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00:00 How many of you would agree that unfortunately,
00:03 the world seems to be coming more and more negative?
00:05 Raise your hands, raise your hands.
00:07 Those of you online, you can type it in the comment section,
00:10 the world is becoming more negative.
00:13 Chronic negativity, we could say, is becoming an epidemic
00:18 that's poisoning people's mental health right and left.
00:23 And unfortunately, this isn't just a practical problem.
00:26 At its root, in many ways, it's a spiritual problem.
00:30 And what I wanna do today is give you a couple
00:32 of foundational thoughts that we'll come back to
00:34 again and again, and I want you to recognize
00:37 the incredible truth that your thoughts
00:40 have incredible power.
00:42 Your thoughts have incredible power.
00:45 The good news is that you have incredible power
00:48 over your thoughts.
00:51 Your thoughts are incredibly powerful.
00:53 Your life is moving in the direction
00:55 of your strongest thoughts.
00:57 But the good news is you're not a victim of your thoughts.
01:00 By the power of God, you can actually choose
01:02 what you think about, and what you think about
01:04 determines how you live.
01:06 Your thoughts are incredibly powerful,
01:09 and you have incredible power over your thoughts.
01:12 In fact, it was the Apostle Paul who said this
01:14 in Romans chapter eight, verses five and six.
01:17 He said, "Those who live according to the flesh
01:21 "have their minds set on what the flesh desires."
01:26 What did he mean by that?
01:28 He wasn't talking about our skin.
01:30 The word in the Greek is the word sarx,
01:32 and it essentially means our fleshly or our sinful nature.
01:35 What he's essentially saying is those who live
01:38 according to their sinful nature,
01:40 they have their minds set on what the sinful nature desires.
01:44 Then he says, the good news is,
01:45 "But those who live in accordance with the Spirit
01:48 "have their minds set on what the Spirit desires."
01:53 Now, how does this impact us?
01:55 Verse six tells us, "The mind governed by the flesh
01:58 "is," what?
02:00 "Is death, is darkness, is destruction.
02:03 "But the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace."
02:08 If you find yourself hurting,
02:12 if you find yourself feeling broken,
02:14 if you find yourself often being discouraged,
02:16 could it be that your mind is set on the things of this world
02:20 instead of set on the things of God?
02:22 Because when you set your mind on the things of God
02:24 and the things of your Spirit,
02:25 you will find life and peace in all that you do.
02:27 I'm gonna lay out my plan to you,
02:30 and it's a very aggressive plan, I just wanna tell you.
02:32 Anytime I do a talk, I always have some stated goals
02:35 that I'm gonna try to achieve,
02:36 and I wanna tell you what those are
02:38 just so we'll be on the same page,
02:39 and these are our aggressive goals.
02:41 The first thing I wanna do, three things.
02:43 Number one is I wanna show you
02:45 why negativity is not only hurting you,
02:47 but your family, your relationships, your marriage,
02:50 your values, the direction in your life,
02:53 your outlook, and on and on and on.
02:54 I wanna show you why negativity is hurting you.
02:57 The second thing I wanna do is try to help you identify
03:00 a specific area of negativity in your own mindset.
03:05 And the third thing is by the power of God's Word,
03:07 I wanna show you how, with the help of God,
03:10 through His Word, empowered by His Spirit,
03:12 we can change from that which is bringing death
03:15 to that which brings life and peace.
03:17 A very aggressive set of goals, but that's my goal.
03:20 Let's start at the beginning.
03:22 Why is negativity so toxic?
03:27 At its root, we need to understand
03:29 that we have what's called a negativity bias.
03:34 We're biased toward that which is negative,
03:36 and neuroscience actually shows us
03:38 that negative events imprint on our brains more quickly
03:43 and linger longer than positive ones.
03:47 Negative events, something bad, something tragic,
03:50 something unfortunate, seems to hit our brains
03:52 and sticks longer than positive ones,
03:55 and I can prove it with several examples.
03:57 What do you think spreads faster on social media,
04:00 something positive or something negative?
04:03 And the answer is something negative.
04:05 On any news app, which news stories gets more clicks,
04:09 the negative ones or the positive ones?
04:11 And the answer is the negative ones.
04:13 They will say if it bleeds, it leads.
04:16 And then for you, if you have a presentation coming up
04:20 and you're really nervous about it,
04:22 and you do the presentation and you do a good job,
04:26 and afterwards, five different people say,
04:28 "Wow, that was amazing.
04:31 "You crushed it.
04:33 "That was so powerful.
04:34 "I love what you did."
04:36 Five people loved it,
04:37 and one person makes a negative comment.
04:40 At the end of the day,
04:43 are you thinking about the five positive things,
04:45 or are you lamenting the one negative thing?
04:48 If you're like me, I'm lamenting the one negative thing.
04:52 And what happens, unfortunately, is chronic negativity,
04:55 it sends us into a constant state of fight or flight,
05:00 and we're actually wired this way.
05:02 It's not initially bad until it becomes bad,
05:05 because in any stressful situation,
05:07 God actually designed our brains
05:09 to release cortisol into the blood system.
05:12 And that's a good thing at first.
05:14 It makes us more alert, it makes us more focused,
05:17 it makes us ready to deal with a problem,
05:19 and it's good until it's not.
05:23 When we become chronically negative,
05:26 when we're stuck in an ongoing negative loop,
05:30 we always feel like we're in danger.
05:34 We always feel like there is a threat.
05:36 Paul said it this way,
05:38 "The mind governed by the flesh is death,
05:42 "but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace."
05:46 What happens is when most of what you see online is negative
05:50 and most of what your friends say is negative
05:53 and most of what you say to yourself is negative
05:56 and most of what you hear about in the news is negative,
05:59 when you focus on the negative,
06:01 what you're doing is you're creating
06:03 negative neural pathways.
06:05 We've talked about this a lot.
06:06 When you think a thought once,
06:08 it's easier to think a thought again.
06:10 And when you focus on the negative
06:12 and you think on the negative some more
06:13 and you hang around negative people
06:15 and you're surrounded by criticism
06:17 and you never think the best,
06:18 but you always think the worst,
06:20 you're creating negative neural pathways.
06:23 And very literally for you, negativity becomes a habit.
06:28 It's a default posture.
06:30 It's the things are gonna be bad
06:31 and they're gonna get worse
06:32 and you can't trust anybody
06:34 and everybody's gonna let you down
06:35 and all Christians are this
06:37 and life sucks and it's getting worse
06:40 and my mental health is bad
06:41 and I'm never gonna get anywhere
06:43 and I'm never gonna be happy
06:44 and I'm never gonna have a ministry.
06:45 There's never gonna be anything that really matters in life.
06:47 I'm always gonna be stuck here.
06:49 And very literally,
06:51 negativity becomes your default habit posture.
06:54 Think about it.
06:56 The mind governed by the flesh is death.
07:00 The news you consume,
07:02 the shows that you watch,
07:04 the lyrics to the music that you play
07:06 over and over and over and over again,
07:08 the social media that you consume
07:10 that makes you feel left out or jealous or angry
07:13 or less than,
07:15 the people that you spend your time around,
07:17 they all create this inner script
07:20 that directs your life.
07:23 Your thoughts have incredible power
07:26 over the direction of your life.
07:29 But the good news is,
07:31 you have incredible power
07:32 over where your thoughts are taking you.
07:35 What I wanna do is I wanna now try to help you identify
07:40 where you're most prone to negativity.
07:43 Because we all are.
07:45 When I looked into my own life,
07:47 I found a very specific category
07:48 that I've really worked on for a long period of time
07:52 and with the help of God's Word,
07:53 He's been renewing my mind
07:54 and I've made significant progress.
07:57 Which of the four areas,
07:58 according to the experts that I've been consulting
08:00 throughout the message series,
08:02 say there's four big specific buckets
08:05 or areas of negativity.
08:07 What I wanna try to do is help you to find
08:09 what is your one biggest one.
08:11 We'll talk about this in our life groups.
08:13 We'll discuss it and bring God's Word to it.
08:16 What is your one big one?
08:18 If you cannot define it, you cannot defeat it.
08:21 What is it that's holding you back?
08:23 I'll give you four big categories.
08:25 The first one is what I might call relational cynicism.
08:29 Relational cynicism.
08:31 What is this?
08:32 Cynicism is a general distrust for people and their motives.
08:37 It's you can't trust people,
08:39 they're gonna take advantage of you,
08:41 everyone is out for themselves,
08:43 all those people are this way,
08:45 no matter what you do,
08:47 they're looking out for their interests,
08:48 nobody's really generous, nobody's really benevolent,
08:52 you can't really trust people.
08:54 Now, on a side note, according to the experts
08:57 that I talked to, this cynicism is generally a reflection
09:00 of how you feel about yourself.
09:02 Hate to say this, but when you distrust the motives
09:06 of others, according to the people I've talked to,
09:09 it often reveals that you don't really
09:11 always like your motives.
09:13 But that's another point,
09:14 and I'll let some other preacher preach on that one.
09:16 I'm gonna keep this one positive.
09:18 (congregation laughing)
09:20 There's relational cynicism,
09:23 and for some of you, that would be your one.
09:26 You might say, yeah, I really am,
09:28 I really don't trust people.
09:30 I really think people are out for themselves all the time.
09:33 I really don't have a good view of people.
09:35 You might just say it, this is what I am,
09:36 I'm relationally cynical.
09:39 There's a second category that's called negative filtering.
09:43 Negative filtering.
09:44 And this is just seeing what's wrong.
09:48 Finding the worst possible thing to point out.
09:51 It's overlooking what's good,
09:53 it's overlooking what's right,
09:55 it's maybe assuming the worst possible outcome.
09:59 Your kids are running late, and you think,
10:02 oh my gosh, they must've been in an accident.
10:04 And you thought that the last 18 times they were late,
10:07 and they were never in an accident,
10:08 but you continue to think that.
10:10 Or you text your friend,
10:11 and your friend doesn't respond for two hours.
10:14 Oh my gosh, my friend must be mad at me.
10:16 It's looking for what's wrong,
10:17 instead of looking for what's right.
10:20 And we see this a lot of times in a lot of different ways.
10:22 You can go on a vacation,
10:24 and you find what's wrong with a vacation.
10:25 You go to a restaurant,
10:26 and you find what's wrong with a restaurant.
10:28 You meet a person,
10:29 you figure out what's wrong with the person.
10:30 You go to church, and bless God,
10:32 you know what's wrong with that church.
10:34 It's negative filtering.
10:35 It's finding what's wrong,
10:37 instead of seeing what's right.
10:39 Some of you, that's yours.
10:41 There's another category that's called absolute thinking.
10:45 And this is polarized thoughts.
10:48 This is kind of the all or nothing, black or white.
10:51 If someone does, a man hurts you, all men are bad.
10:56 If a woman lies to you, all women are liars.
10:58 If a Republican does something, all Republicans,
11:01 or all Democrats are this, or whatever.
11:04 If someone makes a mistake, if you make a mistake,
11:07 it's like, oh, I'm just dumb.
11:08 If you disagree with someone about an issue,
11:12 you write the whole person off.
11:14 In fact, in my opinion,
11:15 we've seen more of this type of thinking
11:17 in the last couple of years than in my entire lifetime.
11:20 Well, they think that, so screw them, and I'm right.
11:23 Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
11:24 It's absolute thinking.
11:26 And some of you, you are so there, and you cannot see it.
11:29 You're a jerk to everybody
11:33 because you're right about something.
11:35 And just because you're right
11:37 doesn't mean you're righteous.
11:38 There's another one, I'll save that one
11:42 for another person to preach on as well.
11:44 (audience laughing)
11:47 And the final one would be blaming, blaming.
11:52 And this is simply believing that you're always a victim.
11:57 The reason you're where you are
11:58 is because someone else did something,
11:59 got in your way, or took your toy,
12:02 or didn't give you a chance.
12:04 And you feel like you don't have any control
12:06 over what's happening to you.
12:08 You're just a victim of life and circumstances,
12:11 and there's no way for you to get ahead
12:13 because the world is stacked against you.
12:16 That raises the question,
12:18 if you find yourself constantly jealous,
12:22 or critical, or discontented,
12:26 or assuming the worst,
12:28 or you're hard on other people
12:30 and negative about other people,
12:31 or you're hard on yourself, can you change?
12:36 Can you shift from a chronically negative mindset
12:41 to one that's full of faith
12:43 and reflects the heart and the character of God?
12:46 Can you shift?
12:48 And the answer is yes, you can, but it's not easy.
12:52 And I'll show you an interesting study
12:54 that I saw in a TED Talk that was very fascinating to me.
12:58 And they introduced an imaginary new surgical procedure.
13:02 And they took two different groups of people,
13:04 and they presented the same procedure
13:07 with different odds of success versus failure
13:11 to see if they thought it was a good or a bad procedure.
13:13 The first group, they said,
13:14 "Hey, there's a 70% chance of success in this surgery."
13:18 And the other group, they said,
13:19 "There's a 30% chance of failure."
13:22 Essentially the same odds,
13:24 but a different way of presenting it.
13:25 They asked the first group,
13:26 "Hey, if there's a 70% chance that this is going to succeed,
13:30 "is this a good procedure or a bad procedure?"
13:33 And you would expect the majority said,
13:35 "Oh, this is actually a good procedure."
13:38 To those who were on the other side
13:39 that thought there's a 30% chance of failure,
13:42 they asked them the very same question,
13:43 "Is this procedure good or is this procedure bad?"
13:47 And when they were presented with a negative,
13:49 they stuck with the negative,
13:51 and they said, "This is a bad procedure."
13:54 You might expect that.
13:56 Then they wanted to determine,
13:57 can you switch if you simply change the narrative?
14:02 They went to the first group and said,
14:03 "Well, we're glad you think it's a good surgery,
14:06 "but let me give you the other side.
14:07 "There's also a 30% chance of failure.
14:11 "Knowing that, do you still think it's good?"
14:14 And the majority who first said it was good said,
14:16 "Oh, now that you say it that way,
14:18 "this is actually a bad surgery."
14:21 Then they went to the other side and said,
14:24 "Well, knowing that it's a 30% failure,
14:27 "what if you think about it this way?
14:28 "There's actually a 70% chance
14:32 "that it's actually a positive thing,
14:33 "meaning it's gonna be successful.
14:35 "Do you now change your stance
14:37 "or what do you think they did?"
14:38 Those who said it was bad,
14:40 even after the switch, said it is also bad.
14:44 Proving that you can change your perspective,
14:48 but to change from negative to positive,
14:51 it is not natural and it is not accidental.
14:55 You might need a little supernatural help from God
14:58 and a little intentional work on your end,
15:00 and it really, really matters
15:02 because your thoughts are more powerful
15:04 than you can imagine,
15:05 and you have more power over your thoughts
15:07 than you think you do.
15:09 How do you do it?
15:10 If you really need to work at change,
15:13 how do we practically change?
15:16 I'm so glad you asked.
15:18 What I wanna do is look at
15:21 one of the most powerful illustrations of the mind
15:24 with David in the Old Testament,
15:26 and he shows us what to do
15:29 when you are hit by, blindsided by,
15:31 an avalanche of negativity.
15:34 We're gonna be in 1 Samuel chapter 30,
15:36 and let me give you the context.
15:38 It was a bad day.
15:40 It was worse than you can possibly imagine.
15:42 However bad your week was,
15:45 David's was much worse.
15:47 David and his troops had just come home from battle,
15:50 and they tragically discovered
15:52 that an enemy force had burned their homes
15:55 and kidnapped their wives and their children.
15:58 So you got these warriors coming home,
16:00 and David thinks it can't get any worse than this.
16:02 They've burned our villages,
16:05 they've taken our families,
16:06 and he thought it couldn't get any worse until it did,
16:08 when his own men decided to turn on him
16:10 and thought about stoning him.
16:12 And we can read the story in verse,
16:14 in Scripture, which says this,
16:16 "When David and his men reached Ziklag,
16:19 "they found it destroyed by fire,
16:22 "and their wives and their sons and daughters taken captive.
16:25 "So David and his men wept aloud
16:30 "until they had no strength left to weep."
16:34 Some of you may feel close to that right now.
16:38 You're hurting so deeply,
16:40 so much pain, so much anxiety,
16:44 so much fear, and they wept aloud
16:49 until they had no strength left to weep.
16:52 And David, understandably, was greatly distressed
16:56 because the men were talking of stoning him.
16:59 Each one was bitter in spirit
17:03 because of his sons and daughters.
17:06 And in the middle of his worst and lowest moment,
17:12 Scripture says this,
17:15 "But David found strength in the Lord his God."
17:21 In the middle of an avalanche of negativity,
17:28 he found strength in the Lord his God.
17:32 Some of you, it's time to find some strength,
17:34 not in your own power, not in your own positive thinking,
17:39 but in the power of a life-changing presence of God.
17:43 He found strength in the Lord.
17:46 And I love the way the King James Version
17:48 translates this verse.
17:49 The King James Version says this,
17:51 "In the middle of his darkest moment,
17:53 "David encouraged himself in the Lord his God."
17:59 Some of you, in a world of chronic negativity,
18:04 it's time for you to learn to encourage yourself in the Lord.
18:07 What did David say?
18:10 And the answer is, we don't know.
18:13 Because Scripture doesn't tell us.
18:16 But we do know what he said other times.
18:19 And it's very likely what he said at other times
18:22 is similar to what he said to himself.
18:25 Let me give you some examples.
18:26 Psalm 103, verse one, David was talking to himself.
18:31 He was encouraging himself in the Lord.
18:34 He said, "Praise the Lord, my soul."
18:36 He's not saying like, "Praise you, God."
18:38 He's saying, "Hey, soul, praise the Lord.
18:40 "All my inmost being, praise his holy name.
18:42 "Self, start worshiping God," he says.
18:45 "Praise the Lord, my soul.
18:46 "And forget not his benefits."
18:48 David, don't forget who he is and what he's done.
18:51 The one who forgives your sins and heals your diseases,
18:55 who redeems your life from the pit
18:56 and crowns you with love and compassion,
18:59 who satisfies you with desires of good things.
19:02 He's saying, "Hey, remember, David,
19:03 "he anointed you as king, he chose you.
19:06 "Hey, he sets you apart.
19:07 "He delivered you from the lion and the bear.
19:09 "He gave you the faith and the courage
19:11 "to stand up to Goliath."
19:12 Remember that he never leaves you,
19:14 that he never forsakes you.
19:15 Remember that he protected you from the spears of Saul
19:18 and he encourages himself in the Lord.
19:21 And then in verse eight,
19:23 he says something that you may have heard before.
19:25 And in a moment, I'm gonna ask you
19:27 if you've heard this verse before.
19:29 And if you have, I want you to raise your hand or online,
19:32 I want you to type it in the chat,
19:33 I've heard this verse before.
19:35 No foul if you haven't,
19:37 not everybody's been around the Bible,
19:38 but if you have, I want you to tell me.
19:39 Verse eight, in the very same chapter, he says this.
19:42 He says, "The Lord is compassionate and gracious,
19:46 "slow to anger and abounding in love."
19:49 Who's ever heard that verse before?
19:51 Type it in the comment section.
19:52 I've heard that verse before and your hands go up.
19:54 I'm gonna ask you, are you sure?
19:56 Are you sure you've heard that verse before?
20:02 Because David said that in Psalm 108,
20:04 but David also said this in Psalm 86, verse 15.
20:09 In 86, he said this,
20:10 "But you, O Lord, are a compassionate and a gracious God,
20:15 "slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness."
20:19 Have you heard that verse before?
20:20 Raise your hand.
20:21 Are you sure?
20:22 Are you sure it wasn't the other one?
20:25 Are you sure it was that one?
20:26 Or perhaps it was Psalm 145, verse eight,
20:31 when David said this, he said,
20:33 "The Lord is gracious and compassionate,
20:36 "slow to anger and rich in love."
20:39 Have you heard that verse?
20:41 Are you sure?
20:42 Or was it a different one?
20:44 Because evidently, David wasn't very creative.
20:47 When he was talking to himself,
20:51 he said the same thing over and over again.
20:53 "Lord is gracious, he's compassionate,
20:55 "he's slow to anger, he's righteous."
20:57 He said it again and again.
20:58 And what's crazy is David wasn't the first one who said that.
21:03 He was copying it.
21:04 You know who he plagiarized?
21:06 He copied God.
21:08 God was the first one to say that.
21:10 God said it of himself in Exodus 34.
21:14 What's interesting is when things got bad,
21:18 David didn't have to go searching for a Bible verse.
21:21 He had already hidden God's word in his heart.
21:26 And he said the same thing to himself
21:29 over and over and over again.
21:31 He encouraged himself in the Lord.
21:34 And I wanna give you a tool to help you encourage yourself.
21:38 And one of the greatest tools I can give you
21:40 is to start acting like a cow.
21:43 Start acting like a cow.
21:47 Eat more chicken or whatever the cow commercial would say.
21:49 You know, I don't know.
21:51 But what does a cow do?
21:53 One of the things a cow does is something called ruminates,
21:56 which is really, really cool.
21:59 What does a cow do?
22:00 A cow takes a mouthful of grass
22:03 and chews it and chews it and chews it
22:08 and then swallows it
22:09 and then throws it back up in his mouth
22:14 and chews it and chews it and swallows it
22:17 and throws it back up in his mouth and chews it some more.
22:22 Besides being really cool, that's really gross.
22:25 Why does the cow do that?
22:28 He wants to get every bit of nutrition out of that grass.
22:33 Is to ruminate.
22:35 And the same Hebrew word in the Old Testament
22:38 translated as meditate can also be translated to ruminate.
22:44 Ruminate, meditate, chew and enjoy.
22:49 Get every bit of spiritual nutrition from God's Word
22:53 over and over and over and over and over and over
22:57 and over again.
22:59 So when you find yourself in a tight situation,
23:02 you don't have to look for a verse.
23:04 You've already got one hidden in your heart.
23:06 And David said, "The Lord is slow to anger.
23:09 "He's compassionate, He's gracious."
23:11 Because he's been meditating on that.
23:14 And I wanna help you learn to meditate on God's Word.
23:17 I told you in the last few weeks
23:20 that I hit a very low spot, incredibly low spot.
23:24 Occupationally burned out is what the diagnosis was.
23:29 And my mind started to break down
23:31 like mental, real mental challenges.
23:35 And in this time, what I did is I ruminate,
23:37 I meditated on Romans 15, 13.
23:41 "May the God of all hope fill you with joy and peace
23:46 "as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope
23:50 "by the power of His Holy Spirit."
23:52 Over and over and over again.
23:53 "May the God of what?
23:54 "May the God of hope, hope."
23:56 He is a God of hope.
23:58 "May the God of hope fill me.
24:00 "I need the joy, the joy of the Lord is my strength.
24:02 "I need His peace, the peace that surpasses
24:04 "all understanding.
24:06 "May the God of hope fill me."
24:09 Over and over and over again.
24:11 "As you trust in Him, trust in the Lord
24:13 "with all your heart, not on your own understanding,
24:15 "but in all your ways, acknowledge Him."
24:18 Said He'll make your path straight.
24:20 "May the God of hope fill me with joy and peace
24:23 "as I trust in Him."
24:24 And as I meditated over and over and over and over again,
24:27 what I'll tell you, and Amy will tell you,
24:28 that today is like I'm different, changed, healed, whole,
24:32 full of joy, full of power, full of strength,
24:35 full of victory, my mind is different.
24:38 My mind is different.
24:39 The mind governed by the flesh is death.
24:42 And I was caught up in all the negativity
24:43 and all the external pressure trying to perform
24:46 instead of taking the strength of God from the inside
24:49 and letting it flow to the outside.
24:50 I'm different by the power of God's Word.
24:53 Some of you right now, what you need is
24:54 you need a negativity fast.
24:56 You need a fast from negativity.
24:59 Whatever it is that's freaking you out,
25:01 the news every single day, man, you wanna be like
25:03 ticked off and mad and afraid of everything.
25:05 Just read the news every day, nonstop, nonstop.
25:07 Watch that same channel.
25:08 You know the one, you know the one, your favorite one
25:11 that pisses you off every day.
25:12 Oh, feels so good, oh, oh.
25:15 (congregation laughing)
25:18 Or social media that makes you feel left out
25:21 and horrible about yourself.
25:24 That one person, just like, just don't look.
25:26 Or some of you, you're stuck in a YouTube rabbit hole
25:30 and you're fighting a battle that only this many people
25:34 are fighting and you think the world's coming after you
25:36 and you don't even know you're lost in an algorithm
25:41 that's feeding you the same type of garbage
25:43 that's just destroying your soul.
25:45 Some of you, it's your friends.
25:50 Every time you're together, it's just a hate fest.
25:54 Is it criticize that church, criticize those people,
25:57 criticize that group, criticize here.
26:02 Your thoughts are incredibly powerful
26:04 and you have power over your thoughts.
26:08 So earlier, we went over the four big categories
26:12 and what I wanna do is I wanna give you
26:15 a potential spiritual truth to ruminate on.
26:20 What I like to do is I like to take Scripture
26:22 and I like to put them in power thoughts.
26:23 So it's God's word in something I can remember
26:27 and say over and over and over again.
26:28 And so I created four for these four categories.
26:32 If you wanna take a photo of one, you can.
26:35 If you wanna take a photo of a different one
26:36 for your friend, you can.
26:37 If you wanna take a photo of all four for yourself,
26:40 you can do that, but I'll show you some power thoughts
26:42 and you can ruminate on these.
26:44 If you find yourself battling with cynicism,
26:47 you may say this over and over again.
26:49 With God's help, I will get rid of all bitterness
26:54 and skepticism.
26:56 I choose to believe the best about others
26:59 and be kind, compassionate, and loving.
27:03 I will love and forgive others as Jesus has loved
27:07 and forgiven me over and over and over again.
27:12 If yours is negative filtering, you might say this.
27:16 God, by your power, I take every thought captive
27:19 and make it obedient to the truth of Christ.
27:21 Because you're good, I choose to think on what's good,
27:24 right, true, helpful, and worthy of praise.
27:28 As I trust in you, your peace will guard my heart,
27:32 soul, and mind in Christ Jesus.
27:34 If you find yourself lost in absolute thinking,
27:38 everything's black or white and all these people are this
27:40 or that, you tell yourself, as Jesus loved and accepted me,
27:44 I will love and accept others.
27:46 This is God's word.
27:47 Rather than always being right,
27:49 I'm called to always be loving.
27:51 Rather than just making a point,
27:52 I choose to make a difference.
27:54 In humility, I choose to love others above myself.
27:59 And if you find yourself always a victim, always blaming,
28:03 you just declare the truth that God has given me a life
28:06 and a mind of my own.
28:08 By his grace, I will own my choices
28:11 and choose God's best for me.
28:14 I've been given everything I need
28:16 to accomplish everything God wants me to do in Christ,
28:20 by his power, by his blood, by his stripes,
28:23 by his spirit, I will overcome.
28:26 I am an overcomer by the blood of the lamb
28:29 and by the words of his testimony.
28:32 The mind governed by the flesh is death,
28:35 is destruction, is darkness, is negativity.
28:38 Who do you think that's from?
28:40 Our spiritual enemy, who is the father of lies,
28:44 who comes to steal, kill, and destroy.
28:46 But Jesus said, I've come to give you life
28:48 and life to the full.
28:50 The mind governed by the flesh is death,
28:52 but the mind governed by the spirit is life
28:55 and joy and peace.
28:58 So what are you gonna be?
29:01 Swept up by the latest gossip
29:06 and lowering yourself to the lowest common denominator
29:10 of popular opinion?
29:11 Are you gonna stand up for something
29:14 that brings glory to God?
29:15 Say, we're not a victim of what goes on in the world.
29:21 I'm gonna choose to see where God's working.
29:24 I'm gonna choose to look for the good in people.
29:27 I'm gonna choose to be loving and kind and full of grace
29:32 because your thoughts have incredible power
29:36 and you have incredible power of your thoughts.
29:40 And therefore we will not be conformed
29:43 to the patterns of this world ruled by the princes
29:48 and powers of darkness, but instead we'll be transformed.
29:51 How?
29:52 By the renewing of our minds,
29:55 then we can test and approve what the will of God
29:57 is as good, it's perfect, and it is pleasing will.
30:02 If you feel the presence of God,
30:05 can you tell him, thank you, he's here, he's with you,
30:08 he's good, he's for you, he's moving in this place.
30:13 So father, we ask that by the power of your spirit,
30:17 you transform us.
30:18 Wherever you're watching from today,
30:19 those of you who would say,
30:21 I may be stuck in a negativity loop and I need help out,
30:26 lift up your hands right now, all over the place,
30:27 lift them up, just be honest, lift them up online,
30:29 just type it in the chat, help me out of my negativity.
30:33 God, thank you for people that wanna be free.
30:35 God, I pray you would reveal to all of us
30:39 in which area are we most vulnerable.
30:42 Show us God, help us to own it.
30:47 To repent of it and to turn to your word
30:51 to renew our minds.
30:53 Heal us God, change us.
30:56 Help us to think on that which is pure and lovely
30:59 and excellent, admirable and worthy of praise.
31:03 Help us to be a voice of hope and life
31:08 and point people to the goodness of your son, Jesus.
31:12 Set us free, heal our minds, renew our minds, we pray.
31:16 As you keep praying today, there are some of you
31:18 that you just look at life and think,
31:19 ah, it's just a mess.
31:22 And you may feel guilty and you may feel hopeless.
31:25 What's the point?
31:26 Anyway, I wanna tell you about Jesus.
31:30 Jesus is the sinless son of God
31:34 who came that we may have life and life to the full.
31:39 And the good news is he didn't come
31:41 for those who are perfect,
31:42 he didn't come for the righteous, he came for the sinners.
31:46 We talked about the mind that's governed by the flesh,
31:48 that's our sinful nature.
31:49 And the reality is that we have all sinned,
31:51 every single one of us.
31:53 We've done things wrong, we've hurt people.
31:56 And our sin separates us from God.
31:59 But God in his love sent Jesus perfect in every way,
32:03 who was the innocent sacrifice, died on a cross
32:06 and God raised him from the dead.
32:08 So that anyone who believes in Jesus,
32:10 who turns to him, your sins will be forgiven
32:12 and you will be brand new.
32:14 Wherever you're watching from today,
32:15 those who say, I want that, I want his grace,
32:19 I want forgiveness of my sins, we're gonna trust in him,
32:21 we're gonna surrender our life to him.
32:22 When you call on him, he hears your prayers,
32:25 he forgives your sins, he makes you brand new.
32:27 Today is the day of your salvation.
32:29 Wherever you're watching from,
32:30 those who say, I need his grace, I want his forgiveness.
32:33 Today, I surrender my life to Jesus,
32:35 I give my life to him, that's your prayer.
32:37 Lift your hands high now, all over the place and say yes.
32:39 Lift them up and say, I give my life to him.
32:41 Thank God for you.
32:42 And over here, praise God for you guys.
32:44 Others today say, yes, Jesus, I surrender to you.
32:48 Online, just type in the comment section,
32:52 I want to follow Jesus, I wanna follow Jesus.
32:56 And let's all pray aloud, pray, heavenly father,
32:59 forgive my sins, Jesus, save me, be first in my life.
33:04 Heal me, forgive me, fill me with your spirit
33:10 so I could know you and show your love.
33:14 Do your will in all that I do.
33:17 My life is not mine, I give it to you, Jesus.
33:22 Thank you for new life, I surrender mine.
33:25 In Jesus' name I pray.
33:27 Could somebody celebrate big,
33:29 welcome those born into God's family.
33:31 Come on, church.
33:32 (audience cheering)