A Resurrection of the Mind--April 8, 2026
"If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on the things that are above, not on the things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory. (Colossians 3:1-4)
Let us be clear from the outset: this is not about altitude, or even attitude. This about making the choice to orient our thinking in line with the character of Christ rather than the world's tired old, crooked, greedy, and violent mindset.
To "set your minds on the things that are above" is not meant as a reference to physical height. The apostle did not intend to suggest we distract ourselves from the mess on the ground around us by daydreaming about mountaintops or skyscrapers or even the dishes on the top shelf in your kitchen cabinet. Nor does this business about "the things that are above" simply mean to have a cheerfully "upbeat" and positive attitude. Christians are not called to be naive optimists or quixotically deluded fools who believe everything is awesome all the time.
I would hope these things would be obvious, but let us remove any doubt. Thinking on things that are "above" is not about heights or topography, and it isn't even about imagining what the furniture or landscape of "heaven" is like. These words, which many of us heard this past Sunday, are not telling us, "Don't worry about the troubles of the world--just think about how lovely the pearly gates will be, or what it will be like to play one of those golden harps in the afterlife." That's not the point any more than the summit of Mount Everest is the point of "the things that are above." This is about aligning our way of thinking with the way of Christ. The apostle is calling us to a resurrection of the mind.
Now that those have been cleared away, we can attend to the vital and critical question of what such a resurrection mindset would mean. What would it actually mean for us to align our thought processes with the character of Christ, whose way of embodying God's Reign was death and resurrection rather than conquest and killing? Well, again, I don't think the point is for us to say, "Nothing we do in this finite life or this sinful world will make a difference, and we're going to heaven anyway, so we can just let the whole world go to hell in a handbasket." Neither do I think the apostle is giving us permission to say, "Terrible things might be on the verge of happening in the outside world, but that's none of our concern, because we're just waiting on going to glory." A mind set on "things that are above" does not mean to abandon care for this present world and its troubles, because of course, the Christ on whom we are to be focused never gave in to such abandonment. You never see Jesus in the Gospels coming across a sick person and saying, "All I can give you is a ticket to heaven when you die, but I don't really care about helping you with your illness." You never see Jesus saying to the outcast tax collectors and sinners, "Look, you're still going to be pariahs, but I can offer you a spot in the afterlife." Jesus never acts like the present world or its sufferings are insignificant, and he never teaches his followers to withdraw from the world so that they can only focus on how pleasant it will be in sweet by and by. Jesus does not endorse escapism, not even a religiously-branded one. And he is never, as the old saying goes, "so heavenly-minded that he is no earthly good."
Instead, I think the writer here in Colossians is calling us to change the way we think and act in this world, in light of the way of Christ, and in light of the fact that Christ's resurrection gives us courage to stand up to the powers of the death--even to defy them as Jesus did--knowing that even when those powers bellow and threaten with death and destruction (again, as they did to Jesus), we do not have to give in to being afraid of them. We do not have to order our lives in accordance with their wishes. We do not have to give our allegiance to the Emperor in Paul's day, or the sinful systems and crooked machinations of every era of history since, because we have already given our allegiance to an even "higher" Lord--Christ himself, who is "in God."
For early Christians, sometimes that change of mindset meant refusing to obey Caesar's orders to worship the emperor or "Roma," the deified version of the Empire. Sometimes it meant refusing to treat the enslaved like they were property, but rather receiving them as siblings in the family of God. Sometimes it meant refusing to see those branded by the Empire as "enemies" as real adversaries, but rather to see them as people beloved of God nevertheless, who might be waiting to be met with the surprising love of Christ. For many of those early Christians in the first several centuries, it meant a refusal to take up arms in Caesar's war machine for the sake of the glory of the Empire.
A mindset set on Christ and "the things that are above" would have also meant a revision of priorities and values. In a culture that prized acquiring wealth, it would have meant a countercultural willingness to be generous with one's possessions and a letting go of the old impulse to pile up money and stuff. Those things, after all, will all get rusty, break down, or get stolen one day, and you certainly can't take a pile of money with you when you die. So a Christ-centered mindset would be uninterested in getting rich or have "more" for the sake of more.
Similarly, a resurrected mindset would reject the world's obsession with power, domination, and status. In the first century world where Colossians was written, there were constant struggles for military power, political power, and monetary power. You saw them play out in the local town, in the regional provinces, and in the empire at large. And it was, of course, very easy to get swept up in caring about getting more power or defeating your opponents. But the writer to the Colossians calls us to a different set of values: we do not need to be constantly bullying others or trying to intimidate others to put ourselves over them. That is not the way of Christ--who literally went to his death praying for forgiveness on his executioners rather than threatening to get revenge on them. If we are committed to the mindset of Christ, we are also called to turn away from that petty, childish, bullying way of thinking, no matter how prevalent it is in the world around us.
All of this is to say that a mindset centered on Christ will compel us to make a choice over how we live in this present hurting world, not just to daydream about escaping it. We will be called to reject the old way of thinking that justified domination, destruction of enemies, cruelty and greed, and instead to adopt Christ's own mindset of self-giving and suffering love, courageous truth-telling, love for enemies, and peacemaking. To set our mind on Christ, as Colossians calls us, will mean our loud "NO!" to participating in the schemes of the powers of the day to dominate and destroy or to hoard with greed, and instead our clear "YES!" to Christ's way of embodying an alternative to those schemes. Setting our mind on "the things that are above" is a way of changing how we live now in this present life--in light of the truth that the real Lord of all is not an emperor or king, past or present, but the Crucified and Risen Christ.
To do that, whether in the first century or the twenty-first, will require a bravery that most of us have not had to practice very often in our lifetimes. We tell stories of the courageous witness of saints like Bonhoeffer and King, Rustin and Tutu, Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth, but we are not accustomed to having to take strong stands as they did very often. The writer to the Colossians seems aware that any one of us may well be called to such a countercultural (perhaps even described as subversive!) posture in the world. And he intends for us to know it is the right course, even when it is scary. We are learning to set our minds on Christ, rather than the world's values, the threats of the latest empire, or the risk we might face in the present moment. And we can do that because the One in whom we place our trust has taken us by the hand and promises to bring us even through death into life again. With confidence in this living Christ, we can live in such against-the-grain ways in times that require it.
Can we dare, today, to let Christ align our thinking again with his way, rather than the world's priorities? Can we allow the risen Christ to resurrection our mindsets?
Lord Jesus, realign our thinking and resurrect our minds to be set on your way of living in this present world, and in the fullness you will bring.
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