SPEAKER_01: The rest of the worship team, um I forgot to tell you the word I was supposed to tell you from bringing you up there in the first place.
SPEAKER_01: Uh the Lord is bringing revival to this house, he's gonna bring it other places, but this is going to be a house that's going to steward and sustain revival.
SPEAKER_01: This is not fairy tale, this is not make-believe, this is a reality.
SPEAKER_01: For some of us, you may doubt that, but that's okay.
SPEAKER_01: When it happens, you'll be like, oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_01: There's gonna be a lot of souls that are gonna be saved, okay?
SPEAKER_01: This is all this is all the starting point, this is the building grounds, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Nothing, nothing, we never see God do anything great without a people responding in faith.
SPEAKER_01: You know what?
SPEAKER_01: I don't see it yet.
SPEAKER_01: When it was Elijah, he looked off, he saw a small crowd, a cloud, and he said, get ready, the rain is coming.
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not calling myself Elijah yet.
SPEAKER_01: Just kidding.
SPEAKER_01: That was a joke.
SPEAKER_01: If you're new here, that was a joke.
SPEAKER_01: Uh you could turn that music off.
SPEAKER_01: We uh we've got invisible musicians here playing all the time.
SPEAKER_01: That was angelic music.
SPEAKER_01: But music worship team, he's bringing a move of his spirit.
SPEAKER_01: You're going to help host it.
SPEAKER_01: Part of this move is going to be worship-oriented.
SPEAKER_01: It's going to be both in the presence, in experiencing his glory, which was what was happening today, but it's also going to be in warfare and contending.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: There's times that we dig for those wells.
SPEAKER_01: There's times that we contend the worship team, you're playing a part in that.
SPEAKER_01: And sometimes I think we think that what we do on the worship team just what happens on Sundays by showing up early.
SPEAKER_01: Actually, that's what's happening during the week.
SPEAKER_01: That's happening in our prayer life.
SPEAKER_01: That's happening.
SPEAKER_01: What we're contending for, we're going to bring out on the platform.
SPEAKER_01: Did y'all catch that?
SPEAKER_01: What happens in the secret place is going to overflow in the public places.
SPEAKER_01: So this is both the Lord encouraging you of, hey, I'm doing something, but also it's a call to respond.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, what goes on in your secret life is going to show that anointing is going to come out, and you can't fake it.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Welcome.
SPEAKER_01: We didn't do announcements, so I'm trying to like fill all the parts.
SPEAKER_01: I'm sorry, Gary.
SPEAKER_01: Well, we might get to them at the end, but we need to move on.
SPEAKER_01: We have been talking about spiritual warfare a lot, and the Lord, I feel like, really wants to hit this message this morning because I believe this goes into alignment of some of the things that God has been doing here this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Amen?
SPEAKER_01: And that's the helmet of salvation.
SPEAKER_01: Now, all the other armor pieces are great, but I would say this is where the rubber meets the road, the helmet of salvation.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: This message is going to be very spiritual, but it's going to sound very non-spiritual.
SPEAKER_01: Is that okay?
SPEAKER_01: Hey kids, where y'all at?
SPEAKER_01: Raise your hand.
SPEAKER_01: Every time I say helmet, I want y'all to say something.
SPEAKER_01: What do you want to say?
SPEAKER_01: You tell me.
SPEAKER_01: What do you want to say every time we're gonna play a game?
SPEAKER_01: Every time I say helmet, you wanna say Jesus?
SPEAKER_01: Kids, do y'all agree?
SPEAKER_01: Or do y'all have anything else?
SPEAKER_01: Y'all wanna say wahhoo?
SPEAKER_01: Popcorn?
SPEAKER_01: Are y'all okay with popcorn?
SPEAKER_01: Do you like no?
SPEAKER_01: She said no.
SPEAKER_01: Are we gonna have to paper rock scissors it?
SPEAKER_01: Do you know how to do paper rock scissors?
SPEAKER_01: Come up here.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, come up here, Caleb.
SPEAKER_01: Give them a hand.
SPEAKER_01: Come up here on the stage.
SPEAKER_01: Come on.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so here's the game.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the rules.
SPEAKER_01: How are you doing, sir?
SPEAKER_01: I'm David.
SPEAKER_01: Caleb.
SPEAKER_01: How are you doing, lady?
SPEAKER_01: What's your name?
SPEAKER_00: Abby.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, it's so nice to meet you.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so we're doing paper, rock, scissors to determine what are the kids gonna say every time I say helmet.
SPEAKER_01: She wants to say Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And you want to say popcorn.
SPEAKER_01: Very, very spiritual.
SPEAKER_01: What's happening right now?
SPEAKER_01: So are we gonna do best two out of three?
SPEAKER_01: Paper, rock, scissors, do you not do it?
SPEAKER_01: You're gonna go one, two, three, and then do it.
SPEAKER_01: Alright?
SPEAKER_01: So stand right here.
SPEAKER_01: Two, three, go.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, there's one.
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: The best two out of three.
SPEAKER_01: Let's go.
SPEAKER_01: Here we go.
SPEAKER_01: Two, three.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, it's tied up.
SPEAKER_01: This is the game.
SPEAKER_01: You ready for this?
SPEAKER_01: Hey, give them share for them, church.
SPEAKER_01: What's going on here?
SPEAKER_01: Here we go.
SPEAKER_01: One, two, three.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, you lost.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, okay.
SPEAKER_01: So we're saying popcorn, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Is that okay?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah!
SPEAKER_01: It's okay.
SPEAKER_01: Give them a hand.
SPEAKER_01: You're so smart.
SPEAKER_01: So every time I say helmet, you're gonna say helmet.
SPEAKER_01: Helmet.
SPEAKER_01: Popcorn.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't tell you to say anything.
SPEAKER_01: I said popcorn.
SPEAKER_01: That was a trick.
SPEAKER_01: You gotta pay attention, kids.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: You gotta pay attention in school, but you gotta pay attention in church, right?
SPEAKER_01: Because we have to have our helmet of salvation on.
SPEAKER_01: Y'all missed it, kids.
SPEAKER_01: You were too busy coloring.
SPEAKER_01: You were too busy on your iPads.
SPEAKER_01: You need to focus up here because the Lord wants to talk to you too.
SPEAKER_01: The Lord likes to talk to children.
SPEAKER_01: Did you know?
SPEAKER_01: Raise your hand if you knew that God likes to talk to children.
SPEAKER_01: He's over there.
SPEAKER_01: He's like, He's like, I'm ready for warfare.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus, sign me up.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like Sam, y'all here I am, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, I thank you for what you have started, what you are doing, and what you're gonna continue to do, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: And we just thank you, Lord, there's an overflow of your presence, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: There's an overflow that's gonna come from this service into our personal lives, our personal walks, our family, our friends, our work, everything that we do from day to day.
SPEAKER_01: And Lord, I say that this church and everyone connected to it is walking in victory in the name of Jesus, not defeat.
SPEAKER_01: Walking into victory, we break off every victim mentality, every mindset of defeat, every mindset of loss and discouragement, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: And I thank you today.
SPEAKER_01: You're bringing a revelation of your truth, and I rebuke every religious spirit, both the religious that denies the supernatural, and then the religious that tries to control or over-define the supernatural.
SPEAKER_01: Ooh, someone needed to hear that.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: The helmet of salvation, Ephesians 6 said.
SPEAKER_01: I forgot that y'all were doing that.
SPEAKER_01: That scared me.
SPEAKER_01: You got me, kids.
SPEAKER_01: You got me.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if this was a good idea.
SPEAKER_01: I just don't know.
SPEAKER_01: Put on salvation as your helmet.
SPEAKER_01: This is what Paul says.
SPEAKER_01: He says, put it on.
SPEAKER_01: Everyone say, put on.
SPEAKER_01: In verse 13 of Ephesians, he also says, put on, but he says, put on all the armor.
SPEAKER_01: The put on he uses here is different from the put on in verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: Because this put on means to receive something.
SPEAKER_01: Understand, when we're talking about salvation, we don't just make salvation happen ourselves.
SPEAKER_01: We receive it.
SPEAKER_01: Amen?
SPEAKER_01: Because it's a gift.
SPEAKER_01: The context of all the armor of God, before we even got to this point, Paul said, be strong in the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Everything that we're doing is from a posture of receiving and responding from something that we've already received.
SPEAKER_01: The Christian walk is not about conjuring up everything ourselves, it's about receiving something and then acting upon it.
SPEAKER_01: I receive the truth of God so that it can impact my life and I live from his truth.
SPEAKER_01: I don't make up truth.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: Put on salvation as your helmet.
SPEAKER_01: Amen, kids.
SPEAKER_01: Good job.
SPEAKER_01: Paul is talking about a Roman soldier's headpiece.
SPEAKER_01: See what I did there?
SPEAKER_01: Loophole! He's talking about a Roman soldier's helmet.
SPEAKER_01: Typically, these headpieces would be made of iron or bronze.
SPEAKER_01: They were made of metal.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes they would have a leather on the inside to help them make help them be more comfortable, okay?
SPEAKER_01: But these helmets were big.
SPEAKER_01: They covered all over the head.
SPEAKER_01: They covered the ears, they protected the eyes, they even protected around the mouth, okay?
SPEAKER_01: They weren't necessarily comfortable to wear.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: We need to remember that as we go into this.
SPEAKER_01: They weren't necessarily comfortable to wear.
SPEAKER_01: This armor piece is not necessarily always going to be fun to do.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: So, and we know that this is a this is a symbolic thing that Paul's giving to the church.
SPEAKER_01: He's using these armor pieces because it helps us remember, but it also helps give some meaning to what is how is this going to affect our life?
SPEAKER_01: We had the belt of truth around our loins.
SPEAKER_01: That that kind of means something.
SPEAKER_01: We have the breastplate of righteousness that's covering our heart.
SPEAKER_01: Well, we know the heart in Scripture means something.
SPEAKER_01: It's not just talking about the physical organ, it's talking about our deepest desires.
SPEAKER_01: It's talking about our true self.
SPEAKER_01: Let's, for simplicity's sake, in today's message, let's just determine that the heart is our true self.
SPEAKER_01: That's where our real desires live.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: We have the breastplate of righteousness over that.
SPEAKER_01: And then we have we prepare our feet with the gospel of peace.
SPEAKER_01: The feet, a lot of time in scripture, is talking about walking.
SPEAKER_01: Walking can symbolize as we live our life.
SPEAKER_01: Our life is like a walk, like a journey.
SPEAKER_01: And actively going, doing something, going somewhere.
SPEAKER_01: I can want to go somewhere, but until I start walking, I'm not going to go anywhere.
SPEAKER_01: And he says, prepare your feet with the gospel of peace.
SPEAKER_01: Make spreading the gospel, being a witness of Jesus Christ, being a bringer of peace, changing the atmosphere wherever we go.
SPEAKER_01: Make that a part of your life.
SPEAKER_01: It establishes confidence in us.
SPEAKER_01: And then we have the shield of faith that we're holding up that's blocking these arrows.
SPEAKER_01: In the spiritual sense, that's what faith is going to do.
SPEAKER_01: Kids, kids, there's an actual enemy out there that's unseen, but you know what?
SPEAKER_01: Jesus Christ has beat that enemy.
SPEAKER_01: Did you hear me?
SPEAKER_01: Jesus Christ has beat that enemy.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes that enemy wants to look big and scary.
SPEAKER_01: And he'll be like, ah.
SPEAKER_01: Was that scary?
SPEAKER_01: Did someone say no?
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to have to work on it.
SPEAKER_01: Who said no?
SPEAKER_01: Alright, I'm going to work on scaring all y'all, but I'm going to do it when you're least expecting it.
SPEAKER_01: You're going to be eating your little graham crackers and apple juice, and I'm going to scare you, and you're going to pour it all over yourself, and I'm going to be like, ah.
SPEAKER_01: Should have had your helmet of salvation on.
SPEAKER_01: Air high five.
SPEAKER_01: Go.
SPEAKER_01: I love that some of the adults did it.
SPEAKER_01: I like air high fives.
SPEAKER_01: I'm still a kid.
SPEAKER_01: I love that.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: So we have protection of our head.
SPEAKER_01: So we're, and when we look at this from a Christian perspective, the context of this, the head is talking about the mind.
SPEAKER_01: The mind is where thoughts live.
SPEAKER_01: This is going to be a different piece of armor, okay?
SPEAKER_01: This is not talking about the heart.
SPEAKER_01: This is talking about the mind.
SPEAKER_01: So what I would say is wisdom would tell us, hey, what does the Bible say about the mind?
SPEAKER_01: What does the Bible say about our thought life?
SPEAKER_01: In fact, the Bible has a lot to say about our minds and our thought life.
SPEAKER_01: We look at Romans chapter 12, verse 2.
SPEAKER_01: This is the first part of it.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.
SPEAKER_01: I'm just changing everything up.
SPEAKER_01: It's a new translation.
SPEAKER_01: I call it the DIT, Dave's International Translation.
SPEAKER_01: I'm glad I made one person laugh.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, whoever you are.
SPEAKER_01: Just make sure you come to every service.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.
SPEAKER_01: In Ezekiel 36, this is an Old Testament prophecy through the pro the prophet Ezekiel.
SPEAKER_01: God says this, he says, I'm going to give them a new heart.
SPEAKER_01: Talking about the time that we live in today.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to give them a new heart.
SPEAKER_01: Now the heart is our true self.
SPEAKER_01: So God is saying is that I'm going to change who they truly are to be who I truly made them to be in desire for them to be.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to give them a new heart.
SPEAKER_01: That was back then talking about now that we are meant to experience.
SPEAKER_01: God is transforming us from the inside out.
SPEAKER_01: In the Old Testament, there was an external law meant to change us from the outward in.
SPEAKER_01: Things are different today.
SPEAKER_01: He's working in and outwardly.
SPEAKER_01: But that's a heart.
SPEAKER_01: We're talking about a mind.
SPEAKER_01: There's a difference.
SPEAKER_01: How sad would it be if we went into a battle and we're expecting God to fight the battle?
SPEAKER_01: Think about this.
SPEAKER_01: How sad would it be if we're expecting God to fight the battle, but God was expecting us to fight the battle?
SPEAKER_01: Would we win the battle?
SPEAKER_01: Kids, would we win that battle?
SPEAKER_01: No, we would not win that battle.
SPEAKER_01: It's okay.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, she gets it.
SPEAKER_01: It would be awful.
SPEAKER_01: We're expecting God to come fight a battle for us, and He's expecting us to fight it.
SPEAKER_01: You see, God is saying, I'm gonna come and I'm gonna change your heart.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna change who you truly are.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna change your deepest desires.
SPEAKER_01: But Paul here is saying, let God transform you.
SPEAKER_01: Wait a second, God's all powerful.
SPEAKER_01: Why is this verse saying, let God do it?
SPEAKER_01: Again, Bible, just soak it in.
SPEAKER_01: If this challenges any of your theology, again, Bible, just soak it in.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible challenges my theology sometimes, and my theologies have to change to support what the Bible teaches us.
SPEAKER_01: Y'all with me?
SPEAKER_01: Let God transform you.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna come give you a new heart, and then he says, Let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.
SPEAKER_01: He's talking about our mind.
SPEAKER_01: And what he's saying is, is what's going on in our thought life?
SPEAKER_01: What is going on in our minds is actually going to either allow or not allow God to transform us.
SPEAKER_01: God wants to, God's promised He'll do it, but all of a sudden you're telling me that the way I think can actually determine whether or not I'm going to be transformed or not.
SPEAKER_01: That's a lot of power.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna be honest.
SPEAKER_01: That you know, the my thought life does not seem like something that that would be that big of a deal.
SPEAKER_01: That would have that much power.
SPEAKER_01: Then in the next part of the verse, he says this.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Then you will be able to test and approve kids.
SPEAKER_01: How many of you have taken a test before?
SPEAKER_01: Everyone in here, I have two.
SPEAKER_01: I've homeschooled and I went to public school.
SPEAKER_01: I got all kinds of tests.
SPEAKER_01: Raise your hand if you like tests.
SPEAKER_01: One.
SPEAKER_01: No, there's two, three.
SPEAKER_01: There's no raise.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, teachers take no, not the kids, the kids don't like tests.
SPEAKER_01: What?
SPEAKER_01: Really?
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: We have a divide.
SPEAKER_01: We'll have to work this out later.
SPEAKER_01: Paper, rock, scissors.
SPEAKER_01: The second part of this verse says, let God trans.
SPEAKER_01: Sorry, it says, Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to catch this.
SPEAKER_01: This is the second part of this verse.
SPEAKER_01: Again, we're talking about the mind.
SPEAKER_01: We're not talking about the heart.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: Test here means to give critical examination to something.
SPEAKER_01: When I'm looking at something, a critical examination, I'm looking at something and I'm deciding, I'm like, wait a second, is this right or is this wrong?
SPEAKER_01: Kids, have you ever been there where you have to like determine, is something right or is something wrong?
SPEAKER_01: Raise your hand if you've been there.
SPEAKER_01: Do you remember those times where mom or dad said, don't do this, and then all of a sudden you come to a moment and you're like, okay, I could do this, but mom and dad said, don't.
SPEAKER_01: Is this right or is this wrong?
SPEAKER_01: Have you ever chosen wrong before?
SPEAKER_01: Raise your hand and let's just be honest today.
SPEAKER_01: Have you ever chosen wrong before?
SPEAKER_01: Have you paid the consequences of choosing wrong?
SPEAKER_01: I paid the consequences a lot.
SPEAKER_01: My parents used to spank me.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if that's, you know, not all parents do that, but my parents used to spank me.
SPEAKER_01: And I had this little thing as they hold my hand and they had a little stick, okay?
SPEAKER_01: They didn't beat me, but they spanked me.
SPEAKER_01: Alright?
SPEAKER_01: I didn't like it.
SPEAKER_01: They would hold my hand.
SPEAKER_01: I wasn't even planning on sharing this.
SPEAKER_01: This might be prophetic.
SPEAKER_01: Or pathetic, whatever.
SPEAKER_01: They would hold my hand up and they would then they would they would spank me, okay?
SPEAKER_01: But what I would do is I would run from it.
SPEAKER_01: But they were holding my hand, so I ran in circles like this.
SPEAKER_01: And they'd be circling trying to hit me, and I was like, Stop.
SPEAKER_01: I was very skilled at dodging.
SPEAKER_01: Then you will be able to test and approve, make a critical examination of something.
SPEAKER_01: Look at what Paul is saying here in the text.
SPEAKER_01: He's saying that God desires to transform us, God's changing our heart.
SPEAKER_01: Ezekiel tells us that.
SPEAKER_01: But yet the way we think is either going to allow or not allow it.
SPEAKER_01: And now what it's saying is that we're called to critically examine our thought life, to approve God's will for us.
SPEAKER_01: If I'm called to approve of it, that means I'm looking at stuff.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not approving of God.
SPEAKER_01: God doesn't need my approval.
SPEAKER_01: What I'm doing is I'm approving of his will being implemented into my life.
SPEAKER_01: I'm saying, okay, this is good, let that happen.
SPEAKER_01: This is not good, because if I have the ability to approve something, I also have the ability to reject something.
SPEAKER_01: This is a lot of power.
SPEAKER_01: And I think that sometimes this challenges our Christianity a little bit, as far as what is God's responsible for doing and what are we responsible for doing.
SPEAKER_01: You hearing me?
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna mess with some religious people today.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes we think, okay, God's responsible for doing this, and I just gotta trust Him and just walk in it.
SPEAKER_01: I appreciate that, but there's too many verses that also tell us to take up our own cross.
SPEAKER_01: Paul is calling for the church to engage in what God is wanting to do, to make a conscious decision, change the way you think, actually take effort to examine and approve God's will for your life.
SPEAKER_01: You see, I work in the computer world, and sometimes we deal with programs that have like millions of lines of code.
SPEAKER_01: Does anyone else have you ever looked at programming before?
SPEAKER_01: Computer languages?
SPEAKER_01: It's crazy.
SPEAKER_01: Millions of lines of code.
SPEAKER_01: You know what?
SPEAKER_01: It only takes one bad line of code to distort, to mess up the whole program.
SPEAKER_01: And what I'm what I think Paul is trying to say here is he's saying that God's will for you is perfect.
SPEAKER_01: There's nothing else in life that even comes close to perfection, but God's will and his plans for you are perfect.
SPEAKER_01: But if we have a bad line of code in our thinking, that can distort it.
SPEAKER_01: Because maybe all of a sudden we start approving of things that's not God's will.
SPEAKER_01: And then maybe we start rejecting what is God's will.
SPEAKER_01: And that's happening up in our mind.
SPEAKER_01: Our mind is like a gate.
SPEAKER_01: It's letting stuff in and it's letting stuff out.
SPEAKER_01: The mind is not the heart.
SPEAKER_01: I can desire to please God, but my mind's gonna choose what pleasing God looks like.
SPEAKER_01: And then my mind's gonna choose whether or not I actually take action to please God.
SPEAKER_01: Faith lives in the heart.
SPEAKER_01: Amen?
SPEAKER_01: Faith, I believe in God with all my heart, and I desire to please God.
SPEAKER_01: But it's the mind that carries the knowledge of God.
SPEAKER_01: We don't just please God by just following our heart.
SPEAKER_01: We've got to learn what pleases God.
SPEAKER_01: I've got a verse.
SPEAKER_01: Let me give you a verse.
SPEAKER_01: Colossians 1 10.
SPEAKER_01: It says, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him.
SPEAKER_01: This is that same language that Paul's using, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Pleasing.
SPEAKER_01: We desire to please God.
SPEAKER_01: That lives in our heart.
SPEAKER_01: That's noble.
SPEAKER_01: I appreciate that.
SPEAKER_01: But look at what it says.
SPEAKER_01: It says, bearing fruit, anytime you see bearing fruit, that means we're doing something.
SPEAKER_01: That means something's actually being produced in our life, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Good feelings does not mean good fruit.
SPEAKER_01: Pure desires, I just love God.
SPEAKER_01: That doesn't mean you're bearing fruit.
SPEAKER_01: Bearing fruit in every good work.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, whoa, whoa, whoa.
SPEAKER_01: I thought it wasn't by works.
SPEAKER_01: It's not by works that we're saved, but it's by works we're producing fruit.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus says he goes, if you love me, you truly love me, you'll bear fruit.
SPEAKER_01: Fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.
SPEAKER_01: Knowledge lives up here.
SPEAKER_01: This is what helps us interpret well what actually pleases the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: This helps us actually understand.
SPEAKER_01: Knowledge lives up here, y'all.
SPEAKER_01: Now knowledge alone will make us prideful.
SPEAKER_01: But knowledge combined with a transformed heart will produce fruit.
SPEAKER_01: But we've got to decide it.
SPEAKER_01: I'll give you an example.
SPEAKER_01: Is everyone okay?
SPEAKER_01: Kids, are you okay?
SPEAKER_01: Do you have your helmets on?
SPEAKER_01: Yes, you do.
SPEAKER_01: Let me give you an example.
SPEAKER_01: Say a guy he's married.
SPEAKER_01: He gets radically saved and he all of a sudden God transforms his heart.
SPEAKER_01: He's a new creation.
SPEAKER_01: And from this transformed heart, he has this desire.
SPEAKER_01: I want to please God.
SPEAKER_01: That is a pure noble desire, right?
SPEAKER_01: But that desire has to make it from the heart up to the mind to become an action.
SPEAKER_01: You with me?
SPEAKER_01: And our mind is a gay.
SPEAKER_01: Remember, it's approving or rejecting.
SPEAKER_01: It's saying, Oh, yeah, that's good.
SPEAKER_01: You can pass, or say, nope, stop, turn around.
SPEAKER_01: And what if our mind is being controlled by something that's not that's other than the Spirit of God or the truth of God?
SPEAKER_01: What if our mind is not operating correctly?
SPEAKER_01: What if there's bad code in our mind?
SPEAKER_01: So imagine that a guy, he gets radically saved and he has this desire.
SPEAKER_01: It's a pure desire, very simple, is I want to please God.
SPEAKER_01: And when we make the decision to want to please God, when we have this desire, it overflows into every part of our life.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to work hard and be responsible because I want to please God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to be a good friend and take care of my friends and my family because I want to please God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to love my spouse because I want to please God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not going to cheat on my tests at school because I want to please God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to be nice to my sister or my brother, even if they're not nice to me because I want to please God.
SPEAKER_01: Are you following?
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: Noble desire.
SPEAKER_01: I want to please God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to show unconditional love to my wife.
SPEAKER_01: That is a pure noble desire.
SPEAKER_01: That would be something that pleases God.
SPEAKER_01: But then that desire comes up to our mind, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And what if a fear of rejection is operating the gate of our mind?
SPEAKER_01: What if we've got some bad code and it gets up to our mind and this is a noble desire, and it wants it wants to like, you know, demonstrate its love for God.
SPEAKER_01: And I just want to please, I want to please God and love my wife unconditionally.
SPEAKER_01: And fear of rejection is operating the gate.
SPEAKER_01: And it comes up and it says, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
SPEAKER_01: We've been rejected before.
SPEAKER_01: You've tried this before, but you were hurt.
unknown: Yeah, yeah, I'm the point.
SPEAKER_01: You've tried showing unconditional love before, and that was painful.
SPEAKER_01: And that took you a lot of years to get over.
SPEAKER_01: I'm sorry, that's a nice desire.
SPEAKER_01: And I know you want to like put that to action, but I'm just gonna have to tell you to turn around.
SPEAKER_01: Because we can't take that risk.
SPEAKER_01: You've been a lot safer, you've been reserved, you've closed yourself off to people, you kept people at a distance, and you're not being hurt anymore.
SPEAKER_01: So let's just keep the gate closed, and we're not gonna let you become an action.
SPEAKER_01: You see, that desire is noble.
SPEAKER_01: But when we don't act upon those godly desires, we're not actually pleasing God.
SPEAKER_01: I've heard this before.
SPEAKER_01: God knows my heart.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, he does, but he watches our actions.
SPEAKER_01: He knows my heart.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, those are noble desires, but are they becoming actions?
SPEAKER_01: Are we actually demonstrating and walking out this Christian life?
SPEAKER_01: There's too many verses where it calls us to produce good works.
SPEAKER_01: James says it like this.
SPEAKER_01: He goes, I appreciate you got faith.
SPEAKER_01: I appreciate that you're all into the unseen things.
SPEAKER_01: But you know what?
SPEAKER_01: Faith without actual works is dead.
SPEAKER_01: It's impossible to please God without faith.
SPEAKER_01: I appreciate that.
SPEAKER_01: But it's also faith without works is dead.
SPEAKER_01: We can have a disconnect from our mind to our heart.
SPEAKER_01: Where my heart we desire stuff, we want to please God, but we don't ever make the decisions to please God.
SPEAKER_01: We don't ever turn that desire into an action because our gait is not working properly.
SPEAKER_01: Are y'all with me so far?
SPEAKER_01: This part of the armor is very crucial because you know what?
SPEAKER_01: It's our mind that controls the body.
SPEAKER_01: Kids, raise your hand.
SPEAKER_01: When I rose my hand, raised?
SPEAKER_01: Rose?
SPEAKER_01: Rose my hand.
SPEAKER_01: Raised it my hand.
SPEAKER_01: That was a choice made in my mind.
SPEAKER_01: No one forced me.
SPEAKER_01: God didn't force me to do that.
SPEAKER_01: My heart didn't compel me into raising my hand.
SPEAKER_01: I just chose it.
SPEAKER_01: Our mind controls the body.
SPEAKER_01: My mind chose to put on the belt of truth.
SPEAKER_01: My mind chose to put on the breastplate of righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: It chose to prepare my feet with the gospel of peace.
SPEAKER_01: It chose to hold up my shield.
SPEAKER_01: You would, this is where the rubber meets the road.
SPEAKER_01: What is going on in our thought life?
SPEAKER_01: All of us have good desires.
SPEAKER_01: We all want to please God.
SPEAKER_01: We're all grateful for salvation, but what are we actually doing up here?
SPEAKER_01: What's going on up here?
SPEAKER_01: Maybe there's some bad code.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe there's some bad understanding.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe we don't actually have a knowledge of God that's producing the fruit that He would desire to produce.
SPEAKER_01: I can see you all.
SPEAKER_01: Barely.
SPEAKER_01: The lights are blinding up here.
SPEAKER_01: A Roman soldier's helmet, there it was, would sometimes have a crest made of horse hair.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, horse hair.
SPEAKER_01: And what this would help do is signify ranking.
SPEAKER_01: If you're out on the battlefield, you would could look and you could see their crest on their helmet, they're like, oh, that's a captain.
SPEAKER_01: Good job.
SPEAKER_01: And I and speaking of horses, I grew up with horses.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: I grew up with horses.
SPEAKER_01: I know, not my wife just had me.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, that's a good clarification.
SPEAKER_01: I forgot.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't grow up with horses in a stable.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for that.
SPEAKER_01: Kiss on what?
unknown: Born in a barn.
SPEAKER_01: Born in a barn.
SPEAKER_01: Touche.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, I grew up, we my family owned horses, so I would help take care of horses.
SPEAKER_01: I'd help feed them.
SPEAKER_01: I'd help clean out their stalls.
SPEAKER_01: I would help like I'd get up early in the morning before school in the wintertime and go break ice in their water.
SPEAKER_01: I literally broke the ice.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, there we go.
SPEAKER_01: But we grew up with horses and I would ride horses, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Now, who's familiar with horseback riding?
SPEAKER_01: Who's familiar with horses?
SPEAKER_01: I just need to know what kind of crowd I'm working with here.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, we got like 15% of people, if everyone was honest.
SPEAKER_01: I I grew up with horses, I love it.
SPEAKER_01: We would ride horses now.
SPEAKER_01: There's two different saddle types, two primary, there might be more, but there's two primary different types of saddles to ride a horse.
SPEAKER_01: You have Western style that the cowboys rode, okay?
SPEAKER_01: The western style has a little horn on the front and you can hold on to it, but it's mainly used for when you lasso something like a cow or a horse, you tie the lasso to the horn so you can hold them in place.
SPEAKER_01: So I would ride Western style, so I'm kind of like a cowboy.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, if you want to call me cowboy Dave or Cowboy Pastor Dave, you can do that.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you can call me cowboy pastor Dave.
SPEAKER_01: CPT, to abbreviate.
SPEAKER_01: But you have another style of saddle called English style.
SPEAKER_01: The English style doesn't have a horn on the front.
SPEAKER_01: It's not as easy to ride.
SPEAKER_01: You've got to have balance and precision.
SPEAKER_01: You've got to like, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_01: You've got to know what you're doing.
SPEAKER_01: Like, you know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_01: That was that was my impression of riding English style.
SPEAKER_01: English style.
SPEAKER_01: Now here's the thing.
SPEAKER_01: I wrote English style too.
SPEAKER_01: So I was like a cowboy with class.
SPEAKER_01: Alright?
SPEAKER_01: I was like John Wayne drinking tea.
SPEAKER_01: I was like Wyatt Earp, who reads Jane Austen.
SPEAKER_01: I was like Billy the Kid with a butler.
SPEAKER_01: I was a cowboy with class.
SPEAKER_01: But this is what always amazed me with horses is that I was a scrawny little 14-year-old kid, and these horses were mag they were huge and they were strong.
SPEAKER_01: And yet I could control a horse by simply attaching something to its head.
SPEAKER_01: I could control a big magnificent magnificent beast just by putting something on its head, and then I could steer it whichever way I wanted to go.
SPEAKER_01: Our thought life is like this.
SPEAKER_01: The power of God is so huge and so big, and our hearts and who we truly are is such a big part of our life.
SPEAKER_01: But it's the mind that's actually going to determine what steers us.
SPEAKER_01: Our thought life doesn't seem like that big of a deal, but it's actually going to be the thing that determines will we be transformed or not.
SPEAKER_01: It's actually going to be the thing that determines are we going to please God or not?
SPEAKER_01: God knows my heart, but he watches our actions.
SPEAKER_01: Anyone wants to debate me, I'll throw like 20 verses at you and you'll have none.
SPEAKER_01: I'll tell 21.
SPEAKER_01: Because I'm a classy cowboy.
SPEAKER_01: Cowboy Classy Cowboy.
SPEAKER_01: Did you not pay attention?
SPEAKER_01: What this is telling us, though, is that we have control.
SPEAKER_01: Everyone say control.
SPEAKER_01: It's like that song, I've got the power.
SPEAKER_01: We've got control.
SPEAKER_01: We've got control over what we think about.
SPEAKER_01: And not only do we have control of what we think about, but we have a call to be responsible for what we think about.
SPEAKER_01: This is not a battle where God's going to come and fight the battle for us.
SPEAKER_01: He's calling us to go fight the battle.
SPEAKER_01: This is not the heart, this is the mind.
SPEAKER_01: It's something different.
SPEAKER_01: 2 Corinthians 10 5 says this.
SPEAKER_01: We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God.
SPEAKER_01: And we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Everyone say captive.
SPEAKER_01: Listen, this is warfare language, y'all.
SPEAKER_01: Kids, say warfare.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, this is warfare language.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible's not playing around here.
SPEAKER_01: This is not like, hey, sit down and let's talk this out.
SPEAKER_01: This is like when we have a thought, we take it captive.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, we put it in a headlock.
SPEAKER_01: Kids, go like this.
SPEAKER_01: Headlock.
SPEAKER_01: And we make it be obedient to Christ.
SPEAKER_01: This is not like, let me consider this a little bit.
SPEAKER_01: It's like, I'm taking you captive.
SPEAKER_01: Be obedient.
SPEAKER_01: That's how we treat our thought life.
SPEAKER_01: We don't give it room.
SPEAKER_01: Some of the stuff of what God was doing here today, He was speaking truth to lies.
SPEAKER_01: There's no place, there's no room for lies in the life of a believer.
SPEAKER_01: Because we're taking every thought captive.
SPEAKER_01: We're called to.
SPEAKER_01: You see, God's not a God of confusion.
SPEAKER_01: He's not going to call us and set us up for failure.
SPEAKER_01: When he says, I want you to control this, what he means is I've given you the power and the ability, but I've also given you the responsibility to control it.
SPEAKER_01: Because it's your thought life is going to play a much bigger part than we might think.
SPEAKER_01: We take captive every thought.
SPEAKER_01: This is warfare language.
SPEAKER_01: There's an imbalance in Christians.
SPEAKER_01: I've seen this.
SPEAKER_01: I've had this.
SPEAKER_01: Where it's physical on one side, Christianity's all physical, it's all works, or it's all spiritual.
SPEAKER_01: Listen to me.
SPEAKER_01: Some of y'all are gonna get breakthrough today.
SPEAKER_01: It's all spiritual.
SPEAKER_01: It's all ethereal.
SPEAKER_01: It's all faith.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't really matter what we do.
SPEAKER_01: When we go all physical, we'll step into legalism.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: And if we go all this, when I say spiritual, it means that we only focus on like the unseen things.
SPEAKER_01: You know what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_01: It's all spiritual.
SPEAKER_01: Nothing matter does, I do matters.
SPEAKER_01: I was watching this witch.
SPEAKER_01: She was a witch from the time she was born.
SPEAKER_01: She was dedicated to the demonic, okay?
SPEAKER_01: She got set free.
SPEAKER_01: She was a witch all her life.
SPEAKER_01: She got set free, and she's a Christian now, radically saved.
SPEAKER_01: Beautiful testimony.
SPEAKER_01: I'm watching her get interviewed, okay?
SPEAKER_01: She's a Hispanic lady.
SPEAKER_01: And she says, she goes, the church is very dumb to the spiritual stuff.
SPEAKER_01: They refuse it.
SPEAKER_01: For some reason, they reject it.
SPEAKER_01: She's like, the world's like way farther.
SPEAKER_01: The demonic realm, which is they're way farther.
SPEAKER_01: The church is just like, they don't understand this.
SPEAKER_01: They don't understand how big, how important this stuff is and how real it is, okay?
SPEAKER_01: I'm talking people getting cursed and all this kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to scare the kids, but it's scary.
SPEAKER_01: But she says this.
SPEAKER_01: She goes, Christians, she goes, Christians, they don't realize that even all the little physical things they do and choices they make affect them in the spirit realm.
SPEAKER_01: Even the food they eat will actually establish a certain spiritual foundation in their life.
SPEAKER_01: Do you know that?
SPEAKER_01: They're just doing stuff all the time, and they think it doesn't matter what I do on my daily business.
SPEAKER_01: And they're just, you know, they're just opening up little realms and little spiritual things, and they don't even realize it.
SPEAKER_01: What we do matters.
SPEAKER_01: What we say matters.
SPEAKER_01: Life and death is in the tongue.
SPEAKER_01: But we're making those choices in our mind.
SPEAKER_01: By what we're entertaining.
SPEAKER_01: The mind is going to let things come out in our attitude, our actions, our speech, but it's also going to let things come in.
SPEAKER_01: If God is changing the heart, if he's creating new desires in us, if he's changing who we truly are, we can let things in.
SPEAKER_01: That's going to help that or hinder that.
SPEAKER_01: What we look at matters.
SPEAKER_01: The things that we entertain on our daily lives, that matters.
SPEAKER_01: That's going to help God transform us, or it's going to work against it.
SPEAKER_01: That's why Paul says, let God transform you by changing the way you think.
SPEAKER_01: Not religious like you think, it's the religious on the spiritual sense.
SPEAKER_01: You cut out all the works part of your Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: That's religious.
SPEAKER_01: That's putting all the responsibility on God and expecting to do nothing.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, really?
SPEAKER_01: How much fruit do you have in your life then?
SPEAKER_01: Jesus looks at that stuff.
SPEAKER_01: He says, if you don't produce fruit, you're not actually connected to the vine.
SPEAKER_01: You're not a walking testimony, you're a walking phony.
SPEAKER_01: That's the DIT translation.
SPEAKER_01: So does the Bible show us?
SPEAKER_01: Does it give us any does it give us like schematics?
SPEAKER_01: Does it give us like some things to like guide us in how we should have our thought life?
SPEAKER_01: Yes, it does.
SPEAKER_01: Helmet! That was like three seconds.
SPEAKER_01: Horrible.
SPEAKER_01: I'm just playing kids.
SPEAKER_01: I love you.
SPEAKER_01: Do you love me?
SPEAKER_01: You're allowed to respond.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
SPEAKER_01: Philippians 4.8.
SPEAKER_01: And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing.
SPEAKER_01: Fix your thoughts on what is true.
SPEAKER_01: Everyone say, fix your thoughts on what is true, honorable, and right, pure, lovely, and admirable.
SPEAKER_01: Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.
SPEAKER_01: We can't always control what we experience in life.
SPEAKER_01: Don't think you can.
SPEAKER_01: But we control our interpretation of those things.
SPEAKER_01: Did you hear me?
SPEAKER_01: I can't control and keep people from doing bad things to me all the time.
SPEAKER_01: But I can control how I choose to respond, how I interpret it.
SPEAKER_01: I can either view life through a lens of hope, the glass is half full, or I can view it as the one of lack, the glass is half empty.
SPEAKER_01: That is what we do control, and that happens up here.
SPEAKER_01: And Paul is saying here, fix your thoughts.
SPEAKER_01: Because our thoughts need to be fixed.
SPEAKER_01: So what does this look like?
SPEAKER_01: I used to quote this verse all the time, but I just summarized and I said, think about good things.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, what's good things?
SPEAKER_01: Things that make me feel good.
SPEAKER_01: I was having a bad day.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, okay, fix your thoughts.
SPEAKER_01: Try to cheer yourself up.
SPEAKER_01: But there's a lot more going on here.
SPEAKER_01: There's like eight things listed.
SPEAKER_01: Is there not?
SPEAKER_01: Even today I can't even fully quote it.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, think about things that are true, lovely, pure, admirable, excellent, worthy of praise.
SPEAKER_01: It's hard to remember.
SPEAKER_01: That's a lot.
SPEAKER_01: That's eight things.
SPEAKER_01: So let's go through this real quick.
SPEAKER_01: True.
SPEAKER_01: What is that?
SPEAKER_01: Focus on things that are real, that are factual.
SPEAKER_01: Our minds can be so consumed with things that we assume to be true that's not actually true.
SPEAKER_01: Have you ever thought have you ever struggled thinking before that, hey, maybe someone doesn't like you, or maybe someone's mad at you, and you've been all concerned about it, then you get around them and you feel and you realize they weren't even mad at you.
SPEAKER_01: Raise your hand if you've been there.
SPEAKER_01: Come on.
SPEAKER_01: Not everyone's being honest.
SPEAKER_01: Engage with me.
SPEAKER_01: The kids are here.
SPEAKER_01: Raise your hand if you've been there.
SPEAKER_01: You thought someone was mad at you, you were worried about it, then you find out they're not mad at you.
SPEAKER_01: And that's because we're focusing and thinking on something that we assume to be true, but it's not actually factual.
SPEAKER_01: There's many things that we can do, and our thought life can be consumed, and we've got to ask ourselves, wait a second, is this actually true?
SPEAKER_01: God's word is truth.
SPEAKER_01: God's word is a dependable place to go when we need truth.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Kids, say amen.
SPEAKER_01: Say amen.
SPEAKER_01: Say, praise him.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Next, it says honorable.
SPEAKER_01: Things about things that are dignified and worthy of respect.
SPEAKER_01: Avoid things that are petty, crude, or mocking.
SPEAKER_01: And just ask yourself this one question.
SPEAKER_01: Does this thought elevate or degrade?
SPEAKER_01: Does this elevate or degrade something?
SPEAKER_01: Or someone or a situation?
SPEAKER_01: Next, think about things that are right, or other translations would say just.
SPEAKER_01: This is talking about justice, God's justice.
SPEAKER_01: Think about things that are righteous.
SPEAKER_01: Dwell on what is fair, righteous, and alignment with God's standards.
SPEAKER_01: And then ask yourself this question: Does this reflect God's justice and integrity?
SPEAKER_01: God's form of justice is not our form of justice.
SPEAKER_01: It amazes me that we watch so much media, entertainment, and when you look at the heart of it, it's all about revenge.
SPEAKER_01: Someone did something bad to someone and they returned the favor, and we celebrate that.
SPEAKER_01: That's not God's form of justice.
SPEAKER_01: Can you imagine if the Avengers like exemplified God's form of justice where he extends mercy and grace?
SPEAKER_01: Like the Avengers are there.
SPEAKER_01: They're about to kill, they're about they're about to get Thanos, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden they get up to Thanos and they're like, hey, we forgive you.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, don't we turn the other cheek?
SPEAKER_01: Captain America's like, guys, let's circle around him real quick.
SPEAKER_01: He needs some prayer.
SPEAKER_01: He needs deliverance.
SPEAKER_01: Hulk, will you break off a spirit of anger?
SPEAKER_01: Hulk's like, I'm still angry.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, someone else, can you pray for him?
SPEAKER_01: Hulk's still in his, he's still working things out.
SPEAKER_01: Black Panther starts preaching.
SPEAKER_00: There's fire in this place.
SPEAKER_00: Literally, fire, because y'all blowing up stuff.
SPEAKER_00: Go put out the fire.
SPEAKER_00: Then we'll get back to the message.
SPEAKER_01: Thor's like, does God love aliens?
SPEAKER_01: Then they're like, Hawkeye's like, yeah, you heard the song, Jesus Loved Little Children, all the little children of the worlds?
SPEAKER_01: Red and yellow, black and white, blue and green and red, Jesus loved the little children of the worlds.
SPEAKER_01: We don't think that way.
SPEAKER_01: We're entertained by things of this world.
SPEAKER_01: We don't even realize that these things don't line up with God's heart.
SPEAKER_01: It's going into us, affecting our heart.
SPEAKER_01: Hey kids, did you know what you watch and look at will actually affect your heart?
SPEAKER_01: God's desiring for your heart to be a certain way.
SPEAKER_01: But what you actually take in will affect that.
SPEAKER_01: It'll help God or it'll work against God.
SPEAKER_01: It'll make his life harder.
SPEAKER_01: Not his life.
SPEAKER_01: That's not theologically correct.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you get what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: Amen, woman.
SPEAKER_01: Facebook, not woman, Miss Pam, sorry.
SPEAKER_01: All of it.
SPEAKER_01: Think about things that are pure.
SPEAKER_01: Guard your thoughts from corruption and impurity.
SPEAKER_01: Think about things and motives and honesty.
SPEAKER_01: Think about things that are not sinful.
SPEAKER_01: Ask ourselves, is this sinful?
SPEAKER_01: Then don't think about it.
SPEAKER_01: Think about things that are lovely, focus on what brings peace, joy, and delight.
SPEAKER_01: This can include beauty and creation, people, or action.
SPEAKER_01: Ask yourself, is this thought marked by grace and kindness?
SPEAKER_01: If it's not, then reject it.
SPEAKER_01: Admirable.
SPEAKER_01: Think about things that are uplifting and worthy of imitating.
SPEAKER_01: Avoid criticism and cynicism.
SPEAKER_01: This is a big one, especially in the church.
SPEAKER_01: There's a form of Christianity where we feel we're more immature the more critical we are.
SPEAKER_01: I struggle with this.
SPEAKER_01: I come before the Lord, okay, and I'm just like, Lord, I want to be different.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, then stop, then change the way you think.
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, that's not the answer I was wanting.
SPEAKER_01: We make choices to focus on something.
SPEAKER_01: You can have two people look at a painting, same painting.
SPEAKER_01: One person's gonna be like, this is beautiful.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, this is a beautiful artistic creation.
SPEAKER_01: The other one's gonna be like, there's kind of a smudge right there, and I don't really like the color, and blah, blah, blah.
SPEAKER_01: You understand, have you ever been around people?
SPEAKER_01: Just critical, negative.
SPEAKER_01: We're not meant to be like that.
SPEAKER_01: And if we're always thinking about flaws, and especially looking at flaws in others, it's gonna come out in the way we speak.
SPEAKER_01: Amen?
SPEAKER_01: We govern that.
SPEAKER_01: Nothing's forcing us to act like that and talk like that.
SPEAKER_01: Admirable.
SPEAKER_01: Think about things that are uplifting and worth imitating, avoid criticism of citizens.
SPEAKER_01: I already read that.
SPEAKER_01: Cynicism is always expecting people to be selfish.
SPEAKER_01: Everything they do, it's selfish motives, okay?
SPEAKER_01: They don't really care about anyone, they're only doing that to gain this.
SPEAKER_01: Excellent.
SPEAKER_01: Choose thoughts that reflect moral and spiritual excellence.
SPEAKER_01: Is this the best?
SPEAKER_01: Not just acceptable.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes we ask God, we're willing to settle for a good decision, a good plan, instead of going after the God plan.
SPEAKER_01: What is your perfect will?
SPEAKER_01: You you following me.
SPEAKER_01: We we pray a lot and declare purpose over people.
SPEAKER_01: We take we declare God's perfect will.
SPEAKER_01: We don't want to settle as Christians.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: What is your perfect plan for my life?
SPEAKER_01: What is your perfect will?
SPEAKER_01: For how I'm going to be.
SPEAKER_01: Who did you truly make me to be?
SPEAKER_01: Because he's working to change us into his image.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Next is praiseworthy.
SPEAKER_01: Focus on what brings glory to God or reflects his character.
SPEAKER_01: Ask, is this thought something that brings honor to God or others?
SPEAKER_01: I the Lord likes, the Lord has started this pattern in my life where he likes to test me on whatever I'm preaching on that week.
SPEAKER_01: And I love it.
SPEAKER_01: It's amazing.
SPEAKER_01: He likes to test me on whatever I'm preaching on.
SPEAKER_01: This last week, I got a test.
SPEAKER_01: I woke up and I was angry.
SPEAKER_01: Kids, have you ever been angry?
SPEAKER_01: It's not fun.
SPEAKER_01: And I had no reason to be angry.
SPEAKER_01: It was a beautiful day.
SPEAKER_01: My life was great.
SPEAKER_01: Hayden was a good baby, so I got some sleep.
SPEAKER_01: He's always a good baby, but he cries sometimes as a good baby.
SPEAKER_01: And I don't always get good sleep.
SPEAKER_01: But I got good sleep.
SPEAKER_01: I had no reason to be angry.
SPEAKER_01: I wake up angry, I'm driving to work, and I've got these storm, this the thoughts going through my mind.
SPEAKER_01: Like a storm.
SPEAKER_01: Has anyone ever been there?
SPEAKER_01: It's like a storm.
SPEAKER_01: It's like no matter what you can do, your thoughts are just not giving up.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm angry and I get kind of desperate and I say, Lord, I just don't want to be angry.
SPEAKER_01: And I get this here, I get this sweet little voice, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And it says, David, you're choosing this.
SPEAKER_01: And it caught my attention.
SPEAKER_01: I said, What?
SPEAKER_01: And then it started to be a little less gentle.
SPEAKER_01: I said, David, you're about to go preach on this, and here you are, allowing this, allowing this storm.
SPEAKER_01: Not doing anything about it.
SPEAKER_01: And you're asking me to change it for you.
SPEAKER_01: You're choosing this.
SPEAKER_01: I stopped in that moment and I said, Lord, you're right, forgive me.
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: This is what the power of God will do.
SPEAKER_01: This is where the Holy Spirit will partner with us.
SPEAKER_01: He'll bring conviction.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's that sweet little voice.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, you actually don't have to do this.
SPEAKER_01: You can actually stop thinking this way.
SPEAKER_01: You can make a choice today to stop doing that.
SPEAKER_01: So I I stopped and I said, Lord, forgive me for entertaining those thoughts.
SPEAKER_01: Forgive me for choosing.
SPEAKER_01: You see, a victim will never take ownership of their problems.
SPEAKER_01: Forgive me for choosing that.
SPEAKER_01: And I repent.
SPEAKER_01: I come out of agreement with it.
SPEAKER_01: I come out of agreement with anger.
SPEAKER_01: My day turned around.
SPEAKER_01: It ended up being a great day.
SPEAKER_01: So how does the helmet of salvation play a part in this?
SPEAKER_01: Good job.
SPEAKER_01: 1 Thessalonians 5.8, Paul mentions the helmet of salvation, but there's something added here that I didn't see.
SPEAKER_01: In Ephesians, look at this.
SPEAKER_01: But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet.
SPEAKER_01: Salvation is going to guard us.
SPEAKER_01: It's something we're going to put on because it's going to remind us why we do this.
SPEAKER_01: I'm saved.
SPEAKER_01: I am a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: I am called to partner with the workings of God in my life and take ownership of that responsibility to change the way I think.
SPEAKER_01: You hear me?
SPEAKER_01: And it gives us hope.
SPEAKER_01: This is not going to be always a fun journey to work on our thought life.
SPEAKER_01: This is not.
SPEAKER_01: Roman, can I use you as an example, brother?
SPEAKER_01: It's good, and I don't want to put you on the spot, but I'm just asking in front of everybody.
SPEAKER_01: A few months ago, actually last year, late fall last year, we have Wednesday night sermons.
SPEAKER_01: Roman comes in, he looks distraught.
SPEAKER_01: He looks emotionally exhausted.
SPEAKER_01: He walks in, he's just like, oh, and I'm like, bro, what is wrong?
SPEAKER_01: He goes, it's this day, man.
SPEAKER_01: I've been all these thoughts, and I'm sitting there and I'm doing this, and I'm trying to like fight against it and stuff, and it's just awful, and I'm exhausted.
SPEAKER_01: And Roman was thinking that he was a failure.
SPEAKER_01: That was his conclusion.
SPEAKER_01: He comes into church defeated because he'd been battling his thoughts all day.
SPEAKER_01: What he needed to know was, is you're actually doing this right, my man.
SPEAKER_01: Because sometimes the battle will not just be over in a second.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's not going to be over in a day.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's not just going to be I read a couple verses and then all of a sudden everything's rainbows and sunshine.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes there's going to be weeks of fighting, months of fighting.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes, you know what, we think we won the battle over our thought life, and then a few days later it pops right back up again, and we're right back trying to get our thoughts to be submitted to the obedience of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it'll be years, but we continue fighting.
SPEAKER_01: We continue in this thing that's going to be uncomfortable.
SPEAKER_01: And why do we do this?
SPEAKER_01: Because we have hope.
SPEAKER_01: Because one day, the King of Kings is going to return.
SPEAKER_01: Because one day we're going to be standing in his presence.
SPEAKER_01: Because one day he's going to wipe away every tear.
SPEAKER_01: Because one day we're going to receive new heavenly bodies.
SPEAKER_01: We have a hope for tomorrow.
SPEAKER_01: And because we have a hope for tomorrow, that gives us hope today.
SPEAKER_01: That I could do all things through Christ who gives me strength.
SPEAKER_01: I could do all things to Christ who gives me strength.
SPEAKER_01: You may feel defeated in your mind, but I'm here to tell you that God is working in us and for us to make us in a new creation.
SPEAKER_01: And we just step into it and agree with it.
SPEAKER_01: It's hope for tomorrow.
SPEAKER_01: It's hope that we can succeed in this.
SPEAKER_01: And it's also hope that these private battles that no one will ever know about mean something because it's going to help us produce the fruit.
SPEAKER_01: It's going to help us be a light in the dark.
SPEAKER_01: It's going to be a help us be a witness for Christ.
SPEAKER_01: This is not a works-based theology.
SPEAKER_01: This is as faith infused in it.
SPEAKER_01: But it's where we choose not to strive, but to get into alignment with the will of God for our life.
SPEAKER_01: He's provisioned it for us, but we're stepping into it.
SPEAKER_01: You follow me?
SPEAKER_01: Stand to your feet.
SPEAKER_01: The Spirit of God is here to break off something very vital in all of our lives.
SPEAKER_01: This morning, He's going to break it off.
SPEAKER_01: We're not going to do an altar call.
SPEAKER_01: We already had one.
SPEAKER_01: 2 Corinthians 10 4.
SPEAKER_01: It says the weapons we fight with are not the weapons of this world.
SPEAKER_01: On the contrary, they have divine power.
SPEAKER_01: Everyone say power.
SPEAKER_01: This is the lie.
SPEAKER_01: This is the stronghold we're going to defeat right now this morning.
SPEAKER_01: The Holy Spirit is going to break this off.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you, I don't think it's just some of us have this.
SPEAKER_01: I think all of us have struggled with this at different times in our life, and that is, I feel powerless.
SPEAKER_01: I feel like I don't have control.
SPEAKER_01: I feel like I try to get my thoughts to submit, but they can't.
SPEAKER_01: I don't I feel powerless.
SPEAKER_01: That is a lie of the enemy.
SPEAKER_01: That is a stronghold because greater is he who is in me than he who is in the world.
SPEAKER_01: We are not doing this alone.
SPEAKER_01: We have the power of God working with us.
SPEAKER_01: We have the Holy Spirit empowering us, helping us, reminding us.
SPEAKER_01: Raise out your hands.
SPEAKER_01: This may seem super spiritual, but the Holy Spirit's going to break off lies in people's minds this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Strongholds that I'm powerless and I'll never change.
SPEAKER_01: I'll never win.
SPEAKER_01: Holy Spirit, I thank you right now that your power is here to break off this lie that we are powerless.
SPEAKER_01: And I rebuke it right now in the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And I thank you, Lord, that you called all of us, you've equipped us, you've given us power to break off the lies of the enemy and also to choose your perfect will, to choose what is right in our life, not to choose the things of this world.
SPEAKER_01: And I pray, Father, that you'd forgive us for the times that we choose things that's not good for our heart.
SPEAKER_01: That's not good for what you're doing in our life, Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Draw us into repentance.
SPEAKER_01: And I thank you, God, that you are patient and kind.
SPEAKER_01: So as we continue to fail, Lord, we're always continuing to grow.
SPEAKER_01: You're not cutting us out of the relationship.
SPEAKER_01: You're helping lift us back up and push us forward.
SPEAKER_01: So we step upon that.
SPEAKER_01: Your love, your kindness, and we step out of condemnation in the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Isn't God good?
SPEAKER_01: Let's give him praise for just his goodness and faithfulness.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: You're worthy to be praised.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Jesus, you're worthy to be praised.
SPEAKER_01: It was great having the kids in here this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Helmet! I got her.
SPEAKER_01: She said, Helmet! Wait, no, popcorn.
SPEAKER_01: We love you.
SPEAKER_01: Let me go ahead and give a couple reminders.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, Gary, is it okay if I give