Welcome to the For the Gospel podcast, where we provide sound doctrine for everyday people. I'm your host, Kosti Hinn, and I want to welcome our listeners on Apple, Spotify, and those enjoying this on our YouTube video podcast format. This is episode two in our series on self-control. And my wife and I recently released a book for children titled The King Who Found His Self-Control. It's all about a king who brought down the walls of his city because he lacks self-control. And we had talked a couple episodes ago with her on about the importance of teaching this to our kids, but this series turns the focus now to us who are beyond the age of childhood. Last time we talked about five self-control breakers that bring down the walls of our self-control. And now I want to unpack five war zones in this episode that become ground zero for attacks on your self-control. Being diligent with these items or environments is the key to winning the battle for self-control. And I want to just tell you, whatever you hear in this episode, you've got to be thinking, and you know this if you've been around for the gospel for any amount of time, you need to plagiarize and customize, so to speak. Meaning, take what I'm giving you and add to it, customize it. Are there things you would add to the list? Are there things that on my list aren't necessarily a major issue for you, but there are other things you would add. Always, always, always pray, ask the Holy Spirit to lead and guide you and apply the truth you're hearing. If you've ever played a sport, you've likely heard the term scouting report. A scouting report in, let's say, baseball gives you a breakdown of pitcher and hitter tendencies. It's not that hard to predict what guys are going to do. If you look at what they've done, you can begin to see patterns. And it's still not a hard and fast guarantee that you can predict everything about a game, but it gives you a look at patterns over a sample size of games or someone's career, and it enables you to face another player, if it were baseball, let's say a pitcher, with a strategy. Now, no win is guaranteed until the game is over, but a scouting report gets you prepared to face your opponent. I want you to think of this episode as that. It's a scouting report. We're going to scout five particular areas. So when we go into them, we have eyes wide open and we can employ strategies for winning the battle in these war zones. Ready? Here we go. War zone number one, the phone. All right, the phone. You can call this one a tablet, an iPad, laptop. But basically you get the point. Be it social media through that phone or YouTube, apps, shopping, texting, gaming, surfing, all of it. Your phone, my phone. Our devices, our war zones with innumerable fronts. And like World War II, if you're a history buff, you know, you've got beaches and cities and rural towns and forests. It's air, land, and sea. There's chemical warfare, enigma codes, espionage, propaganda. There's a host of other angles to consider. And the ever-present pressure to stay connected, to get ahead, to know what's going on. How about in the flesh? To flex or flaunt what you have, to buy, to scroll. And then there's lust that can just crush the Christian's self-control. The walls can so quickly and very easily come down, and the phone, with all of its many facets, can lay siege to our spiritual, emotional, physical, and mental well-being. We cannot approach this area with neutrality. And I remember some years ago where a lot of leaders or people in the church just in general would kind of throw this into some Christian liberty category or say, oh, don't be such a legalist. This is just like TV back in the day, light now. Well, thankfully, by the grace of God, whether it be educators, schools, Christian schools, parents, uh, online teachers, your pastor, your church, authors, like Tony Ranky, who wrote that book, 12 Ways Your Phone is Changing You. Nobody really, who has a thinking mind biblically, is saying this is just some small issue. The phone and devices, it's a war zone. We can see the phone as a helpful tool, but we can't be ignorant of its ability to be a viciously hurtful one. It is a war zone for distraction and spiritual destruction. It can be. In his book, Twelve Ways Your Phone is Changing You, Tony Ranke writes this the more distracted we are digitally, the more displaced we become spiritually. He goes on to say ways in which our smartphones are changing us and undermining our spiritual health include our phones amplify our addiction to distractions and thereby splinter our perception of our place and time. He goes on to say our phones push us to evade the limits of embodiment. They cause us to treat other people harshly. Our phones feed our craving for immediate approval. They promise to hedge against our fear of missing out. You know, FOMO is a thing, fear of missing out. He goes on to write, our phones undermine key literary skills. And because of our lack of discipline, they make it increasingly difficult for us to identify ultimate meaning. He goes on to continue to add various ways in which the phone is diminishing us spiritually. If we say this is not a war zone, we're blind. War zone number one, the phone, or you could just say devices. War zone number two, I'm calling this one the living room. You might call it the family room, but as a general idea, when I say the living room is a war zone, I don't mean sitting on the couch, hanging out. Of course, so many wonderful things happen in our living rooms or our family rooms. It's biblical to rest. And what I mean is letting your guard down. You've been busy, relaxing with your family, and in a sense, kind of shutting off the world around you. There is a good aspect to that. But when I say the living room is a war zone, here's what I want you to think of with me. You're letting your guard down in the wrong ways. You've been busy, you've been working hard, and your pride starts to tell you, you know, you deserve to let your hair down. Watch whatever you want, do whatever you want, zone out, binge on Netflix, all day NFL ticket or whatever else. And look, those aren't sinful things to watch football or to enjoy a show on Netflix with your wife. Hear me on this. Movies can be edifying, a valuable use of time. I could definitely do uh the Lord of the Rings movies for sure. Uh sports can be a wonderful form of camaraderie and bonding, not to mention, again, the sweetness of a date night or watching a movie with your wife or sitting with friends and laughing in the comfort of your living room. We do this all the time. Even just the other day, our small group was over at our house. Our living room is like the epicenter for so many great memories and hilarious ones as well. So don't hear what I'm not saying. It's a good thing, but don't think it's a neutral place all the time. Like all the things on our list, it requires purpose. What do I mean? If you treat with entitlement and an attitude of indifference your living room, meaning you just start to think, well, I can do whatever I want. This is my house. This is my space. This is the place where I don't worry about anything. I just do what I want. Well, you're going to start to cross the line into being a lazy couch potato or taking purposeful relaxation to unhealthy distances, crossing the line. All of a sudden, you don't have healthy entertainment. You have unhealthy entertainment. So self-control is the ability to discern when it's time for back-to-back NFL games, when it's time for reading. It's the ability to know that if I really want to rest, I should maybe nap instead of a Netflix binge, or it's good to watch a show in certain moments, but what show am I watching? It's the ability to watch something or enjoy something without turning it into a marathon. Let's talk briefly when it comes to the living room about the ability to enjoy a snack and watch something or relax without it turning into gluttony and hours wasted imprinting our body into the couch cushions. The living room is a place where wonderful things unfold in our homes and with friends and with family, but don't be mistaken, it can be a war zone for self-control. I want to add something here that pastorally I deal with all the time and talk with people about all the time is I find more and more stories of people who say their Netflix binging, they're unlimited sort of just, I'm going to eat what I want, do what I want. This is my space, my living room, that hair-down mentality actually leads to increased pornography use, increase in sin, increase in conflict with their spouse in the home because there's no purpose and there's no order. And perhaps worst of all, for those with children, a bad influence on their children is their children are exposed to things that they never intended them to be, but they've let the guard down and they've done the, hey, this is my space. Come on, you legalist. Where can I just be me? Look, be you all the time. Don't live a compartmentalized Christianity where your living room becomes some epicenter for I do me here and no one tells me what to do. Look, the enemy would love for you to have that sense of entitlement. Don't be mistaken, the living room can be a war zone. Let me segue now into war zone number three, which involves food. It's the kitchen. And last year I did an episode to kick off the year in spiritual disciplines. I did a little bit of a kind of, I don't know, roadmap down into fitness and food. And so I don't need to repeat myself a ton here. But I would encourage you to go back and listen to that episode. And I can't cover self-control, though, without thinking through how we approach the kitchen. Food is a good gift from God, but it needs to be kept in its place. A lack of self-control with food is indicative of a lack of self-control in other areas. It's not just another impulse or desire that is, you know, benign and whatever, you know, I just enjoy myself and God wants me to enjoy everything. Of course, He wants you to enjoy things, but it's another impulse and desire that, if not controlled, can lead to distraction and certainly addiction or sin. I find John the Baptist to be a great illustration of someone we can learn from and appreciate for his unwillingness to let obsession with food or materialism keep him from his purpose in pointing to Christ. Now, we don't need to dress like him or eat like him with camel hair and locusts and wild honey, but Spurgeon, who, by the way, was no stranger to enjoying life, says in reflection of John the Baptist's lifestyle, Lord, let not my meat or my drink or my garments hinder me in thy work. The principle of everything in moderation is what comes to mind. And self-control is the key to achieving that. You know, in our home, we love to cook. My wife is the chef coup de gras. She's amazing. I love her cooking. And I love to barbecue. I got a smoker, I love to make meat, and we enjoy fellowship and we enjoy God's good gifts. These are good things. He's the one who made it and designed it. But just like other aspects of life, be it uh food, be it recreation, be it technology, be it sex, all of these things that God gives us and allows us to even make. And of course, we didn't make sex, he did, but you think of technology and various aspects of life that God affords us and allows us in our intellect to design and create. Food is similar, where he did ordain and create food, but he gave us such freedom with creativity. We should be enjoying quality and creativity, and yet, like all good gifts, it can be taken too far when we don't exercise self-control. War zone number four, the workplace. Be it your emotions and attitude, uh, your speech, your lust, flirtation, crude humor, greed, competition, undercutting others, or even cheating other Christians, because you know, all is fair when I'm just trying to make a buck and provide for my family and get ahead. The workplace is a war zone. And I want to relate to those of you here who are in worldly workplaces and you think, Gosti, I'm not a pastor like you. It's hard. I don't work in Christian education, I don't work at a Christian business. I work with people who are very difficult. They're wild, and it's hard. I get sucked in sometimes. Look, we all are tempted in various ways. I'm not saying you have to be perfect. No one ever will be, even in the church world. Don't get that twisted. But you've got to go into your workplace with eyes wide open. That it's war on your self-control. Where else is it war, or how else is it war on your witness? Satan wants you to act like the world in the workplace because this diminishes your witness. And now, when you say you're a Christian, he gets the joy, the sick joy of cheering as they roll their eyes at you and go, Oh, I figured you were a Christian. You guys are all hypocrites. Self-control in the workplace is key. Why? Because you represent Christ everywhere you go. And I think Christians can struggle at times with an out-of-sight, out-of-mind approach. I mentioned earlier, compartmentalized Christianity. You got your church, your home, you got your Christian friends, your small group, and then you've got, you know, work. And work is where I'm all business. Careful. You've begun to compartmentalize your life in Christ. And that's not a biblical idea. People behave one way at church, one way at work, and worldliness can overtake even the most well-intentioned Christians. So look, you need an intentional strategy. One more. Warzone number five, the gym. Now, this is where I said earlier, plagiarize, customize, add it to your list, adjust the list. You can do the beach or any other forum, generally speaking, where less clothing has become the norm in society. But the gym is a regular rhythm for a lot of people. So I'm putting it on the list. I'm young enough to know how it is, but I'm old enough to remember that going to the gym did not require always an abnormal amount of willpower to keep from running into constant visual temptations. It's one of the reasons, and my conviction doesn't have to be your command, but I stopped going to uh public gyms because I was tired of just staring down at the black rubber floor everywhere I walked and not really ever being able to engage people or talk much because nobody's wearing any clothing anymore. And you could say, oh, well, you must just not be able to, like me, be strong enough and whatnot. And that's great for you. It's not about strength, it's about simply trying to go do something at a gym and work out and even be a witness, and nobody's wearing any clothing. I don't want to be around that environment. I don't want that in my eyes. I don't want that in my mind. I'd rather work out in my garage or go see a buddy. And a lot of people now, more and more that I talk to are opting for that. And I've got buddies that prefer going to jujitsu gyms and going other places where there's gonna be people that are generally clothed and not necessarily uh a bunch of people staring in mirrors with their phone out on social media, flexing and all this stuff. You know, I'm I'm again young enough to kind of have just hit that era. And by the way, maybe you don't know this, but my undergraduate degree was in kinesiology, and one of my first jobs was being an athletic trainer. And I worked as a personal trainer in gyms back in the day. And so I know that culture really well. And there are a lot of landmines all over society. You could walk down the street and there's quote unquote visual landmines. But when we're in the gym, and you all know this, that's the beauty. I don't really have to explain or argue this much at all. Now, some people may not like that I said I stopped going to a regular gym because now they feel convicted by that or bothered or imposed on. Again, my convictions don't have to be your commands, but hear me on this. You know, and I know that society today, culture today is hyper sexualized, and the gym has become a self-control war zone because it's a place where flaunting the body in excessive ways is now celebrated. People are eager to show off their body in every way, shape, and form. And look, health is an important goal for all of us, and we should want a healthy temple because we are the temple of the Holy Spirit spiritually, but we also use our bodies to live and serve the Lord to the best of our ability. But many people just want a great body to parade it around and incite the lusts of others. In fact, they like it or they view it as sort of a conquering moment when they've worked so hard on their body that you just can't keep your eyes off them. And it's an expression of self-idolatry. Even pastors today, I see some who spend what seems to be more time working out their biceps than they do studying their Bible. You see that a lot in the seeker-driven movement. I remember one gentleman telling me that I needed to be a physical specimen if I wanted people to respect me and for the church to grow and the world to be attracted. And look, I agree pastors should be men of control and discipline. Men should not look at the pastor and be distracted by his lack of discipline and think, brother, you're telling me how to live and you're living like that at the same time. Let me go further. Women should not be distracted by the pastor because he's dressing and flexing a certain way and trying to show off his body and you know, flex his tricep in every photo he takes. Look, our bodies can quickly become objects of worship in the church and outside the church. And so we want to be mindful, very mindful, that the gym is a war zone, and perhaps that's what breeds this, you know, if you got it, flaunt it type of attitude. And that in and of itself requires we be mindful of the way we go about our exercise and our physical health. Let the Holy Spirit convict you, he'll lead you, but scripture is clear. No matter how you slice and dice all these war zones, you need to guard yourself. And the war zone of the gym and the war zone of the phone and all of the others requires strategy. So let's shift gears to that and then land the plane. Jesus gives us strategies for dealing with these very, very challenging environments or items and gives us a strong formula when they've taken us captive or we're sinning. And we also have biblical balance on enjoying a lot of these good things. So let me unpack four strategies or four things we should not be shy about considering. The goal isn't to live in a hermit or live in a bubble. The goal is to go to war and win the war. Doing what it takes can evolve any number of these things. Number one, cut it off. Cut it off. This is the modification by elimination. It doesn't change the heart, but it'll give you some help. Jesus says in Matthew 5.30, if your right hand makes you stumble, cut it off. Throw it from you. It's better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell. He's saying it's best to lose something temporary than to suffer spiritual destruction from it enslaving you. I've got some friends who have gone as far as having a flip phone in a smartphone world. Again, I mentioned the gym. Others who work out in the garage rather than spending 90 minutes, you know, bouncing their eyes around a gym to avoid all of the half-dressed people. Pray. Brainstorm the strategy. What do you need to cut off today without apology? Because that area or that item is enslaving you and you lack self-control. Number two, foxhole friends. You say, What in the world do you mean by that? Your strategy should include having brothers, or if you're a woman, sisters who are in the foxhole with you. Proverbs twenty seven, six says, Faithful are the wounds of a friend, meaning people who tell you hard things are the ones who love you. They are faithful friends. In Proverbs 27, we also read iron sharpens iron. So one man sharpens another. In Galatians 6:1, we're told that we're to bear one another's burdens. People who are in sin, we want to bear up under them. You picture helping an injured football player off the field. You get under his shoulders, you walk them off. That's how we should be with one another when people are in sin and need help. And by the way, primarily repentant, because there'll be some people that don't want your help. But you should be praying for them and pressing in on them if you love them. And I'll be honest with you, some of my biggest growth spurts in specific areas of self-control have come because of friends who are in the foxhole with me. Now, let me define that term. A foxhole is a term from war. That's why I use it because we're talking war zones and strategy, where someone is stuck in a position and bullets are flying, and a fellow soldier jumps into the foxhole, if you will, jumps in to help either comfort them and encourage them and give them backup and say, hey, I'm here, or help pull them out. I have friends who discuss food habits, we discuss health habits, home, marriage, work life, balance, uh, discipleship, parenting theology, all of it. I've got guys in my life that I'm constantly talking about these things with. They are a treasure for my battle for self-control because they bring a perspective that sharpens me if I have a blind spot. We all need blind spot support. Number three, establishing good habits. There isn't a chapter and verse for this, but a good life principle, you don't break bad habits, you replace them with good ones. You can't just siphon off avenues of temptation without putting that energy into something good. So scrolling your phone needs an outlet. It needs an opposite. Go on a run. Uh maybe you should take up reading, read a novel, uh, do an extra date night if you're married or if you're dating someone. Maybe pick up a hobby, get more involved at your church. Whatever you do, when you take this strategy and employ it, when you establish good habits, you've got to do something. You can't just sit around and put yourself in some kind of strait jacket as though you can't do anything. You know, don't do bad things. Don't do bad things. Athletes will tell you that's the worst mentality. You don't go up to bat saying, please don't strike out, please don't strike out. You're gonna strike out. When you're so worried about not doing bad things, you're gonna struggle. So go get busy doing the right things. And fourth, stay clocked in. What do I mean? First Peter 5.8, be sober-minded, be watchful. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. Look, the devil's not taking a vacation from attacking your self-control. So don't take one from being intentional about your self-control. And if that seems exhausting, hey, it will be and can be if you try to do all of this apart from Christ. So in the next episode, we are gonna spend the entire time on lessons about self-control from the example of Christ. Who better to look to than our Lord? Thanks for listening. Thanks for watching, thanks for supporting. If you haven't already, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel and check out some of our recent videos on studying the Bible, managing money, eternal perspective, and the Holy Spirit. And don't forget, all our videos are available in our YouTube playlists on social media as well. And if you want to go back and listen or watch prior podcast episodes, click on the playlist on our YouTube channel, Podcasts, and you can go right there and catch up on video or go to Apple and Spotify and scroll through the list, and you can listen there as well. To check out our team or to partner with our ministry by becoming a gospel patron with either a one-time or a recurring gift, you can go to for thegospel.org, and I'll be back next Monday with another episode. Keep on living for the gospel.