January 4, 2026 | The Power Of Your Thoughts | Ephesians 6:10-20

Our brains are three-pound supercomputers, processing up to 60,000 thoughts a day. In a world full of bad news, economic stress, and constant worry, it’s easy for our thoughts to spiral out of control. Had you wished you ever had tools to reel them in? Let's start the year by renewing our minds (Roman's 12:2). Using Max Lucado's book as a guide, we will spend 7-weeks talking about how to tame your thoughts. The good news is our brains can be reshaped through scripture and healthy habits. Anxiety, guilt, shame, and lingering questions don't have to have the final word. Let's learn, grow, and practice new ways of thinking-together. 

This week we will talk about the power of our thoughts.

Transcript

Well, good morning once again. My name is Brian Asker. I'm one of the pastors here at Community Covenant Church. And we are starting 2026 off by thinking about our thoughts. Thoughts are powerful. They can help us. They can also hurt us. And they can remind us of past regrets or they can remind us to take out the trash. Isn't that fantastic? Uh thoughts don't just begin when we start our day. They actually continue all night long when we're sleeping. Our brains are processing our thoughts and putting them together in stories.

And so this past summer, I was um starting to have some issues with my jaw. And uh I first noticed it when we went on our summer trip, our annual trip to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area. And I was eating some of the dried fruit that we had brought along. And I bit down. I was like, "Ah, it doesn't feel very good. It started to hurt." And then by the end of the trip, I could barely open my jaw. And a week later, I thought, you know, I've had some problems with my jaw in the past, so I'm just going to let this lie. But a week later, I was still struggling. So, I went into the oral surgeon and he measured how far I could open my jaw. I think it was like 15 uh millimeters or something like that. And you're supposed to be open your jaw somewhere between like 40 and 50 millimeters. So, like I was having a serious problem. Uh but they did an X-ray and he came back and said everything looks fine. And then he said are you experiencing a lot of additional stress? And I was like I mean I mean I have stress but I don't think it's any more than normal. Well, sometimes our bodies can reveal some things that we're not even consciously aware of. And as I've thought about it more, I realized, yeah, I have been under some additional stress.

So, I thought I'd ask you, how are your thoughts impacting your life? Our thoughts really are powerful. They have the power to heal. They have the power to harm us. And that was the case for me. I didn't even realize that my thoughts were causing harm to my body until the pain came along and the surgeon asked, "Are you dealing with a little extra stress?"

Well, studies show that HIV patients who have positive thoughts and feelings are 300,000 times more resistant to disease than those whose thoughts are negative. And sadly, we have some stinking thinking. One study reported that 80% of our thoughts, 80% of those 70,000 thoughts that we have are negative. And another study reports that, let me check it here. Yep. 42% of teens are experiencing persistent feelings of sadness and hopelessness. That's really sad. When you're a teenager, you're supposed to be dreaming and having fun. But us adults aren't fairing much better. We, one in five of us report symptoms of anxiety and depression. And so with all that stinking thinking, we need to do something. And so we're starting off 2026 by talking about our thoughts.

And the Apostle Paul admonishes us in Romans 12:2. If we can get to that slide, he says,"Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will."

So the world the world values money over people. The world grades people based on their looks, their awards, their bank account balances. It judges people by the color of their skin and it manipulates data to fit their desires. Let me just say those are not the values of the kingdom of God. The values of the kingdom of God are love, joy, peace, patience, forbearance, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control.

Conforming is a little bit like Plato. You can mold Plato into whatever you want, but at the end of the day, it's still Plato. transformation, which Paul also calls us to in this passage, is a little a little bit more like caterpillars and butterflies. When a caterpillar goes into its cocoon, it comes out and emerges as something brand spanking new and beautiful.

Satan wants you to be conformed. He wants you to be like the world and to value the things of this world. God wants you to be transformed into something new and beautiful. So, we're going to be using Max Lo's book, Tame Your Thoughts. Uh we're going to spend the next six, including this week, seven weeks, fighting the negative thoughts that are introduced into our mind so often so that we can be transformed by the renewing of our mind. And so, we're going to introduce some tools to help you with that. and we're going to walk through some of the most common thought ruts that many of us find ourselves in.

I think it's important that I pause here and say if you are a person who is struggling with anxiety or depression or something that is persistent, these tools can and will help you, but you may need to get some additional help. And there's no shame in that. it can be really important for you to get that additional help uh from someone. Sandy uh my wife and I who's my co-pastor, we both have professionals that we meet with regularly to help us with our thoughts. And so I want to encourage you if you need that to seek that out and find that. But these tools that we're going to cover will help you even if you're in that place as well.

So let's dive in. Uh we're going to be in Ephesians chapter 6 uh today uh looking at the armor of God starting in verse 10. Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers and against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world. and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

So the first thing that we can say about this battle for our mind is that our strength comes from God. It doesn't come from ourselves. It doesn't come from within. I don't conjure up something to overcome the negative thoughts in my mind. uh earlier in Ephesians, Paul actually uh says the author of this book that we have access to the same power that raised Jesus from the dead. And that's the kind of power that we're going to need access to if we're going to overcome the negative thinking in our minds.

So the second thing I want to note in this passage is that the devil is always scheming. The devil is always on the prowl. So don't be surprised when you face negative thoughts. Like the devil is out there trying to put these negative thoughts in our mind. The enemy is out to seek, kill, and destroy. That's what another passage in scripture talks about. And if the enemy can destroy our thinking, as I've already talked about, our thinking starts to control our bodies and our actions. And we can have physical responses to that negative thinking. So that you know don't be surprised when the devil starts to play with your mind and tries to think negative thoughts.

The third thing I want to highlight in this text is that our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the spiritual forces of evil. So it's not you that you're wrestling with. It's not the person next to you that said something that maybe makes you feel bad or reminds you of something. It's the enemy that's putting those thoughts in your mind. It's the enemy that is putting those thoughts and words in your friend or in that person's mind. I don't want to suggest in any way that you don't have responsibility because you do. We all have responsibility for ourselves and our actions and what we're going to do. But those evil thoughts are certainly things that the enemy wants to put in your mind or in your friend's mind to destroy you. That's exactly what the enemy wants to do.

So when your friend says something that gets under your skin and it starts to play over and over in your mind and you keep thinking about it, it could be the enemy twisting their words and your friend didn't really intend to hurt you at all. You may still need to address that person and say something to them. Hey, those words that you said, they didn't make me feel good. They made me feel like this, whatever that is. But it's funny, this, you know, the devil, Satan would rather have you keep that to yourself because then you're fighting that battle on your own. So these are all the the tricks and and the ways the schemes that the devil uh and the enemy try uh to keep us down.

So Paul having warned us about the enemy and uh reminded us where our power our true power comes from goes on to urge us to put on the full armor of God. So talk about the belt of truth. Truth is something that we need if we're going to attack the negative thinking or stinking thinking that we have. The breastplate of righteousness, doing right to one another. Another one of those things. The feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. Do our anxious thoughts give us peace? No, they don't. The shield of faith, another one, the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God.

For today, we're going to zero in on the helmet of salvation. A helmet is designed to protect our heads. And in the Roman world, a helmet was a leather cap that had a strap on it and it was reinforced with metal. Now, opponents would carry a battle axe. And if a soldier went to war without their helmet on, their head could roll. Similarly, if we go to battle without our helmet on, well, let's just say something worse could happen.

So, in the act of salvation, God wraps himself around our heads and cares for us. He declares to the enemy, "This mine, this head is mine. I saved it. I own it. I am renewing it."

Today, we wear helmets for all sorts of activities. Bicycling, skiing, snowmmoiling, football, hockey, rollerblading, skating, construction, mining. I think I could keep going, but you get the point. The question is, if we're going to wear helmets for all of these sorts of activities, why wouldn't we wear our spiritual helmet?

The reality is that we need Jesus. If we're going to attack these negative, stinking thinking, we need Jesus. And we need Jesus's resurrection power. And if God can raise Jesus from the dead, he certainly can resurrect hope. He can defy depression. He can clarify confusion, flush out shame, destroy doubt, overcome insecurities, download discipline, eliminate lust, and banish bitterness.

You might ask, "How do I get the helmet of salvation? If I need it, how do I get it?" Well, it's pretty simple. You just ask for it. You can say a simple prayer. God, I'm messed up. I need your help. Would you come into my life? Would you protect my brain, my thoughts, my person?

Of course, I can't promise that if you ask God for the helmet of salvation that all of your thoughts will suddenly be fixed and healed. There are some deep ruts that some of us have. Some things that we've been thinking for a long time. And it's going to take some time to dig new channels and to put spiritual truth in place of those negative thoughts that we've been thinking. But with God, a new you, a new thinking is possible. We can be transformed and we be we can become that beautiful butterfly that God has in mind for us.

But here's the thing. God is a kind and gentle God. So God doesn't force you into transformation. God invites you to go to work with him in taming your thoughts.

So next week we're going to take a deep dive into three tools and we're going to use those tools for the remainder of our series. But today I'm going to introduce No, you can go back to the previous one. Um I'm going to introduce those tools to you in a moment briefly. Uh but what I really want to do today is to invite you to do deeper work to tame your thoughts.

So we've got some resources that we have prepared for this series. So uh you could buy the Tame Your Thoughts book. Um I don't know if I remembered to bring them today. Shoot. Um I do have a box of those uh at probably at home. This is what happens when my wife is on vacation. I forget things. Uh so we have a box of books that we can sell you. You can also jump on Amazon and buy it uh and you can read it for yourself and start the work of trying to put together some of these tools uh in your own life.

Some of you are really good with like head knowledge and like working through a book, reading a book, and that's enough for you. Others of you maybe uh more like me, you need to actually do something. So this is a workbook. So this has questions. You could go through this on your own or in a group. Uh we're hoping I think we've got a couple groups we're going to be starting uh that'll be going through this book. Uh so this would be an option for you as well.

Um and then and I should say in either of those cases, if you don't have the finances, we would be happy to buy the book for you um if that's something that you're going to put to use. The last one uh that I want to introduce is uh 21day brain detox. I found another church online that had uh this and it's very similar to the tame your thoughts. This is free. Uh, and I have a bunch of copies of this that I printed off that are out u next to the coffee uh table and the refreshments out there. So, if you want to grab one of those, you can grab this. And this will take you through 21 days of kind of guided reflection and then putting in some practices throughout your day that can help you to retrain your brain and put in some to get rid of some of that stinking thinking and put in some divine truths.

And so uh those are three different resources. You can also download that. I should mention that uh in the app if you jump on the app here and you go to the maybe it's going to load. Uh if you go to this week on the mobile app, it's not loading. Um if you go to this week on the mobile app uh you can jump on there and download um all of uh those three things or there's a link to go um to purchase those books if that is something that you are interested in.

Uh so again we're going to take a deep dive into these tools that we're going to introduce. Uh but I want to introduce them to you today. Okay. So the first tool, we can go back to the toolkit. Perfect. Is practicing picky thinking. So believe it or not, you don't have to entertain every thought that comes into your mind. You can choose not to think about that thought. And so you can guard your thoughts. So that's going to be one of the tools that we're going to use throughout this series. And again, we'll go into deeper um kind of dive into these next week. And then we'll use them each week in the sort of the common thought ruts uh that we get into.

The second one is you can identify UFOs and that stands for untruths that create false narratives that lead to an overreaction. This one's really common for us and again I can't wait to get to this next week, but so many things in our minds are untrus and we need to replace them with the truth of God. uh things like I'm not worth it or I'll never be able to fill in the blank. God has something different uh to say to us.

The last one is we need to uproot and replant. So we need to weed out those unhealthy thought patterns and replace them with divine uh truths. This is a pattern that we see in scripture often. Paul sometimes uses uh the idea of taking off the old clothes and putting on new clothes. And that's what we need to do with our thoughts.

So I should at this point mention that this is something that we can't do alone. And so uh we do have prayer ministers uh that are available. And so if there's something that you would like prayer for around your sort of stinking thinking, um they would love to pray with you and for you. Uh so I'm going to have them head over here after the message and you can head over there and get some prayer uh for whatever you need. They do a fantastic job of praying with you and for you. And if you let them, they'll even follow up and check in with you later uh because they they really do care about you.

So, uh prayer ministry will be available afterwards. Uh and I think this is one of the things where there may be some things that come up uh each week and I wouldn't be surprised prayer ministers if we have a few more people coming over during this season because these these are difficult things that we're going to tackle as we go through our stinking thinking.

All right. All right. So, one of the TV shows my son introduced me to this week uh had a woman who climbed up on a really high tower and she said, "I don't have anything to live for." The main character, who happens to be a cop, uh pulled out a lottery ticket out of his wallet and she kind of looked at him strangely as he offered it to her. She's like, "What? Why are you giving this to me?" and he said, "The drawing's on Friday. It's worth something like a billion dollars." And he said, "Now you have something to look forward to."

And he went on to share about how he had gone through a really ugly divorce and that it had become his practice of buying a lottery ticket each week to look forward to something. And I thought, you know what? Lottery tickets not the best thing to look forward to, but I think it illustrated something. If a lottery ticket can give you a bit of hope, enough to get through whatever it is you're facing, how much more can the God of this world, who overcame death help you overcome whatever stinking thinking you have in your mind.

Let's pray. God. We all at times have thoughts that run through our brains and they hurt us and they hurt other people. And God, we want to get rid of those thoughts and replace them with the truth of your love for us, with the truth of the reality that you are always pursuing us, that you are always with us. We are never alone. And so God, as we enter into this series, would you help us to uproot the negative thinking in our minds? And would you help us to replant the truth of your word in our hearts and in our minds? And help us to do that with one another and encourage one another as we do that. Amen.