Conquring The Chaos In Your Mind

Forever.

I have a testimony I have a story to sing this is my story this is my song.

Have a testimony Y say my testimony.

Rain came wind blue My house was built on you I f with you I feel somebody's faith rising. This is the reason you made it. One more time F way through.

This.

Is the reason I'm standing.

Good morning. Good morning. What's happening, guys? All right, I didn't tell you I was gonna tee up. I see that's a bit there.

All right, go for it, man.

Good morning, guys. Most of of you guys were just on the time of prayer, which is awesome. More and more people joining us for pray as we transition into Bible study now. Happy Wednesday to you guys. I'm expecting record breaking numbers for attendance on the Zoom because they know Riley is teaching a lesson today and not myself. I asked Riley a couple days ago if he would take the reins for Bible study. I got struck with a bit of an illness and it wiped me out, man. So I don't think Riley has ever said no when I've asked him to fill in the gap for me, not just with this, but for anything. So thank you, Riley for that and I'm excited for this morning and I'm glad I could join you for it. Usually if I ask you to do, it's because I can't be on for some reason. So I'm glad to actually be on and join you.

Yeah, man, I'm glad for you're going to be here. Fill in the gaps. Fill in the gaps for me. I. I think Christian, he was sick for a couple days, so he's like, who can wing this? Like nobody else. And here I am. So no, I spent. I was up till about 11 in the morning, guys. The last couple days I was just like, all right, Lord, what, what do you have for us here? I know we Christian's been doing some topical studies and if you did see the email, we're going to dive into 2nd Corinthians 10 today particularly, I think the email went out at verses one through six, but we're going to focus on more, probably just three through six throughout this. And I think this is just such an important topic for us as Christians. I'm assuming everybody on here is a born again believer in Jesus Christ. If not, my hope is that you'll want to be after this because this life, man, that we go through, it really is a battlefield and frankly, I don't know how people do it without Christ. And when you become born again, we gain access to such A powerful creator of all things. And it's wild to me. And this is where I was when I first received Christ as savior of my life. I was, you know, 16, and I didn't really understand the power of the Word of God, power of Holy Spirit in my life, and really what he wants to do, I think, through all of us. But if we understand that, you know, just. Just receiving Christ as Savior is like just the beginning. It's like, it's just the. It's the starting line, right? And a lot of people think, like, it's a finish line. I got, you know, I got my ticket to heaven, and now I'm just going to check out and do whatever I want. And I know that's not you guys on this call. Obviously, we're on this to dive into the Word and to sharpen each other and to pursue sanctification, right? Bible tells us that we are sanctified, right? When we're born again, we are a new creation. But also it is something that we are to pursue, right? It's that whole concept of already and not yet, right? So it's this pursuit that we go on, and I think this is the battle of our mind, is the. Stronghold that we're going to dive into a decent amount today just of what a stronghold actually is. That. And really it's the only thing the enemy can actually infiltrate, right. God has blessed us beyond belief, and the enemy cannot block our blessing at all, but he can infiltrate our minds and cause us to block it ourselves. Right? I'm happy if you guys want to come off mute and say, give me some amens throughout today, because I got like 17 pages of notes. I don't know if I'm going to get to any of them, but we're going to, you know, I'm gonna. I will promise I will make some time to talk and end on this armor of God. Robert Larson. I love it, man. We're diving into that today, actually. This is amazing because that the battle that we fight is there. It's not something that we can do on our own, right? But Christ has given us the exact armor that we need to do, that we need to take up. And so I love that you just shared that, Robert. So. So let's just dive into this. I'm going to read the first few verses and then we'll dive into this here. But as we, you know, kind of talk through this, throw up hands, have questions, insights throughout this, and I want to keep this kind of informal today and as just a discussion, because I know this, this thing right here, right? It's not our brain, right? But it's, it's, it's our, it's our soul, right? That this mind and heart, that it is transformed when we've received Christ, but it is a continual transformation and scriptures told us how to do this. So my heart, if this is a new concept to you, you know, I grew up kind of in the personal development world. I was in the multi level marketing world since the age of 15 and frankly, I love it. Man, I drank that Kool Aid so hard because it was just like, man, I can actually think about or choose the thoughts that I think about. And it wasn't until like I actually really six years ago started to understand that, bro, the Bible is like the greatest personal development tool that we all have, right? But it's not about us. It's not about us being developed. It's a lot of it is about us denying self to become the best version that Christ is actually desired for us to actually be here on this earth. And so let's just dive into this here. I threw, I know Christian shared or Robert. Robert, Roger. I was thinking Robert Larson that, that I was just talking about, but Roger probably threw the, the link for the notes. You know, there's, there's some scriptures and, and if you guys are taking notes, I'm gonna probably, you know, whiz through a lot of things that aren't on the notes there. Maybe I'll add to them after the fact because I was again just up late kind of asking God, what do you, what do you want us to really share here today? And I ended up with like 17 pages of notes. So, so here we are. But second Corinthians, chapter 10. I'm just going to start in verse three. It says that for though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments in every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God and take every thought captive to obey Christ. This is a scripture that I repeat to my daughter a lot, right? Like taking every thought captive especially. I mean everybody but teenage girls have a lot of thoughts going on, right? Emotions are running high as you know, they're entering new seasons of life. And. But this is for, for guys. This is such a, we're up here in our head a lot about, you know, how we can be, be more, do more, have more what we think success is. And it's like we're. God's given us a blueprint that if I even. I like blueprints. I like, like paradigms that, that we can work off of. And there's so many of those throughout Scripture. And my intent out of this is that we'll all have one that we can apply and. And why this is important. Guys, as I mentioned before, if you're a Christian like you, you've entered this. You've just entered the battlefield, right? If you're living your life just doing whatever you. You never, you know, experienced Jesus or, you know, heard the gospel. Satan ain't worried about you one bit, right? He's like, cool, you're good. But once you've received Christ, it's. You've now entered this battlefield. If you've just received or receipt. Well, for men, if you've received your spouse, right? If you've taken on that role for women, if you, if you become married, become one with your spouse. Like, you entered a whole new battlefield, right? Can I get an amen for those that are. That are. Have been married? Like, it is a. Is a battlefield, baby.

Amen.

There we go. Because marriage is like that is. That is what the enemy hates above all things, right? He hates us just because God loves us, right? And. And he's very jealous of us, so he hates us. But when we come together as a married couple, it's. This is how the. God's ultimate plan to. To have dominion that the mandate that he gave us to be fruitful, to multiply happens through marriage, right? The kingdom, as we're. We're called to. You know, we've been given this blueprint to pray. You know, your kingdom come, your will be done. This was God's original plan on Earth, was for man and woman to multiply. And you better believe this is what the enemy hates. And he will attack it and attack it and attack it and attack it. And why as couples, we are called to be one, right? And you know, a lot of this junk that we have, it. It starts in our mind. I know you guys have probably heard me mention this at times in the past, but it's like in the garden, as God created Adam and Eve, the. The serpent didn't come and do anything else except instill doubt into Eve, right? Just by posing a little thought like, did God really say. And she went and ran with that. If she would have actually applied this of like, no, no, no, no. I'm gonna. I'm gonna destroy every argument, right? Every lofty opinion that's against the knowledge of God, I'm gonna take that captive to obey Christ. We wouldn't be in this mess, right? But here we are, right? So we can learn from mistakes. That's, you know, a lot of the Bible is either, you know, prescriptive or descriptive. And as we're learning, like, okay, this is stuff not to do, right? Just because adultery is in the Bible, just because, you know, there's sin in the Bible, that's not. It doesn't mean that we are to prescribe to it, but it's a description of how we can run from it, right? How we can flee from that sin in our life and our minds while we think is maybe not a sinful thing. It's a sin to think about things. We're going to have constant thoughts, right? Whether it's guys with like thoughts of lust or even women. I'm a guy, so I have that can have that perspective. And we can all identify like what sin is like those sinful thoughts. But also I think one that a lot of Christians don't necessarily identify as sin would be like a victim mindset, right? Or, you know, things are just a negative mindset, right? God didn't create us to have this, this pessimistic mindset to, to walk out this life that we have here on earth, right? Our thoughts, we're supposed to think about the things that are eternal. And there ain't anything pessimistic about that, right? To put our thoughts on, on, on things above, right? There's nothing pessimistic about that, right? So this is where what we'll dive into today is just like, how do we take those? How do we grab them, right? How do we identify them? Number one. And then ultimately how do we replace them? Because for those maybe that have dabbled in meditation, shout out to Christian and the breath work video. If you guys haven't watched that yet or did it yet, it's only about 12 minutes. Go to the YouTube page and do it. It's amazing. But it's not just about like ridding our mind of things, of the negative things, but we have to learn how to replace it, right? What's wild to me is as I was kind of diving into this, the human. As humans, we have roughly between like 50 and 60,000 thoughts every single day. Isn't that wild? Literally, if you think about there's 86,400, I think, seconds in a day. And most of us, if we sleep for eight hours, that still leaves like 50 some thousand seconds in a day that we're conscious and so that means we literally have more thoughts in a day than seconds in a day that we're consciously awake. Isn't that crazy to think about? It's like we're constantly being bombarded. Especially today if you're on social media, it's just like everything is coming at us, and it's a lot of just noise, right? Like mental noise that we're getting bombarded with. So what would happen if we were able to just like, stop 10% of that, right? Just 10% of it, right. What if we could take our thoughts captive and actually, you know, bring them under control? Right? How could we as believers see more clearly, hear more clearly, if we're spending time in the word? Like, I think a lot of us, God is. Is wanting and trying to speak to us, but there's not room in our minds for. For us to actually even receive it, right? And so this. That's, again, my goal out of this is that we can. We can start to understand this and just the importance of slowing down and thinking about what we think about, like, audit our thoughts, if we want to call it that. To actually walk with the authority that he's given us, right? Not to not live a life by just default, where it's just like, let me get through this day. Let me hustle, let me grind, let me do my thing, right? But it. To actually say, no, I'm going to live with an intention. I'm going to live with the purpose. I'm going to live a life of obedience. Because this is. This is my spiritual act of worship is to literally. I'm going to lay down my life for Christ to actually use for his advancement here on this earth. Right? All right, so why. I know I'm teeing this up kind of a lot for you guys, but I want us to. I think we got this. We understand that just the, the. The only warfare that we have, it's not, in my opinion, it's not against, like, culture. It's not against, you know, what's going on in the world. Yes, there's a lot going on in America. Some of you listen to the podcast Christian and I aired on Friday was a lot about Islam, right? It's like there's. There's a real threat here in America to what's taking place. But at the end of the day, the biggest threat that we have is our thinking, our stinking thinking. If we, if we can mention that, right? It's like, because that's what the enemy can infiltrate each and every one of us on an individual level. And then corporately, as the church, if we have stinking thinking, we become complacent, right? We're no longer active in the actual faith, right? We're no longer doing or participating in what he's actually called us to do. Okay? So foundationally. I'm going to just read this again. Second Corinthians. I'll skip over verse three, but starting in verse four, the weapons of our warfare, right? This is a. I forget even which version I pulled up on this, but I like this one better. Someone might know, but the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, right? But mighty through God for the pulling down of strongholds, right? We're to demolish arguments, okay? And it's not the arguments that you think of. We'll dive into this. But every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God. And we take every thought captive to make it obedient to Christ, right? So notice what Paul doesn't say here is try really hard to not think bad thoughts, right? That's not what he's saying at all. He's saying we take them captive, okay? This is language of like actually arresting it. Like take a captive. Think of if a cop is taking someone captive, they're handcuffing them, right? It's a position of authority that we're taking these actually captive. Because for, for most of us, we, we deal with anxiety or worry at you know, at some level. I think everybody does it. Some people feels like they never worry about anything. They live kind of this aloof life, God bless them. But a lot of us, you know, we have families, we have kids, we have businesses or jobs, high, high level things that we're constantly doing, right? So when that anxiety starts to kind of whisper in our minds, like, okay, what if it goes wrong? Right? Some of you know that Ash and I are, are in the process of potentially adopting Titus. Our, our. We've adopted Titus, but his biological mom is pregnant again, right? And now there's been some hiccups, so we're immediately like, yes, all right, we'll. We'll take him or her. We don't even know if it's a boy or girl at this point. But our answer is yes. Like, God, if this is your will, you have our yes. But there's other things that have been going on in that, right? And it's like when, when that are completely out of our control. And this is like where anxiety and worry and like we try to step into and control these things. It's like, well, what if this happens. What if this doesn't happen? Right? And this is the point where we have to, like, not negotiate with those things, right? We don't. We don't reason with. Okay, well, I play this out if this happens, and if this happens, but this is where we actually take it captive that thought. We take it. We arrest it. Right? I know. I've heard this before. It's like worry is the interest that we pay on a debt that we don't owe. Right? So it's like we. We have to stop those in their tracks. We gotta arrest them. And then we. We need to replace it with actual truth. All right, Don, you got a question, brother? Oh, no, I. I just that the version that you're reading from, that's esb. Perfect. Perfect man. I was going back and forth between a number of versions, so appreciate that. Thank you. One thing, too, one thing too, that I just want to make note of is that I've been in Christian circles too, where it's like, oh, that's just, you know, positive thinking. And I know I mentioned this, that it's like this as Christians, there's no room for pessimists. Like, there shouldn't be. Right? But I think every pessimist has an argument that they call themselves a realist. Right? And I just call that a realist is a. Is a pessimist that identifies as a realist. Right? But. But I want to be clear on this. Like, the power behind this isn't necessarily positive thinking. It's biblical thinking, right? Because. Because positive thinking in this, in the world, right? They're going to see when the trials and the tribulations that Paul talks a lot about in the New Testament. It's like when we experience those trials, it's not that, oh, this is amazing. Right? But the biblical thinking is Philippians 4, right? Where it's like, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Right? One version is that self help, and another version is God help.

Right?

One version is based upon our efforts. One version is based upon God's empowerment. Right. One version is, like, is thinking at just the temporary circumstance, and one is about the eternal, right? It's about the transformation. And so it's not just positive thinking, but it's rooting our minds in what the Bible actually says and then starting to speak those things, declaring those things, you know, probably a decade, maybe two, maybe. Man, I'm getting old. Maybe two decades ago, you guys remember a huge book that out there was the Secret, right? And this is. This is again, I was in the multi level marketing world where it's like, you know, what you think about, you bring about, which is true. That's actually biblical. Proverbs. I've got it in my, my notes here somewhere. That is actually biblical, right? What we think about. Proverbs 23:7 says, As a man thinks in his heart, so is he, right? So it's wild. I love it. When the world hijacks what the Bible, what God has already told us, I love it, right? They call it something else, but we're going to call it what it is and it's true, right? This is what the Bible actually tells us. So the power of our thoughts, right? And grabbing hold of these strongholds, taking them captive, then replacing them with true. This isn't about our feelings, right? Because we don't need to, we don't have to make ourselves feel different to think different. What we've got to do is make ourselves think different and that will eventually make us feel different, right? So again, Proverbs 23:7 says, As a man thinks in his heart, so is he. I love that. It's just such a simple verse to remember, right? And, and I think a lot of scriptures, we read through it and we, we read past it, right? We don't, we don't let it actually, you know, as Christian would call it, ruminate, right? We don't let, we're not, we're not meditating on the scriptures that become embedded on our hearts, right? And one of my favorite verses in all of the Bible is Romans 12:2, right? I know probably everybody can repeat this, but Paul gives us this just like opening in Chapter 12. All of a sudden he's just like, bam, right? We are just about the power of renewing our mind. And what's cool about this, if you dive into the verse when Paul gives this statement of renewing your mind, right? A more proper way to actually read that verse is to insert the word continually, like to continually be renewed. Because the tense of the original Greek word there, it's actually, it's a present imperative tense, which means that it's happening right now and it's happening in the future, right? Sean, you got something, brother?

Yeah, I was just thinking how stagnant water grows junk. You know, if it's stagnant, then you're going to have, you know, the algae and the mosquitoes and all the nasty, nasty stuff. But that, that constant renewing of our mind is like flowing water. And I was in a small group on Sunday. We were in Ephesians Chapter five was talking. It's talking about marriage. So I thought the correlation you were talking about marriage earlier was kind of fun. But in 26, it's talking about how Christ cleanses us. It says to like the church, to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word. It's not like, you know, sponge. You know, it's. It's washing and it's a gentle thing, but it's like our minds are open, and if it's being washed over with the Word, then we're. We're clean. But if it's just stagnant and it's just got the world pouring into us, then it's going to have all that nasty junk just growing in it. Yes.

So good. Leslie.

Pointing out the water is actually. So there's. I actually did Buddhist meditation for many, many years and was a teacher in it. So that's just caveat. And then, you know, I was always a Christian through that. But the water principle is one. There was kind of a teaching about that where, yeah, there's thinking of the mind like water, and what is clouding that water. So, like, anger will. It'll just feels very, like, active and you can't see through, like, anger makes it unclear. It's like a boiling, raging heat. And how. What is that emotion you're feeling doing to the clarity of the mind? And so, yeah, like, even laziness. How does laziness affect the mind? You know, you feel slow, slow and still, and you're not going to see clearly when you're just like, you know, taking on a brain diet of junk food and junk TV and just really noticing what it's doing to that flowing water. And there's a couple others there, but just. Just to point out that that's a really strong one. And if I remember the others, I'll share it. But, yeah, I love meditation, so I'm trying not to jump in, like, every five seconds to add. So. But I just wanted to jump on what Sean said and be like, that's actually a really huge insight.

Yeah, that's good. Just the concept of water reminds me of Proverbs 4. 23. It says, above all else, to guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. Right. So it's like we're to guard our heart. That's an. That's an offensive, like, think I'm a football guy. Like, I think the offensive guard, he's, like, guarding what. What's most important, the quarterback who's got the ball. Right. So it's like we are to guard our heart because everything flows from it, right? It's. It's not defensive at all. That's an offensive mindset that I think. I think the, the enemy puts a lot of Christians on their back where we're playing defense and like, I just got to get through this life. No, no, no. Like, we're, we're on the offense here, right? Number one, because we already know we've won the war, right? But the battlefield is a daily process of sanctification. We are continually being transformed into his image on a daily basis, but we got to participate, right? I think a lot of, A lot of Christians are, are just, you know, they're wasting their lives, right? If we can be. Be blunt with this. And, and it's, it's unfortunate because I think, you know, part of. If you guys have gone to the, the King's Council website as of late, you know, we've changed, like our, our mission, our vision, our purpose, and rooted in Second Chronicles that I believe God is really just scanning the earth looking for those that are humble, right. And humble before God, but bold before man, right. That are willing to actually step up and be used for God to actually advance his kingdom here on earth, right? So I'm going to end with just the kind of the blueprint that I had mentioned with, but I want to dive into for you guys just like what a stronghold actually is. What is Paul talking about? And because in the strongholds are. They're more present. Like the concept of the more present, like in the, in the Old Testament. But Paul, this is like the only mention of it in the New Testament. Like the, the only time that it's used is right in second chronic or second Corinthians, chapter 10 there through verses three and four. Forget which one specifically. But he's using it metaphorically, right. Of what this stronghold is. Because people might think like a stronghold is a, you know, a demon maybe, right? Or a stronghold is sinful behavior. But if we get to the root of like, what is Paul talking about here? The stronghold boils down to like, what is this mindset that we've created, right? And for us, it might be that poverty mindset, that victim mindset, that woe is me mindset that a lot of Christians actually inherit, maybe generationally how they've been raised, right? A lot of our, you know, who we've become, we are the product of our environment for the most part, right? And if you are the, you know, the first generation of a follower of Jesus Christ in your home, like, you're called to break these strongholds, right? We're called to be generational men and women here for the kingdom, right? So the enemy may have won a lot of the battles in the past with your parents or that your grandparents or whatever it is, but you now, it's like, no, no, it stops here. It stops here, this stronghold that mentally, we. We are to take captive and stop here so we can then teach our kids a new way of thinking, right? And this is something that. That I just take so seriously because I believe, you know, the. I believe a lot of us on here have kids, right? Young kids. And it's like, man, what is God going to do in their life? Because at the end of the day, as parents, it's no longer. Is it? I remember being in my, you know, 20s and 30s. It's like, I want to make a. I want to be. You know, make a name for myself. And it's. It's no longer that at all. It's. I want to. I want to make his name great and equip my kiddos to actually be used, right, For. For what God could have maybe did in my life, but I took so many years to actually get there. Now it's like, all right, I'm gonna. I'm gonna teach them the proper way here of how to fix our stinking thinking, right? And so if we come back to the stronghold that we have. Zach, what you got, man?

Oh, I was just gonna say that. That what you're sharing right now is so powerful, because when we. When we are in a way of thinking, we literally, like, create these neural pathways in our brain, and then we have these synapses that develop. And what that really means is that we get stuck in this pattern of thinking, almost like muscle memory of the mind, where we just do it on autopilot. When we think one thought, we automatically go to the next thing. It's like when you walk through your yard and then you have that dirt path like there was between my two aunt and uncle's houses, they. Because all the kids would walk back and forth all the time. But carving a new groove, so to speak, is so difficult. And so when. When the Lord says that, like the Bible says, to be transformed by the renewing of the mind, that literally, like, our brain does transform. And so when you have these strongholds you're talking about, I mean, there's a spiritual component of that. We are quite literally stuck in a shape up here. And. And it's just so powerful. It's almost like there is a Fortress being built in our brain that has to be broken down. And that's not. That's. That's closer to the actual neuro science than it is to. Just an analogy. They're quite literally almost our strongholds. It's incredible.

Literally. Yes. It's so good, man. I geek out to that stuff so hard because it's. Science proves it again. This is just science finally catching up with what God has told us this entire time. That is such a true Dr. Carolyn Leaf is a great book. I would highly recommend it. If you guys haven't read it, it's called, I think switch on your brain or something like that. Oh, Brandon, what you got man?

Yeah, man. I mean I just. I was stuck in that. I was, I was one of the big realists, my wife, that's what I would always say, you know, I'm a realist. So I gravitate towards what you, what you said earlier. Like that was me. But when I started this business, there was so much no's that I came across as I was selling things that it was. I had to, I had to overcome that. And there was so much I had to bring scripture to mind to get me out of this stuck place, to get me out of the fear, to keep me moving, you know. Jeremiah 29:11. You know, I know the thoughts and the plans that I have for you, declares the Lord. Plans for good and not for evil. Plans, plans for a hope and a future. Like I had to meditate on that knowing, like even if I had a hundred no's that day, there was one on the horizon, you know, and it was that being transformed by, you know, being transformed in your mind, daily renewing of the mind, but also, you know, knowing that we are victorious, knowing that it might not be today, but it's going to happen in the end. And you had to. I had to constantly just meditate on those words of the truth before I. Before. Before too long. It just became a part of me. And it's like now it's not so much fear going into new businesses and to do these things and to hear a no. Because I know that that no is just a no right now. And that it's not a fear, it's a. You know, I don't have a mind of fear anymore. It's of power and of love and of self control and just continuing to meditate on those things and how it's just reshaped me and how I can see myself so much different now. And now my wife can sit there and say, you're not that. You're not that realist anymore. I see it, and I can't claim that over myself anymore. And so just the ability to do that, how it literally will transform you even so. Even so much not of your own self, but that others will see it too.

Yes. That's good, man. So good. Powerful, powerful stuff. I love this, guys. Sean.

And God will orchestrate things in such a way that he's the one who gets the glory. If it's like. Yeah. If it's. If it's, like, negotiable or if there's some way that you can say that, oh, Sean did it, then God's probably. Probably not so much in that, because, like Joshua in chapter six, when he's going against Jericho, when you were talking, when you first said stronghold, that's the first thing that popped into my mind was the walls of Jericho.

I just want him going next. That's good.

Their military strategy was to walk around the walls and shout and then praise God. And there's zero idea that Joshua had anything to do with the conquest of Jericho.

Yes. Yeah, that's exactly where I'm. I'm going next, man. Because what the. Paul, or the. The imagery that he's using, right. Is. Is directly tied to that. The. The Greek word that he actually uses. I'm gonna butcher this. But it's like something along those lines. But when he's talking about what that stronghold is, it's. It's. It's a fortress or a fortified castle. Right? So it's like a prison, a place of bondage, even if we want to call it that. Right? So biblically, if we can think about a stronghold is a. It's. It's a pattern of. Or a thought process that we have that acts like a fortress that's protecting a lie. Right? And this is why it's so hard. Zach mentioned those neural pathways. It's so hard to. To get out of that. If you think of, like, a. I think of, like, ruts that are, like, in our. These neural pathways that we've created that's. They literally are ruts, right? And so it's so easy to just fall back into this easy way of thinking. This victim mentality, this woe is me. And no, Paul tells us that we are to be continually transformed by the renewing of our mind. Right? And if you read on, it's like it says, then we can test what God's will, his good and perfect will is. Right? So we have to get our thinking correct so then we can Start to test what is God's will. If we're wondering what God's will is, start with your mindset, right? It's not that hard, but we complicate it. We want to rush through this process of. And even for some that have, you know, let's say you, you didn't have a radical born again experience like Christian did, right, where he's delivered from drugs, 14 year drug addiction, bam, on the spot, delivered. That's radical, baby, right? A lot of us maybe receive Christ as a kid or even now it's like, okay, I prayed a prayer, so maybe we don't feel any different. But best believe if you've repented, you've turned, Holy Spirit is dwelling within you, right? But the process of sanctification, now this is where it's a process that we have to build these new neural pathways of thinking in creating an environment where God can actually move within us, right? And that's what this part again of this sanctification process is. So again, a stronghold. It's like it's a mental prison, right? And the cool thing is we don't have to fight these battles. It's impossible, right? Paul says that these battles are carnal, right? You can't battle them with our flesh. Self will discipline, while that can, can help. The only way that we're going to actually battle, win these battles, if I want to say that, is through the supernatural, right? And that's exactly what Sean was even mentioning. Where my thought went, as I was, you know, originally reading this was exactly those walls of Jericho, right? That if you remember in the Old Testament, the, the walls of Jericho were like, I think they're like a representation of the minds of a rebellious people, right? And, and we, if we've received Christ, we were a rebellious people. And these walls, these fortresses, they're strong, right? And we got to tear those things down. We got to demolish those arguments, those thoughts, those that, that we're having, we have to demolish those is what he tells us in second Corinthians there, right? And, and the battle which, you know, they're marching around, marching around might seem just ridiculous, right? But they're marching around. They were, they were following the Lord's instruction on this. And what seemed foolish, completely like ridiculous is, is ultimately what God used to tear down those walls, right? So we don't have to over complicate it. Like imagine those people just like walking around that wall, you know, and, and then blowing the horns and then bam, they fell down, right? Seems ridiculous, right? And Maybe even reading scripture might seem ridiculous, right? It's like, oh, this isn't going to help me. All right, well that's a rut. That's a neural pathway that you've created. That is stinking thinking, right? And it's so we kind of over complicated. We want this amazing way that's going to fix things, but it just comes back to simplifying this. Let's get back to the basics, baby, right? Meditate on this book of the law. Do not let it depart from your mouth so that you may do what it says. Then we will be prosperous and successful. It's that simple. When I, When I. That revelation six years ago, for me, that's, that's how simple it was, where it's like, okay, well I can meditate on this book of the law, right? We can meditate on scripture, we can start to speak scripture, we can start to do scripture, and then we can start to experience what true prosperity and what true success actually is in life, right? It's. It's not that hard. Okay? So again, every stronghold we. We know, it begins with a lie, right? This is what the serpent did to Eve. Did God really say? And, and it. The ma. The. The matter or the point of the matter is are we going to run with that and create a negative neural pathway or are we going to capture that thing and replace it with what God actually says, right? And a lot of this can be based upon our identity, right? But the how we overcome this, as Robert put up, is, is basically the armor of God, right? The spiritual weapons that he's given us. And for the sake of time, I'm not going to. I'll. I'll just run through these quickly for you guys, right? If you guys know Ephesians 6, right? Paul X. Well, back in Second Corinthians, verse chapter 10, verse 4, Paul reminds us that the weapons of our warfare, right, they're not carnal, they're not. They're not of the flesh, but they're mighty through God for the pulling down of strongholds, right? And then in Ephesians 6, he actually names what those weapons are. This is the armor of God, baby. This is it. This is, this is like. It's so good, man. When he gives us the blueprint of how to actually do this, right, so quickly, we could probably think just randomly some what. What is the armor of God? All right, first off, the belt of truth, right? The belt of truth. Truth is what's going to break every stronghold, right? Every stronghold begins with a lie. And so We've got to replace it with truth, right? Foundationally. This is. This is. This is where it begins, the belt of truth, right? And you know, back in the day, the belt is like what held everything up. What they could put all their armor on everything. It was like, we got to start with truth. Do we know truth? Okay? And if we. We know that, right? We can actually continue to put on the armor of God, right? The blessed, the. The breastplate of righteousness, right? This is. This breaks shame and condemnation in our life, right? This is a big one, right? Because we think we feel guilty, right? And, you know, enemy's gonna come at us with the shame, the things that we've done. Maybe we've already received Christ and yet we're still struggling with sin in our life, right? It's like, no, this. Christ said that we are righteous not because of who we are, but because of what he has done. His obedience of going to the cross for us has set us up to be righteous, right? We become. We were slaves to sin, we are now slaves to righteousness, right? So once we put that breastplate on, shame can't stay, right? Guilt can't stay. Self condemnation, the. Our identity is going to be retransformed, continually be transformed by putting on that breastplate of righteousness, right? The third one is the shoes of the gospel of peace, right? This. This breaks anxiety and fear, right? Because when we're anxious or we're fearful, oftentimes it puts us in this passive state, right? Or the fear of making a decision, we procrastinate. But we're called to put on the shoes. I love it. Just the visual representation of what that is, the shoes of the gospel of peace, right? This is going to disarm any sort of fear, any anxiety that we have in our life, the chaos that's going on, right? Then we take up the shield of faith, and this breaks the strongholds of doubt and unbelief, right? If you think of that shield, it's extinguishing every dart, every arrow that. That the enemy is throwing at us. It's a shield, right? So you can think of like, what are those arrows that he's throwing at you right now? What are those flaming arrows that. The accusations that he says, the lies that, that we, when we receive them and we build that neural pathway, that's when we. We be. We become stagnant in our life, right? Right. Where the enemy wants us, okay? Because the enemy, I mean, he doesn't care if you worship God, doesn't care if you like it's funny because I was like, when you go to church here, there you go. Brandon, it's like he doesn't care if he's. If there's a. A church that is filled with people that come and are just like, singing songs like, you know, I love you, Lord. He. He's concerned about those that are, that are, you know, like, when our feet hit the ground, he's like, I'll snap. Let's get. He's coming at us, right? And this is why, you know, my life, if I'm not experiencing the, the. The flaming darts, I'm concerned. Like, man, am I walking in God's will? Because things, that. Things seem to be too easy here, right? And it's like, it's a new mindset that I've had to take on of because a lot of Christians want to live the easy life, right? And we choose not to do the hard things because we think the easy things that must be God's will. Not true. Not true at all. Right? Now, God may open doors, right? But you best believe there are going to be flaming darts that are going to come at you. And this is why we got to put this armor of God on every single day to continue to advance, to continue to move forward. All right? The helmet of salvation, right? I think this is. Comes down to a lot of our identity, right? Or even a distorted identity. And, and I love it. Just again, the visual representation of this is the helmet. It covers the mind, the battlefield, right? Imagine us waking up every day and not putting on that helmet of salvation. What's the enemy going to do with that? This is where we go into just complete chaos, into complete turmoil. So just every day, wake up, like, visually rep, like, imagine yourself putting this on the belt of truth, right? I'm gonna put on the, the gospel or the shoes of the gospel of peace, right? I'm going to put on this breastplate of righteousness, this helmet of salvation, right? And the last thing we do, baby, when we, when we get out of bed is we unsheath. That's the word. Unsheath. The sword, man. And this is the sword of the spirit is. This is the main offensive weapon that we've been given, which is the word of God, right? The word of God isn't for just, you know, for it to sit in our paper book Bible that we have. It's not a scripture that's supposed to be decorated on our wall. This, baby, is a tool. This is a weapon of warfare that we've been given. And this is why it's so important that we know the word of God. We don't just read it, but we ruminate on it and we start to repeat it. And when we start to, to make these declarations of what God says, this is when these arguments are demolished, right? These walls actually can fall down that we've created in this stronghold of the mind, right? This is where it all begins. And I love even how Paul ends that armor of God, right, that Ephesians 6 there. It ends with pray in the spirit on all occasions, right? So I think prayer isn't. It's not another piece of armor, but it's what activates and empowers the armor to be used. We can put it all on, but if we just don't do anything with it, what's the point, Right? Prayer is like the activation of engaging in the battle, okay? Now you don't want to go into that battle without armoring up first, but then we do it when we go into prayer, right? This is why we were to pray continually and all, all situations, all circumstances. Brandon, as you're getting on that sales call, right, as, as you're, you know, having the next meeting for any of us, as we're taking our kids to school, like praying in all situations, my prayer is, I'm driving Ellie to school. I'm under my breath, like, lord, what do you want me to. How do you want me to, to, you know, lead her today? And it's just like this continual conversation that I can have with God so I can actually put the armor of God to actually work versus just sitting on the dust, sitting and gathering dust, you know, on my bookshelf or whatever the case is. All right, all right, 752. So what, I'll end with guys, and then we'll open this up for a little bit more, I think, in the notes. If not, I'll make sure they get put in. There was kind of a blueprint again, I'll call it that or the, the three step strategy or warfare strategy. I'm trying to find it here in my notes that Paul has given us here and how to, how to take captive those thoughts, right? So number one, we got to recognize the thought, right? Does is the thought, does it produce fear? Does it produce anxiety? Does it contradict scripture in any way? Is it an accusational thought to our identity, right? Audit our thoughts, recognize it first, right? Because remember, we're getting about 60,000 of these for the 55,000 seconds that we're actually consciously awake on a daily basis. So we got to recognize the thought, right? Stop it in its tracks, recognize that thing, right? What is it and identify what it is, and then reject the lie. So recognize and then reject the lie, right? Isaiah 55. 8 says that God's thoughts are not our thoughts. That's cool to think about, right? Because sometimes we're in this thought pattern or this downward spiral, and like God's thoughts are not our thoughts, right? So if it contradicts Scripture, we reject it, right? If it's accusationable, if it's putting on shame, if it's putting on guilt, reject it. If it steals the peace within us, reject it, right? But we have to recognize it out of that bad boy and then reject it if it's not God's thoughts, right? Because his thoughts are not our thoughts, right? What we think about ourselves is not what God thinks about ourselves. So we got to reject those lies in our life, and then we replace them with truth. Is that simple? And it. It's wild. It's not that hard, right? But a lot of Christians will maybe stop it, the second step, or we're recognizing it and rejecting it. And in nature, scientists will tell you this, that nature hates a vacuum, right? And so if we're just stopping at step two and we're not replacing it, right? If we're not replacing fear with like scriptures in Philippians 4:19, right? Or anxiety, and if we're not replacing that with actual scripture, they're going to come back. It's just going to come back. We're not building a new neural pathway. We've just created, I think, of a rut. I think we've taken out the water, but we're not regrowing a new pathway. And this is the importance of actually replacing it with what scripture actually says. All right, I think one more that I threw in the notes for you guys was just called the. The Peace pattern of Philippians 4. This is my daughter's favorite verse, which I'll just pull that up, which Philippians 4:6. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer, in petition, with thanksgiving, present your request to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your heart, right? Above all else. Guard your hearts. We're told to do that. Well, how do we do that? We present by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, we present our request to God. That's how we guard our hearts, right? The peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. And then this is such a great verse, Philippians 4, 8. Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, right, whatever is right, pure, lovely, admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things, right? So the blueprint for that peace pattern is worry about no things in verse six. That's what it tells us. Worry about no things, right? Think about good things. It tells us that in verse eight. And then how it started was to pray about all things, right? So pray about all things, worry about no things, and think about good things. It's pretty simple for us to gain that peace or recapture that peace that we're looking for in our life. It doesn't mean that chaos isn't going to be all out in the world, but amongst the chaos, we can actually have peace. All right, thoughts, questions, Anything? Anybody want to add.

The joy of the Lord? When you're, when you remember, or different gifts that were given by God. We have. We experience time differently. We experience a less hunger in our stomach when we're doing God's will and the bliss of the Lord. And sometimes when we go through pain. I've had pain poisoned by different industrial stuff. If I didn't have joy, those pains would have locked in for life the toxic stuff I was exposed to in a work environment. So it helped me when I couldn't sleep at night to have the joy of the Lord. It was a gift from God. During the suffering, I don't say it always happens, the joy of the Lord, but. But joy. Joy of the Lord.

Yeah. It's good, Robert. Mercies are new every morning. That's so good. Yeah, because, you know, amongst the pain and the suffering, we can still choose joy. Right. It's not a feeling, but it's a choice that we can actually make in our lives. Thanks, Robert. Leslie.

Uh, so for me, a lot of this was how, like, how do I see this? How do I do that? And then, you know, I mean, as I mentioned my prior experience, but it's just funny how much like, as much as we all dedicate daily reading scripture, daily prayer, I think daily meditation is just as important. And I know so many people are like, oh, I can't sit still that long. I can't. I can't that long. I get bored. And it's like, no, no, no. This is exactly how, you know, you're in the quiet place and you dedicate time to doing nothing. And so it's kind of like spending time with Father, Son, Holy Spirit. And for me, meditation is spending time with Holy Spirit. And a lot of the how was just like Breathing in and out, knowing Holy Spirit is there, and. And then, yes, some of these things will kind of filter in, but then it's like. But seeing it in truth as it is, as Holy Spirit reveals it, that is really just like a discipline to do. And it gets hard, you know, when. When you want to sit there and you're like, I'm bored of this. It's like, oh, you got bored of Holy Spirit? Check again. So just encourage everyone to add, like, you know, a 20 minute practice of sitting in silence and dedicating that to time with Holy Spirit. And there's so many hows to do it where the Word can help, but there's nothing like just quieting and emptying, emptying yourself, seeing the thoughts, but then like letting Holy Spirit do what it wants with that. So for me, it's like breathing in and out, Holy Spirit, breathing in me, my temple, all that, and then just getting quieter and quieter so that you can be filled.

Yes. That's so great, Leslie. And it's so frustrating to me too, when people are like, well, you know, God didn't make me that way, or I can't sit down, or, you know, I just, I just, I can't read the Bible. Yes, you can. Right? Because again, if we only did things that we want to do, good Lord, my life would be a train wreck, right? I don't want to go work out, but I choose to work out, right? Because I want to be healthy. This is God's temple, right? I don't want to eat healthy, but I choose to be healthy, right? And it's not that I have to do it all the time, but more times than not, when we develop these disciplines in our life, it becomes the normal new pathway for us. So just because you don't feel like doing something, I don't think God gives a rip about your feelings, man. We are nasty human flesh, right? Like people say, well, just follow your heart now that your heart is wicked, man, you gotta follow God. You gotta choose obedience. And when you choose to read the Bible, when you choose to spend time, focus your mental focus on this. He will then start to transform you continually in that process. So, so good. Zach, what you got, man?

Oh, well, one, I just wanted to say, Leslie. Yeah, I agree with Riley. That was so good. It just made me think when you're like, oh, yeah, I just get bored. Like, that's an excuse to not spend time with the Lord. Like, I get bored is like saying, I'm too fat to go to the gym. I'm too Fat to work out or not, you know, it's like you're bored because you never do it. You're not in the practice of it, Right? But, Riley, one thing that you said that was so good, and it got an audible laugh from me. Lauren was looking over at me, and she started laughing. But you said, the enemy puts a lot of Christians on their back. Like. And then you did this. You're like, like, like, I just got to get through this life, you know? And. And if life is just something that we're getting through, like, it. It's just so laughable. But how many times, like, okay, maybe there's a season of life, or maybe there's, you know, I just got to get through the shift. I got a headache, I'm sick, you know, whatever it is. But. But yeah, a lot of. A lot of times we're just trying to get through. Through life. And that's so sad. It's like, what kind of life do we want to live? Like, if we're not auditing our thoughts, if we're too. If we're too fat to go to the gym, you know, if we're not actively taking hold of these things. That's why what you're sharing is so powerful, Riley. Because if we are not. We're not creating the. The mental space we want to live in. We're not creating the relationship with God that we enjoy. We're not. We're not fostering the marriage that we. That we want to live with every day. It's like, oh, well, yeah, we're just. We just want to get through this thing, you know? But. But God didn't design us for that, right? He designed us for an abundant life. And. And that really, that's. That's what we're taking hold of here is. Is like one more segment of that. It's like we all have this space we have to live in, and then we get to do something with it, right? And if we're just getting through it, it's like, man, we've totally missed it. So, yeah, that was. It was so funny the way you inserted that. But it's so powerful at the same time because it really does make you kind of wake up and realize, well, what am I even doing? You know, Am I getting through this thing? Or. Or is it getting through me to other people and actually making a difference in eternity? Not even just this world, but in eternity, right? Because as our thoughts are different, you know, out of the abundance of our heart, our mouth speaks, and what goes into our Hearts, it comes through our head, you know, and all of that. The Lord works through that. So, yeah, this is just really powerful stuff. Wanted to say thank you for spending the time kind of putting it together and bringing it to us all.

Yeah, man. Yeah, Yeah. I could go on for hours and hours on this, but I think, Sean, you had. You had something, bro.

Zach, I don't know if you intended to say that. Am I getting through it or is it getting through me that stuck? There's so many people that you work with every day and they're like, ah, man, I'm just surviving. I'm just getting through it. I can't wait till the shift is over. And is that. Is that how we are? Are we ho hum? Or are we filled with the Holy Spirit and is it getting through us into other people? You kind of made me forget what I was going to talk about. That thought was so good, Zach. Oh, okay. So yesterday I'm in. I shared with the prayer group that I was so depressed yesterday. I was so discouraged. And I'll do this thing where I make commitments and then I feel like I have too much on me and then my mind will just start spinning. And instead of just like settling into the peace of God and finding that alone time with him, where it's his strength that's getting me through the things that he's brought me to, these commitments, they're good commitments. He's brought me to this place where I can be of service to other people. And then I'm trusting in my own strength and failing. And that's where that feeling of overwhelm just floods me so. Like, just obedience, that one next step of obedience into what he is calling us to do brings so much blessing. Because when I was able to minister to the people in Pakistan this morning, I feel like I was as blessed as they were by God's word. And I have just a fresh perspective of the day. It's that renewing of the mind. You know, it's so important that we put on that helmet of our salvation, because that's like the one thing that we can't live without is our head. You know, you can still flail around if you've got one arm. You know, you can still be relatively effective in offense or defense. You can wield the sword or wield the shield. But, man, if you lose your head, you're done. So guard those thoughts, take them captive.

Yeah, that's good. And I would just encourage for anybody that has those feelings of overwhelm randomly throughout the day, I get them where you've got this never ending to do list. My phone keeps ringing. It's like it's just constantly bombarded where it's just anxiety and overwhelm. I. What's helped me in that is to when we think about, like, there's not enough time to get all this done. I've got all these things and then I've got to move to these things. And it's like I view it as. I relate a lot of things to money because that was a stronghold on my life, right? And. And it's like, man, if I. The greatest thing I ever did was.

Was.

Was starting to commit to tithing and. And God radically, radically started to prosperous financially, right? And. And it. It wasn't. It's just wild on how. How it does that. Shout out Christian. And I have the third book of the Kingdom Entrepreneur series that's going to be coming out here hopefully in December for you guys, which is all about money and finances. Shameless. Plug on that. But I relate our time to that just as much, right? So as much as I think I don't have time, it's like if I can just pause and give that time to God, that peace is going to transform. And Even if it's 10% of the time, if I think of it as a tide, I know he's going to do way more with the 90% than I could have ever done with the 100%. And so when you're experiencing that, it's always like, I got to get all these things done. It's like, nope, I'm gonna pause. I'm gonna do the breathwork video that Christian made. Right? Meditate like Leslie loves to do. What does the Bible say? Right? He's not. It doesn't give us a. A spirit of fear, right? God is not a. A God of confusion. Because sometimes I feel confused on those. I. I can declare God has gotten not. He's not a God of confusion, right? I have a sound mind in Christ. I am being continually transformed by the renewing of mind. I can start to declare these scriptures over myself and then put that armor on, baby. And now I can get after it. And wildly enough, all those things just start to fall into place. Everything gets done when it needs to get done, right? But it comes back to just centering ourselves. Who's the focus here? Because the enemy's going to come and he wants to be frazzled in our life. He wants us to be, you know, worked up to miss out on the opportunities that God actually has.

For us.

And if we could just be present, be where our feet are. Right? I'm going to be present. I'm going to be where my feet are, and I'm going to. I'm going to be. Be usable by God in that situation. He's going to do some radical things in each one, every one of our lives. So, Reuben, we'll end with you, brother. You're on mute if you don't know your hand went up, so I'm assuming you got something. Three, two, one. All right, I'll. I'll jump in.

Riley, if. Yeah. One of the things that I've always seen about you that I. I struggle with, because I. I've always dealt with worry, like a worry wart, because, like, I'm a thinker. So rather than thinking about the thing that's right in front of me, I'll think about. All right, what's after that, then? After that, then after that. And one of the things I've always seen with Riley is he could have a day where it's nothing but meetings and, you know, important meetings and just the. The. The weight of having a company where so many people's livelihoods are at stake. And then he'll have, like, an hour to spend time with Ellie, and he'll literally, like, shut it off. Totally compartmentalize. Like, shut off all those thoughts, play with Ellie for an hour, and truly be present. And then it. When the hour's up, gets back into it. And for. For me, and I don't know if any of you, it's like, okay, if I'm in that situation, okay, I know I got an hour with Ezzy. I could allow the enemy to rob that time and that joy because it's like, yeah, I'm physically present, but I'm thinking about everything I got to do as soon as that hour's up. Right? So honor to you, Riley, for. For being an example of how to compartmentalize that and not allow worry to steal the joy that you have. Not just with Ellie, but that's the example I was thinking of specifically in my mind right now. But the enemy simply robs us of joy. And think of if we have an hour to spend with our. Our children or whatever it may be, that's an hour where we not only could have joy, but create memories. That hour could be a memory that your son or daughter, they look back on and reflect on later on in their life. And if we're not there present, it's like, oh, man, I'm not just robbing myself of this joy, but potentially a memory our child is going to have their entire lives. So just want to commend you for that being a good example. And I think Reuben has unmuted now if we want to close it out with him.

Yes. Can you guys hear me now? I'll make it fast.

Yes.

Okay. Sorry. I'm. I got a new phone I'm trying to figure out how to use. Done. Mute button. Anyway, I really appreciate the teaching today. And I heard one pastor told me, you know what? You're gonna do what you want to do, you're gonna do what you want to do. And that goes through the. Across the board seeking God, tithing, or, you know, doing both natural and spiritual matters. But he also said the Holy Spirit is not gonna renew your mind. You have to renew it yourself. And that takes discipline, and that takes drive, and that takes our intention. It's very intentional. So I just pray for the spirit of intentionality to be amongst us, to seek the Lord more, renew our mind, and to worship God like we've never done before. Thank you.

I'll accept that. Amen.

That's good. That's good. All right, I'll pray us out. Father God, we thank you, Jesus. Thank you for the ability, Lord. Each and every one of us woke up with breath in our lungs today. So there is a reason to give you praise, Lord, may each and every individual on this call, those listening online, wherever, God, just may they realize that and understand that there is always, always a reason to give you praise. You are. You are alpha. You are omega. You know all the things. You know all of our thoughts that we have, what we struggle with internally, God, we just acknowledge that. And we thank you, Lord, that you've given us this life to be transformed into your image, Lord. And I just pray that those on this call would. Would take that to heart, Lord, that you've given us this. This ability to choose thoughts that are. That are higher than our thoughts. To choose your ways, God. So ignite that fire. I just. I just fan the flame in each and every one of us, God, that. That we would choose life. Today, we have the choice, and it's. It's. It's up to us. And so, God, we just declare that today, God, we choose you. We in our house today, we choose to. To serve you, Lord. So we thank you for that opportunity. I pray for the right alignments, for the. For the right connections for these on this call, Lord, that there would be personal connections within proximity for people not just to. To come on and you know, glean off of a zoom call, Lord, but they would actually have personal connections to develop relationships to continue to pursue this process of sanctification with you, Lord. We love you, Jesus. We praise you, God. Thank you for the opportunities. May we just be sensitive to you, Holy Spirit, throughout the rest of this day that we would move mountains and. And we would be transformational in our thoughts and ultimately be the ambassadors that you called us to be here on this earth. In Jesus name, Amen and amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Thanks, Riley. Yes. Thank you guys today, man. Have a good rest of the week.

Thanks, Riley.

See you good.