Have you ever noticed that some things in the Christian world are just plain weird if you look at them through natural eyes? I didn’t grow up in church so some things took me a little time to get used to. Worshipping God with my hands raised was one thing I had to work out.

In this Deep Dive, I want to address something that has been on my heart for a long time. It is not popular, it may even offend your prosperity gospel, but we cannot read the New Testament without getting a deeper understanding of persecution and suffering.

The Bible calls us to a higher level of living and thinking, an impossible level without the help of the Holy Spirit. Let’s have a look at the topic of the mind in Philippians. Why would Paul address the mind? The apostle was big on renewing your mind, he was big on believers having a different way of thinking.

In Philippians, Paul shows us examples to follow and the ultimate one is Christ. Paul goes even further than thinking on good things and says we should have the same mind as Christ. Let me show you what this means. In some versions, including NIV, Philippians 2:1-11 is in a different format to the rest of Philippians, which is why most scholars believe that this was a hymn sung in the early Church about Jesus.