SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Journey Christian Church podcast.
SPEAKER_00: This week's episode is the second entry in the Powerful Dots Sermon Series.
SPEAKER_00: It's called Creating New Neural Pathways.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: That is so, so powerful.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
SPEAKER_00: Happy Mother's Day.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you to all the moms.
SPEAKER_00: One of the things that a mother does is she helps us to think correctly.
SPEAKER_00: How many of you have ever gotten an attitude adjustment?
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe some still need an attitude adjustment.
SPEAKER_00: I know I do once in a while.
SPEAKER_00: But you know, our moms, they they help us to think what is true and what is right.
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, when we start that stinking thinking, a lot of times it's our moms who will correct us and say, you know, what you're thinking is not true, it's not accurate, it's not right.
SPEAKER_00: And they do that very, very well.
SPEAKER_00: And hopefully your mom spoke enough truth into you that that still echoes in your ears.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what God wants.
SPEAKER_00: This is what our Heavenly Father wants, to change our thinking, to help us to think his thoughts, godly thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, we we rely pretty heavily on this day and age on modern psychology, modern psychiatry, and and it's important to look at track record.
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot that has been said and done and taught and practiced in psychiatry and psychology that frankly has been weird at uh at the uh best and harmful at the worst.
SPEAKER_00: Um there have been practices we look back on, like like uh one that was common for millennia is trepanation, tree panning.
SPEAKER_00: The idea started, and they have um hieroglyphics, cave drawings of this practice being done back to the very beginning of civilization.
SPEAKER_00: The original idea of tree panning was if somebody was um you know had some mental issues, they would drill a hole in their skull to release demons.
SPEAKER_00: That's how that started.
SPEAKER_00: And tree panning is still being practiced in parts of Africa and South America, but it's not just the farthest corners of the earth that that uh have been plagued by some pretty sketchy um practices.
SPEAKER_00: Um, Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Benjamin Rush is considered the father of American psychiatry.
SPEAKER_00: He taught that depression needed to be treated by what he called direct and drastic interference that involved assaulting the patient's mind and body to give them a factory reboot.
SPEAKER_00: He prescribed poisons like arsenic to purge a person's system, and it will make you purge.
SPEAKER_00: He promoted spinning in a gyrating chair because he believed that a lot of psychiatric illnesses were the result of poor circulation.
SPEAKER_00: And so if you're schizophrenic, just get real dizzy and everything will be fine.
SPEAKER_00: The problem with psychology and psychiatry, and the reason that we have like this, I just don't know if I trust this, is because these are the fields of we used to think, but now we know.
SPEAKER_00: And in the future, how much of what we know now will fit in the category of we used to think, but now we know.
SPEAKER_00: And so we probably all have some reservations about whatever the modern psychological trends are, whatever is being taught today.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe as I'm preaching this sermon series, when I talk about reworking our minds and rewiring our brains, maybe there's some skepticism, but I want to remind you, I'm not talking about modern psychological trends.
SPEAKER_00: I'm talking to you about the truth of God's word, the eternal truth that came from God Himself.
SPEAKER_00: This is what God says about how to have health in our thinking.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible talks about this a lot.
SPEAKER_00: 2 Timothy 1, verse 7 in the New King James Version says, For God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of sound mind.
SPEAKER_00: This is God's desire.
SPEAKER_00: In Isaiah 26, verse 3, it says, You, God, will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast because he trusts in you.
SPEAKER_00: God, our Father, wants to keep us in perfect peace, and he wants our minds to be steadfast, to be secure on a firm foundation and completely grounded as we trust in him.
SPEAKER_00: This is his desire.
SPEAKER_00: And if you want to know how to be of sound mind, read the Psalms.
SPEAKER_00: The Psalms, if you want to know how to pray, read the Psalms.
SPEAKER_00: It's prayer after prayer after prayer after prayer, and it's very, very real.
SPEAKER_00: People describing serious things that they are struggling with and great, great fears, great distress.
SPEAKER_00: But almost all the psalms start with a problem and end with them meditating on the goodness of God or meditating on something that he has done.
SPEAKER_00: And that is rewiring of the mind, helping us to think spiritual thoughts instead of fearful thoughts instead of sinful thoughts, instead of distressing thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: And so as we go through this sermon today, the second in the series, um, going through this book by Craig Richel, Winning the War of Your Mind, we're going to talk about how to create new neurological pathways in our minds.
SPEAKER_00: And it it sounds complicated, but we do it all the time.
SPEAKER_00: Anytime you learn to do something new, you're creating a new neurological pathway in our minds.
SPEAKER_00: But first we have to figure out what are our mental ruts.
SPEAKER_00: What are the ruts that you're currently stuck in mentally?
SPEAKER_00: And identify those.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_00: Father, thank you for your word and your love.
SPEAKER_00: And Father, thank you so much for caring about our minds.
SPEAKER_00: That uh, Lord, you want to keep us in peace.
SPEAKER_00: You want to give us a steadfast mind, you want to give us a sound mind, you want to keep us all always in our good senses.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for caring about that.
SPEAKER_00: I know that we have an enemy that wants the exact opposite, to keep us in turmoil, to keep us in distress, worry, and fear, confusion and sin.
SPEAKER_00: Help us, Lord, to see what's happening, the spiritual warfare that's taking place.
SPEAKER_00: And help us, Lord, to put our hope and our trust in you.
SPEAKER_00: I praise you and pray this in Jesus' name, amen.
SPEAKER_00: Number one.
SPEAKER_00: Recognize your unhealthy thought patterns.
SPEAKER_00: You've got to figure out, each of us probably have four or five ruts, things that come through our mind, negative thoughts about ourselves, negative thoughts about the world, sinful thoughts that we've just we've traveled that path so many times that we have dug a trench.
SPEAKER_00: And so our minds just naturally go there to uh these negative, harmful thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: First of all, we have to understand how uh the narrow pathways are created.
SPEAKER_00: Cedric, um, after I read this, either say amen or I disagree, but I'd prefer amen.
SPEAKER_00: Cedric is our expert uh uh uh neurologist.
SPEAKER_00: He studies the brain and thoughts all the time.
SPEAKER_00: I did not run this past him beforehand.
SPEAKER_00: So we'll see how it goes.
SPEAKER_00: So Craig Rochelle writes there are bundles of nerves at the base of our brainstem known as the reticular activating system.
SPEAKER_00: And I've heard you talk about this before.
SPEAKER_00: The RAS.
SPEAKER_00: The RAS sifts through millions of pieces of sensory data being sent to our brains and groups them according to relevance and similarity.
SPEAKER_00: Our brains are constantly looking for patterns.
SPEAKER_00: And what they're really looking for is confirmation of what we already think and already believe.
SPEAKER_00: If the information will keep us alive, prevent problems, avert danger, or bring pleasure, the RAS is activated.
SPEAKER_00: If your brain system for filtering through, it is your brain system for filtering through all the data in your life and allowing you to focus on what's most pertinent and ignore the rest.
SPEAKER_00: Our RASs also utilize our established beliefs to screen incoming information.
SPEAKER_00: This is part of the reason we so often get what we expect.
SPEAKER_00: Because if it's not what we expect, our brain filters it out.
SPEAKER_00: If you keep thinking you're a victim who never had a steady job or a long-lasting relationship, you're training your brain to look for all the evidence that supports that belief and to filter out all the evidence that doesn't.
SPEAKER_00: You condition your brain to reinforce what you already believe.
SPEAKER_00: Your brain is designed to look for patterns and create neurological pathways to help you keep thinking the things you keep thinking and to keep doing the things you keep doing.
SPEAKER_00: Mental ruts.
SPEAKER_00: Your brain will help you stay in those well-worn pathways unless you create new neurological pathways.
SPEAKER_00: We all have negative thought patterns, you know, negative opinions about ourselves, negative things maybe that we think when we look in a mirror, unless we retrain our brains to think something differently.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we have childish thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: When you think about how a child thinks, what do you think?
SPEAKER_00: One of the first words a child learns is mine.
SPEAKER_00: And uh children also, you know, if something doesn't go their way, they throw a temper tantrum.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul says that our thinking has to change.
SPEAKER_00: In 1 Corinthians chapter 14, verse 20, brothers, stop thinking like children.
SPEAKER_00: In regard to evil, be infants, but in your thinking be adults.
SPEAKER_00: You've got to create new neurological pathways for adult thinking.
SPEAKER_00: And for us to function in our jobs, we all have had to do that.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe there's still some areas where we need to do that.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes our thinking is selfish.
SPEAKER_00: We've created these selfish thought patterns as evidenced when anybody is serving us out in public, we treat them like servants.
SPEAKER_00: If that is how you treat public servants, then probably there's some selfishness that is in your thinking.
SPEAKER_00: In Philippians 2.3, Paul says you need to rewire your brain.
SPEAKER_00: Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.
SPEAKER_00: How do we rewire our brains?
SPEAKER_00: The next part, but in humility, consider others better than yourselves.
SPEAKER_00: So if you go to lunch today on Mother's Day and there's a poor mom that is working on Mother's Day, and there are way more people in the restaurant than they usually have, and it is super, super stressful if you'll look at her and think, you know, there is no reason why she should be serving me.
SPEAKER_00: You know, I don't deserve this from her.
SPEAKER_00: And we start thinking of people as better than ourselves, we will be rewiring our thinking.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes our our ruts are sinful ruts.
SPEAKER_00: They're sinful thoughts that that started very small and they kind of grew into this trap, into this trench.
SPEAKER_00: Romans chapter 8, verse 5 says this is what the mind, the sinful mind, looks like.
SPEAKER_00: Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires.
SPEAKER_00: And so over and over again in the scripture, the Bible tells us that we have to master our thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: We have to control what we think about.
SPEAKER_00: But first we have to recognize where those negative uh and and harmful thought patterns are in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: Probably each of us have four or five ruts that we've walked down over and over again.
SPEAKER_00: The way we see the world, the way we view ourselves, the way we view other people, um, the fears that we have, the worries that we have, and the temptations that we face.
SPEAKER_00: Probably all of us have a lot of different ruts.
SPEAKER_00: I remember one particular temptation that uh became a rut for me when I was in high school.
SPEAKER_00: I remember when it started.
SPEAKER_00: I remember the moment that it started.
SPEAKER_00: I was a freshman and I was sitting in the bleachers watching a basketball game, and there were two guys behind me that they were just brutal.
SPEAKER_00: They were bullies.
SPEAKER_00: If you crossed them, I could tell you stories of what they did to people that that crossed them.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's one of those things you just you just wanted to either fly to the radar or stay on their good side.
SPEAKER_00: And they're sitting right behind me, and they start making fun of this guy on the basketball court, and I was just quiet, and then they asked me, What do you think?
SPEAKER_00: And I don't know if I wanted to impress them or if I was afraid or what, but I joined in with them, and I immediately felt like this is wrong, I shouldn't do this.
SPEAKER_00: But on the other hand, there was a little bit of rush because I was getting approval from these guys that were feared.
SPEAKER_00: And a little bit more of that rush, and that started a couple years in high school where I just didn't care what people thought or what people felt.
SPEAKER_00: And I had to fix that, I had to create new neurological pathways.
SPEAKER_00: And so you think about your sinful thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: Can you pinpoint when that started and how awkward it felt when that first began?
SPEAKER_00: And then after a while it didn't feel awkward anymore.
SPEAKER_00: And then it became something very, very natural and something almost that you just could not get away from, you couldn't stop.
SPEAKER_00: But that's the lie of Satan.
SPEAKER_00: We always have a way of escape, we always have a way out.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord can always change us, and this is number two rewire your brain, creating new thought patterns.
SPEAKER_00: We can all rewire our minds.
SPEAKER_00: So, this a couple weeks ago, Elizabeth received the dreaded message that her credit card had been hacked.
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, you know, are we gonna get that back?
SPEAKER_00: And you know, what kind of hassle is this gonna be?
SPEAKER_00: And and everything.
SPEAKER_00: Thankfully, it all worked out, everything was okay.
SPEAKER_00: But I say that to say to you that Satan has hacked your brain.
SPEAKER_00: And he has wired it improperly to think things that we shouldn't be thinking.
SPEAKER_00: Psychology Today, a secular magazine, did a study of the brain in which they found that people have on average 500 intrusive thoughts a day.
SPEAKER_00: And these are thoughts that we don't want to think, things that we're afraid of, something bad somebody did to us, and all of a sudden it brings back those feelings, fears that we have, sinful thoughts that we have, negative thoughts that we have, 500 intrusive thoughts a day.
SPEAKER_00: And they said those thoughts last an average of 14 seconds, which means for two hours every day we're thinking about something we don't want to be thinking about.
SPEAKER_00: And I was talking to somebody after the service, and she said, you know, sometimes that, you know, I'll have these thoughts in my mind and think, man, what a horrible person I am for that thought to go through my head.
SPEAKER_00: And she realizes now that that doesn't come from her.
SPEAKER_00: Those thoughts don't come from you.
SPEAKER_00: We have an enemy waging war with our minds, and he is constantly lobbing thought missiles at us.
SPEAKER_00: And secular scientists have actually concluded that he does it 500 times a day to every single one of us.
SPEAKER_00: Intrusive thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible tells us, though, that there is hope to rewire our minds.
SPEAKER_00: Romans chapter 8, verses 5 and 6.
SPEAKER_00: This is so powerful.
SPEAKER_00: It says those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires.
SPEAKER_00: But those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.
SPEAKER_00: The mind of the sinful man is death.
SPEAKER_00: But the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace.
SPEAKER_00: I want life and peace.
SPEAKER_00: I want my mind controlled by life and peace.
SPEAKER_00: How about you?
SPEAKER_00: This is available to us.
SPEAKER_00: How do we do it?
SPEAKER_00: We use scripture to combat our unhealthy thought patterns.
SPEAKER_00: You have to identify what are the unhealthy thought patterns that I have, and then you've got to find scriptures, multiple scriptures, to combat those unhealthy thought patterns.
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you some examples.
SPEAKER_00: Let's say you're worried about finances, that finances is a big fear of yours, you're going to run out.
SPEAKER_00: Several scriptures that tell us that as Christians, we are covered.
SPEAKER_00: In 2 Corinthians 9, verse 8, it says, And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things, at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.
SPEAKER_00: Philippians 4.19 says, And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And Philippians 4.12 says, I know what it is to be in need.
SPEAKER_00: I know what it is to have plenty.
SPEAKER_00: I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.
SPEAKER_00: And so, you know what that is saying is uh, you know, you you have a big windfall, that doesn't need to change anything about who you are in your life and your peace of mind.
SPEAKER_00: Let's say you lose everything.
SPEAKER_00: That doesn't need to change anything about who you are, your life, and your peace of mind, because none of that matters if you are tied in with the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Let's say that joy is your problem.
SPEAKER_00: You just don't feel like you have the joy of the Lord that you need to have.
SPEAKER_00: Philippians 4.4 says, rejoice in the Lord always.
SPEAKER_00: I will say it again, rejoice.
SPEAKER_00: Now it doesn't say feel joy, it says be joyful.
SPEAKER_00: It says, act joyful, rejoice.
SPEAKER_00: It's interesting the way our minds work, that our thinking often follows our actions.
SPEAKER_00: I remember I was probably in junior high, and and I was at church, we were working on some Christmas program or something, and and I was pouting.
SPEAKER_00: And my mom was there, she was one of the leaders, and she looked at me and said, Dusty, get happy.
SPEAKER_00: And I thought, okay, how does how does one go about, you know, getting happy?
SPEAKER_00: How do you do that?
SPEAKER_00: And uh I thought, well, if I don't do something, I'm gonna get in big trouble at home.
SPEAKER_00: And so I started acting happy, and lo and behold, after acting happy for a few minutes, I started to feel happy.
SPEAKER_00: The same is true of joy.
SPEAKER_00: We are not commanded to feel joy, we are commanded to rejoice.
SPEAKER_00: Rejoice in the Lord always.
SPEAKER_00: I will say it again, rejoice.
SPEAKER_00: And if you live this way, you're gonna accidentally start feeling it too.
SPEAKER_00: Our feelings follow our actions.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 118, verse 4 says, Let those who fear the Lord say his love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Be reminded of his constant love for us, rejoice in that love.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe your mind is is clouded by fear.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe fear has a hold of you.
SPEAKER_00: Romans 8 31 is a great passage for that.
SPEAKER_00: What then shall we say in response to this?
SPEAKER_00: If God is for us, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: If God is for us, what do we have to fear?
SPEAKER_00: If God's in our corner, if he's backing us, what do we have to fear?
SPEAKER_00: Psalm chapter 46, verses 1 and 2 says, God is our refuge and strength, an ever present help in trouble.
SPEAKER_00: How present is he?
SPEAKER_00: Ever present, always present.
SPEAKER_00: Ever present help in trouble, therefore we will not fear.
SPEAKER_00: Though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the sea, and a bunch of aliens come out from the bottom of the sea, it doesn't matter because God is our refuge and our strength, an ever-present help in trouble.
SPEAKER_00: And so we identify the ruts in our minds that we have created.
SPEAKER_00: We find scriptures to combat those ruts, but it's not just reading those scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: That's not what changes our thinking.
SPEAKER_00: This is number three.
SPEAKER_00: Ruminate on truth from God that combats your unhealthy thought patterns.
SPEAKER_00: Ruminate is a cousin of meditate.
SPEAKER_00: It's repeating over and over and over again.
SPEAKER_00: Cedric, I didn't hear an amen earlier.
SPEAKER_00: How am I doing?
SPEAKER_00: Is it okay?
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: All right.
SPEAKER_00: Good.
SPEAKER_00: Want to check here.
SPEAKER_00: A rebuttal on our Facebook page later on.
SPEAKER_00: Actually, no.
SPEAKER_00: Ruminate on truth from God's word.
SPEAKER_00: Meditating is creating new brain ruts.
SPEAKER_00: The word meditate is used 16 times in the Psalms.
SPEAKER_00: And the psalmists talk about the kinds of things that we are to meditate on.
SPEAKER_00: Meditate on God's love, meditate on his deeds, on his decrees, on his wonderful works.
SPEAKER_00: And the word meditate from that, we also get the idea of chewing the cud.
SPEAKER_00: Any of you ever learned about how cows eat?
SPEAKER_00: So they'll eat the grass and they'll chew on it and chew on it and chew on it and swallow it.
SPEAKER_00: And then after a while, they'll regurgitate it back in their mouths and chew on it and chew on it some more, getting every possible nutrient out of it that they could get, and then they'll swallow it.
SPEAKER_00: And then they'll bring it back up again and chew and chew and chew and swallow.
SPEAKER_00: It's not enough just to read scriptures that combat our mental ruts.
SPEAKER_00: We have to chew the cud.
SPEAKER_00: We have to meditate on it.
SPEAKER_00: We have to study it and then bring it back up.
SPEAKER_00: You know, find the scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: There should be, you should have some key meditating passages.
SPEAKER_00: These are the meditating passages that I focus on.
SPEAKER_00: These are the things that help me with my unhealthy thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: Dissect the words of those scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: Discuss those scriptures with your friends.
SPEAKER_00: Imagine what those scriptures meant to the people back then and what they mean today.
SPEAKER_00: Research it.
SPEAKER_00: We have so many resources available to every single one of us online.
SPEAKER_00: You can find hundreds of commentaries on every single verse of scripture free, available to you online.
SPEAKER_00: You can see what people a thousand years wrote about this particular verse of scripture.
SPEAKER_00: And see, read everything that you possibly can about it, trying to get every nutrient of meaning out of that passage that you possibly can.
SPEAKER_00: And as you do this over and over again, you are creating a new neural pathway.
SPEAKER_00: You're marching down this path again and again of the truth of that scripture you're meditating on until it becomes a wiring in your brain, a part of your constant thinking.
SPEAKER_00: And in the Psalms, we actually see people doing just this.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 77 is fascinating.
SPEAKER_00: It begins with Asap, Asaph absolutely desperate.
SPEAKER_00: In Psalm 77, verse 1, he says, I cried out to God for help.
SPEAKER_00: I cried out to God to hear me.
SPEAKER_00: When I was in distress, I sought the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: At night I stretched out untiring hands, and my soul refused to be comforted.
SPEAKER_00: It's like I'm praying, I'm praying, I'm praying, and I'm praying, and I don't feel any better.
SPEAKER_00: Pray all night long and I feel worse in the morning.
SPEAKER_00: My soul refused to be uncomforted.
SPEAKER_00: I remembered you, O God, and I groaned, I mused, and my spirit grew faint.
SPEAKER_00: You kept my eyes from closing, I couldn't sleep.
SPEAKER_00: I was too troubled to speak.
SPEAKER_00: I couldn't even tell anybody what I was going through.
SPEAKER_00: I couldn't even put it into words.
SPEAKER_00: I thought about the former days, the years of long ago.
SPEAKER_00: I remembered my songs in the night, my heart mused, and my spirit inquired, will the Lord reject forever?
SPEAKER_00: Will he never show his favor again?
SPEAKER_00: Has his unfailing love vanished forever?
SPEAKER_00: Has his promise failed for all time?
SPEAKER_00: Has God forgotten to be merciful?
SPEAKER_00: Has he in anger withheld his compassion?
SPEAKER_00: In other words, God, have you turned on me and rejected me and left me alone to deal with this all by myself?
SPEAKER_00: Are you even there to help me?
SPEAKER_00: Do you even have compassion for me, love for me, or has your anger just completely overwhelmed all your other emotions towards me and your people?
SPEAKER_00: And then Asaph forced himself to do something in verse 11.
SPEAKER_00: I will remember your deeds, the deeds of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago.
SPEAKER_00: I will meditate on all your works and consider all your mighty deeds.
SPEAKER_00: And he chooses the parting of the Red Sea.
SPEAKER_00: Now he lived hundreds of years after the Red Sea was parted.
SPEAKER_00: And he chooses to just focus his mind on imagining what the parting of the Red Sea really looked like.
SPEAKER_00: What was happening in the invisible realm as the Red Sea was parted.
SPEAKER_00: And he gives one of the most fascinating descriptions of the parting of the Red Sea.
SPEAKER_00: You know, it more detail than you can find in Exodus.
SPEAKER_00: I love this.
SPEAKER_00: In Psalm 77, verse 16, he writes, The water saw you, O God, the water saw you and writhed.
SPEAKER_00: The very depths were convulsed.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, it's like, you know, the water saying, God's coming, get out of the way.
SPEAKER_00: The clouds poured down water.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever thought about the parting of the Red Sea involving torrential rains?
SPEAKER_00: The skies resounded with thunder.
SPEAKER_00: Your arrows flashed back and forth.
SPEAKER_00: Your thunder was heard in the whirlwind.
SPEAKER_00: You ever thought about these high-speed winds ripping through as the Dead Sea, the Red Sea was parted.
SPEAKER_00: Lightning, thunder.
SPEAKER_00: Your thunder was heard in the whirlwind, your lightning lit up the world, the earth trembled and quaked, earthquakes at the parting of the Red Sea.
SPEAKER_00: Your path led through the sea, your way through the mighty waters, though your footprints were not seen.
SPEAKER_00: Parting of the Red Sea, he's saying, is not God on high, just saying waters be parted, but God Himself is actually walking through the Red Sea, and the water is getting out of the way.
SPEAKER_00: You led your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron.
SPEAKER_00: That's what it looks like to meditate on one miracle.
SPEAKER_00: It's interesting, the miracle he chose didn't really have anything to do with his fears.
SPEAKER_00: It didn't have anything to do with his problem.
SPEAKER_00: He just decided I'm just gonna think about God for a while.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna remember what he has done, what he's capable of, and the love that caused him to do these mighty acts.
SPEAKER_00: And it's powerful.
SPEAKER_00: It is powerful.
SPEAKER_00: When we learn to meditate on the word of God, we create new neural pathways.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're having trouble, like you know, you've got these ruts in your mind and you can't think of any scriptures that that you can meditate on that will directly confront those ruts, see me, see one of the elders, see one of the staff, you know, see a Christian that that's hair is a little bit white, you know, and and they can probably tell you, here, here is uh the scripture you need to be focusing on.
SPEAKER_00: Don't don't feel like you've got to do this by yourself, but you need some passages that you meditate on, that you chew on regularly to set your mind right.
SPEAKER_00: You can do this.
SPEAKER_00: You have evidence that you can do this.
SPEAKER_00: You learn to read, you learn to write, you created a new neural pathway, you learn to ride a bike, you learn to drive a car.
SPEAKER_00: You learned to do the job that you're doing right now, even though when you first got hired there, it all felt weird and strange, and you're like, I don't think I'm ever gonna learn this, I don't think I'm ever gonna pick this up, and all of a sudden you do it without even thinking, you know, after time, and somebody else gets hired on and they start, you know, saying, I don't think I can do this.
SPEAKER_00: You're like, why?
SPEAKER_00: It's easy.
SPEAKER_00: It's easy for you because you created a new neural pathway that you walk down again and again and again and again.
SPEAKER_00: We do it all the time.
SPEAKER_00: We can do this.
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you hope.
SPEAKER_00: This really is not even that difficult.
SPEAKER_00: We just have to know how.
SPEAKER_00: Pray with me, please.