How To Change Your Mind

Today my my feeling for this message is probably a little lower gear, a little slower start to it than maybe I normally do, but I do feel like the Lord has a word for us today. I want to talk about how to change your mind. How to change your mind.

You know, in life there there's there's always vision. At least you should have vision in your life, and with that you should have intention. What are your intentions? If you have the vision, what are your intentions? And then the method that gets you to where you know you need to go.

So I'm going to start today with a vision that's in the scripture. I'm going to read a verse or two verses, actually. And I know it's been been a time change — are you guys aware of that? I was talking in live class earlier, even my dogs this morning were like, what's going on, it's not time to get up. So I hope you're wide awake, and we're going to plunge in.

But this Romans chapter 12 it's a, it's a verse I quote quite a lot around here. Paul, right in there to the church at Rome, says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. Verse number two: do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is good and acceptable and the perfect will of God.

So how to change your mind. Look at that verse there, and pardon my — I got a little congestion today, so sorry if I sound like I'm in a box up here. How do you renew your mind? You know what, what's going on inside of us? About you, but for me, I find often times the biggest struggle I face is is not what the outside opposing things — it's inside myself. What my mind set on, how am I thinking about whatever situation I'm facing, or temptation, or whatever the whatever the circumstances are. How am I internalizing, how am I doing myself? And we inevitably end up living out the kinds of thoughts and intentions and desires that we have. It's just part of being a human being. It ends up coming out. And when we talk about things like personality traits — and what I mean by that is like somebody being cranky or bossy or sad or joyful — or only talking in my mind, I'm talking about things that end up becoming patterns in their life, things that are basically a habit.

You know, I firmly believe that people have a habit of being in a bad mood. And you can disagree with me if you want to, it's okay, but I just feel like people just have a habit of being in a bad mood, or have a habit of being crankier. At the same time, I think people have a habit of being joyful. It's something that they've just decided: I'm going to be happy. And they've done it long enough that in most cases they are just happy, joyful people. It's it's something that they live out.

So, you know, if you don't aim for something — in, for example, there was a big disagreement in in the Bible between Jesus and the religious leaders of his day, to try to get — they believed in the power, if you just had enough rules, that people would be okay. But just having rules, or just having uh compliance because there's a rule, doesn't change the person. Yeah. And I know this because there there's a vast majority of us — I said us — in the room today who, who are always compliant to the speed limit when I see the man parked on the side of the road, okay. But if it's a wide open stretch and I don't see any real danger there, and I don't see, you know, the uh Mr. Officer, I may may push the limits a little bit in there. So there's being compliant for the moment, or or maybe what we we better term as behavior modification, right? There are some of us who know how to behave in certain settings. There's some of you who know how to behave in church. And if we based everything in your life off of how you act when you're here, we'll be like, man, they are a perfect person. But outside of here the behavior modification changes soon, right? This happens. And then there's this conflict that goes on, because, you know, if it's just rules that you feel like you have to obey because the rules' sake, and you don't take the time to understand the bigger reason behind it, it never, ever works. And that's what was going on when Jesus showed up. They had taken what was God's command for them, but they had turned it into something that made it impossible for people to have a relationship with God. And then, because it seemed to be impossible to have a relationship with God, people begin to struggle inside their mind: does God even care about me?

So it's important how you think. It's important what you think about. It's important what you allow to be inside your mind. Jesus said it best, I feel like, in Matthew chapter 12:33, when he said this: either make the tree good and it's fruit good, or else make the tree bad and it's fruit bad, for the tree is known by its fruit. Brewed of vipers, how can you, be an evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. He was — I don't know about you, but I feel like that's a pretty good way for you and I to judge. I know you're like, well, hey, you know, you shouldn't judge. Doesn't the word of God say something about that? Isn't it amazing how we hang on to some verses? Yeah, the Bible says judge, unless you be judged. It does say that, but you got to finish the rest of the chapter. Don't just hang on to the verse. And these verses I just read to you in in Matthew 12 are red-lettered verses two. And Jesus says you can judge the tree by the fruit. So I can look at your life, and you can tell me you love Jesus, but if you're breaking every command that he has given us, I have a hard time with that statement you just made. How do you love him, especially when his word says: if you love me, you will keep my commandments?

The idea here is the inner life of the tree is healthy, what you'll see on the outside of the tree will also be healthy. It manifests itself. If the inside is bad, the fruit's going to be bad. Let's see here. I know i know what you're thinking: well, I know a lot of people that, they look like they got it together, but they're right inside. Yeah, he addressed that too. He talked about him being white sepulchers, but inside everything was just just a mess, everything was just a wreck. So yeah, people can pretend, but eventually it leaks out, eventually it comes out on the other side. And people can say, hey i'm a little bit, I'm a little bit surprised that you said that, I'm a little bit surprised that you behaved that way. I'm a little bit — in fact, it even gets so bad sometimes we even make the statements: I can't believe I did that. If that statement has ever come out of your mouth, that lets me know you're out of touch with your heart. You should have a pretty good idea what's going on inside yourself, unless you've chosen to detach from it.

See, what we think, what we put in, what we process, it makes a difference in how we live. The state of your inner life will inevitably leak out. And if your inner thoughts and and desires are misguided and false and self-centered, it's going to come out, and eventually people pick up on it. It happens. There have been people — and I hate to say this — there's been situations where I've been in with them, where I've been around preachers who have just preached amazing conference, and I've been sitting at the table with them 30 minutes later and, and listening to them, I'm like, oh my goodness, I can't believe you just were there. Because things leak out. Now, it doesn't mean we don't have moments where we can let our hair down a little bit around close friends. Don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying that we always have to be so starched and stiff and not rigid, because look, people pick up on that too. And i for those of you who've been around this church any length of time, you just know I'm me all the time, whether that's for the good or for the bad. I'm just a pretty transparent person, and I believe that that's the only way I know how to live. I don't know how to be anybody but me. And I try my best to keep my thought life, and in in my mindset and what I'm envisioning for my life, and especially in this case for the church, with some clarity, so that I can make sure I get to where I know God wants us to be. But it's important what I'm allowing in.

Matthew 12:35: a good man out of the good treasure his heart brings forth good things, and an evil man out of evil treasures bring forth evil things. But I say to you that for every idle word man may speak, that will give an account on the day of judgment. I used to think about this a lot as, especially as a teenager, because sometimes my speech wasn't always the best. You guys are perfect, I know, but I wasn't, in my mouth got myself in a lot of trouble. And a lot of times I said things that were just not right. And then I began to read this verse and I got convicted about him. And you think, you know, what does this mean? Is this just simple idle talk, or something deeper?

Do you know, I'm gonna i'm gonna date myself a little bit — and this was actually a little bit before my time, but I still remember it. Do you guys remember remember the TV show Mr. Ed? A horse is a horse, of course, of course. Yeah you remember, you remember the line of the story that said that, basically this, that I wrote it down: Mr. Ed will never speak unless he has something to say. See that that, that's what Jesus was saying there, is you really ought to have something to say before you open your mouth. Now, you know, I could take up an offering right now and say amen, and I've preached a good sermon just by saying that. Sometimes if you don't have anything to say, just don't say anything. Just don't say anything.

Then Peter, up on the mount Transfiguration, he's up there, and all of a sudden he's seeing this this this this this just marvelous moment before God and, and everything goes on, and he gets up, he says, Lord, this is good that we're here, we should just make a temple, one for you and and. And it says in the scripture he didn't know what to say. Well, better just to keep your mouth shut. Better to keep your mouth shut.

You cannot cover up distorted thoughts and misguided desires by trying to act spiritually, because the real you, the inner you, will inevitably leak out of you. It'll leak out of me. And it happens in idle moments and in casual conversations. Where you at, God sees all this. God sees everything. He's always there. He sees how you and I live, well, you and I talk about what we're doing, what I'm not doing. If I'm trying to be spiritual, if I'm not trying to be spiritual, my inner life will always leak out. Your inner life will always lay down. There is no trying to to to to to deny it. It simply happens.

So the question is, what is the condition of my mind? What is the condition of your mind? And how do I process it correctly, especially if I'm not living close to God? And the answer, according to the Apostle Paul, is not so good. Because Paul says this in Romans chapter 1, verse 20: forever since the world was created, people have seen the Earth in the sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities, he's eternal power and divine nature, so that they have no excuse for not knowing God. Verse 21: yes, they knew God, but they wouldn't worship him as God or even give him thanks. And they begin to think up foolish ideas of what God was like, and as a result their minds became dark and confused. Man, that's today. That is today.

Well, they know God. You can't deny there's a God. You can't — everything points back to a Creator. You — now what what term you want to put on it, and how you how you want to to to to to put the terminology together to describe it there — there's a career. All evidence always supports there's a divine Creator. You know, you try to argue that all you want, but the more science tries to disprove it, it only proves it. Let let God be true in every man a liar. It always points back to that. Now how you choose to format that in your own mind is on you, but the word of God says that man's without excuse to know there's a God, and how things are connected. You just look at the world around you, you're really without excuse. But then it goes a little further, as Paul's writing — again, this is to the church at Rome. It begins to say, did they begin to think of foolish ideas of what God is like, instead of just trying to discover who he is? They try on their own to to fit him in their mind. So what's going on the side of us, apart from God, it gets messed up.

And it's and it's fascinating that there's there's so much social science and research that goes behind this. Saturday, one of the more popular books that that I skimmed through and begin to read over, and actually end up watching a TED Talk by the guy, is a book called Flow. He's a leading researcher. His name is Mihai Chick Sense Me High. I know I had to go over that several times to make sure I said it correctly. But I'm going to read a quote from the book. It says, contrary to what we assume, the normal state of the mind is chaos. When we are left alone with no demands on attention, the basic disorder of the mind reveals itself. According to their research, the mind drifts towards chaos. And they have all this research to back it up. And I know we have some therapists in our in our midst today in the room, and I thank God that you guys are going to help us with the chaos that's in our mind but. But stuff just happens. And when we left alone, and we left there, oftentimes our mind, left to itself, tends to drift towards these random thoughts and dwell on worry and problems and anger and grudges and temptations. And what's the value of my 401k? I think my boss doesn't like me. I hate that she looks better than me. Why is she that skinny? That person's more attractive. I don't have any friends. Why can't anybody successful? Why am I fat? Why can't I gain weight? Why is this guy not talking to me? Why do I keep wasting so much time? And I could go on and on and on and on how our minds drift over there. That's why a lot of times we find ourselves struggling to be alone.

Many, many years ago, chassis, now we're out in San Francisco, and we went and visited Alcatraz. Pretty cool. In fact, we went and took the night tour, which was extra cool. So we get over there, and we're touring around, you know, we've seen where Al Capone is at, did the whole deal, and it was really neat. But as they were doing a little guided tour around, you know, the the the the most uh severe degree of punishment that they could give somebody inside Alcatraz was a thing called solitary confinement, is they put somebody in a room all alone by themselves, shut the door, and there was nothing there. There's no communication with the outside world, nothing. They were to sit there by themselves, alone with their thoughts. And people literally went crazy in that. I couldn't handle it, being by themselves for their thoughts. Shutting somebody up that way — you think about this — what's what oftentimes is a parent's first form of punishment when the kid is doing? You know, I'm going to put you in time out. Now as an adult I'm like, please, please just put me in time. Now, you know, there's so many things. As an adult, that when the kids are offered it as a kid, you fight it. As an adult, you play — nap time, why do they waste that on kids? Adults should have nap time, even with the mats, just maybe a little bit more padding now because don't get up so quick. But they're there, you know you, because there's something about being being caught up in your own thoughts. We don't like the quiet time.

For many of you in the room, this is true of you: no matter where you are, you always have noise going on. You have sleep machine that goes on. You're in the car, you have the radio on. You're at the gym, you have something going on. You're at home clean, you have something going on. Whatever, there's always noise going on. You don't like being alone with your thoughts. Where's your mind at? Why can't you be by yourself? Why can't you be alone with your thoughts?

See, this doesn't apply to everybody, because some have learned how to escape inside their mind. They've done research on this in many prisoners, especially prisoners of war. The ones who who were able to overcome, and not only overcome the the prison war can't, but come out and thrive and be very successful in society, were the ones who learned how to escape in their mind. Because they they figured out this truth: as though I may be held captive with my body, my mind is still free. And it was to that freedom they ran. In fact, many of them figured out that they were actually more free than their captors were, because their captors were bound by something else. But inside themselves, even though there was a — in a cell or, or some kind of bamboo cage, or whatever the case may be — they were still free to have their thoughts. Because it's a very powerful thing when you learn how to tune into the mind, especially the way God wants you to tune in. When you can focus, it is this mindset that I want to focus on today. Because of this mind focus, it can be a kingdom focus. And if you're kingdom minded, it has a way to cause you to have a powerful spiritual life.

I know this because there's many references in the Bible that talk about it. Here are just a few. First Corinthians 2:16: for who has known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ. Philippians 2 and 5: let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. Second Corinthians 10 and 5: casting down arguments and every high thing that exalted itself against the knowledge, I've got to bring in every thought into captivity through the obedience of Christ.

What would it be like, ladies and gentlemen, to have a renewed mind? Because Paul instructed us, don't be conformed to this world, but be transformed by their — in my life class today, as I was wrapping up the the book we were studying out, Living Our Lives by John Mark Comer, I was telling today that you got to be careful how you you live in this world when we're in, because this world has a way of just just kind of clinging on to you. And you got to be careful, because he's determined the book about becoming colonized, and what that is, is you get so used to the surroundings you're in, you become desensitized to a lot of things. And if I was to take everybody who was old enough to remember 25 years ago, and I was to take the 25-year-ago person you were, however old you were 25 years ago, and I transported you from there to right here in our world today, I guarantee you 100% of us would be shocked at what's going on in our world. But because it's not a big thing — it's a slow, steady decline — we we get used to stuff that's going around us.

Well, where am I going with this? You got to be careful of what you allow to go on inside your mind, because this very same thing has a way of eroding and corroding your mindset, especially how you view God, specifically in what God wants to do through you and in you. Got to pay attention, because if not, things have a way of falling away. The command we have here, because I got to bring thoughts into captivity, I got to renew my mind. And maybe you're asking the question this morning: what would you like to renew my mind? Maybe maybe it's the mind that, when it sees someone else being successful, instead of being jealous or upset about them, you're actually thank God that God has blessed them. I don't know about you, but I think that would be a renewed mind. That when when you have something going good in your life, I'm happy for you. I may be experiencing loss, I may be going through a tragedy, or maybe maybe having a health crisis, or a family loss, or something's going on, but something's going on good for you, and when I say that and I hear that, I'm happy for you, I'm excited for you — that would be a renewed mind. And maybe a renewed mind is, when it's faced with criticism, chooses to remember that God loves me. They may be talking about me, they may not like me, they may not be happy, but my God loves me. He's happy with me, so I don't have to get hooked on that stuff. I don't have to get — I don't have to fall prey to those things. I have to fall pray, those negative comments. It doesn't matter what's going on on social media about me right now. My God loves me. That would be a renewed mind. I can choose to respond with joy and happiness even though others may be against me. Maybe renewed mind sees the beauty in the sunrise and sunsets and the nature around them, and think to them, what what an amazing God I serve, that he lets me get to see this see. See, that's what happens when you have a renewed mind, is a renewed mind is constantly going back to where God is in the moment. A renewed mind is always going back there. May be a lot of negative going on, my wife may not be the one way I want us to be, but a renewed mind is constantly looking for God: where are you at in this moment? Because as long as I have you, as long as I'm following you, as long as I have you at the center of my life, then things go according to his plan. Did you hear me? His plan. It may not always go according to my plan, but it's going to go according to his plan. And if I'm following after him, if he's truly being the Shepherd of my life, the Lord of my life, if I follow after him, the word also tells me in Psalms that goodness and mercy follow me every day of my life. I may not feel it in a moment, but they're behind me. Why? Because I'm following the shepherd. And every time I follow him, goodness and mercy, they're right behind me. Goodness and mercy are up. It may be bleak right now, I may not understand the moment I'm in right now, but behind me is goodness and mercy, because I'm keeping my mind on the shepherd.

Paul says in another amazing passage in Philippians 4, verse 8: finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are notable, whatsoever things are just, what sort of things are pure, what sort of things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there's any virtue, if there's any praiseworthy, anything praiseworthy, meditate on these things. See, I think that's what it is to have a renewed mind. Paul is bringing it back to perspective and say, hey, he got a whole list there of those things. Don't then think on those things. Think on those things. Keep your mind over there.

When I have these thoughts, there are other kind of thoughts that start showing up. Because when I see somebody doing something good, I want to do something good. When I see something going for the kingdom, I want to do something for the kingdom. Why? Because my my mind is being renewed. See, without renewing my mind, I become self-focused. Without renewing my mind, I become self-centered. Without renewing my mind, I'm always in, what's my best interest for me? But when I begin to renew my mind, I get my mind on God. I get my mind on him. And all of a sudden I become kingdom focused. I become kingdom-minded. And the things of the king become the priority in my life.

That's how I can tell whether or not my mind is where it's supposed to be. What am I thinking about? Is it always about me and how I can be better, and what events is my agenda, and what I want to do? Or am I thinking about what events is the kingdom, and what does God want for me, and how can I be better for him today? And I can never live my life according to his plan and his purpose for what he wants for me. A renewed mind — when I become focused on anything else, I'm always looking for praise myself. I'm always going to go back to what whatever gets me the attention. I'll go make the bed, do it all by myself and get exactly how she wants, and I'll bring her in there and I'll say, babe, look at what I did. Because I'm like, oh, I did that. Last night, except for bringing her in, the part I did make the bed. I want i want the praise. I want the accolades. I want the stuff to come back to me, because my mind's not where it needs to be i.

I love this quote from Dallas Willard. Listen to this, this is so good: one of the signs of spiritual maturity are the thoughts that no longer occur to you. Did you catch that? One of the signs of spiritual maturity are the thoughts that no longer occur to you. When a recovering alcoholic comes back after that first day of sobriety making it, you know, he's filled with the thoughts of, man, I made it one day, what a heroic effort, one day I didn't take a drink. But after 20 years he's not thinking about that. There's more things there. So there's stuff that just doesn't occur to him or her. So again, one of the signs of spiritual maturity: the thoughts that no longer occur to you. You get to the point to where you realize life's more than me. Life's more than me. And God blesses us with the opportunity to be involved in so many things. One of the signs of spiritual maturity, the thoughts no longer occur, that the mind is set free — that's a renewed mind.

So with the remaining time I have, I'm going to actually start into my notes, actually. I haven't went a couple pages. I got i got a little nervous — we were talking about page numbers. I normally have five pages of notes, which is usually about 45 minutes of preaching. Wesley and I were talking about this the other day. He has more pages than that, and the number of pages that he typically has, if I'd have that many pages we would be here until tomorrow. But I was a little nervous today because i, when I started out this morning trying to go through, I had nine pages. So everybody say whoo. Yeah, I know, that's what I said: Lord, you got to help me.

How does the mind get renewed? How do we set our mind free? I've never personally — and there could be an exception, but I doubt it — I've never personally known a true follower of Jesus who had an exceptionally deep transformation in their life that was not immersed in the word of God. Now, I've known a lot of shallow Christians. I know I've know, I mean, I know I've known an abundance of shallow Christians. But I've never known anybody who has really went through a deep spiritual transformation in their life that was not immersed in the word of God. There's something about the word of God. There's something about when it when it gets in you, it does something special, something that only the word of God can do, something that's deeper than a worship service something that, something that's even deeper than when the word of God's being preached. Now, another, preaching is necessary, because the word of God tells us, except for the foolishes of preaching — that's what he chose to do, the salvation process, okay he. He believes in preaching. But beyond the preaching, there's something about daily ingesting the word of God inside of you that makes a difference in the process of renewing your mind.

And it starts by having a vision. It's about wanting to be able to live in the reality, the presence of God, and the love and the joy and the freedom that he promises us in his word. It must start with that. And then I will come to an understanding that the best way that I can live is according to what his word says I should live. So I have a vision for the word. But then, once I start to read the word, the word gives me the intention I need in my life, that I can have it in my life. And God, I have to have this. We must form an intention around scripture. I can build my life on the word of God. I can't build my life on money — well, you can't depend on money. I can't build my life on government — you just can't do. No, I i can't i can't build it on just personal good intentions, because even the best of us make mistakes. But I can take the word of God and I can build my life on its principles what, what it says that he desires for my life. The basics are there, and I can build it and build it, build a successful life.

I've been thinking about this a lot this week. The Bible has never been easier to obtain than it is in our world today. We are without excuse for not having the word of God in our life. I mean, you can have a physical copy — you know, this is analog, right? Or you can have a digital copy. You can listen to it you can have. You can have famous actors read it to you. You know, maybe you like Morgan Freeman's voice, whatever, I don't know. I don't know who watching, like, you're really without excuse for not digesting the word of God. You have no excuse. Have I said that yet? You really have no excuse for not — it's as easy as it's ever been for you to take in the word of God. You got to have intention for that. We live in a day of unprecedented availability of external stimulation. I'm going to say that again: we live in a day of unprecedented available external stimulation. For everything that we have access to, we have never lived like — you want to set Chastity Dawn Allen on tilt, you be one of her daughters and you say the home, you're bored. She just — she just comes on, her her head gets a twitch in a little bit. Because how is it possible? And we talked about this generational thing, right? You know, you generate, every generation always, you know, looks at the other generation like, when you're the younger one, like, what do you even talk about? But we we lit — our parents just kicked us out of the house. It's like, no, you go outside and you find something to do. And they lock the door, and they didn't care that you beat and banged on it. They didn't — nobody is going to call the cops, because other parents are like, you know, I don't want my kid in the house either. And we found stuff to do. We found sticks. We set stuff on fire. We got all kind of rashes. And we broke stuff. And we weeded out the week, and the strong survived. And we were managed to do something, because our mamas loved us enough to kick us outside.

Don't get me started on our playgrounds. I mean, who thought up the things we had that we were supposed to play on? Monkey bars and the merry-go-round, seesaws. That's why everybody broke something. I mean, everybody — you know, if you're between the age of 35 and up right now, and you've broke a bone, raise your hand. If you broke multiple bones, raise your hand. Yeah, yeah, it was a rite of passage, right? Everybody had a cast. You know what, we weren't — we were never bored. No, but now everybody's bored. I got i got adults that are bored. I got adults — and then I'm going to say it, y'all gonna, I don't know, I'm not gonna look over here, I'm gonna say it: we got grown men who spent eight hours a day playing a video game, um, bored. Do you know the ancient Greeks had no word for boredom? The word, the actual word boredom, didn't even come around into the mid-1800s. There's no word to describe it. They come off, because when someone who seemed to be a little bit dull, they would say, you know, they're just a boar. But now we're bored.

Then what we do — we we we have all this stuff, we have all these things, that's easy for us. We're constantly entertained. We're constantly — we have screens constantly going on. Screen, screen, screens. Everything's got a screen. There's noise, all this stuff's going on, and we can't be by ourself. And what we've done is we've lost the capacity to think. You take you take the good portion of the current generation, and you give them a book from a century ago, and set them down and tell them to read the book — they can't even read the book they. They don't have enough brain power to comprehend the thought of one paragraph. And the enemy has caused us to be trans, to be can be conformed into what he wants us to. And the word of God keeps coming back and saying, you got to be transformed. And the way you transform is you have to get the word of God in you, because the word of God will shape you and make you and change you to what God desires for you to be.

They — we go to the ancient world, they have no word. They handle TV. They had no internet. They had no iTunes or no virtual books. And they had no podcasts and this stuff that was going on there. There was no Tick Tock. There was no YouTube. We got to have noise, something going on all the time, because we've weakened our attention muscle. Guess what country produces the most poets per capita in any other country in the world? Anyway, let's turn to your neighbor and I say, what country you think? Iceland. Yeah, because they have nothing to do. They're bored, so they're writing poetry. You know, you laugh at that, but it has profound implications. Because there's something about when you get the word of God in you — you ever you ever read through the Old Testament, to come across those genealogies, the begats? Remember that, all of us bread readers? You know, you go through there and you get into the baguettes, you're like, oh my goodness, he begot him, I get it. It's a granddaddy's granddaddy, granddaddy here. Now, how many will be willing to raise their hand — I'll go first — that you've skipped the begats before? Yeah, you're like, oh yeah, I get it too. Yeah, y'all had babies, I get it. Feel good, because when those begat chapters come up, you're like, I got 49 verses out of the way just like that. But see, to Israel it was different. There was something, there was important to them. They had an identity. They were the people of God. They delighted in memorizing long strands of scripture and recited them, because they were not just nobodies, they were somebody. And they gave them their identity. They could go back and say, I know who I belong to. It was important to them to know who they belonged to, because because they were on their way to some place, and they had something to do. They had been blessed by God to be a blessing.

When David was a boy — you remember what he would do? Remember his occupation? What was David's occupation in the Bible? What was he? He was a shepherd. That's what David did. Now here's the deal. You know, when sheep are stupid — now what's funny is is is we get identified with sheep in the scripture. All we like sheep have gone astray. Yeah. Oh, we are stupid. Yes, yes we are. So here's the deal with that. David's out there watching sheep. There there's not a lot going on, all right? They're not putting on place, like, hey David, hey, watch this. They're not telling jokes, all right? So he's there. What's he doing we? He starts writing songs. He starts writing his feelings towards God and expressing himself. And then he begins to put it to music, lyrics, so that he can remember remember it and bring, recall it back to memory, so he could have that moment with God there was. There was something powerful going on. He would sing, and he would say, you know, the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. What's he doing? He's identifying with something he knew well. He knew a shepherd's job. That was vision at play. It turned into the word that we still have today. We can read it. We can read Psalms chapter 23 when it says: the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures. He leads me besides the still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me a passive righteousness for his name say. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me. You're right, and your staff, they comfort me. That was in his mind. It was in his heart. Those are words he pinned, because of what he was thinking about. That's what he was concentrating on. And this is what I know about David: David was not a perfect man. David was a murderer, and he was an adulterer, and he made a lot of mistakes. But he goes down in the history book right here as a man after God's own heart. There was something about his mind staying on him. There's something about, where your word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against you. He was he was showing us that you have the ability to change what your mind thinks about. And in doing so, he got the title as the man after God's own heart.

What's your mind on? What are you processing daily? What are you putting in there? A lot of times people will ask me the question, well, how much how much time should i spend how much time should I spend reading the word of God? Because we like that, right we need? We need parameters. You know, I need framers. I don't know, Chastity, how much should I love you today? How much, I mean what's, what would be a good amount of love for me to give for you today? 10 minutes? 20 minutes? An hour? Yeah, yeah. See, you know, you're like, oh, you're just kind of being said. No, no that, that's what we do. We want minimums. Nobody says what's too much Bible reading. Nobody ever asked that question. What I want to know is, what's the minimum requirement in order for my mind to be renewed? I don't know. I don't know your mind. I'm not in your head. Thank God I got enough crazy in my head, and I can look at you and tell you got more crazy than you than me. So I don't know. It's something you have to determine. But if you're looking for, you know what, you know, this is what it reminds me: when someone asked me that question, it's like homework, right? Who likes homework? Nobody ever likes homework. Oh, I got homework to do. That's what, when you say, how much Bible, how much homework do I have to do, what I gotta do to get the grade? No, it's not — as long as you keep treating this like homework, you'll never renew your mind. You got to get to where David said, your word is like food, it's like air. That's the man after God's own heart. That's how he said it: I need it. I need it in my life. I got to have it inside of me. That's that's what — are you at the point that you have to have the word of God? Are you at the point that you have to have it in your life every day, that if you don't get it you're not right, you feel off, because you haven't put it in you to? To ask the question how much — I don't know how to answer that question for you. I don't know where your mind is and how much renewing you need. But I do know this: if you're not able to dwell on him and your thoughts, if you're not able to push some stuff away and get your mind refocused on him, if you're not able to live with kingdom principles every day in your life, then you don't have enough word inside of you yet. You don't have enough word inside of you yet. If you're constantly still dealing with temptations — and we all deal with temptations — but the temptation beats you more often than you beat it, you don't have enough in you. So I'm going to answer: if you're struggling with some suffer repeatedly, over and over again, you got to put some more inside of you. You don't have enough in there yet.

You know, if you want to take a shower, it's never going to happen if you just get one drop of water every five minutes. I don't care if you sit there all day, one drop, you're never gonna have a shower. He said every time — because if you want to shower, it requires sufficient water for a sufficient period of time. Sufficient water for a sufficient period. It's going to take sufficient input for a sufficient period of time for you to get immersed where you need to be. And you're saying, man man, Pastor Kevin, you're just kind of preaching an old-fashioned message. You know what, I am. Because a lot of this stuff that's going on right now just not working. It's just not working.

Now go back and, and I read that I'm not supposed to be conformed, I'm supposed to be transformed by the renewal. I got to figure out how to renew that thing. David said in Psalms 1: blessed is the man who walks on the council the ungodly, or stands in the path of sinners, nor sets and to see this cornful. There's a progression going on, you see that? But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law he meditates day and night. Something about this — I went from walking, to stand, in the setting. I believe that's a progression of a man's life, honestly. And I've preached about that before. I'm gonna re-preach that message. But i gotta I gotta get to the point to where I can meditate day and night. Because if I do, then it says in verse 3, I'll be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf also shall not wither, and whatever he does shall prosper. That if I can get to where I'm meditating on that — so we meditated on a lot of things. You're going to meditate on something, all right? It could be a bunch of idle mess that doesn't get you anywhere. It can be on — it could be on a song. It can be on scrolling through some social media stuff. You're going to meditate on something. There may be small incremental pieces here or there. But when I read that verse right there that was on the screen, Psalms one and three, that if I learn to meditate on that, then I can be like a tree planted by the river's water. The belief is not going to wither. And then whatever I do, it will prosper, if I can keep my mind where it's supposed to be. If I keep my mind where it's supposed to be, because it's going to guide me, it's going to direct me, it's going to be there. That word of a hid in my heart, that I might not stand against you. That word is a lamp unto my feet and a light into my path. What's that mean? Is it, when I get the word in there, it's like having a big spotlight, and everywhere I'm going I say, oh, that's a pothole, I'm not going to do that over there. Like, ooh, that's — nope, I want to go over there. What am I doing? I'm filtering my life through the word. And when I filter my life through the word, it has the ability to get me to where I need to go, to the expected end that God has for me.

I don't know, this message is different, and I'm going to end it. But you know, when we can when we can learn to have things memorized and as a part of us — you need to have scripture memorized. And you can do it. I know you can do it. I know you can do it. You can do what what what they did in Bible time. They — not everybody had a copy of the verse, of the scripture, like we're blessed. We can get any — I got — I mean, I'm a really — I don't know how many Bibles I have, hahaha. But but i have I have several, and I probably will buy more. I like Bibles. But they didn't have copies if. If they were in a nice village, they may have one copy of scripture, and they can go hear it. But they knew the word, for they memorized it. They would put into song. There's so much study in this. But we we do the same. We can do it.

You know how I know we can do it? I'm going to show you. I'm going to show you right now. This came to me, and I thought it was so cool. I had a moment — every now and then God just gives me a little nugget. This is where — you ready for me? Some of you're gonna laugh about it. This is the nugget of how I know, Mr. Freeman, how I know we can memorize scripts. Are you ready? You ready? I'm a terrible singer, so bear with me. A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R. Go ahead, don't tell me you can't remember our scripture. Don't tell me you can't memorize scripture if you can memorize the ABC song. Yeah, don't tell me you can't memorize scripture. You choose to not memorize scripture.

See that, if you're going to have a life, a renewed mind — you know, and i I hope you want it, maybe you don't, I don't know where you are — but if I'm going to live this life, the overcoming life he has for me, if I'm ever going to accomplish what he has for me — because he has something for every one of us to do — I'm never going to accomplish it if I can't get my mind where it needs to be. Because there's a fight going on inside me every day. And if you're honest, there's a fight going on the side of you. And we're being bombarded on every side in our world. It's a constant noise. It's a constant distraction. There's something always vying for our attention and trying to get us to conform over to another way. But I'm telling you, there's transformational process that can take place in your life if you will learn to commit scripture to memory, if you learn to spend time in the word. I don't know how much time to tell you. Enough time to get your mind where it's supposed to be. And the only way you know it's supposed to be is when you stop thinking about you and you start thinking about him. When he started realizing he's around you every day, and his presence is there, he's before you and behind you and beside you and in you. He has things for you, generational blessings. But you got to get your mind focused back to where it needs to be. And the way you change your mind is you get your mind immersed in the word of God, and it'll get you to where you need to be.

Isaiah 26 and 3, and I'm done: you will keep him in perfect peace whose mind has stayed on you, because he trusts in you. Leave that verse up there. That verse in itself is a whole sermon. Keep him in perfect peace, his mind is staying, because why? He trusts. Why does he trust? Because my mind's on you. Well, my mind's on Jesus. I'm not worried about my problems, because Jesus is bigger than my problems. On my mind's on him, it's bigger than my health. My mind's on him. It's bigger than my relationship problems. It's bigger than my money problems. It's bigger, no matter what I'm facing. If my mind's on him, he is bigger than anything that's going to come against me. So no matter what I face, no matter the circumstances, no matter where I'm at, I keep my mind on him, and I trust that my God will get me to where I need to be.

Will you stand with me today, and let's pray? God, I love you, and I'm so thankful for your presence I feel in this place. Lord, I know you desire to do work in this place. Jesus, I pray that your drawing power would begin to do its work. For I know there are many who need a process of renewing their mind, to trust you like never before. For some in this room, God, they don't know you as Lord of their life. And I pray, God, you continue to draw them to a place where they can come to understand that you died on a cross for them. They need you to be Lord. For some in this place, they've they've had to deal with hurts and disappointments and failures they don't understand. God, I pray that you would help them renew their mind, to get it focused back to where you are, to trust that you were good even when it don't understand. You were good for something that needed healing in their body. I pray, God, they can get their mind focused on that: you are a healer. You're a God who heals. You're a God who loves. And that you're going to do a work today in this place. In the mighty name of Jesus we pray.