the church in the above quoted passage of scripture to renew our minds. All believers come into the kingdom of God with carnal mindsets. In other words we think just as this world thinks, and because the carnal mind is enmity against God we have learn to change the way we think. The way we do that is to transition from natural thinking to spiritual thinking, i.e. we renew our minds through God’s word (Romans 8:6). And so this process of renewal begins when we come into the kingdom and continues throughout our time here on the earth. As we will see in this section, it is because of the role that the mind has to play in influencing the will of man that it is vital that all believers are diligent in the area of renewing their minds. Sadly because many believers are not diligent in this area they continue to live just as this world lives, for ultimately it is the way we think that determines the way we behave.


Michael E.B. Maher



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