Mindful to Worship Purity 1160

To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.org or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter. Good morning. Today's photo of a rainbow turned to gold in a pink and purple hazy sky comes to us from Mindful of Christ's Lauren Roskillie, who shared this view on social media back on August 11th, stating at the time that although she was driving, she just had to stop the car to admire and capture this moment. As the rainbow was literally changing before her eyes. Well, it's Saturday, and I am sharing Lauren's photo because of its beauty and because I admire the work that Lauren does through Mindful in Christ and can relate, uh, to have— and to having to stop and stand in admiration and awe when we watch something or watch things or people change before our eyes. Lauren's testimony is a testament to how the Lord can heal and change us, as is mine. And through my latest call to lead the Celebrate Freedom growth group at Starpoint Church, I am witnessing people literally changing before my eyes. In the 20 weeks since we have begun meeting as a group, I have watched people grow in their faith and overcome a variety of hurts, habits, and hang-ups. And even though my day-to-day life can be a bit hectic at times, it is good to pause, reflect, and admire the work that the Lord has done in changing people's lives, giving them victory, freedom, a hope, and a future. God is so good, and one of the best things, perhaps the most appropriate thing we can do, is to worship him. Uh, to be completely honest, this morning I slept a little bit later than usual because I didn't notice my phone wasn't plugged into its charger properly, and I started the morning with the frantic thoughts of what am I going to write about. And I decided to lean on a little help from my friends, and I'm going to share a message from Lauren Roskillie that encourages us to worship the Lord and to seek his help that she sent out to those who subscribed to her Mindful of In Christ emails this past Wednesday, as she ba— that she based on Matthew 15:25. Matthew 15:21-28 tells the story of how Jesus agreed to deliver a Gentile woman's daughter from demonic possession when she worshiped Him and persisted in asking for help. Matthew 15:25 tells us, "But she came and worshiped Him, pleading again, 'Lord, help me!'" Lauren's Mindful in Christ Word for Wednesday stated, "Ask Jesus to help." Do you think you are beyond help? Perhaps you are exhausted, fed up, or nothing seems to be changing in your circumstances, or do you feel lost? Then we are to take the example of this Gentile woman in the book of Matthew. Number 1, go to Jesus. Number 2, worship Him, whether you feel like it or not. Put on your worship music if you cannot do it alone. You will be surprised at how changing your focus helps you too. 3. Plead to Jesus. If you do not know what to say or how to pray anymore, then simply ask, "Lord, help me." I have felt like this even recently, and the one thing that we can do is to be intentional and turn our focus and attention back to Jesus. Give Him the worship He deserves, whether you want to or not, and reach out to Him, beg Him to help you as this woman did. And be reassured, Jesus was sent to help the lost, as it says in verse 24. So hang in there and use this woman's action as an example of how you too can come to Jesus and how He can meet you where you are today. I love— and that's the end of her post. I love Lauren's simple advice to us to simply go to Jesus and worship and ask him for help. At the Celebrate Freedom growth group meeting each week, we set aside some time as a group to worship the Lord in song. I intentionally set that time after our group's check-in, where the members report on what's happening in their lives over the last week. Some of those check-in reports, um, report on victories, but we encourage keeping it real, and they also report on the various trials and problems that are happening too. So after what can be some pretty heavy moments of reporting life's difficulties, I attempt to encourage a change in the narrative by directing the members to also share something they are thankful for or something good that has happened in their lives. But to realize the tension and, uh, to release the tension, uh, and to honor our Lord, I direct everyone to stand up, shake out the tension in their bodies, and to join together in singing to the Lord to worship him. Our worship is a weapon against the spiritual forces of darkness and our own negative mindsets. Our worship is a spiritual discipline that brings us into the presence of the Lord. And provides us with a means to attach to him relationally. When we worship the Lord, we acknowledge our understanding of who he is, and we can express our love and appreciation for him and what he has done for us. Uh, worship cements our relationship to God and can be a means to breakthrough. So as we have made it to the weekend, I encourage you to take some time to admire the things and people in your lives that are literally changing before your eyes. And to worship the Lord who loves us, sustains us, and guides us through it all. Today's Bible verses come to us from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling by John G. Kruis. This morning's meditation verses come from the section on anger, and today's passage is, um, Galatians 5:19-21 from the English Standard Version, the word of the God The word of God says, now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. Today's verses fall under the 10th point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on anger. And, uh, the 10th point is: Fits of rage belong to your sinful nature, the way of sin. Today's verses highlight the works of the flesh, and with this list of activities, which includes fits of anger, it should be clear that these are sin and should be repented of. However, the devil's advocates out there may argue that they are not all bad, so the Apostle Paul makes it clear in verse 21 that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. If your life reflects a lifestyle of the works of the flesh more than the works of the Spirit, you may be fooling yourself and others about being a Christian, but you won't fool God. You run the risk of being told that "I never knew you" by Jesus when you enter into eternity and find yourself in hell. Whoa! This was one of the passages in the Bible that sent me into recovery from my drunkenness. I was an alcoholic, a functional alcoholic, a cultural alcoholic, a binge-drinking alcoholic, a periodic alcoholic. My alcoholism was part of my identity. I drank, and unlike some others I have met in recovery who secretly hid their alcoholism, I didn't hide it. Drinking alcohol was what I did, and I thought it was a fundamental part of who I was. And I suppose it was, but when I put my faith in Christ, I became a new creation, and it was only a matter of me believing and receiving the truth of that that caused me to walk away from my lifestyle in drunkenness and, and the other works of the flesh. Because most of the other ones were part of my lifestyle too, including fits of anger. Anger is pretty commonplace, but our resource does us a great service in pointing out that it is part of our sin nature. And now I object, that should say our old man, because when we are born again, we have one nature, Christ, and repentance is the act of walking into the new nature we have been given. The old man is dead. But we have to choose to live as a new man by actually turning from our sin and doing it. But regardless of that possible error in understanding, our resource rightly points out that anger is a work of the flesh, a way of sin, and thus it should, along with all those other works of the flesh, be repented of. Before, before Christ, I lived in the way of sin, and fits of anger was tied up in that mess of the works of the flesh. But after I started to agree with who I am in Christ and repented, I was less and less angry. Fits of anger, you know, doesn't represent a life in the Spirit. And if you are angry all the time, you need to repent, because the Word of God indicates that your angry disposition could mean that you still belong to the kingdom of darkness. And, surprisingly, beyond the highway to hell. As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ in their walk. Um, today we continue sharing from The Holy Spirit by A.W. Pink as we continue sharing from chapter 27 on the Spirit Transforming. And today's topic is Changed into the Same Image. And, um, you know, what image are we being changed into literally before your eyes? Well, hopefully we're being changed and conformed to the image of Christ. We're being more and more like Jesus because that's the nature we've been given. Although we have free, free will and we can still sin as Christians, we have been changed. And, um, you know, the reason why people struggle is because they don't really believe they've been changed, and they don't pursue the new life in Christ through genuine repentance and obedience to the Word of God. We've been given the power to overcome. We've been, we've been given a new life, but if we don't act on that new life that's been given to us, believe that we have it, we'll struggle. Will walk in sin rather than walk in the Spirit, you know, walks in the works of the flesh rather than the works of the Spirit. So that's why we, that's why we blog, to encourage people to know the truth of who they are in Christ and to live it by adopting a lifestyle of the fruit of the Spirit, the works of the Spirit, to walk, to to walk the walk and to talk the talk of being a Christian, like by repenting of your sin and following Jesus into the meaning and purpose that he has for your life. So we do that on the, uh, on the blog and our podcast by sharing our discipleship teachings that we did back in 2021 at our local church for Victory Over the Darkness: The Bondage Breaker and Freedom in Christ. They're some of the most popular things that we have on our YouTube channel, so you wouldn't be alone in checking them out. So there's playlists for each one of those. Those teachings, of course, are not, you know, they're the work of Dr. Neil Anderson, and they're based on the Word of God, so they're definitely Christian. I just was a humble servant to deliver the message that Neil Anderson and God put out there for us to hear. So we encourage you to check those out because they can teach you about who you are in Christ, about the spiritual forces of darkness, and most importantly encourage you to go through the Steps to Freedom in Christ, which is a prayerful repentance process that would alleviate you of your spiritual and personal conflicts. It would set you free. So we encourage that. And we encourage you to, of course, join into a Christian fellowship where you can learn and grow and live a life of a real Christian. You might be a little lonely in that, but it's definitely the best way to go, and it's the way that Christ told us to go. So, well, it is Saturday, so we're going to wrap it up in prayer and enjoy, enjoy the day. Uh, Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. Lord, we thank you so much for the things that you've shown us, the things and the people in our lives that are changing all the time. But we really thank you for the, the changes that you're, you're doing in their lives. And the people in the Celebrate Freedom growth group, the people in our churches, um, the people who are hearing your word and turning towards your truth. Lord, and the new life you have for them. Because that's the— those are the changes we love to see, because it's an increase in life, increase of freedom that you had, you know, that you intend for all of us to have. Some of us have found it. Thank you for that, Lord. We just pray for some of those who found it who might be listening and reading our message today. We just pray for you to come alongside them and their prayer request and to, um, to bless them in their walk. Lord, I'm not sure what the day holds for us, but we pray for you to go before us, um, open our eyes to the things you want us to see, and lead us in the way we should go. Because all we want to do is represent you in your kingdom, Lord. And we thank you, we praise you, we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.