For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. —2 Timothy 1:7

Have you ever felt like you’re losing your mind? Have you ever thought you might be going crazy? If you have, you are not alone. The mind is very powerful! Even in the Bible there was a man of God who thought he might be losing his mind, and in his most difficult time he wrote the words, “God has not given us a spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7).

Paul wrote these words during a very tumultuous time for the early church. The Roman Emperor, Nero was becoming more and more insane and persecuting the church daily. Timothy was now a pastor of the Ephesian church, and he knew that if Nero’s secret police could kill him, they would enjoy doing it. You can imagine why Paul would write these words under the power of the Holy Spirit. The great Comforter was speaking life into Timothy’s spirit. You can clearly see why Paul would write, “God has not given us a spirit of fear,” but I love that he went on to say, “but of power, and of love, and of sound mind.” I want to focus on “sound mind” as we complete our week’s homework on renewing the mind.

What does it mean to have a sound mind? The phrase sound mind comes from two Greek words sodzo and phroneo. Sodzo means “saved” or “delivered”. It suggests the idea
of a person who was on the verge of death but then was revived and resuscitated because of new life breathed into him. Phroneo carries the idea of a person’s intelligence or