20210626 | Just My Imagination | Pastor John Lomacang (tvsdac)

let us pray gracious loving father in heaven thank you for covering us covering our lives covering our thoughts covering our imaginations covering us and sheltering us in the times of challenges and difficulties in the times of our personal storms but lord this morning we ask for you to speak to us for you to guide us through your word for us to find strength as we navigate the blueprint of deliverance and may your holy spirit come and your holy angels abide in this place to lead us into your presence we ask in jesus holy and precious name we pray amen just my imagination it's a short scripture but it's a powerful one and we go to the book of proverbs chapter 23 and verse 7. i've only chosen the beginning part of it because it takes our minds in the direction that i'm asking the lord to lead us today understanding our hearts understanding our thoughts understanding that how we think has a major role to play in who we become it's a very short scripture why don't we read it together proverbs 23 verse 7 is on the screen and i'd like to hear you raise your voices this morning as we read god's word together here it is for as he thinks in his heart so is he to illustrate the power of the imagination cometh me to my past cometh me to the days when i was a disc jockey in new york city growing up in a city encapsulated in music and rhythms of all different kinds there was a song written by a group called the temptations that every now and then we get pulled back into the tunes of our past isn't that right every now and then we hear songs that remind us of where we've come from a few weeks ago as i was asking the lord what should we talk about when it comes to our wednesday night bible studies and and karen and those of you that have been on it you might remember that topic very well but i thought it was amazing that this song was written by a group called the temptations and the lyrics was so synonymous to what we're talking about this morning listen carefully the songwriter wrote these lyrics that are just amazing speaks about a man who has a desire and he's looking forward to the day of spending his his pulsating heart with a woman of his dreams but until that day comes he's just in a beautiful way thinking about her longing for that day and he writes each day through my window i watch her as she passes by i say to myself you're such a lucky guy to have a girl like her is truly a dream come true out of all the fellas in the world she belongs to me and the second verse he says soon we'll be married and raise a family oh yeah in a cozy little home out in the country with two children maybe three i tell you i can visualize it all this couldn't be a dream for it is too real for all it seems but the tagline says but it was just my imagination running away with me it was just my imagination running away with me did you get it the woman that he looked forward to being with did not exist she was just a figment of his imagination apart from the tagline you would probably ask yourself the question what kind of woman was he but she was woman with no dimensions no existence no reality she existed only in his imagination so this morning come with me to the most amazing arena on the earth the place of the greatest victories and the greatest defeats the place of amazing beginnings and tragic endings the place where success motivates us and failure pursues us it is the place where the future is happiness but it comes before our past it is where mountains come down and walls go up it is where we love and hate at the very same time when we think about our imagination some of us are beaten up by thoughts animation and men and imaginations that don't have any arms some of us are beaten up by the thoughts and imaginations that don't have any arms and many of us are incarcerated by what we think and by what we imagine others spend their days dodging the results of their imaginations and their thoughts it doesn't really exist only in their thinking and many people waste their lives at the intersection of i thought and i imagine i think that's what's going to happen i think that is what's coming but one writer points it this way a doctor of psychology he says the ability to think and imagine permeates our entire existence i thank god for the ability to think and to imagine and many of the things we have today would not exist unless somebody had the ability to think about them and imagine them our imagination influences everything we do everything we think about everything that is created our thoughts lead to elaborate theories and indispensable inventions think about it if somebody didn't think about it we wouldn't have an ipad if somebody did not imagine it we wouldn't have an iphone or an android phone or we wouldn't have many of the inventions that surround us today so the mat the mind and the thoughts and the imaginations are not a bad thing but our thoughts and imaginations are the catalyst of our dreams the doorway that shapes our intellect and the ticket to our creativity or lack thereof so today what i want to do i'm going to ask you to not imagine anything else but the sermon so that you won't be imagining that you're somewhere else and that you won't be thinking about what's going to happen this afternoon or this evening but that you'll lock your imaginations and your thoughts right here somebody ought to say amen we are going to address the phantoms that are chasing you and the things that are not really there except in your imagination we're going to look back on how to gain the victories over thoughts and imaginations that are pursuing us that really don't exist and when you think about how powerful thoughts and imaginations are they can be our greatest assets or our worst liability i remember growing up and doing something wrong my imagination beat me up long before papa gave me a spanking i thought about it i anticipated it i felt it i experienced it it was all a part of my being anybody know what i'm talking about our thoughts and imaginations cause us to go to work with an intrepid feeling when our names are called i know of someone that uh once got a phone call from uh their supervisor and they said oh i'm in trouble now and i thought why would you imagine that they said what other reason would my supervisor call me thoughts and imaginations the place where walls go up or walls come down and when you think about how powerful the thoughts and imaginations are we need only to look back at a world that's gone by at a world that no longer exists except in our thoughts and in the pages of history go with me to genesis chapter six and verse five and let us begin to build on the understanding of the power of thoughts and imaginations the greatest access or our worst liabilities when you begin to analyze and look back at the world of noah's day notice the commentary in scripture about that society genesis chapter 6 and verse 5 and we read the following words and i'm reading from the king james version because it reads it or prints it the way that i want to communicate it the bible says and god saw that the wickedness of man was what great in the earth and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil how often continually now think about it the scripture is saying it's not what the ant and luv antediluvians did but as what they imagined and what they thought in other words their thoughts became their actions their actions became their habits their habits became their character and their character shaped their destiny the downfall of the anti-deluvian world began with their thoughts and their imaginations and let me put a pin in that because let me tell you something the devil is seeking to do the very same thing today why do you think we are bombarded with social media why do you think when one social media platform begins to wear out the devil comes up with another one some of you are old enough to remember my space can i get an amen when that first came out it was the craze of craze everybody wanted to be on my space i wasn't on my space i thought it was a kitty platform people got excited about it and i'm not exactly sure of the trajectory but i get it i guess it eventually began to move till it got to facebook then it got to instagram then it got to [Music] come on snapchat then it got to twitter now we're down at tick tick-tock i don't know if there's any after that but i want you to notice a pattern the devil is cleverly and artfully creating things creating platforms creating devices that don't give us the freedom to think for ourselves he wants us to think like the folk on their postings i've heard people that go into an emotional down spiral when they read something on facebook you know what i do i don't really care because what people think or don't think about me on facebook is not my concern somebody oh we forgot messenger by the way we forgot messenger somebody messaged me this week i don't look at that but it pops up somebody messaged me this week and said i no longer like your sermons you know what i said i don't care i didn't tell them that but i told my wow i don't really care i don't preach for popularity anymore amen somebody sermons are not to be graded like speeches i don't get an a or d or c i don't really care about that as long as i'm proclaiming what's in god's word i don't really care about the opinions can you imagine somebody saying to elijah i don't like your sermons anymore john the baptist i don't like what you said god never called us to allow what the proclamation of his word he calls us to proclaim his word faithfully but we're looking at a society that before the manifestation of a good act or an evil act it begins in the thoughts we think about it we imagine it we feed our thoughts we nurture our advent our in imaginations we we nurture our the things that we think about the things that we focus on and long before we get to the performance of an act it's all in our imagination it's feeding on us we sense it we feel it we taste it we see ourselves in the middle of it i remember growing up in new york city one night my friend and i were watching uh television it was about a quarter to midnight and it was back when a 13-inch television was huge anybody remember that sony trinitra some of young folk don't even know what that is 13-inch sony trinitron totally analog he had a 13-inch sony trinitron and a and a burger king i think mcdonald whatever commercial came on a quarter to 12. and you know how they do it they drop the ketchup at the right angle and then all you hear is to all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onion on a sesame seed and you smell it and your your taste buds start to salivate and and we looked at each other right away and said let's go get one quarter to midnight now there was not a mcdonald's for 12 miles of where we live here we are driving all over brooklyn looking for a mcdonald's we didn't stop till we found one you know why because we thought about it we imagined it we tasted it we felt ourselves chewing it and we knew we couldn't go to bed without it but it began right here then it went right here brethren you gotta you gotta lock in on this because that's exactly what's happening today we're living in a society where we are being massaged to forget god's word and to remember everything else around us and our thoughts and our imaginations are no longer ours one psychologist recently wrote he said if you want to become a person that thinks for yourself the first thing you need to do is turn off any external stimuli anything that's telling you to think this way or do this way and it's getting worse nowadays because you can't even have email without an ad popping up in your email have you noticed that if you look on google if you make the mistake and look and look for a car a car an ad for a car shows up in your email we are being we are being hunted by social media giants they want us to think that way they want us to act on their whims and and their desires and their impulses and our imagination takes off but i've discovered to get to the place where your imaginations are only evil continually it requires a constant and consistent diet of thoughts that suggest evil as one doctor said thoughts don't just pop up imaginations don't just pop up something happens to activate them something takes place and i know you've been there before you might walk into a building feeling perfectly fine and then your eyes lock in on somebody that's in the building and your attitude change your heart begins to speed up you begin to think about how they think about you or how you think about them and the thing you fear the most is running into them or saying hello to them or them saying hello to you and some people live long lives i've i've seen this play out itself in churches that i've pastored i can tell when people are at odds with each other you know we have so many aisles they'll come in on that aisle and you're coming on that aisle and they'll watch what aisle you go out on and go out on another aisle cannot think together cannot pray together cannot sing together cannot worship together they're planning on being in heaven with you that's what you think is just your imagination because as we were reading this week we are not going to wake up in the resurrection with different thoughts than we nurture right now the thoughts we wake up with on resurrection morning are the thoughts that we nurture on our day-by-day basis the things that we imagine and perpetrate in our lives are not going to change in the resurrection therefore it is our responsibility i'm going to say that again it is our responsibility to begin to become active in shaping the way we think the way we imagine and the way we live and my wife and i have i tell you about four or five years ago we implemented in our lives some safeguards so that our thoughts can continually more by more become like the thoughts of god but if you don't have a doubt if you don't have a diet in your life if there's not anything in your home that's that's shaping your thoughts and molding your thoughts you are inevitably becoming the thoughts and the imaginations of the person or the thing that you focus on the most and romans chapter 6 and verse 16 tells us what happens when that takes place look at romans 6 and verse 16. the apostle paul says do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey you are that one slave whom you obey whether of sin leading to death or of obedience leading to what righteousness i like to educate myself about things that i'm not fully aware of and when i decided a little more than a week ago that this was going to be the sermon topic i said let me educate myself let me let me listen to the professionals let me read some of the writings and the and the findings of the professionals the the doctors the psychologists the neurosurgeons people that deal with the human mind and one one uh psychologist pointed out he was dealing with the gentleman that wanted to overcome a particular habit in his life and in the conversation with this gentleman he said what is the thing that you want to overcome and he mentioned what it was i'm not going to mention it just for the sake of not putting anybody on the spot if in fact that may be a challenge in your life but he mentioned the thing that he wanted to overcome that he wanted to gain victory over and the doctor asked him so what happens he says when i think about that thing i focus that i need to overcome that and the doctor said the problem is you're focusing on the thing you need to overcome but i can guarantee you that before you go down that path there is a precursor to you beginning to turn in that direction there's something that happens in your mind before you begin to think about that very thing and it was just pointed out in romans chapter 6 and verse 16 so let me go back to this verse and let me break it down in components so you can understand because he pointed out no one makes a decision about what they are going to do unless they yield first so until you yield the sin has no power over you until you make a decision to yield to something what you are imagining has no power to make you do anything until you first yield let's look at that again i'm going to bring out these points in specific details and four steps because the problem that we have when we try to overcome something we focus on that very thing but there's something that happens before that romans 6 16 once more do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey you are that one's slave whom you obey whether of sin leading to death or of obedience leading to righteousness this this the psychologist pointed out that we don't just sin because we yield to the sin something happens first here's the first thing they recommend the first thing we decide the first thing we do is decide to present ourselves to the thought let's break that down a thought is a thought is swimming around because of the atmosphere that you're in the thought is trying to find its way in but if you look at the text it says do you not know that to whom you present yourselves in other words the thought is here and you say to the thought thought here i am let me use the classic illustration eve before eve got to the tree the tree got to eve before you got to the club the club got to you you opened the door to think about the club before you moved in the direction of the club before you perpetrated an action the thought presented itself and you reciprocated by presenting yourself to the thought and you said thought what do we do so when we present ourselves the next thing we do with that thought is we decide to obey the thought when we obey the thought the next thing we do is we embrace the thought because the thought continues to suggest to us that somehow if we embrace it on the other side of this prohibition we're going to be wiser we're going to be better off and there's going to be some kind of benefit and that's a lie because you knew that when eve began to present herself to the thought when the thought began to present itself to her the bible says the tree was pleasant to the eyes a tree desirable to make one wise and she saw that it was also good for food she began to look at the personal benefits of a wrong action rather than saying the wrong action is something that god has prohibited me from participating in therefore no matter how many benefits it claims i will gain from participating in it i am just not going to present myself and have any conversation with the thought making it even clearer as my newest as my newer as my neurologist's friend told me and he brought out a powerful insight he said i deal with the human mind every day and you know we say that the first lie told in scripture was you will not surely die but that's not true the first light told in scripture was when satan said to eve has god said that you shall not eat of every tree of the garden so the devil suggested to eve something that he knew god didn't say and he put her in a position to want to defend god so she decided that's not what god said like people might say to you i heard that you said this right at that moment right at that moment you can decide to argue with that thought or dismiss that thought i heard this is what you said the devil did the very same thing he presented to eve a plausible thought and he said i know that based on her commitment to god she is going to try to defend his honor so she said that's not what god said and the moment that she embraced the thought he presented the conversation began and when the conversation begins it's a slow methodical seduction to a place that we know that we should not be look at the next step the first thing we do is we decide to present ourselves to the thought then when we present ourselves the next things we next thing we do is we decide to obey and then we embrace and when we embrace the thought what happened to eve happens to us we cross over from imagination to manifestation follow me carefully she no longer had to imagine what the fruit felt like or what the fruit tasted like what was in her imagination became her manifestation it became as real as the thought that she wrestled with long before she got to the tree now let me break it down even more imagination forms a mental picture it develops a thought in our minds but when we yield to the precursor or the activating thought something begins to take over and there's a natural opening of a door and we begin to investigate an area that we know logically we shouldn't be there but we go there because and listen carefully because we dismiss what god told us about what we are about to do we dismiss god's prohibition and we think that we are in the place where we can handle disobedience without god's help let's look at that in romans 1. romans 1 talks about the activating factor romans 1 talks about the activating factor he talks about the psychological disconnect when we ignore what god prohibits us from participating in romans 1 verse 21 because that when they knew god did the texts say they knew god when they knew god they glorified him not as god neither were thankful but look what happens when we don't glorify god when we don't acknowledge god for his blessings to us notice what happens in the mind but became vain in their what imaginations and their foolish hearts were what darkened let's not run past that too quickly i can tell you from experience that when you ignore what god says don't do the light goes out because the imagination is no longer on a godly plane it dismissed what god said and the thoughts are no longer now under god's direction your thoughts become vain what does it mean vain thoughts it means your thoughts are not being led by godly principles by god's word by any of god's prohibitions and so now you are putting yourself in the battle and your enemy or your opponent or your adversary is far more equipped to defeat you than you are without god's help and then when you think that you could handle it what happens to your heart your foolish heart becomes what darkened because when we reject light there's only one else one other thing that takes its place and that is darkness let's see what happens look at verse 28. of romans 1. why did this happen you'll find this is the reason why i always encourage people to study god's word romans 1 verse 28 look at what happened and even as they did not like to do what retain god in their knowledge when god is not in your knowledge there's only one other god that's there one the supreme sinless god is not in our knowledge there's only one other person on that throne it's the adversary or adversary of our souls it's our arch enemy it is the deceiver when we don't like to retain god in our knowledge look what happens the foolish heart paul makes it even clearer what happens to the foolish heart the bible says god gave them over to what kind of mind a debased mind to do those things which are not fitting now i'm not going to go into the things that are not fitting in the base activity what i want to focus on today is what happens in the mind when our minds are not controlled by the presence of god you see a lot of times you've heard me say do you have a prayer life do you have a study life do you have a devotional life and if you think that's something that we could dismiss if jesus himself knew that his only answer to defeat the devil was it is written how can we defeat the devil without it is written you can't do it so the very the very book that god has preserved thank god for the preservation of his word the very book that god has preserved to give us power in those moments when our imaginations and our thoughts are darkened because we don't like to retain god in our knowledge meaning what we want to do and what god god's word says clashes and so we choose what we want to do over what god's word says and then our minds become dark our thoughts become vain our hearts become foolish and our minds become debased and we are going down a path that began with thoughts and imaginations that were not guided by the molding influence of god's word well how do i know that look at hebrews 4 and verse 12. how do i know that i can tell you i i tell you guys so much about me you ought to start telling me stuff about you i can tell you that the greater the greater battles i've faced in my life came when i was not studying the bible came when i was only using the bible for sermon preparation rather than for personal growth if the only reason that you use the bible is to give a bible study or to study your sabbath school lesson or to get ready for some kind of activity the word of god should be more important to us than our daily meal it should be the first thing of our day we should fill our minds with the thoughts of god's word and here's the reason why here's the reason why look at hebrews 4 and verse 12. the bible says for the word of god is what living and what else powerful sharper than any two-edged sword piercing even to the division of soul and spirit it's getting way down into the psyche of humanity and of joints and marrows and don't miss this part this is why the devil wants to keep us from studying god's word and is a discerner of the what thoughts and what else intents of the heart i said this before but it fits right now when we start reading god's word god's word starts reading us god's word is the guard rail it's the yellow lines in our journey it's the stop signs the warning signs the railroad crossing signs without the word of god we might think we are free but as one person said if you think that red lights are bad when the red lights stop working the traffic stops moving when the word of god is not moving in your life your life is not going anywhere pleasant but when you are reading god's word notice what the bible says the word of god discerns your thoughts it knows what you're thinking because it's a living let me say that again the word of god is alive it's a living book it's not just a book on pages printed by thomas nelson or by remnant publications the word of god is god breathe all scripture is given by inspiration of god now let's follow that if the word of god sorry let me rephrase that because the word of god is living why would we put aside the living word of god to venture into paths that are strewn with nothing but thoughts that will lead us to death a lot of people say but i don't have time for bible studies my schedule is too busy and the devil loves to hear that because if our schedule is too busy to protect ourselves we are in trouble because the devil knows that if the word of god is not the shaping molding influence of our thoughts and our imaginations than facebook is and twitter is and instagram is and tick tock is and all the other social media outlets are or the radio or the or the ear plugs that are in your ear pumping into your brain without your permission thoughts and words that will inevitably move you in a direction when the devil calls on it the things you watch the movies that you bring into your homes the things that you thumb through on on instagram and and on on youtube one medium giant said that more videos are uploaded to youtube in one day than we can watch in 500 years if that's all we did it's a spiral but those are the things that are moving fast the reason why so many people don't have a delight to study god's word is because god's word god does not reveal his truth in three seconds somebody once said oh you know if you don't get their attention in 20 seconds they're lost no i'm sorry if god don't get their attention in 20 seconds they're lost so the devil says if it's not fast if it's not quick it's not interesting let me tell you something friends you will never know interesting until you spend a good hour studying god's word and what i've discovered what i've discovered is the more time you spend studying god's word the sweeter it gets and then all of a sudden the things that want to find itself in your home and in your mind and in your heart all of a sudden start looking dark like it really is my wife and i discover that we're in the book of isaiah we're loving it we are loving it we say well we only have time to read one chapter we get to the end of one chapter let's read another one got to find out what happened and when we get to the end of the second one she said well the next one's only 12 verses let's read that one and before you know it it's like and we pause and we think about it we talk about it let me say something to you husbands you ought to sit down and read the word of god with your wife thank you you ought to be the priest of your home not because it's convenient but but because if you don't have a wall against the outside world being built in your life your your heart is going to be darkened your imaginations are going to be vain because the word of god which is a discerner of your thoughts and intentions are not even there it's like the gatekeeper tracy has been fired and anybody can come in god's word is the gatekeeper what happened to the enter deluvians you know what happened they didn't like to retain god in their knowledge you know what happened when when when god's word is not shaping us you know what happens evil no longer seems wicked and good is no longer desirable when we don't study god's word when living right loses its appeal a bewitching addiction takes you over i'll look at some of these young folk and i say how could they do that and have no conscience against it i know what i'm talking about i've been down that road i've been down that road and i'm speaking today on the on the heels of knowing the deficit and the liability of going down the wrong road like somebody once said you don't want to go down that road i've been down there you don't want to go down that road i've been down there isaiah the prophet talks about that evil will no longer seem wicked and good will no longer seem desirable right living is going to lose its appeal and then this bewitching addiction takes over and then something happens in the psyche that's why i was looking at the churches today i like to look at different churches not just our church but i'm going to tell you every christian church is going through a paradigm shift that is shocking to the eyes of god because the word of god is being minimized music is being maximized it's no longer a thus saith the lord but as i love you lord i feel your presence i'm glad you're here i ain't reading your word and we leave churches like a drug addict and when the drug of the the hype leaves our veins we have no word of god to fall back on because we do not like to retain god in our knowledge and if you don't think the devil takes advantage of that you don't know who he is isaiah the prophet talked about a time he talks about what happens when the word of god is not shaping our minds look at isaiah 5. not one you familiar with but i believe you'll not forget it today isaiah 5 and verse 20 and 21 he talks about what happens when the imagination and the thoughts are not guided by god he says woe to those who call evil good and good evil that's this world who put darkness for light and light for darkness who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter that's this world woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and prudent in their own sight that's this world you ever talk to a young person that you want to slap come on excuse me lord some folk you don't want to talk you just want to say wake up i'm not abusive but sometimes you want to say i tell you honey that person needs a that person needs the person i was raised with amen old folk some of these now don't do that johnny some of the stuff i see in walmart i'll leave it right there but what isaiah is saying is that when our thoughts are not shaped by god's word that's that to me is a striking example of what's happening in our world today it is so deep that people are going to church and they can even embrace and understand the simple things of god's word i gave you the example yesterday i've had other examples of people that thought this was so i said if you read god's word you'll see it's not so but ministers today are clever they they navigate around the things that may upset the intellect of the people that they want to seduce and the things that are happening in our world today not only in the world but in the churches not only in the churches but in our church when you get to the place when you get to the place where immorality to base practices man with men women with women and then you say i need your support to let the adventist church know that their position on these issues are wrong something is seriously wrong they're calling evil good and they're calling good evil then they say it's legal you can't speak against it i'm sorry answer to an even higher authority but why do you speak against it not to condemn the sinner but to show the sinner that there is something called redemption and deliverance and forgiveness and that today is becoming the that's becoming the dinosaur in sermons today people are waiting for their ships to come in rather than for the power of the holy spirit to come in and when our discerning center as isaiah makes it when our discerning center yields to evil our thoughts and imaginations take over but it goes even deeper than that because what's happening today is we see the problem as the things around us and not what's taking place within us follow my lead when our thoughts are not governed by god's word we see sin as our enemy because it's easier to see sin as our enemy than to see our behavior as our enemy we blame the substance we blame the attraction or the habit and we stop taking responsibility for our own choices follow me carefully do you think the devil made eve sin do you think the devil when when adam was confronted by his wife that he had no choice but to partake of the fruit i don't believe that so today we do what adam did when we fall into transgression you know what we say instead of saying i have sinned we say the woman you gave me when we blame others and we see others as our enemy we know we no longer examine ourselves we blame others and we take no responsibility for our behavior now where did we get that from from our parents adam said the woman you gave me and she said the serpent beguiled me and we say today now this is a very powerful point and i'm going to repeat it again sin is an enemy but sin doesn't make you sin you got a yield in order for that sin to be born sin doesn't sin doesn't jump on you and say you better do this you got to decide but when we say you know if it wasn't for that alcohol if it wasn't for that cigarette if it wasn't for that pornography it wasn't for that man it wasn't for that woman i'd be all right so we go through life blaming all of the external stimuli rather than saying lord i need you to help me get in control of my actions and my thoughts i need you to change me from the inside so that what happens around me is no longer the focus of my blame and the reason i know that's the real because jesus walked the same earth that we're walking today and the bible says he was tempted in all points just as we are ended with me yet without sin he didn't even yield in thought and as i get older my wife and i have some great conversations and i've gotten to the place in my walk with god that i'm not just i'm no i'm no longer in the theory i'm in the i'm in the practicum i'm practicing i'm i'm looking i'm examining i'm looking at me who are you what are you what do you like what do you dislike what is easy for you to fall into and what is difficult for you to do right we don't examine ourselves everything and everybody will be the reason why we act and behave the way we do and we'll never take personal responsibility for the choice that god has given us the power to make and we'll say it's the drug it's the substance it's other people i wouldn't be this way if it weren't for them but look at ezekiel 18 and verse 20. the bible doesn't give us an out the bible does not give us an out it holds us responsible look at ezekiel 18 and verse 20. if we think it's the drug the substance and other people that are responsible for our behavior we will not be saved ezekiel 18 verse 20 the bible says the soul who sins shall die but look what it opens up even wider the son shall not bear the guilt of the father nor the father bear the guilt of the son the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon whom himself in other words whatever he does right he's the only one to benefit from it but it goes on further and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself each one is responsible for his or her own choices and each one of us is responsible for our own destiny you know why that gives me excitement it's because not one of you sitting here today could prevent me from being saved come on say amen there's not a person in this church that could prevent you from being saved if it is your choice that's why david prayed the prayer he did let's look at the let's look at the steps of deliverance the first step of deliverance is taking personal responsibility and this is something that is not common today but david the psalmist makes it clear as to what the first step should be in our lives look at psalm 139 verse 23 and 24. this is what we have to pray we like to say lord examine that person or examine him or them or they but look what david prayed psalm 139 verse 23 and 24. look what he said what's the first two words say it one more time let that be your testimony one more time search me oh god and know my heart try me and know my thoughts you see the personal responsibility there now why is david praying that because david knew david knew that the sin of his past was because he gave his thoughts and imaginations supremacy over making right choices and the devil can't make you do anything but he didn't stop there search me your god and know my heart try me and know my thoughts but look at this and see if there be any wicked way in me and lead me in the way everlasting when i read that text i had to put three questions together that i want to throw at you what would god find if you invited him to examine your thoughts what are you thinking right now i wish that sermon would hurry up and end he always make a noise i wish so-and-so is here today to hear this sermon i hear why do they have to come to church today what would happen if we ask god to reveal to us our thoughts what would happen what would happen how different would we be if god exposed us to our imaginations how would we feel god invites you down to central booking put you in the interrogation room and he looks you in your eye and says so tell me did you do it and he knows your thoughts he knows your imagination he sees you calculating your next lie and some of us are really good liars but you know what we do we lie to ourselves the greater lie is not the lie we tell others but the lie we tell ourselves and that is this i there will be no negative impact to the way i live because eventually i'm gonna get better let me make a point here you don't get better one day if you practice if you live a negligent life and the study of god's word is a haphazard periodical activity in your life and you don't take time to study and pray if you live a haphazard life just just apply that to your job how good would our production be if we had a haphazard production department oh the colors really don't matter so other people hear it or see it doesn't really make a difference the same tenacity we apply to the things of our lives we should apply to developing a spiritual character for the kingdom because we're not going to one day uh two weeks before jesus comes get righteous because habit is a powerful thing does anybody know that habit is a powerful thing some people lie so long that they lie we knew somebody said man if the mouth is moving they'll lie and some people can build a story and the more they talk the greater the the event gets and before you know it it doesn't even exist except in their words and in their thoughts david prayed that prayer because he knew that sin is powerful but once you one what you need to recognize and what we need to recognize is sin cannot force our will we've got to surrender our will made it even clearer we are not victims of sin we are victims of our own wrong choices but you know what folk don't like to take responsibility case in point three people rob a bank they'll all turn on each other it was his idea but look what james says james 1 verse 14 and 15. we've got to take responsibility for our own actions don't blame anybody else because james says it's a slow methodical process that will incarcerate you before you know it james 1 verse 14 but each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires that's his thoughts and imaginations and enticed in other words instead of saying i shouldn't be thinking that i shouldn't be thinking that i should not be imagining that you ever had a thought that you want to push away but you didn't and later on four or five hours later or the next day you wish you did that's what james is talking about because look what he says in verse 15 then when desire has conceived what does it show you it gives birth to sin and sin when it is what full grown brings forth death that means a lot of us didn't have to be there we didn't have to get there but we didn't push the thought away when we were tempted you want a bulletin temptation is not sin temptation is temptation yielding to it gives birth to sin and the bible doesn't let us off the hook i was reading the other day and i may have said this but if i didn't i'm gonna repeat it anyway we're reading ellen white's writings and she says the same character that we go down into the grave with is the same character we're coming out of the grave with she says death does not change our character it just solidifies us in the character that we have nurtured and i looked at my wife square in the eye and said honey we got to get this right before we go in the grave because i plan on coming out in the first resurrection i don't want to go in at all but if the lord doesn't come in my lifetime i want them at my funeral to say he lives a godly life and even if they don't i want god to be able to say he lived a godly life but it all comes down to making the right choice look at joshua 24 15 just the beginning of it just the beginning of it and if it seems evil to you to serve the lord choose what is that word choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve now let's get this i'm going to transition now and come and bring it to a close this is the part that really gets me he says choose you this day whom you will serve there's nothing that irritates other folk more than when your children are not trained it's amazing how people overlook their own unruly kids but they don't like other people's unruly kids come on say amen and they see that kid acting up some mothers you know leave their switchblades in their purse when they see other people's kids acting up you can see the anger on their faces in the stores but the thing that came to me as i was studying this when we failed to train ourselves to make right choices our thoughts and our imaginations have supremacy over us think about the whole word train we train dogs right we train children we train birds we train animals we train circus animals we train monkeys we train tigers and depending on the level of difficulty we keep on training them until they do what we want them to do now follow this if animals can be trained to do what we want them to do why don't we take responsibility for training ourselves so you know what i'm doing now i don't want to appear perfect so i got a ways to go but i'm not going to get there because you trained me i'm going to get there because i asked the holy spirit to train me jesus made a statement that we often miss in john 6 and verse 40. it's not a very common one but it's powerful when the disciples were worrying and concerned about who they were going to be look at what jesus hit them on the forehead with he said to them in luke 6 and verse 40 a disciple is not above his teacher but everyone who is what perfectly trained let's see that again who is what perfectly trained will be like his teacher have you read that text before now watch what the bible is saying who do we want to be like our teacher how does that happen only if we are perfectly trained who's going to train you you have got to take the responsibility of training yourself when you read god's word the holy spirit tells you that's right that's wrong don't go there go here don't do that do this and then you train your mind look at this quotation in testimonies for the church powerful quotation volume 3 page 22. look at this the mind must be trained through daily tests to habits of fidelity to a sense of the claims of right and duty above inclination and pleasure that means don't go down the path that your natural crook itself want to go down train yourself discipline yourself minds thus trained do not waver between right and wrong as the reeds trembles in the wind but it goes on to say as soon as matters come before them when as soon as matters come before that i mean as soon as you got to make a decision notice what else it says as soon as matters come before them they discern at once that principle is involved and look what happens when they are trained and they instinctively choose the right without longing without long debating the matter that means they don't stand there and argue between their feelings and what god's word says and then she ends by saying they are loyal because they have trained themselves in habits of faithfulness and truth thank you thank you bob i don't know how you know i was going there when the three hebrews stood in that in in the front of nebuchadnezzar and nebuchadnezzar said i'm going to heat the furnace seven times hotter they didn't fear the furnace they honored the lord if ex the devil said let me see what kind of external stimuli can get them to change their mind in areas of fidelity and obedience and that story was recorded bob to let us know that no amount of external threat or external stimuli can change the mind of a person who has taken personal responsibility to train his or her thoughts simply translated you don't have to do it just because the temptation presents itself you don't have to think it because the thought presents itself you don't have to embrace it and build on it just because it's there can you imagine people going to grand canyon and because there's a cliff they just jump off because it's there no absolutely not we don't jump off because we know that the disability or the liability once you are airborne there is no turning back the same thing is with sin sin is like a cavernous drop if you don't discipline yourself and i told my wife this when we went to grand canyon back in 2016 we were there in the grand canyon and uh i want to take a bit she's backing up i said honey stop and she turned around to look and the edge was like about six feet away well i didn't know that i was that close god wants us to turn around and face the direction of our footsteps and know that the next step we take can mean the difference between failure and success but as this quotation made it very very clear the reason why god has to chastise some of us is he has to show us that our bad choices need to be re-examined and so god sometimes brings adversity so that he could begin to train us in the areas that we fail to train ourselves that's why some people go through stuff they shouldn't even go through anybody know what i'm talking about some people go through trials and difficulty and hardship and pain that they never had to go through but why did they go through it because they didn't train themselves to say yes or no that's why the writer of hebrews writes what he does in hebrews 12 and verse 11 he said when you fall down the path you shouldn't go down what does god do out of love for us notice what he does now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present but painful but god sees you've gone down the wrong path he's got to bend you back but he continues nevertheless afterwards it yield the peaceable fruit of what righteousness to those who are trained by it let me tell you god has been training me every year that i've been in ministry and i want to tell you sometimes it's painful but afterward i say thank god he loves me enough to put me back on the path even though he has to chastise me to get me there i'm not afraid of god's chastisement but the problem with the battle of sin is we try to suppress the sin instead of trying to suppress our own choices we we try to suppress the the activity rather than the thought that leads us to the activity and the bible does not let us off the hook as i close look at my last three scriptures isaiah 1 verse 16 the bible makes it clear that we have a personal responsibility we cannot just blame and say it was just my imagination look at the personal responsibility of character development wash yourselves isaiah 1 verse 16 do what wash yourselves that means if you have this hope you purify yourself as god has already made you pure in other words your mother cleans the house and she says keep it the way i've made it when god cleans up our lives we have to make choices that are continually daily washing us keeping us clean in the righteous character of christ he says wash yourselves make yourselves clean put away the evil of your doings from before my eyes cease to do evil and what are the last four words learn to do good the problem with too many christians is they want a righteous life without training themselves or putting forth any effort to develop it and here's the final part the most pivotal part i left for last the most pivotal part i left for last here's the most pivotal part go to luke chapter 22. it was found in the life of jesus and by the way our best example is jesus jesus made this decision he was confronted like we were confronted as we will be but notice the decision he made and before i read the passage i want to tell you the verse in a moment before i read the passage what i want to say is this god will not remove the temptation listen to me carefully god will not remove the temptation because god wants to see what choice you're going to make at that moment god doesn't make the choice for us he wants us to make the choice between his will and our will he's not going to remove the temptation because he's saying you've got the power to choose between right and wrong and so often instead of knowing and exercising our power to choose between right and wrong we say if it wasn't for this or for that or for him or for her or for them i wouldn't be this way i am so glad that jesus didn't say that look at what he said when he was hung between the choice to give in or the choice to fold up look at what he said in luke 22 and verse 42 we read these words faced with that trying moment he says father if it is your will meaning remove take this cup away from me did the father take away the cup god will not remove the trial in the moment of the test here's our response jesus established the example nevertheless not my will together but yours be done i'll reiterate this only because it needs to be reiterated the lord does not remove the temptation now let me make it clear make it practical how many of you wish there were not certain temptations in the world amen you could be sitting down listening to the perfect watching a family program and thoughts popped in your head that you wish were not there something shows up on the screen you wish wasn't there and you say now why did that have to be what does that have to do with what i'm watching and lord says at that moment what choice are you going to make you're going to sit there and imbibe or you're going to change your channel or get up and walk away say it again honey we change your channel i'm not watching it i'm not looking at it i'm not thinking about it if you don't know your enemy you're in trouble sometimes you're watching a beautiful innocuous show and all of a sudden the commercial comes in and the devil is right there on the screen turn it turn it off get up move pray ask god for help the lord said not my will but thine be done but let me show you the benefit of this statement the benefit of making this decision is powerful for us as christians because as soon as jesus decided to give his will to his father as soon as he decided to submit his will to the father as soon as he said what the father wants is more important than what my flesh is crying out because he was crying out that his flesh did not have to endure the trial before him father remove the cup from me the father was not removing the cup and knowing that he said but not my will thine be done what happens when we choose to submit our wills to god look what happens look at verse 43 as soon as we choose to surrender our will to god's will look what happens then an angel appeared to him from heaven strengthening him did you know that that would happen the moment you decide to submit you other gods when young folk older folk everybody listening when we decide at that pivotal moment to submit our wills to god god sends an angel from heaven to give us strength can you say amen we think that we have to battle for the next moment no not my will yours be done i'm going to send you reinforcements that's why the writer of the book of acts says whosoever shall call upon the name of the lord shall be saved when peter was sinking he said lord save me and immediately god stretched down his hand and prevented peter from drowning let me tell you my brothers when you're faced with imaginations and thoughts that are pulling you down understand the moment you submit to god's will he sends an angel to strengthen you but you know what you got to get past that moment that's the most pivotal moment in the victory or the failure of your day and when that strength comes god brings with it something else he brings some divine weapons here it is here it is here it is second corinthians 10 verse 4 and 5 for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but what are they shall he mighty through god to the pulling down of strongholds casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalted itself against the knowledge of god and bringing into captivity every what every thought to the obedience of christ amen i know you guys are thinking about it really hard i don't know what there is to think about it that's an amen hallelujah when we submit to god he he brings down the thoughts the imaginations and he brings them by the aiding influence of his spirit everything into harmony with the will of god casting down every imagination and the thoughts that seek to exalt itself above god so we're not helpless so now let's end with the four steps of victory what happens when the thought presents itself the first thing we need to do is present ourselves to the lord is to do what church when the thought presents itself present yourself to the lord that's why joseph said how can i do this great wickedness and sin against god joseph at that pivotal moment said no he didn't say maybe let me think about it he trained his mind for the battle of the moment and i can tell you many of us if not most of us have fallen in the moments of greater tests because we did not train our minds for the moment that has not yet come god never intended for righteousness to be just my imagination he intended to be my experience when the thought comes present yourself to the lord the next thing when we present ourselves the next thing is instead of obeying the thought we decide to obey the word of god when we obey the word of god we embrace his righteousness like eve embraced the fruit of disobedience and when we embrace the fruit of righteousness get this part we cross over from imagination to the manifestation of the presence of god in our lives god never intended for a righteous life to be just my imagination second corinthians 4 and verse 11 for we who live are always delivered to to death for jesus you know what paul means we've got to put those thoughts we've got to put those imaginations to death for jesus sake and when we do that look at what is going to happen we go from imagination to manifestation that the life of jesus also may be what manifested in our mortal flesh how many of us want the life of jesus to be manifested in us and then john the apostle reminds us in first john 3 2 we shall be like him but we shall see him as he is you want to be like jesus here's the last thing we do and i want to preface this by saying these words the world is tired of imaginary christianity i see it on i see it in the news the arguments between conservatives and liberals people swinging the bible but ain't living the bible talking about what we need to do but ain't doing it themselves the world is tied of imaginary christians when we surrender our thoughts and imaginations to the will of god the world will finally see a glimpse of god's imagination for us did you grab that you see righteousness should not be just our imagination righteousness is god's imagination but only god can take our imagination and turn it into his manifestation but he'll never do it unless we decide what we're going to do with our thoughts what are we going to think about what are we going to focus on here's the last scripture and i want us all to read this together the key to leaving the past behind the key to defeating that sin that continues to pop itself up and say to you you'll never be anything other than what you've done the key to finding victory at the pivotal moments when the temptation seems too great god says what are you going to do with your thoughts right now and here's what the apostle paul tells us by the guiding hand of god that we must all do together finally brethren whatsoever things are what true whatsoever things are what honest what's over things are what just what's over things are what pure whatsoever things are lovely whatsoever things are of what good report if there be any virtue and if there be any praise together what think on these things and you can't think on it if you don't put the if you don't install the hard drive [Music] how much of god's word is in your brain that you think about if it's just a short verse once a week or as you're running out of the door quick prayer you don't have enough hard drive in there there's not enough information so i'm gonna ask you today do you want your christian life to be just your imagination do you want victory to be just your imagination or do you want victory to be your manifestation so i'm going to ask you today and i challenge you tenaciously and passionately because brethren if we are going to be if we are going to reach out to the community around us they can't come in here and see imaginary christianity they need to see real christianity they need to see folk that love each other regardless of where we've been what we've done we're all as i've said before we're all saints under construction they want to see what god can do for us and until they see the manifestation of god in us they'll never desire to have the manifestation of god in their own lives so would you stand with me so we can pray for that it's not going to happen because you desire it it's only going to happen because at the pivotal moments of the challenge you're going to make the decision that this is the path i must go no to the thought and the imagination and yes submit your will to the molding of the power of god and then he will manifest his presence in your life i know it because he did it for me and i know he's done it for many of you but we've got to do this intentionally don't let it be haphazard don't let it be by chance let it be by plan let it be purposeful and we will experience the imagination of god in our righteous life father in heaven the world wants to mold our thoughts and our imaginations but god wants us to see what he has always imagined a purified bride a church without spot or wrinkle or any such thing god wants the world to see his imagination a delivered saint a forgiven child a forgiven son or daughter of god god wants this world to see a fisherman now becoming a preacher god wants to see a man who doubt to become a man who stands on the promises of god god wants to take the pharisee and make him a proclaimer of the eternal word of god he wants to take those who turn their back on him to turn their face towards him he wants to take the sinner and make them hold and then put them on display for the world to see that yes god was able to change this life and to deliver it so lord jesus today as we are challenged by what is taking place in our hearts help us to take the words of our mouths and the meditations of our hearts and may they be acceptable in thy sight o lord our strength and our redeemer in jesus name we pray amen

Channel: Thompsonville Seventh-day Adventist Church

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Length: 85min 35sec (5135 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 26 2021