 So, my mom spoke to you this morning about how we minister and what an unbound session looks like. So, I hope that you have a pretty good picture of what the process looks like and that it's pretty simple and as you seek ministry, maybe today or tomorrow, that you'll know what to expect. I want to, did she go over the ministry resources that you received this morning? Okay, I'm gonna, she said I would do that, good for her. I'm gonna go over those resources now before we talk about staying free. So, these are some helpful resources, they're all on our website. You can download them, they're in PDF form. You can print them out, you can give them away. These are just helpful resources for introducing unbound to others and also as you begin to minister to others, very helpful things that we use. The first one is simply an unbound summary. A lot of people won't read the book or have trouble reading a book or they start the book and then they get stopped and they'll say, what else do you have? And you could, we have a CD or MP3 that you can purchase from our website called an overview of the five keys, which is like less than an hour talk and it gives a summary of the five keys. So that's another thing that you can give to people who have trouble. Getting through the book, but you could also give them this two page summary, which is really just an explanation of the five keys in the context of the gospel. And it could be something that you review just to be reminded. There's also just an explanation of the resources that we have for sale. Some of them are in the bookstore, but there's a short description of each. I'll talk a little bit more about tomorrow. I'll talk a little bit more about how to bring unbound to your parish, how to use unbound in the confessional, and then how to use the study programs that we've created to lead people through. So we have the freedom in Christ, basic training, and then advanced training. So that you can actually establish teams in your parish. The discernment of spirits article is a really helpful article that helps people to understand how do you use the gift of discernment within the context of unbound ministry. And maybe you know this, but in some ministries, things often go off the rails because of abuse in the area of discernment. When we use our discernment in ways that are controlling or manipulative, and we don't honor the dignity and the free will of the person, that's a lot of times when deliverance ministry or other ministries can become quite harmful. So there's important information about how discernment is used within the unbound process. And if I could summarize it in a word, I would say, turn your discernment into a question. That's the best way to keep your discernment safe. When you start labeling people, when you start putting your discernment onto other people, rather than asking a question, you then leave yourself open to different types of manipulation and sometimes hurting people deeply. So you could read that when you have a chance. There is also samples of related spirits. There's a list of spirits, and spirits are often related. In other words, they work together to hold a person in bondage. And so it's very common for someone, let's say you have someone who's dealing with something like perfectionism. You know, perfectionism is often rooted in fear. It's insecurity. It can be connected to pride. A lot of people who struggle with perfectionism often struggle with things like comparison and envy. And so when you know the things that typically go together, you can ask questions that help people get a bigger picture of who their enemies are. And it can be helpful to learn from a list like this. Now we don't depend on this list. We don't use it like a manual or something, but it's help over us as we're beginning to just get to know the human heart and the common things that people struggle with. I remember praying with a young man once, and he told me some of his story, and I just started asking him follow-up questions based on things that I knew were related. And then I put out throughout this and that, and he was like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then he looked at me and he goes, are you a psychic? I was like, I'm not a psychic. I'm really not. This is, I just know, I've talked to a lot of people, and I know that these are common things that people struggle with. And so what he was experiencing as like revelation from God was really just an understanding of the human heart. And so this can help you get to know the heart, but in general, you're gonna learn by doing. You're gonna learn by listening to people's hearts. Similar to that is a list of common lies. We just compiled a list of common deceptions that people, everyday people struggle with, and some of them are really quite deep and hold people in tremendous bondage, and people have never even considered that these are lies, that these are from the enemy. The learning to listen practice sheet is a great resource. This is our note taking tool. So when we do an unbound session, my mom mentioned we take notes, and we only take notes on the issues that are coming up as they relate to the five keys. And so we found that it's very helpful for you to organize your notes by the keys. So if someone mentions a particular thing that they're sorry for and they wanna express sorrow for, we put that under key number one. If lies are coming up, we put them under key number three. And so not only does it have the areas where you can list these things, but it also has the wording of the prayer. How many of you are grateful for that? How do I lead them in forgiveness again? And so the wording is there as well as covering some types of renunciation like the occult and soul ties, which are a little bit different wording. I think that covers it all. Last is a little flyer for the Unbound Leaders Conference, which will be in Malvern at the Malvern Retreat Center in Pennsylvania. So we would love to have you all come for that. It's a tremendous time to be with people. Some people come from all over the world to be a part of this. You get to hear incredible stories about what God is doing with Unbound, connect with people who are doing it, get good ideas about how to bring it to your parish, how to use it in your ministry. It's a really, I always go away, exhausted but edified in so many ways from that Leaders Conference. Some amazing folks show up. Okay, commercial's over. So this talk is on staying free the battle for the mind. The battle for the mind. So I'm gonna start with the bad news first. You ready for the bad news? Just because we are free doesn't mean the devil leaves us alone. Just because we are free doesn't mean that the flesh goes away. Just because we are free doesn't mean there isn't a battle to be won. It doesn't mean that we don't need to be formed in virtue. It doesn't mean that we don't need spiritual disciplines or all the other things that the church offers us and encourages us to do. So in some cases, in some ways, it's the battle, it might be like, oh man, really? You know, I just received this amazing gift. I just received this amazing freedom. Now you're telling me there's a battle to be fought. But what I wanna say is that's actually good news. The battle is actually where your freedom is going to get played out. The battle is actually where your freedom is gonna be fully realized. The battle is going to be where you step into the freedom and you actually take a hold of it. So if deliverance is taking hold of that freedom that belongs to the sons and daughters of God, it's in living out what it means to be a son and daughter of God that we discover everything that has come to us. You know, you think of the prodigal son, the prodigal son comes home and he experiences the embrace, right? He experiences the reconciliation of the father and he experiences the joy of coming home and there's a party and there's a celebration and it's like, wow, it's amazing. And then he wakes up the next day and he realizes, I have this ring on my finger. What's that for? How do I use that? And then he's walking around on the father's farm and he's wondering like, what do I do? What does it mean to be a son? And what does it mean to exercise my authority? What does it mean to do the father's business? And in all of that, in that process, and some of it's gonna be difficult because all he's known is the pigsty, all he's known is this other life and he's gonna have to fight to hold on to his identity. And it's in that fight that he's gonna discover everything that he's been given. So I'll start with a story of a friend. She told her story that when she was younger, she was on an elevator and a man came on the elevator and asked her to do something sexual and pressured her to do it and in her fear, she did it. And she was filled with great shame and self-hatred and asking herself, why did I do that? Why did I not honor my will? And so she was led through the keys. She experienced the love of the Lord. She repented. She forgave herself, which was really important. She forgave herself and she was discovering her freedom. And she was walking as a disciple of Jesus. She was learning to follow Him and part of a community and serving and as Dad mentioned before, it's all about discipleship. It's not about introspection. It's not about this quest for perfection or inner healing. It was following Jesus. And so she kept following the Lord and so she was grateful for what she had received but it wasn't until many years later that she discovered how much she had received. She said she was on a train in the city and she looked across and she saw a young woman and there was a man on the train who was drunk, who was molesting her. And the train stopped, the girl ran off the train and this drunk man stood up and started walking towards her. Here we go again. And she found herself in that moment with a voice and she said, stop right there, don't move. Don't come one step closer to me. You sit down and you don't speak. And the man was startled and he sat down. He looked confused and then he said to her, I wanna go home. She said, here's what we're gonna do. When we stop at the next stop, you're gonna get off this train, you're gonna go home, you're not gonna talk to or touch anyone. Do you understand? He said, yes. He got off the train. The doors closed and she went, did that just happen? You know, it's like the adrenaline wears off a little bit and you're just kind of shaking. And she was like overwhelmed by the moment but also filled with a joy that she wasn't the girl in the elevator anymore. She was a new creation and she had learned the ways of Christ to the point where she could step into her own authority and she experienced that victory. It wasn't until she was tested that she experienced the breakthrough that she had received all those years ago. And so deliverance is part of an ongoing process. As I mentioned, it's the kingdom of God working like yeast through dough, through every area of our life and redeeming us completely. The good news that we can take hold of is that Jesus has already won the victory. He's already defeated the power of sin. He's already defeated the power of death and all Satan's dominion, Satan's rule is coming to an end. And all around this room I can see there's stories of great deliverance. One of the best things about coming to retreats, I love to hear people's conversion stories and the mighty ways in which God acted to redeem us. However, there is a moment when we all are called to enter into the battle. Jesus turns to us, he puts the sword in our hand and he said, now it's your turn. It's your turn to take place, your place on the battlefield. It's your turn to fight for the freedom of others. You know, a good father doesn't do everything for their children. If I were to do everything for my child, that would be abuse. And so the father is not going to do everything for us. He's going to allow us to fight the battle so that we can learn and that we can grow and that we can become like him. There is a role for you to play in the kingdom. And yes, you're going to have to do battle to hold on to your freedom. But this is good news because God is not satisfied with freed slaves. You know, the people of Israel came out of Egypt and they recognized that they were freed slaves but God wanted so much more for them. He wanted them to be his children, his victorious overcoming children. And so he says, you take the land. As you learn to fight, as you learn to take possession of the land, you will grow. God is not building a kingdom of ransom slaves. He's building a kingdom of glorious sons and daughters who are being transformed into the likeness of Jesus. And he wants his victory to flow through you. He wants his victory to flow through you. There is no plan B. You say, really, God? Me? You're it. Why is he doing this? He wants you to live a new life. Why did Jesus set you free so that you could live a life of freedom? As Christians, we often fail to understand the way that God's grace actually works. On one side, there's those who believe that grace just requires no effort and we're not really free at all. We just kind of use that as whatever happens happens. And God's grace is all the working of grace and there's no effort required on our part. And then there are others who say, well, we ignore the necessity of grace and we just lean on our own efforts and it's all up to me. The truth is that grace is what works in your heart to prepare you to obey. Grace empowers you. But we have a choice to obey. It's an amazing thing. We have the choice to obey. And then empowered by that grace, we are enabled to do what's impossible for us to do. That God's grace lifts up our nature and gives us capacity that we can do things that God can do. And in this amazing way, God actually invites us into his life. It's sharing in his life, sharing in his victory. And then God celebrates as if, you know, as if, you know, he just enjoys our victory with us. So it's why Paul, you know, he talks about, you know, by the grace of God, I worked harder than them all. There's a power at work in me, but I cooperated with it. I didn't just, as Father was saying, I didn't leave that grace of God in vain. I gave it my everything. I gave it my everything so that the grace could be fully manifest me. And then he turns around and he says, but it wasn't me, it was all God's grace. It was all his power that enabled me to do it. He says, I take hold of that for which Christ has taken hold of me. We all have been taken hold of by Christ, but there's a way in which we can take hold of him. We can take that grace, we can receive it, we can put it to the side, or we can run with it. There is a battle to fight. Jesus said, the kingdom of God advances violently and violent men take hold of it. So we wanna be triumphant. We want to fully embrace this battle so that Jesus can be glorified in our lives. So what's at stake? If he's already won the victory, what's at stake? The grace that God has given you is for you to remain in his love. That's a battle, isn't it? We can all have an experience of his love and encounter with his love. It's glorious, and then like a week later, we can forget all about it, you know? It's like trying to even remember what that was like. And so it's a battle to continue in what he has given you and for allowing it to permeate and transform every part of your soul. I love this quote by Mike Bickle. He said, you cannot have wholeness without the pursuit of wholeheartedness. That's the first commandment. How do we get healthy? You know, people spend so much money trying to get healthy, trying to get balanced, trying to get well. The only way to get well is wholehearted love towards God and other people because that's what you were made for. You cannot have wholeness without the pursuit of wholeheartedness. Sometimes the working of God's grace is like imperceptible. You're not even aware of it. You look back over 10 years and you're like, wow, he did a great work in my life. I really wasn't aware of it. Other times you're just smooth sailing, right? Like everything you do is grace. Just incredible blessings and breakthroughs. And the battle will seem effortless. That's normal. And it's important that we just develop that understanding, that relationship with grace where we learn how to depend on it when it's clear and when it's not clear. When it's perceptible and when it's not perceptible. Hold fast to what you have so that no one can take your crown. You know there's a crown coming for you? There's a reward. There's a race to be run and we need to run in such a way as to win the crown. We still have an adversary. He hates your dignity. He hates your place. He hates your freedom. He's a thief. He wants to kill, steal and destroy. He was successful in your life once and he will try to frustrate you any way that he can. He would love to hold you in bondage or discourage you or defeat you. And God does not give us a guarantee that we will win without trying. You're going to have to engage in the battle. So I want to share with you five things, five tips for fighting for your freedom, for staying free. Number one, know that there's a battle going on. Number two, know where the battle is. Number three, know who the enemy is. Number four, know the enemy's weapons. And number five, know the enemy's tactics. And I'll go over each one of those as we go along. All right, number one, recognize that there is a battle. You need to be on guard. Not fearful, not afraid, but ready. Scriptures talk a lot about being prepared. Being on guard, being alert. St. Peter talks about being sober. When, we don't know. We don't know when the battle's gonna come. But past experience tells me that the battle often comes when we are tired, overwhelmed, lonely, distracted, confused and prayerless. I consider these the rumblings of war. It's the beginning of the battle. Remember, it's not your performance that's the key to victory. It's not whether you do everything right. In fact, sometimes you're gonna have to lose. Sometimes we can learn from our failures. Our sins are not the end all and be all. Our mistakes, St. Bernard said our sins can actually be the fertilizer of holiness if we respond to them the right way. We can learn from failure. Failure's not the issue, it's perseverance. In fact, it pleases the Father to give the kingdom to little kids. Jesus looked up into heaven with joy. You can see Jesus just laughing, you know. Father, it pleases you to give the kingdom to kids. How many of you know kids mess up? A lot. Jesus didn't say, Father, are you sure about this? Maybe they should grow up a little first. I don't know about this Peter guy. He's a little immature. No, Jesus doesn't say, oh yeah, get grow up outside of the kingdom and then come into the kingdom. No, he actually wants you to grow up in the kingdom and I know that's radical for some of you but it's true, he wants you to learn and make mistakes and fail with the Father. Under his tutelage, with his help. He's not saying clean up yourself and then come. In fact, it gives the Father pleasure to defeat his enemy through little children, through the weak and through the humble. So just to wrap up, to finish up my story, after I experienced freedom from the deception that no one could understand me and the bondage that I experienced and a lot of that stuff, I still have weakness. I still have areas in my life that are related to former areas of bondage that I need to be aware of and I need to take care of. So I still know that a trigger for me is when someone doesn't understand me. When someone thinks that I've done wrong or misinterprets my intentions, I know that my tendency, if I were to live in my flesh, is to want to explain myself, to want to argue, to want to be right, to want to justify myself. And I have to, when I experience that the beginning of that fear, I need to go back to the Father. I need to recognize that weakness and say, Father, I need to hear your voice. I need to know that you know my heart and that you understand me. I can face this. I can face someone not understanding me. I can face this situation and it's not gonna kill me, but I need to know your voice and it's helpful for me to know those weak areas. You see, before I knew there was a battle going on, I assumed that my battle was flesh and blood. I don't have a demon problem. I have people problems. People are my problem. That's a deception. If you believe that, that your problem in this world is people, that's a deception. That is not part of the gospel. I had to fight them. I had to explain to them. I had to defend myself. Now I know that no weapon formed against me shall prosper. I know that my God is for me. And I know that his opinion of me, his value for me does not change no matter what someone says about me. And so I can respond as a beloved son. I can respond knowing that I'm fully known by God even amidst criticism or misunderstanding. It's not easy. It's a battle. But the difference between bondage and weakness is that when you're bondage, you don't know why you're responding. You don't see it. But in freedom, I can make a choice. Do I always make the right choice? No, ask my wife. I still like my own ideas. I still like being right. But I can see clearly. Where does the battle take place? This is so important. Where does the battle take place? Paul talks so much about the battle and he uses all these martial images and he's almost always referring to thoughts or the mind as the battle place. The mind is such an important battlefield. St. Thomas Aquinas talks about the importance of, he teaches about angels and demons and how they are intellect and will. They have no bodies. They're powerful beings of intellect and will. And the way that they influence us is by presenting thoughts and images to our imaginations. And those thoughts and images can also, if there is sin in us, they can produce its temptation, seeking to influence our thoughts. It can produce powerful emotions if we respond to those thoughts and images. And this can be for good purposes. Angels actually, in Hebrews it talks about, angels are ministering spirits. They minister to us. They actually serve us as we worship him and their goal is to bring glory to God. Have you ever been in mass and you had a thought that was like too good to be you? You know what I'm saying? You were like, whoa. It was a thought, maybe it was a thought about heaven or maybe it was a thought about God's love or His mercy. And it just kind of lifted you up and you were able to enter into worship in a deeper way. Could have been an angel. It says that when Satan tempted Jesus, when Satan left, the angels came and they ministered to him. And what they do is they bring heaven to us. They bring heavenly perspective. They bring heavenly thoughts. They bring thoughts that line up with the will of God to us. Maybe it's while we're reading scripture or maybe while we're singing or we're worshiping. So if that's true of angels, then evil spirits present thoughts and images to us seeking to gain influence, thoughts that reinforce the power of the kingdom of darkness. And the deceptions. And so it's important that we're aware that the battlefield is in the mind. In Romans it says, do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind. Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind. If you wanna change your actions, you wanna change your habits, you wanna change your character, it starts with the way that you think. Because that's the center, it's the core. And that's why renunciation is so important. When we talk about Ignatian spirituality, Saint Ignatius said, if a thought or an image comes from an evil spirit, you are to wholeheartedly reject it. That sounds like renunciation to me. We have a choice, we have a gate to our minds and we can decide which thoughts we are going to allow reign. Which thoughts are worthy of Christ? Which thoughts give him glory? Which thoughts exalt him in our minds? And Saint Paul says we take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ. In the book of James it talks about taming the tongue. And taming the tongue is really about your will because you express your will with your mouth. And when you express something with your mouth, what you believe in your heart, you're actually vocalizing what you believe. So it's so important that we tame our tongues because it's with our mouth that we declare what we believe. And we need to take these thoughts and say, is that thought worthy of giving words to? Is that thought worthy of speaking into the world? That's what taming the tongue is all about. Saint Francis when he was reflecting on our baptismal vows, he made an interesting point. He said, in order for me to say yes to God, so that's faith, our grace filled response. In order for me to say yes to God, I must say no to the suggestions of the devil. You cannot say yes to both. If you said to me, hey, let's have lunch. I said, yes, we'll do 12 o'clock today. And then you said, let's meet at lunch, 12 o'clock today. And I said, yes, I can't say yes to both. I have to say no to one to say yes to the other. And so that's why we say, I renounce Satan in all his works and all his empty promises. You say you're no so that you can say a bigger yes. I believe in God the Father. I believe in the Son. I believe in the Holy Spirit. The kingdom of God works from the inside out. Many of us are wrestling with our flesh and we're trying to get our flesh to produce righteousness. We're trying to beat our flesh and make it something good. And it's really important that we understand that it's not a matter of getting the flesh to do something. It's actually living life by the Holy Spirit. It's living a new life. Some of us are so focused on our old ways and the ways that we used to do things and ways that we used to think and we're trying to reform them. But the truth is we actually need to put on Christ. We actually need to live from a different place. We need to live from the nature that God gives us in our baptism. And we do that. We start to do that when we renew the mind. And the best way to do it is through worship and adoration. Because as you gaze upon the Lord, the veil is taken away. When you gaze upon the Lord, deception is taken away. When you gaze upon his beauty, when you're transformed by his truth, when you're aware of who he is, you become what you behold. And that's how we renew the mind. If I stare at my sin all the time and I just focus on my sin and what needs to change in me, I'm just gonna get depressed. I'm not gonna see that transforming reality. Romans 12 verse one and two is that scripture. I urge you to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, your spiritual worship. Do not conform yourself to this age, but be transformed by renewing your mind. So that you may discern what the will of God is, what is good and pleasing and perfect. That's a good picture of freedom, isn't it? It's knowing the will of God and being able to choose it. And so it's important that we recognize that if we don't have a true grasp on reality, we won't be able to make good decisions. That's why Satan always wants to deceive us at the same point that he tempts us. There's a deception involved in our sin. Maybe you've heard this phrase before. Watch your thoughts, they become your words. Watch your words, they become your actions. Watch your actions, they become your habits. Watch your habits, they become your character and your character becomes your destiny. So if we set out and we're pursuing that telos, we're pursuing that goal and we want everything that God has for us, it begins with our thoughts. Saint Augustine said, my love is my weight. If I love things above myself, I will rise. If I love things below myself, I will fall. Sometimes we don't rise because our minds are set on things that are earthly, not on heavenly things. We're so focused on the here and now. We're so focused on the problem. We're so focused on our way of thinking that we come up with human solutions like Peter. Jesus, don't go to the cross. Jesus says, you don't have in mind the things of God but the things of men. Jesus taught us that murder, adultery and anger start within the heart. Those actions that really are destiny defining start in the human heart. And for the Hebrews, the heart and the mind are not separate. Your mind, your will, your emotions, the core of your mind, will and emotions is your heart. Your heart is not just your emotions. It is the center of your thinking. It's the center of your will and it's the center of your emotions. And so in order for us to remain free, we need to be transformed. We need to have our minds renewed by the truth. We need to allow ourselves to have many opportunities to say yes to the truth. We renew our baptismal vows a lot. We have morning prayer. We have many opportunities to speak the truth and to commit our wills. Number three, who are my enemies? It's really important that you know who your enemies are. The most difficult wars to fight, the most difficult battles in history have been the ones where you can't find the enemy. You don't know who the enemy is or where the enemy is. 1 Corinthians 10, we destroy arguments and every pretension raising itself against the knowledge of God and take every thought captive in obedience to Christ. So you've been given authority. You've been given a battle and we need to not just be tossed here and there by our thoughts, by every thought that comes to our mind. Sometimes we need to take a stand and say, no, I'm not going down that path. I know that when I feel tired, I'm tempted to feel sorry for myself and to make criticisms and judgments of other people, I'm gonna stop that right here. I'm gonna recognize it, take it captive. Ephesians 4, 17. So I declare and testify in the Lord that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do in the futility of their minds. Darkened in understanding, alienated from the life of God because of their ignorance, because of their hardness of heart, they have become callous and have handed themselves over to licentiousness and the practice of every kind of impurity. Pay attention to this line. That is not how you learned Christ. Assuming that you have heard of Him and were taught of Him as truth in Jesus, that you should put away the old self of your former way of life, corrupted through desires and renewed in the spirit of your minds and put on the new self created in God's way in righteousness and holiness of truth. Think about that. You were given a new you. I like to think of it this way. Say you get a package from Amazon and you open it up and there's this big red cape in there and it's got a golden S on it. You're thinking, that's a pretty cool cape. It looks good. So you try it on, look in the mirror. That looks pretty good. I think I'll wear it today. So you're walking around and then suddenly you discover, like, wow, I can see through those walls. And I can melt things with my eyes and I can fly faster than a speeding bullet. You know, faster than a speeding bullet. More powerful than a locomotive. It's as we discover the capacities that we've been given that faith, hope, and love have been infused into our soul. That we are capable of receiving and responding to God's revelation. We're capable of loving like he does. We're capable of hoping all things. We're capable of believing all things. It's coming into the knowledge of our creator and who he's made us to be. That's learning Christ. How many of you know, the Holy Spirit is our teacher and he's teaching us Christ. We have one subject for the rest of our lives. Christ, to live is Christ. And so there's something that we need to put off but you don't just focus on that. You put it off by putting something else on. You know, studies recently have shown that the neural pathways for most habits, the things that we do every day and the things that are so, it just becomes, the neural pathways get set and the response, many people are saying, is that you don't break a habit. There's no such thing as actually breaking a habit. You can learn a new one. You can actually rewire the brain by overlapping that pathway with a new pathway. And I think that really corresponds to what St. Paul is talking about here. In order for me to put off the old self, I have to put on the new self. It's living life in step with the spirit. If you live in step with the spirit, you will not, what? You won't gratify the flesh. You can't do both. If you walk in step with the spirit, you cannot gratify the flesh. And so we need to have our thinking developed about what does it mean to be a new creation? And the only way to learn how to use the new nature that we've given him and been in Christ is in relationship with him. It's being a disciple. It took you a long time to use your old fallen nature, didn't it? But you figured it out. It's gonna take a long time for you to learn how to use the grace that God's given you. But you have been given the mind of Jesus Christ. I love how many times Paul in scripture says, do you not know? Do you not know that you were bought with a price? Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit? Do you not know? He's reminding them things, just elementary things because he knows that if they understand who they are, you know, Paul always puts the instructions at the end of the letter. You know why? Because until you understand who you are, you won't be able to do the instructions at the end of the letter. And so your mind, it still remembers the old ways by habit and how many of you know, it's so easy to go down that path. It's like, you know, almost without thinking sometimes, wow, how did I end up here again? You know, it requires choice. Number four, you have to know the enemy's tactics. So I know who my enemies are, I'm aware of them, and I need to know the tactics. Our thoughts are a doorway to our souls. The liar wants to bring friends to cause us to throw a pity party, to bring fear and pride, sloth, greed. And we get to choose which we make a home in us. And if we allow them to make a home in us, they can become a stronghold. And a stronghold is a fortress. It's a safe place for the enemy to dwell and to go out on raids and seek greater influence. And when these lies become a part of our existence, we become convinced that they are reality and then we accept a reality that's less than the truth of the gospel. And even worse, sometimes we believe that these thoughts are us. They are our identity. And that's why Jesus comes and he confronts us with the truth that Satan is a liar and a thief. Jesus came that you might have abundant life. Scripture makes no qualifications about what to do with the enemy's tactics. Colossians three verse five, put to death therefore, the parts of you that are earthly, immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire and the greed that is idolatry. Could spend some years on that, right? And then he goes on. But now you must put them all away. Anger, fury, malice, slander and obscene language that comes out of your mouths. Stop lying to yourself, to one another. Since you have taken off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed for knowledge, there's that word again, knowledge in the image of its creator. What are we supposed to do with those parts of us? Crucify them, put them to death, you know, there's time to be meek and humble but then there's times to be violent. And when it comes to these things, the Lord encourages us to be violent, to be men, to be courageous, put it to death. What are our tactics? We have tactics. God has given us weapons and tactics and strategies. One of my favorite scriptures is 1 Peter chapter one, 13 through 16. And it's a great image of how we stay free. Therefore, gird up the loins of your mind, live soberly and set your hopes completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Like obedient children, do not act in compliance with the desires of your former ignorance, but as He who called you as holy, be holy yourselves in every aspect of your conduct for it is written, be holy because I am holy. In the Roman Empire, the loins, when he's talking about girding up your loins, the soldiers would wear a tunic and the tunic would go down below the knee. And so when they said, gird up your loins, what you would do is you take up the loose ends of your tunic and you had a belt that you would tie around your leg and that would allow you the flexibility to run into battle and to move. And so when Peter says, gird up the loose ends of your mind, it's saying strengthen those weak spots, those things that are gonna trip you up, those things that are going to hinder your movement, secure them with a belt, secure them with the truth. Live soberly, I love that. What's the primary qualification of a drunk person? Unawareness, right? Complete lack of unawareness. A drunk does not know when he is weak. A drunk does not know when he's off balance. A drunk does not know when the person he's talking to is stronger than him. And Peter is saying, live with an awareness of reality. Live soberly. And then he says, set your hope completely on the grace. Set completely on grace. There's grace here in my present struggle. There's grace in my weakness. God's power can be perfected in my weakness and there's grace that's coming. There's grace that's here and there's grace that's coming. Always remember, God has the last move. So we need to be reflective people. Not introspective, not self-focused, not constantly navel gazing, but we need to be aware. We need to be aware enough to know those areas of weakness. Some people don't like to look at their loins. It's embarrassing. I don't like weakness, I don't like weak areas. I don't like to look at those things that don't look great. I'd rather look at my strengths. I'd rather look at all the things I'm good at and we try to hide them or we try to ignore them. I think it's actually better to expose. It's actually better to expose your thinking to a good friend than to try to dress it up or hide it or act super spiritual or put on false piety. It's really good sometimes to just have your thoughts reflected back from a friend. Have you ever experienced the Holy Spirit in another person speaking to you and the Holy Spirit brings conviction? It happens all the time because I'm married. I said, I'm just, I'm griping, I'm complaining. This is so hard, it's so hard, it's this, it's that. It's never gonna change and my wife says, honey, is that true? I call it a truth bomb. It's like, it hits you. No, honey, that's not true, you're right. The Holy Spirit and someone else interacts with the Holy Spirit and you and that's the way God designed it. And so sometimes it's better just to say it out loud, just expose your stinking thinking to someone else and allow them to reflect that back to you. I was telling my friend one time how big my problems were. He was a faith-filled man. I said, my problems are really big and I've got all these problems and I've got this and that and the other. Would you pray with me? And I thought he was gonna pray this powerful prayer like that would make my problems go away. Instead he just put his hand on me and he started to pray and then he started laughing. I don't recommend that, it's not a great ministry tactic but he just started laughing from his gut. And at first I started getting mad. I was like, don't you realize my problems are real and they're serious? Like they're big problems. And then I kind of realized what God was doing through my friend's laughter. He was giving me God's perspective on my problems. It's like what I think is so heavy and so oppressive is really light and momentary and God is not at all intimidated by my problems. And before I could tell him how mad I was, I started laughing because I realized how ridiculous I sounded. And sometimes we need to have that exposure of our thoughts. We're constantly wrestling on our own. We just need to expose our thoughts to somebody else. Another thing we need to know is what are my red flags? A red flag for a train is telling you, they wave a red flag in front of a train to tell you, there's something ahead that you need to be concerned about and you can't go any further that you need to stop. What's your red flag? For me it's when I perceive that someone is judging me. When I perceive that someone doesn't understand me, my emotions will very easily kick in. If I react to that emotion, I can grab ahold of my flesh and start working with it. My old self is really used to responding. But if I can experience that emotion, I can experience that negative feeling and remind myself of the truth in that feeling. And I'm equipped with these five keys because I know that I can ask forgiveness, I know I can repent, I know I can renounce the lies of my enemy, I can be renewed in the truth. Even if I lose that battle, even if I fail, I can learn from it and move on. What are your signs and patterns? What triggers you, what sets you off down that path of that familiar pattern? You know, whether it's that addiction or whether it's that resentment, rage, know what your red flags are and know how you have a plan. What's my plan? How am I gonna respond, you know? Take scripture, put it where you struggle. You know, I have a friend who struggles with anger. He puts scripture on the steering wheel because that's where he struggles, you know, in traffic. Unholy thoughts, so he puts holy thoughts on a steering wheel. Number five, what are our weapons? The good news is God's given us weapons for this battle. We have a lot of them. 2 Corinthians 10, verse three through six. For although we are in the flesh, we do not battle according to the flesh, for the weapons of our battle are not of flesh, but are enormously powerful. Everybody say enormously powerful. You have enormously powerful weapons. Capable of destroying fortresses. Think about that. You have weapons that are enormously powerful that can destroy strongholds, demonic strongholds, powerful, intellectual, spiritual strongholds in the thinking of ourselves and others. In fact, I mean, there's one way in thinking about the gospel. The gospel is bringing the kingdom of God to the earth. It's proclaiming the kingdom and it's manifesting the kingdom, but the gospel is also tearing strongholds down. It's actually bulldozing the enemy's work. It's making the enemy homeless wherever it goes and it's drawing people into a new reality. You're a part of a revolutionary army. You're literally opening prison cells for people. And seeing them come out. We destroy arguments and every pretension, raising itself up against the knowledge of God and take every thought captive in obedience to Christ. So what are our weapons? There's many. The number one weapon is the truth. The truth. Who God is, what he's done for us, and who we are. Our powerful, powerful weapons. Faith is described as a shield. Protects us to know and hold to the truth, protects us from the lies of our enemy. Prayer, prayer is a powerful expression of the will. Prayer allows our hearts and our minds to become aligned with God. It's how we work out. What he's working into us. It's communicating, it's receiving his thoughts. The scriptures. The scriptures are like a double-edged sword. They can perform surgery on you. How many of you had surgery done by a scripture? It pierced you, it identified something in you. It cut out that rotting thing. And it set you free. I encourage you to look up the kinds of scriptures that counter the lies that you have typically believed. Look up the scriptures that speak of your identity in Christ. Look up the scriptures that speak of you as a new creation. Fellowship. We mentioned that. Experiencing the body of Christ. Receiving those spiritual goods. Experiencing the body of Christ. Receiving those spiritual goods that flow from one person to another. Worship. Can't emphasize the impact, the emphasis of worship. Worship can help us to see things that we couldn't see before. Praising God, speaking out loud who he is. Obviously we can use the five keys in our prayer life. We can renounce, we can forgive. Small in you can grow over time. The voice of truth that sounds almost like a whisper. It's like you can barely take hold of it. You can barely... I don't know that I can believe that. It can become strong and it can grow in you as you surrender your will to him. And eventually it grows so strong, your faith can grow to the point where it becomes a shelter for others. How many of you want your faith to become a shelter for others? Do not despise your weakness. Do not despise that area that you're contending for right now. That area that feels just so bitter, like such a bitter struggle. That place, your area of weakness, that contention is the showcase for the Lord's power. Not your strengths, not your abilities, not your greatness. It's actually in your weakness. That is the theater. That's the stage for God's power. 2 Corinthians 13, 3 through 5. I might have that address wrong. Christ is not weak towards you, but powerful in you. For indeed he was crucified out of weakness, but he lives by the power of God. So we are also weak in him, but towards you we shall live with him by the power of God. Examine yourselves to see whether you are holding on to your faith. Test yourselves. Do you not realize that Jesus Christ is in you? If you want the power of God in your life, invite him into your weakness. That's where his power is perfectly displayed. And so victory requires a daily moment by moment, dependence on his help, dependence on his power to save you. But we know we have hope because the love of God has been poured into our hearts. We have hope that his victory is complete and that his grace is coming. So we can always anticipate that God is going to continue to work in us to bring us into deeper and deeper freedom. So I just want to invite you to welcome the Holy Spirit. To invite the Holy Spirit to transform and to renew your mind. Invite him into those areas of thought that don't line up with the truth. One of the things I've led a lot of people to renounce lately, that's actually more of a repentance, but I find a lot of people need to say this is, in the name of Jesus, I fire myself as the judge of my life. And I reject any standard that doesn't come from your mercy. And Lord, I choose your mercy as the first and last word over my life. Because some of us, we've just, we've accepted Jesus as Lord, but we still want to be the judge. And so everything that we're coming to the Lord with, it's like, Lord, I want you to do this, and I want you to do that, and I have a problem with this, and this is where I'm failing, and this is how I see it, so therefore you see it the same way. And we need to allow the Lord to be the judge and to realize that His ways are way higher than our ways. His thoughts are higher, they're purer, they're gooder. His thoughts are better than ours, and we need to be renewed by His thoughts. Jesus wants to give you the victory. He wants to put the sword in your hand, and then He wants to defeat the enemy through you. He's not satisfied with a ransom slave. He wants a victorious son. Amen? Let's pray. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, I love you. I love what you do. I love your work in us to glorify Jesus in our hearts. Holy Spirit, without you, we couldn't even say that Jesus is Lord. Holy Spirit, you care for us so much, and you have the answers, you have the key. Holy Spirit, we invite you to renew our thinking and to expose darkness. Holy Spirit, we ask for forgiveness for relying on our own understanding and thinking the way that men think. We ask you for forgiveness, for forgiving into hopelessness and despair when you have given us every reason to believe and to have confidence. Jesus, we ask that we would not dishonor you with such low expectations for our lives. We invite you, Holy Spirit. We invite the sword of the Holy Spirit, for God. Spirit, we love your words, for they bring life and they are life. Holy Spirit, show us those weak areas of our mind, our thinking. Teach us how to fight this battle. Teach us how to do the practical things, the very practical acts of love. Jesus, we want to put on you as we put off the flesh. We want to think like you do. We want the perspective that you have. We want to be drawn into a relationship with your Father. Jesus, forgive us for the times that we've given up the fight. The times that we laid down, ran away, or just left it for somebody else. And we invite the holy angels to come and minister. We place ourselves to be docile and aware of the spirits, the angelic spirits who serve us, who minister to us and aid us as we worship. Jesus, we want to be closer to the culture of heaven. We say, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven, in us. We ask our mother, we ask Mary for her guidance and her wisdom that we might be like her, that we might give Jesus our full yes, a full, wholehearted yes. Just say that with me. Just say yes, Jesus. I say yes to you. I say yes to all that you have for my life. I say yes to who you say I am. Yes, Lord. Lord, as we renew our hearts and our minds, we pray that we would just begin to take delight in the things that delight your heart. Pleasure in what you take pleasure in. And the things that break your heart, may they break our hearts. Thank you, Lord, for giving us a battle to fight and a battle to win. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Let's take a five-minute break. So stick around, stay in the area, give a brother a hug, and then we'll come back for questions.