God's ways Higher than our ways - are we using this phrase right? or Do we have the Mind of Christ?!

God’s Thoughts – Higher than Our Thoughts – What does that really mean?

I wanted to discuss a verse that is commonly quoted out of context. It was very helpful for me a while back to go through it, and it seems helpful to others, so I thought we’d go over it together. The verse is from Isaiah chapter 55. Its verse 8 mostly, but sometimes 9 is quoted as well. Here in BSB Verse 8 says: ““For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord.”. And then it continues in verse 9: “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so My ways are higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.”

Usually people just paraphrase this verse to say: Gods thoughts are above my thoughts, His ways are above my ways, or God’s thoughts are not my thoughts, and my ways.

And it’s usually said in such a way to denote that God is mysterious and we just get to accept that we will never understand, and it leaves us in a position mostly of feeling a little at the mercy of a decision that doesn’t make any sense to us. Because it’s often used to explain something in the natural that doesn’t align the rest of God’s word or character. But God does not change, he is the same yesterday today and forever (Hebrews 13:8), and if something doesn’t align with His character, we should look at the verse and see if we are misunderstanding something.

So we are going to look at this verse in context and see if the common way the verse is phrased is its meaning. Was God talking to us: New creations in Christ? Was he talking to Israelites? Or even others? What does it all mean for us?

The verses before this in Chapter 55 of Isaiah are encouraging people to come to the Lord… if you are thirst, or hungry, and to eat and delight in the richest fare. It’s telling people to listen to God, and He’s promising that He’ll make an everlasting covenant with Israel, and then other nations will come as well. And seek and call on God. And then in verse 7 it’s talking about the wicked forsaking their wicked ways, and the unrighteous forsaking their unrighteous thoughts, and when they turn to the Lord (repent), God will have mercy on them and pardon them… And then we get to verse 8, where we started.

So in these verses, God is talking to the Israelites, and explaining to them that he doesn’t function like the world. He feeds and gives drink to all, not just some, who deserve it. He can be found by all. He will completely forgive the wicked and unrighteous. Is that the worldly way? – No. Do we have a fleshly part of us and a spirit? – Yes. So do we have carnal thoughts that don’t align with the word of God (until we have our mind renewed to that area?) – Yes. But are we being transformed to conform to the world or to God? (Romans 12:2)… God! We are transforming our life by the renewal of our mind to God’s word so that we look more like God, and our thoughts align with His thoughts. We want to be led by spirit, not by flesh. And remember, these are old covenant believers God was talking to, who had to follow the law, and didn’t have a new spirit.

Now we are going to go to 1 Corinthians 2:11-16 BSB “For who among men knows the thoughts of man except his own spirit within him? So too, no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. We have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we may understand what God has freely given us. And this is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The natural man does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God. For they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual man judges all things, but he himself is not subject to anyone’s judgement. “For who has known the mind of the Lord, so as to instruct Him?” But we have the mind of Christ.”

From these passages, we are told that you really can’t know the thoughts of another, only the spirit inside us can do that. And that only the spirit of God can comprehend the thoughts of God. So that makes it seem like yes, Gods thoughts are not something we can know. But then it says in verse 12 that we have received the Holy Spirit so that we can understand things from God! And we know that our Spirit is one with the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:17). So in our spirit, we do understand. But if we think and live carnally, ruled by our flesh, rather than live spiritually, yielding ourselves to the Holy Spirit, then we can’t understand spiritual wisdom. And then it finishes reminding us that WE HAVE the mind of Christ!

So we can live carnally or fleshly minded and realize that the worlds ways aren’t complete forgiveness and complete provision and love for all. So yes, God’s ways are higher than the fleshly ways of the world. But we can live guided by the spirit, and then our ways and thoughts align with God. Our ways and thoughts then align with the Spirit within us.

And we have Ephesians 1:9 BSB which says: “And He has made known to us the mystery of His will according to His good pleasure, which He purposed in Christ”. So from this, we know that God made known to us the mystery of His will! As in, it’s not a mystery to us, who have decided to Make Jesus our Lord and Savior. It’s deposited in our spirit. We have the mind of Christ. And God wrote out His will in the scriptures, we can learn about it there. He wrote out commands also. Like the great commission in Mark 16.

So in summary, God’s ways and thoughts are higher and better than the ways and thoughts of the world, but we are born again, as new creations, and we are no longer of this world. And we are one Spirit with Him, and we have the mind of Christ. And God does not change, and He is not a respecter of persons. So we don’t need to think that he is going to do something out of character because He’s a mystery. He doesn’t go out of character. We can trust and rely on God! Sometimes we may not have a complete revelation of something in our physical minds yet. Our spirit knows it already, so we get to remind ourselves of that, and speak that, and open ourselves up to God, to have His help in revealing truth to us from our Spirit to our mind. God is faithful!

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Video version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqPP-KbF0MA

References

The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible, BSB Copyright 2016, 2020 by Bible Hub Used by Permission, All Rights Reserved Worldwide