Ephesians 4:23 And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; The renewal takes place not simply in the mind, but in the spirit of it. It is the special seat of renewal. The mind remains as before, both in its intellectual and emotional structure — in its memory and judgment, imagination and perception. These powers do not in themselves need renewal, and regeneration brings neither new faculties nor susceptibilities. The organism of the mind survives as it was, but the spirit which inhabits and governs it is entirely changed. The ruling and motive power is renovated. The memory, for example, still exercises its former functions, but on a very different class of subjects; the judgment still discharging its old office, is occupied among a new set of themes and ideas; and love retaining all its ardour, attaches itself to objects quite in contrast with those of its earlier preference, and pursuit. The change is not in mind psychologically, either in its essence or in its operation, neither is it in mind, as if it were a superficial change of opinion, either on points of doctrine or of practice; but it is "in the spirit of the mind," in that which gives mind both its bent and its materials of thought. It is not simply in the spirit, as if it lay there in dim and mystic quietude; but it is "in the spirit of the mind," in the power which, when changed itself, radically alters the entire sphere and business of the inner mechanism. (J. Eadie, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; |
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