 that the enemy is after you and he's after two things and two ways is he's after you that I want to focus in on is first off he wants to create isolation in you and surround you with toxic people those are the two ways that I want to focus there's a whole lot more of course that I can list and list on but the two ones that I want to talk about is isolation and toxic people isolation will always make you feel like people are the problem and number two toxic people will always make you feel like you're a problem so isolation is completely the enemy's plan even every time people are in war what the enemy will do even in natural wars is that the best place for you to be attacked is when you are isolated so here's a couple of statistics on isolation that I found quite interesting is that what isolation does is what when your world dies before you do so a psychologist said that and before I read the statistics is that your world dies before you do a terrible and the most saddest feeling to feel is when you're trying to move with your life or try to live but you're truly not living you're truly not living to your fullest potential because everything enemy is already taking everyone is against you everyone's against you and everyone's out to hurt you and one of the things that it said is that social isolation is a growing epidemic in America loneliness has doubled from 20 percent to 40 percent since the 1980s individuals with less social connection have disrupted sleep patterns altered immune system more inflammation and higher levels of stress hormones which causes diabetes with cut which causes heart disease and so on and so forth I isolation increases the risk of heart disease by 29 percent and stroke by 32 percent this is my last one I want to read to you guys on socially isolated individuals had a 30 percent higher risk of dying in the next seven years and that is the effect which was largest in middle age we need to be surrounded by people God did not design you to be isolated for you not to have people that will love on you and to build life with he did not design it that way God does not want you to be alone for he said as I bring back that scripture Genesis 2 18 he says for it's not good for man to be alone we need each other you guys all know that the worst pain comes from a person and the greatest joy comes from the person so even though someone may have hurt you in the past and there's no trust at all it is taking that risk taking that step and saying even though I feel this way I'll take a step the enemy is afraid of you he is afraid of you I'm gonna tell you the devil is powerful but he's predictable and he knows how this works and he knows first is that he wants to kill your identity so that you never walk in confidence of who you are so that's what he does he isolates you to remove people to build you up and then he gives you toxic people to destroy what you think you are okay so he will try he knows how you work because once you discover what you're about once you discover who you truly are in Jesus Christ that he says you can trample over scorpions that you can cast out demons that you are victorious that you are more than a conqueror come on now if you only knew what you are capable of if you only knew things would be absolutely different so he is after your identity so he wants to make you alone so that no one will tell you different what we need to do this year is to get rid of some to get rid of the people that are burdening you and the reason why I say is that you don't want to say I'm better than you see ya later you don't want to ever do that absolutely not because one day you will influence them yes amen because it's either right now you're they're influencing you or you influencing them there's no middle there's no middle so if you are in a position where they're influencing you walk away and once you are strong enough and you have other people surrounding you then you go back and get them over here to your side amen so with with your influence because you have it the enemy wants to surround you with the people that will try to destroy your name try to bring you down break you down trying to make you feel that it's always your fault by manipulating you by all of those things there's so many types of people that psychologists have listed that state how a toxic person is negative breaking you down instead of building you up corrupting your integrity suffocation manipulation removing faith and adding doubt now I want to speak to some people that have been in a battlefield of being afraid to let go of their friends because I know that there's people out there that have this problem I've had that problem too and I was afraid to let them go because I didn't want to be alone and I felt like I worked so hard to get these friends but at the end of the day they didn't really care when I left so but the point is is that if you stayed with them what's gonna happen is is that you should be afraid to not leave your friends but be afraid of that you will never become of your destiny and it's it it's not about being afraid to leave the people but be afraid that your destiny will never come up now if you're thinking oh my friends don't have that much power over me well I want to tell you that thinking is wrong and there's a scripture that I want to share with you that happened all of you know the story of David and Gideon yes now before David was about to take David and Gideon Goliath I'm so sorry yeah they all came together there was such great man of valor no the story of David and Goliath now Goliath comes and he starts to speak against the men of God God's people and says who will challenge me for 40 days and for 40 nights all of these men were afraid of this Goliath he was kind of scary looking I'm sure and so everyone was afraid and holding back now here comes David walking in and he starts to ask questions now it says in 1st Samuel 17 if you guys want to follow and verse 26 David asked the soldiers standing nearby what will a man get for killing this Philistine and ending his defiance of Israel who is this pagan anyway that he's allowed to defy the armies of the living God so he's kind of like who is this guy like trying to you know bring down our God and make him think that he's terrible or something like that but then jump to verse 28 it says but when David's oldest brother Elab heard David talking to the men he was angry what are you doing around here anyway and he skips to verse 29 says what have I done now David replied I was only asking a question he walked over to some others and asked him the same thing and received the same answer then David's question was reported back to Saul and the king sent for him now I just really want to take this and I'm gonna wrap this up is that his brother Elab his three older brothers were exactly those toxic people he said who are you aren't you supposed to go back to the sheep what do you think you're doing go sit back down don't you dare go and try to start asking questions what those negative people were trying to do is stop him from becoming one of the greatest men of God in the Bible try to stop him from fighting that Goliath what would have happened if David was with those brothers he would have been one of those brothers that were standing 40 days and 40 nights but but because he wasn't hanging out with them he became that day that God called them to be and he walked into his destiny amen hey guys it's Bryson and I'm so glad that you made it to life group this week real quick I just want to take a second and fill you in on some information that you may not know about our church first thing is that we have growth track every single Sunday of the month and it's a great place to get plugged in and connected if you're not already plugged in so make sure you make it this Sunday also we have every third Sunday of the month water baptisms if you are saved but you haven't been water baptized make sure you talk to your life group leader for more information and lastly on June 28th through the 29th we have what we call our freedom weekend it's an encounter weekend where there's going to be healing there's going to be deliverance there's going to be food it's going to be an amazing time that you don't want to miss so make sure you're listening up for information in these next couple weeks about this event anyways God bless you guys