A Beautiful Mind (Video)

It's a joy to see you all in the house of the Lord. Praise God. Thank you, Brother Sam, for that prayer. Thank you, Brother Zach and all of your musical team. You really encouraged us this morning with the really beautiful worship music and also the technical team in the back. We thank you. Without you, you wouldn't be able to hear me, so praise God. Greetings from Pastor Roy. He could not be with us this morning, but he loves you all so very, very much. He sends his greetings as we worship our mighty God. Now, the title of the sermon today is A Beautiful Mind, A Beautiful Mind. Many years ago, one of my daughters caused me to watch a movie called A Beautiful Mind. It was about an academy professor who was in mathematics, and he won the academy award that year for mathematics. He had a big problem. He had schizophrenia, and while the professor was brilliant in mathematics, on the other side, he was fighting demons at night. He was fighting darkness. He was fighting emissaries from the enemy. He battled these demons himself and alone. When his family became aware of his battles, they joined the fight to help him overcome. Near the end of his life, he then won the Nobel Prize. He was said to have a beautiful mind, but he wrestled with things of darkness, things that beset him. Now, my question is, as a Christian, what is a beautiful mind? How should I be as a Christian? And part of the answer is given to us in Philippians chapter 2, Philippians chapter 2, verses 2 to 5, Philippians chapter 2, 2 to 5. Fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind, let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than himself, let each of you look out not only for your own interests, but also for the interests of others. And then it gives us the solution in verse 5, let, let, let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. So, if I let Christ to use his mind in me, I can be different. I think we all want happiness, we all want to have love, we all want to somehow get along with others, but it doesn't always work out. And also in church, sometimes fires are started by the tongue, sometimes put-downs are said between church members, sometimes the world is put on fire because of complaints and complaining. Now, we need unity as a church if we want to see revival and a revived church, we need unity in the church. And Philippians chapter 2, verse 3, starts to show us how we achieve unity. Here it says, I should, in lowliness of mind, esteem everyone better than myself. So, what does esteem mean? Esteem means respect. Esteem means admiration for others. Esteem means I consider you valuable. The Bible adds, esteem them even better than yourself. Now, you have received a little handout in your bulletin, it's a pink handout, and there are some notes on there if you want to add notes, and there is the question, what does esteem mean? It means respect and admiration for others. It means to consider others valuable. So, the Bible tells me that I'm supposed to regard each one of you better than myself. And Philippians 2, verse 4, makes it even harder. It says, not only should I think better of you than myself, I now need to do something about it. I also need to help you if you want help. I'm also to be there for you. I'm also to overlook any differences you and I have in this church. I used to watch tennis, and there was a tennis player by the name of John McEnroe, and when he got a bad call, he would shout, you can't be serious about this. And so, when I say these things about esteeming others better, maybe in your mind you say you can't be serious about this, but God is serious. The Lord says, yes, you can do it. And you ask why? Well, the Lord says, I have given you the beautiful mind of Christ already. And so, in 1 Corinthians chapter 2, verse 16, it says, 1 Corinthians chapter 2, verse 16, for who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct him, but we have the mind of Christ. Again, you can make a little note in your handout that if you're Christian, you have the mind of Christ. To be honest, at times I don't have this mind of Christ. What is the matter with me? Am I not a Christian? Why am I not using the mind of Christ? And there, Philippians chapter 2 helps me to understand this, why I don't react the way I should always. And there in Philippians chapter 2, verse 5, it says, let, let, let this mind be in you. You see, in our old bodies, we still have the old physical body with the old physical mind. That old mind takes over most of the time. That old mind says what we should do. That old mind says, if you offend me, I'm going to be upset. I'm going to resist you. I'm going to put you down if you put me down. That's what the old mind says. But then in the Bible, it says that Christ has given us his mind. And now he says, let this mind be in you. So it means that there is some stoppage at times because we don't want to use that mind of Christ. So we need to die to the old mind. We need to die to the old self. We need to put aside the sinful man, the sinful woman, and then concentrate on what Jesus would do and let this mind of Christ take over in you. So how do I do that? How do I really love people? How can I, how can I go this route? Well, the first part is that I must repent before God and I must give permission to the Lord Jesus Christ for him to use his mind in me. An example of that is if you go to a hospital and you need an operation, the first form that you have to sign is a form where you give permission to the surgeon to operate on you. If you have a tumor in your mind, you sign that the surgeon would be permitted to operate on your mind. And here in scripture it says, let this mind be in you. And so pray, Lord Jesus, I give you permission. I want your mind. Help me to overcome that old mind in me so that I would have your mind and act with it. In the winter of 2004, I got a phone call from Germany from my sister and my sister said, mother is dying, mother is dying, mother is dying. I said, what? How do you know? And she said, the doctors told me. And I said, no, no, the doctors don't tell you that. And she said, yes, her liver shut down. Her systems are shutting down. Get on the next flight and come to Germany. So there was a big snowstorm at that time point. I called the airport, but no planes were flying. So I told my sister, sister, I cannot come until tomorrow, perhaps, if the snow stops. Now, I was very, very sad. I had just become a Christian in 2004. And so I thought I would go to church. And I drove around my condominium I was in. And there was a church called Mount Zion Baptist Church. And I thought, well, it's a Baptist church. They believe in the Bible. So I'm going to stop and see what's happening in that church. Now, when I walked through the front door, it was an all African American church. And all of the people were a different color from me. But they welcomed me. And I went in. And at the end of the service, the pastor said, now, do we have any visitors here? And I had no place to hide. So I had to stand up and say why I was in church. And I said, my mother is dying in Germany. And so the pastor said, well, we're going to pray for her. And so the whole church starts praying for my mother. And the pastor prays. When I left that church, some of the people would not shake my hands. And I felt badly. So when I got home, I again checked on the airport. Nothing was moving. So I needed to wait until the following Monday morning. I got a phone call from Germany. My sister was almost screaming on the phone. Brother, don't come. Brother, don't come. I said, why? I must come. Mother is dying. And she said, no, mother is no longer dying. All of her system started up overnight. And we don't know why. But I knew why. God had intervened. And God had done a miracle. Now, what happened after that was quite unusual, because a tiny little voice came when I was praying and said, this church from now on is your church. That's where you go. And I said, but Lord, but Lord, they have a different culture. When I give an offering, I got to go forward. And the pastor sees how much money you put on the plate. And there are other things they do in church. I don't know if I can deal with that, Lord. And I'm not sure that they love me. And I'm not sure, Lord, that I can love them. I was very honest about it. But the Lord said, well, since you don't love people, you better go there and don't leave until you love people. Now, I was brought up as a refugee. I was hurt many, many times. My father was shot. I was half the size of other kids because I was hungry all the time. I got beat up. I did not trust people. I got sexually misused as a 10-year-old. My mother, who meant well, also taught me to judge people on what they looked like, if they were either too thin or too thick, too small or too tall. She taught me to judge people by what clothing they were wearing. She said, watch out for such and such people. They might hurt you. Watch out for the wrong color of skin. So I learned. And beloved, at the age of 62, I was still a 10-year-old child in my relationships. My mother meant well, but she had taught me what she had learned herself. So later on in life and as I grew up, I added to that list of what I had learned. And now I looked at you. Do you have money? Do you have power? Do you have wealth? Do you have status in the community? Are you important? Do you have education? Then Jesus said, put it all aside. It's not important. Look at every person with spiritual eyes. And I cried out and I said, Lord, how do I love people? How can I overcome all of these things from my life? How can I do it? And God started to show me what a beautiful mind was. At that time point, I was supporting a missionary couple in the Middle East. I had money. And so they had witnessed about Christ in a number of the Middle Eastern countries, and they were expelled by the authorities. They were in Atlanta and missionary Mark called me from Atlanta. And he said, don't support me anymore because I can no longer be on the mission field. And my wife and I are back. And I said, what are you going to do? And he said, well, I've got to find a regular job. And I said, Mark, how much money have you got? He said, I have no money. I said, how much money does your wife have? Well, she has no money. I said, you have two children. Yes, we have two daughters, seven and nine years old. Do you have medical insurance for them? No, we don't. So I said, would it be all right? Would you allow me to support you until you find a work and until you have income? And he hesitated for a moment and then he said, yes, thank you. Then 10 days later, I got a letter in the mail that changed my life. In the letter, Mark and Yana said, we have prayed about your kind offer, but you see, we are in a country that is very rich. We will find a slice of bread somewhere. We do not want your money to support us now. Send the money back to the Middle East, to other missionaries there. We want those people. We want the Muslims to find Christ. We esteem them. They're human beings. They will be lost. Support the missionaries there. Don't support us. And I was weeping, you know, I was weeping because I saw the beautiful mind of Christ in those people. I didn't have the beautiful mind of Christ. So I said, Lord, Lord, help me. You got to help me about people. What do I, what can I learn about people so that I can love them? And God answered that question. And you also have the answer to that question in your little handout. Okay. Number one, when I see you, I see that you are made in the image of God. Doesn't matter how bad you are or what you have done. You are made in the image of God. In Genesis 1 26, it says, God said, let us make men in our image, according to our likeness. So when I see you, I see the image of God. Praise God. Now, then I read Mark chapter eight, verse 36. And there it says, for what shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? And then I realized, wait a minute. I have a soul that is worth so much all the values in the world, all the riches, all the money in Fort Knox, all the diamonds in the world, all the oil in the world. My soul has a greater value than that. And then I realized your soul has a greater value like that. Your soul. So when I look at you, I realize you're made in the image of God. When I look at you, I realize your soul has a greater value than all the values in this world. You say, wait a minute. Scripture sometimes says we're worth nothing. But may I ask you, did Christ die for nothings? Did Christ give his life, die on a cross and go through incredible pain for nothings? No, he died for the children of God. Now the Apostle Peter gives us some clarity in his epistle. And there he says, once I was a nothing, but now I am a child of the most high God. Once I was a nothing, but now I am a child of God. And then also if you read Revelation chapter 21, don't turn to it now, but there it says that God will put the names of the 12 apostles on that heavenly city of Jerusalem that he will build and is building now. And on the foundations of that city, he will immortalize the name of 12 human beings who changed the world. And then Jesus said, you and I can do the same things he did and even greater things. Do you believe the Bible? Don't believe the devil who gets to you. Don't believe put downs. Don't believe negativity that comes to you. And then the third thing, the third principle that I discovered was that each of you can do at least one thing better than myself. And when I looked at Zachary and the musical team and all the beautiful music you make, you at least do one thing better than I can and probably many more things. Many of you are wonderful prayer warriors. Many of you work behind the scenes. You do things for the Lord that I don't do because I might have a different gift from you. But would it be all right if I esteemed all of you better than myself? Would that be all right? So let us go back to the African-American church. And there I said to the Lord, Lord, let me see what others do better than I do. So I noticed an old deacon that was sitting next to me in this all African-American church and he held his songbook upside down. And so I realized he couldn't read or write and he was embarrassed about it. He didn't want anyone to know. But then I found out that on Wednesday nights, Saturdays once and Sundays twice, he would walk to church in the middle of snowstorms, in the middle of hurricanes. Didn't matter. He was always the first in church. Now, maybe that's not so unusual, but he had to walk two miles each way. Two miles each way. And when I realized that, a tiny small voice came to me. By the way, all the money you've earned, all the teaching you did at U of T, all the big companies, they mean nothing to me. His faithfulness is worth more than what you have done. Now esteem him better than yourself. You see, only what we do for God will last for eternity. What we achieve for wealth, for power, for things in this life will not give us an eternal benefit. It is what we do for God that will last. The Lord showed me the heart of one of the poorest members of that church. Her name was Sister Sissy. One of my daughters was going on a short-term missions trip, and I mentioned that in an adult Bible class, and she came the following Sunday, and she looked at me, and she pressed a hundred dollar bill into my hand, and I didn't want to take it. I knew how poor she was. And she looked into my eyes, and in her eyes was love of Christ. I could not say no. So I took the money, and then a tiny, small voice came to my mind, saying she gave out of her poverty all she had. What she did is far more beautiful than what you have done from your abundance. She has a beautiful mind. Now esteem her better than yourself. Then there was a brother by the name of Paul in this church. He was a cleaner in a hospital. Whenever a testimony was asked for, he jumped up, and he jumped. Glory to God. Glory to God. I have a pair of shoes to bear. I have a sandwich to eat. I have a roof over my head. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord. That Sunday morning, again, the pastor said, is there anyone who has a testimony? And brother Paul jumps up, and I thought in my mind, oh no, not again. And a tiny little voice came and asked me this. Have you ever praised me like that? Have you ever praised me like that? Now esteem him better than yourself. Well, beloved, I think that seven years went by quickly in that church, and it took probably three and a half years for me to love the people there, and it probably took that long for them to love me. But after seven years, and I had studied for the ministry, 10 African-American pastors ordained me. So by this, the world will know that we are his disciples when we love each other. By this, the world shall know that we are his disciples when we love each other. When I came here to be with you at Queensway, I'm trying to practice those principles. I'm not always successful, so please forgive me. You see, I see you are made in the image of God. I realize your soul has a value greater than this world. I realize you can do at least one or more thing better than I can, so I esteem you better than myself. And if I get to know you closer, you will see that I will look for your strength and not for your weaknesses. You will realize that I look for your beauty and not for your faults. I must also preach the word in truth, and that hurts sometimes, and you don't like that. I don't like it either, because there's some tough, tough passages in scripture. But God gives us the way forward. So now you think, well, brother, you're perfect now. I'm not perfect, beloved. Far from it. I have to tell you that right after that, God gave me a little bit of a test, and I failed the test greatly. God had given me a little vacation for four days on the shores of New Jersey, and there they had a beautiful Bible camp set up and a nice church, and I was outside the church talking with three friends, and a little old lady was walking, and she was heading straight for me, and I didn't know what was going on, and she was a little bit dirty. She had a scarf with a hole in it that she tried to cover up. She had lipstick that went a little bit over her lips, and she said to me, you look like a good Christian. Can I talk with you? And so at first I wanted to say no, but then I said, okay, let's do it. I thought maybe I can give a witness to her. So anyhow, we went to a garden bench there and sat down, and a hobo walked by, someone all spaced out, and all of a sudden she raised her hand and she shouted, Chris, Chris, remember what I told you. There is a hope. There is someone above that will help you, and I looked at her, and I was all surprised. I didn't expect that at all, because what had I done? I had judged her. I had judged her by her clothing, by her age, by her hobbling. I had judged her, and then another hobo went by, and she cried out, and she said, look, look, and this was a woman, look, there is a God who loves you. I'll talk to you later. The woman just hobbled by, wouldn't even look, and then she said to me, don't look so surprised at me. I'm a former missionary. I'm now 70 years old. I came back from the mission field at age 65 from Israel, and I have no money, and I just serve the Lord, and she started to tell me how she served the destitute in the area, how she would go and she would take a hose and hose down a woman that would never wash. She had five children. The five children were from her own father. She was misused all of her life. She would let no one touch her, but she would allow this woman sitting next to me, and then she said to me, well, I don't have time to talk to you anymore. Do you see this man sitting over there? He hasn't got any money, and his head is burning, and I saw it the other day, and I went and I got a little cap for him. I got to go over and give him that cap, and I thought to myself, what? Am I a Christian, or is she a Christian? Do I have a beautiful mind, or does she have a beautiful mind? And you see, the reality then hits you that we need higher help, okay? We need higher help from the Lord to be the kind of people that we want to be with a beautiful mind. Now, Jesus Christ himself, the Son of God, is our example. The Lord tells us to live together in harmony. He tells us to live together in love as though we had only one mind and one spirit. We are never to act from motives of rivalry, personal vanity, or jealousy, but in humility to think more of each other than we do of ourselves. None of us should think only of our own affairs, but should learn to see things from other people's point of view, and Christ Jesus is our example in humility. You say, why? Well, Jesus Christ had always been with God and has God's nature, yet he did not cling to his rights as his Father's equal. He stripped himself of all privileges in heaven by consenting to be a slave and a servant to us human beings, even washing feet, washing feet of others, even washing feet of the man that would betray him. What about you and me? Jesus owned nothing. He had no home for three years. He had no car. In other words, he had no chariot. He was born as a mortal man in poverty, in a stable. Even though he was God, he humbled himself by living a life of utter obedience and servanthood. And even to the extent of dying for others, he was willing to suffer a cruel, torturous death for mankind, for you and for me, and he took the road of an evil criminal being crucified. What about you and me? Is it possible that some of us still put others down? The Heavenly Father wants to help each one of us here this morning. Perhaps you're willing to ask the Lord for help and forgiveness. Perhaps you're willing to turn from what you have learned through your parents to judge others, to put them down if they don't do what you think they ought to be doing. I want to look at other people differently and love everyone here as my sister and brother in church. Help me, Lord. Be merciful to me, a sinner. You see, there was once a mathematics professor who won the Nobel Prize because of his brilliant mind. In his private setting, he was fighting demons. God in heaven has given us the brilliant mind of his son, Jesus Christ. Yet at times we fight demons, we fight the old self, we fight rejection, we fight put-downs. The mathematics professor had help from his family, and we have help from our heavenly family first. We have help from the Father, we have help from the Holy Spirit, and we have help from the Lord Jesus Christ. He says he's the vine. We are the branches. If we connect to him, he will help you and me. It starts with prayer. It starts with repentance. God will give out crowns of glory when we get to heaven. Crowns of glory are what the Nobel Prize and Academy Awards are here on earth. Jesus wants to help us to win a crown of glory by using his beautiful mind. If you can let this mind of Christ be in you and work in you, you will overcome demons of old. You will be able to look at others and say when I see you, you're made in the image of God. When I see you, when I see you, you have a soul that has a greater value than all the value in this world. When I see you, you can do one thing better than I can or more, many more things. So I esteem you better than myself. Now, there's a little prayer in this pink sheet. If you're willing to pray this prayer with me out loud, don't do it if you don't feel led to do it, okay? But maybe you're willing to pray this little prayer with me at the end. But before we do so, I just wanted to ask, there might be a person here who is not yet sure whether you will go to heaven after you die. May I suggest to you that you are in eternal danger. Will God make an exception for you if you don't follow his son as God said that he sent his son, that through him we might be saved? Will he make an exception for you? He won't. There's no other name under heaven by which we can be saved. Today is the day of salvation for all that do not have peace with God through his son Jesus. So after we be going to have a closing song in a moment or so, and after that I'm going to go to the pastor's office to your right in the back. And if you would like to be right with God, will you come and pray with me? Will you come? Perhaps if you have demons in your old life, and I had demons in my old life, you want to get rid of them, please come for prayer. Will you do that? Will you do that? So now let us say this little prayer from the pink sheep out loud together, if you're willing to do that. Excuse me, I think I did something to the PA system. Okay, so let us say together, Lord, please help me to let your beautiful mind start working in me. Please change me. I surrender to you and will let you change my mind. Please help me to see my sisters and brothers' beauty and not their fault. Help me to see their strength and not their weaknesses. Help me to see that they are made in your image. Help me to remember how important their soul is. Help me to realize that each one can do at least one thing better than I can. Help me to forgive where I got hurt. Help me to esteem each sister and brother better than myself. In Jesus' name, amen and amen. Brother Zach.