Are You a Big Loser? Part 3

Well, I've asked you this question a number of times already. I suppose I'll ask it again.

Are you a big loser? Are you a big loser? Now, I think we all understand what I'm asking. I don't care if you are the biggest loser, but I do want all of us to be big losers, especially as we draw closer to the Passover. We are told to put away the sin that easily besets us. Certainly Satan is still the God of this world. Satan is still trying to tempt each and every one of us. He's trying to destroy us. If at all possible, he is our adversary. He is the enemy. He doesn't want you to win in life. He doesn't want you to be in God's kingdom. So we must put off the sin that so easily besets us if we are to be in God's kingdom. In fact, we have one of God's annual Holy Days, or actually it's an entire week, the Feast of Unleavened Bread, where we picture putting sin out of our lives. We put the leaven out of our homes, which pictures putting sin out of our lives. So God does want us to take this seriously. He does want us to be big losers in the sense of putting that sin away, putting it out and keeping it out. Now, we understand that on this particular show that I've been referencing, the biggest loser, the largest and most valuable prize of all is really the weight that the winner loses. It's not the money that he or she wins, but it's all the weight that actually gives their life back to them in many ways.

They're much happier in many, many ways because they've reached a goal that they set for themselves.

So everyone is a big winner on this show because they all lose lots of weight. In fact, I don't think anyone lost less than 80 pounds on the show. Now, we've all been called to be big winners on the road to eternal life. You and I have been called at this time to be a part of the first fruits. We are to rise to meet Christ in the air at His return, so it really doesn't get any better than that in this life to be called now and to be chosen by God to have an opportunity to be in God's kingdom, to be here for a thousand years, ruling and reigning with Christ.

But in order for us to be big winners, as Mr. Dennis mentioned in the sermon out, we need to be overcomers. In the book of Revelation, it says multiple times, to He who grants, to He who overcomes will I grant to sit with me on my throne, and to He who overcomes the mountain of life. There are many different verses in the book of Revelation itself as well as other places that show that we do need to be overcomers. We do need to lose the sin that weighs us down spiritually, that causes us a lot of grief from a spiritual perspective. Now, God has called us at this time to be not only called, but chosen and faithful. We are on a road now that's very narrow. It's very difficult. That's how Christ describes this road that goes to eternal life. It's a narrow, it's a difficult path, and few be that find it. He's talking about at this time, in this life, there are very few people who will actually choose to obey God and then stay faithful.

We must all run the race with patience and endurance if we're going to receive the crown of life at Christ's return. So it is a vital subject as we prepare ourselves for taking the path over this spring. In the last sermon that I gave, we talked a lot about the sin that weighs us down. Sin really does have a huge impact in our lives. We can't deny that we are all sinners, that we all have to deal with sin. So again, are you determined to lose the weight, the sin that pulls you down? What will God the Father and Christ, your Savior, do to help you? What's God going to do to help you? What's Jesus Christ going to do to help? And is there anything that you can do to help lose the weight and become more spiritually lean and fit? Now, the show, The Biggest Loser, as I pointed out last time, has caught on around the world. It's been instrumental in inspiring thousands of people to make dramatic changes in their lives.

Now, you may think, well, it won't last. In many cases, I'm sure it doesn't last. But in some cases, it really has made a huge difference in people's lives in that they have been able to overcome, and they've been able to keep the weight off, and they're certainly blessed because of it.

Rachel was the one who ended up winning the show. I don't know if any of you actually saw the grand finale. Some of you may have watched it. But Rachel started out at 260 pounds, and she was down to 105. In fact, she probably went a little overboard.

It could be that that $250,000 carat was a huge incentive because she lost a lot of weight even after the initial 14 weeks, I think it was. There was a time, a month or so, between, or I'm not sure exactly how many weeks between there, but she looked a lot better on the last show. She looked really healthy at about 145 or so, I think she was at that point. Then she dropped another 35 or 40 pounds, and she looked like she was bordering on anorexia. She had lost so much weight, and there was a lot of controversy. She lost 59.62% of her body weight, almost 60% of her body weight. She was only about 40% of what she had weighed initially. There was the biggest loser before her in terms of the body weight was a guy named Danny Cahill from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. In fact, I think Danny Cahill is one who has continued to keep the weight off, and she beat him out for the biggest loser of all time in the United States, anyway.

I know that Rachel, along the way, early on, she said that she was sick of hiding behind this weight. She says, I see the athlete coming out in me. I found her, and I'm not going to let her go. So she was very tenacious, certainly, in pursuing this goal of losing weight.

David was the one that ended up coming in second. David started out at 409 pounds, and he ended up at 222. Now, he actually looked really good at 222 pounds. He's a tall man. He lost 187 pounds. He lost 54.36 percent, almost 55 percent of his body weight. David says, I lost seven buckets of fat. Seven buckets. 187 pounds, you know, figure it out. That's, uh, what about 15? No, 187 times seven. Wow, that's a bunch of weight. That's 15 or more pound buckets of weight. He lost a lot of weight. Seven buckets of fat. He says, you have to have a breakdown before you can have a breakthrough.

David said that he was inspired, but not really changing, because I didn't really think I could. You know, he had tried to lose weight in the past, but he really didn't think he could lose the kind of weight that he really needed to lose. You know, he'd gotten 409 pounds. When you get that large, it's, that's, that's a lot of inertia that you have to start moving.

So, he said the winning step was the first one. When he actually made that first step, that's the winning step, because if you don't ever make the first step, you'll never win in life. It's, same thing is true when we have a sin that easily besets us. You have to make the first step.

Now, you can't just continue to make excuses for not overcoming, but you have to become tenacious in your pursuit of putting the sin away.

So, there is a part that we all have to play, and that is perseverance. It is becoming resourceful and tenacious in terms of attacking those things that, that are pulling us down.

David said, I'm half the man I used to be, but I'm twice the man in every other way.

So, he literally was half the man that he used to be. His daughter at one of the shows, he has a teenage daughter, and she said, I'm crazy proud of my dad. You know, she was really very proud that he took this on, and that he was able to stick with it, and he made a huge change. He didn't win. He did come in second. I don't know how much money he earned. I assume they got something for that, but I don't know what it was.

I know he won $20,000 worth of gym equipment, I think, in one of the shows. So, at least he's got lots of gym equipment to help him stay fit.

Bobby was the person who came in third place. He lost 170 pounds. He started at 358 pounds. He went down to 188. So, he lost 52.51% of his weight. But, actually, I think the one that really looked the best to me was a woman called Tumi. Tumi started at 319 pounds, and she went down to 144. She lost 175 pounds, which was almost 55% of her body weight. She also won $100,000, because she went home about halfway through, and then she lost the most weight after she went home. So, the person who wins the most weight after they go home wins $100,000. So, she won $100,000. But, she looked healthy. She stayed at a good weight for her, and she's now making plans to run a marathon.

So, at 319 pounds, I'm sure she wasn't making any plans to run a marathon, but at 144, it changes everything. You know, it changes your whole perspective on what you can accomplish in life. Tumi said, I spent the first 40 years of my life in fear. I wanted second chance, so I can live the life that I want to live. In fact, this show is called Biggest Loser Second Chances. I guess they have a different theme for each one of the Biggest Loser programs from year to year. This one was called Second Chances. So, much was accomplished during the course of this program in terms of losing physical weight. Now, in a real sense, a lot of you, all of you, in fact, have been on a program yourself to lose weight. I've been on a program for 40 years to lose weight, to lose that sin that has its way of creeping back in once you lose it. If you're not careful, it can come back in. It can cause you problems again.

So, remember we started a series of sermons about seven principles for losing the weight and losing the sin that easily ensnares us. The first point was to trust and follow our coaches, and we talked about how God the Father and Jesus Christ are the ultimate coaches. They're the ones that love us. They really have our best interest in mind. They're not harsh task masters, but they do expect us to make progress. They do want us to overcome. They do want us to put sin out of our lives. They do want us to obey them and to follow their instructions and follow their rules. So that's the obvious first point. If you want to lose the sin that ensnares you, then you need to follow God the Father and Jesus Christ who are perfect, who don't sin, who never have sinned. See, they're the only ones that could be the ultimate coaches for us because neither one of them has ever sinned. They're absolutely perfect. They're the ones that define what sin is. Sin is the breaking of their laws. Sin is the transgression of God's law. So they know what sin is because they made all the rules.

And so we're supposed to follow those rules. And of course, when we do, we'll be blessed because of it because God does love us and He wants us to learn to become like Him.

So in order to have your sins forgiven, you have to yield and surrender to God.

And it's not just a bunch of words, it's actual surrendering and yielding to God and really following God and obeying God, learning God's will and learning to do God's will. It's very easy to do our own will. We are selfishly oriented beings who have a real pull to want to do it our way instead of doing it God's way.

But there is no other way. If we want to be in God's kingdom, we have to learn to do it God's way.

As we all know, Christ is our personal Savior. He is our Lord and Master. We have to follow Jesus' example. We have to accept Him as our Passover Lamb. When we come here for Passover services, of course, we will drink some wine and we'll eat a little bit of unleavened bread. The wine pictures the shed blood of our Savior Jesus Christ.

The unleavened bread pictures His broken body for us. He laid His life down for us. He was sacrificed for us. There is no other name under heaven whereby we can be saved. All roads do not lead to eternal life. The only road that leads to eternal life is the one where we accept Christ as our Savior. Jesus is our Lord and Master.

We have to learn to obey God and follow God in all things. Remember, we are to learn to live by every word of God. And, of course, God is going to save us. It's not that we will save ourselves through our own efforts. That doesn't mean we shouldn't try, does it? It doesn't mean we shouldn't give it our best shot. We just need to realize that we're not going to earn our salvation because there's just no way that we can. The only way to be given salvation is to receive that gift that God has for us. It is a gift. In Ephesians 2, it does say very clearly that we are saved by grace. Sometimes people think because we keep the Sabbath, because we believe in the annual Holy Days, because we believe in God's commandments, because we don't believe the laws down the way, that somehow we think we're going to earn our salvation. We've never believed that. You know, that's been a bad wrap from some who don't understand what it is we truly do believe.

We understand what Ephesians chapter 2 says. We accept it, we believe it, we embrace it, and we are very, very grateful for it. Ephesians 2, verse 8, for by grace you have been saved through faith. Again, faith is in our Savior Jesus Christ, and it's in the plan of salvation that our Heavenly Father has put into motion for us, for by grace you have been saved through faith. And that, not of yourselves, even faith is a gift that God grants us. Grace and faith and salvation, these are all gifts of God, not of works lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship. See, we are actually God's workmanship. He is doing a good work in us. We are created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. That's why we keep the Sabbath. That's why we keep the Holy Days.

Because we are God's workmanship, we are created in Christ Jesus for good works. It's a good thing to honor God on the Sabbath. That's why we do it. Isaiah 58, if you'll honor me on this day and call this day a delight, and don't speak your own words and don't do your own thing, but come. This is a commanded assembly. We honor God by being here. We don't earn our salvation.

But is it important? Sure, it's important. It's one of the commandments. Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. Yet the world out there, they don't obey it. They don't follow it. It's really very, very fundamental. It's as basic as it gets, really. It's one of the Ten Commandments.

Yet, Satan has truly deceived the whole world. Most people don't get it, and they claim that we're trying to earn our salvation by being here today. It's not the case. We know that we're saved by grace, and we're very, very grateful for our Savior. Again, that's the first point, is accepting God and Christ as our coaches, surrendering ourselves to God the Father and Jesus Christ. You remember I talked about Tanya. I think I talked about Tanya. She was a woman who said, my mother was addicted to drugs. I was abused as a child.

She didn't save me. Her mother didn't take care of her. Her mother was not in tune with being a good mother at all. She didn't save me, but Dolvett saved me. That was one of the coaches. Remember, the coaches had a save, and it was early on. Tanya was the one that had lost the least weight. I think it may have been the very first week. She lost less weight than anyone, and she was headed home. But Dolvett saved her and did not send her home, gave her another opportunity to continue. She said it was the first time that she'd ever been saved in her life. That was her background. She says, I feel better than I have ever felt in my life. She had a crush on Dolvett, partially because he saved her, I'm sure.

In every case, each of the trainers saved the very first person they had an opportunity to save because they could tell that those people wanted to lose weight. They were trying, but they lost less than anyone.

They were headed home, but they were saved in every case.

Obviously, there's an analogy, isn't there, that God saves us continually. He doesn't just save us one time. He continually saves us. In a sense, God has saved us countless times as He has granted us repentance and forgiven us our sins. I was baptized 40 years ago. Well, I've been saved many, many times as my sins have been forgiven, as I've had those sins washed away in the blood of Jesus Christ. You know, 40 years I've been keeping the Passover. Each year, it shows that I am continually being forgiven. And you are continually being forgiven when you come here on Passover and you drink that wine and you eat that unleavened bread. It shows that you accept the Passover lamb, the one that died for you. You accept His sacrifice for you. And you are in the process of being saved. I mean, there's just no way to put a price tag on that. It's priceless to come under the blood of our Savior, Jesus Christ, to have Him die for us. So we are being saved countless times. And unlike trainers on the biggest loser, God has many, many saves. He's not limited to their youth. But we ought not take that for granted.

Again, salvation is a gift, and God will give us this gift. But He does want to see us be overcomers. He doesn't want us to just take it lightly and not do our part. Just like the trainers had Tonya and others just sat around unwilling to work, unwilling to try, unwilling to do the right thing to help them lose weight, they wouldn't have been saved. They would have been sent home right away. Obviously, God is very merciful, but He does have certain guidelines and instructions that He wants us to follow and not take for granted or take lightly.

So that first point, again, is to follow Jesus Christ, to follow God the Father, to obey them, to have our sins forgiven, to repent of our sins.

Secondly, we talked about admitting that we have a weight problem. Again, that's where repentance comes in. You can't repent unless you admit that you have a weight problem, something that's weighing you down. The admission has to be heartfelt. It has to be genuine, or you will not lose the sinful weight that God expects you to lose. He requires you to lose. He wants you to be an overcomer and put that sin out. We talked about true repentance and how it is not just being sorry for our sins, but being sorry in a godly manner because we've sinned against God. We've broken His laws. We've dishonored Him. And so we are truly repentant, and we want to change. We want to grow. We want to overcome. We want to put that sin out of our lives. And then true repentance transforms us. It renews us. It revitalizes us. So the second point again is to admit that you are a sinner and that you are in need of repentance, to repent of your sin. The third point was to commit fully to losing the weight, no matter what the cost, but committing fully, seeking first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness is all in part important if we're going to put the sin out, to put God first in our lives. Remember, being a doer of the law and not just a hearer only, it's not enough just to come in here, but we have to live it each and every day of our lives, seven days a week, 24 hours a day. We need to be doers of God's law. We talked about putting our hand to the plow and not looking back, because once we look back, the Bible says we're not fit for God's Kingdom. Now, if we look back longingly as Lot's wife looked back and was turned to a pillar of salt, we need to look forward to God's Kingdom. We need to cherish God's plan of salvation in His Kingdom.

We talked about Elisha, how he sacrificed his oxen by burning his plow, by burning his plow and then sacrificing his oxen on top of that plow. Remember, Elijah came to Elisha, and God was calling Elisha to be Elijah's successor.

Elisha was a successful farmer. He was somewhat wealthy, I would imagine. He had like 12 teams of oxen out in the field at the time. He showed his complete commitment by burning his plow, burning it and then sacrificing his oxen on the plow. So God expects us to put our hand to the plow. Whenever we think of this verse, we should think of the commitment that Elisha made to become a prophet of God. From a wealthy landowner to a prophet, I'm not sure that's a promotion. I guess it depends on how you look at it. Most of the prophets ended up getting ridiculed. They were thrown in dungeons, as you recall, Jeremiah having been thrown in a dungeon.

Certainly the apostles were martyred, all except John, on the island of Patmos. He was exiled there, imprisoned there. So it isn't easy to be one of God's followers, to be one of his disciples, to be one of his prophets. It's not an easy task, but it is one that God has called us to do. So we all, in a very real sense, have to make the same decision that Elisha made. Are we going to obey God and follow him? Or are we going to shrink back and refuse to make a full commitment? So the third step on the road to salvation and becoming a big loser was to commit fully to putting sin out of our lives. Now let's go on to a fourth and very vital step in putting sin out, and that is to exercise spiritually on a daily basis, if you're going to lose the weight, the sin, and to keep it off. So spiritual exercise on a daily basis. And again, Mr. Dennis talked about that in his sermonette. He talked about prayer and Bible study and the importance of praying and studying our Bibles. This is spiritual exercise. When you don't open your Bible for a month, you're getting pretty lazy, aren't you? If you don't open your Bible for a week, or three or four days, you're not exercising much. You are taking it easy. You're taking the easy road.

In Hebrews 12.1, it says, we are called to shed the weight that so easily ensnares us, and again, to run with endurance the race that is before us. The Bible uses many analogies of exercise, running a race. That's a lot of exercise.

If you don't feel very strong spiritually, it could be because you haven't been exercising.

You might want to just stop for a moment and just take a little analysis. How strong do you feel spiritually? Do you feel that the Spirit of God is strong, that it's vibrant, that it's vital, that it's motivating you? If it is, perhaps it's because you're applying yourself. Maybe you have studied your Bible diligently, and you are benefiting from that. You're stronger because you've been taking God's Word in. You've been exercising. You've been ingesting of the Word of God. And it's making you healthier. It's making you stronger. On the other hand, if you feel pretty weak right now, it could also be that you haven't been doing your part. Maybe you need to study God's Word more faithfully.

On a more consistent basis, on a more regular basis.

I remember Marie was one of the contestants and the biggest loser.

Marie was 249 pounds, and she was just a little thing. She probably wasn't much over 5'2 or 3'. Maybe 5'4". She was 249 pounds. She was obviously overweight. She said that when she looked into a mirror, it was mortifying. That's how she described it. It was mortifying. It was devastating to look in a mirror because she had been younger as a teenager, and then she began to put on all this weight.

So it was very difficult for her to look in a mirror. She avoided mirrors. She didn't want to see herself. She didn't want to look at what she had become.

Because it was devastating to her. It was discouraging. So she didn't want to look in the mirror at all.

Now, excess physical weight can certainly harm our physical bodies, but the most serious excess weight that we can carry with us is the sinful weight that easily ensnares us and hinders us from finishing the race.

We hopefully don't avoid a spiritual mirror.

Hopefully we are drawing near to God, and He's drawing close to us, and we're feeling His power and His strength.

Contestants on The Biggest Loser commit themselves to over three months of rigorous training, and also some serious diet changes, which we'll talk about more later in another point. But we're talking about the rigorous training. No matter how much they lose at the ranch, they know that when they leave, those killer pounds will go right back on if they continue the lifestyle that got them there in the first place. Most of them didn't exercise a whole lot. They got to be 400 pounds because they hadn't been exercising faithfully. Had they been exercising faithfully, in most cases they would not have gotten so heavy. So they realized that there must be a total change, not only for three months, but a complete change of mind, of mindset, of attitude, of heart, of focus, and also of their habits. And it must last the rest of their life, because we all know how easy it is to put the weight back on, don't we? I lost some 25 pounds a couple of years ago. 25 pounds? I mean, I was doing well. I lost a lot of weight. I was looking much better. And my wife tells me I was looking a lot better.

But I allowed some bad habits to creep back in. And so most of it I've put back on, but I have lost some of it again. So I'm moving in the right direction again. I'm making some progress, and I hope to keep it down there. By eating less, that seems to be my big problem. It's not exercise. I exercise. I've always exercised, otherwise I'd weigh 340 pounds.

Because I do love to eat, and I've eaten too much over the years. But it's very important that we get on a proper exercise program. Now, spiritually, it's very, very important that you are on a spiritual exercise program. Now, on the Biggest Loser, they had a sprint triathlon where they swam a half mile, they biked for 12 miles, and they ran for 3 miles. Now, I'm going to encourage you to get on a spiritual quadr...

let's see, it's quadrilaathlon, something like that. It's four. I'm going to give you four aspects to this exercise program. Mr. Dennis talked about two of them. He talked about praying and studying the Bible. Those are very important. Praying and studying the Bible.

Those are very, very basic exercises that we all need to be engaging in on a daily basis. Praying to God and then studying the Word of God. A third one is obvious, too. It's called meditation. Meditation is a powerful tool because it helps focus our mind.

What are you thinking about when you wake up in the morning? What's on your mind? Is it all the problems of the day? When you wake up in the morning, is that what's on your mind? Oh, boy, another day. I've got all these hassles that... I've got to go to work. I've got all these hassles and everything that's overwhelming you. Or do you tend to have your first thoughts upon God and His way of life?

Serving Him, obeying Him, putting Him first. Meditation is very powerful. As I get older, I don't sleep as much as I used to, and I end up laying awake more than I used to. And that's where I find meditation very, very helpful. You know, meditation is a good thing. I don't get so anxious. At 3 or 4 o'clock in the morning, I don't necessarily want to get out of bed. So it's nice to be able to just meditate and think about God and His truth, His way of life. There's many, many things that we can meditate on.

If you haven't gotten used to meditation, it's something you can get used to. It's all in where you focus your mind, what you think about. Obviously, the more studying you're doing, the more you have to meditate on, too. If you study the Bible on a regular basis, then you can meditate on those things that you've been studying about. And you can reflect on what it is God wants you to learn. What is God trying to teach me now? What does He want me to learn? And what have I learned from studying the book of Ephesians or whatever it is you're studying at the time? These are things you can reflect on and think about. So if you haven't been meditating, that is another important exercise spiritually.

David was one who meditated a lot. You can read the book of Psalms, and you'll learn a lot about meditation from King David. King David was out in the fields a lot. He was looking over the sheep. He was able to think. He was able to let his mind go.

That's where you see his mind focused in the book of Psalms. Psalm after Psalm, he meditated on God's law. How love I thy law. Psalm 119, it's full of the meditation of David. He thought about God's law and the beauty of God's law. There are just many, many wonderful examples of meditation in the book of Psalms. So if you have trouble meditating, I would encourage you to study the book of Psalms and read the book of Psalms.

If you have trouble praying, in fact, you can get down on your knees with the book of Psalms and just start reading aloud if you have the privacy and make those Psalms your prayer. You can project yourself in a sense. David was a man after God's own heart. So if you learn to pray and to meditate as David did, and your heart turns to God in the way that David's did, that will be a very positive thing for you. So again, I would study the book of Psalms.

There's really no excuse for not studying your Bible because the Bible is just chock-full of wonderful things to study. But again, it's that first step, isn't it? A lot of times people say, well, I don't know what to study. Well, then just start in Genesis then and start reading, or start in Matthew and start reading, or the book of Jude, or just anywhere. Do something when it comes to studying the Bible. People make a lot of excuses for not studying the Bible. And most, well, none of them hold any water because we have the Bible readily available to us.

I mean, who doesn't have a Bible these days? Everyone has a Bible. We have multiple copies of Bibles.

We can get the Bible on tape. We can get it on our phones. We can have it in all different forms these days. I think reading is still a very good way to ingest the Bible, reading the Bible, because visually, it's, when we read it, it sinks in deeper, I think. Listening is good, but it's not as good as also reading it. Reading is important.

I think we can do all these things. Sometimes, if you have a long commute, certainly taking the Bible and listening to the Bible in the car is a good thing. It helps you have your mind on the Bible. It helps you pick up a lot of stories out of the Bible and lessons from the Bible. But it's not enough to just listen in the car. That's not enough. You know, you need to also engage the reading aspects. God gave us a mind to read and to study the Bible and to pour over it and to think about it. You can't do that when you're in a car.

Not like you can. You've got other tasks in mind. When you read it, hopefully more of it sinks in.

Even if you're just reading a few chapters a day, three or four chapters a day, you'll get through the Bible in a year.

So, in 40 years, you can read the Bible 40 times, just by three or four chapters a day.

You've heard, by the yard it's hard, but by the inch it's a cinch. Okay, well, read a little bit every day, three or four chapters a day. It doesn't take long to study your Bible and to read the Bible.

So, it is a very important aspect of our Christian growth. Studying the Bible, this is a booklet called Tools for Spiritual Growth. You probably all received this recently. You don't have a copy. We have some copies at the table over here. But this talks about Bible study. It talks about fasting.

It talks about some of the tools. Fasting is a spiritual tool. That's the fourth part of your exercise program. It's fasting. Fasting is a spiritual power tool.

It really will help you grow by leaps and bounds if you will practice it. If you will fast on a regular basis, not just once a year on the day of atonement, but if you haven't fasted much, start once a month.

That's really not that difficult to fast once a month. But you have to make plans to do it, or it won't happen. It's funny how that works. We have all these calendars and everything, but I wonder how much we really use them.

A calendar has to be used in order to be utilized.

And if you just put in there, I'm going to be fasting on this particular day in March, April, May, June, July, August.

Make plans. If you don't have a plan, you're not going to be fasting much. You've got to make some plans. Otherwise, it just goes by you, doesn't it?

It slips by you, and you never really get around to it. You never do it. I see there's a big round to it back there on the bulletin board.

If you need a round to it, there's one right back there.

But that is the problem. We don't make plans to do the things that we need to do. Fasting is a part of your exercise program. Christ said that when He was crucified, when He was resurrected, when He went back to the Father, His disciples would fast. I don't believe He was just talking about, on the day of Atonement, by any means, the Bible says that some things don't happen except by prayer and fasting.

Some spiritual trials, we don't get over them. We don't get past them without prayer and fasting.

Those are power tools. Prayer and fasting are powerful tools that we need to be using. I'd like to just quote from what Mr. Vic Kubik said when he asked us to fast here recently. He says, As we strengthen our relationship with our Father in Heaven, I'd like to ask for a church-wide day of fasting. It was back January 25 to February 8. He says, We're not in a crisis, nor is there some monumental decision that needs to be made. I'm just asking for us all to humble ourselves before God so that we can grow and bear fruit.

He says, Prayer is our lifeblood. Prayer is our lifeblood. If you're not praying, then you don't have that kind of life, that spiritual life that you need to have. Prayer is our lifeblood. So when we neglect prayer, then we're cutting off the circulation to our bodies. The spiritual circulation. Prayer is our lifeblood. Life is in the blood. We have to be praying.

Prayer helps us get things circulating.

There's lots to pray about. But again, we have to plan to pray. David planned to pray three times a day. Daniel prayed three times a day.

Morning, noon, and evening. So we need to have these good habits, prayer habits. It will get the spiritual circulation going.

He says, Prayer is our lifeblood. Bible study is our food.

Bible study is our food. But it's fasting that is the catalyst that focuses our spiritual attention upon doing what we should. Okay, again, some things don't happen except by prayer and fasting. He went on to say that we are fasting to ask God for the kind of growth, the genuine growth that He is looking for in all of us. You know, God wants genuine growth in all of us. Only God can provide the spiritual growth to His church. And we are praying that our labors help produce good results in people. But the growth that you and I are personally responsible for comes from inside our lives.

It's only God that can provide that spiritual growth, but we have to do our part, praying and studying the Bible and fasting, meditating.

These are spiritual exercises that we can all do. Let's go to Hebrews 5. Hebrews 5.

Hebrews 5.11.

Hebrews 5.11.

Hebrews 5.11. It says, speaking about Jesus Christ, who is our High Priest, He says in verse 11, "...of whom we have much to say," speaking of this Christ who is after the order of Melchizedek, "...we have much to say, and it's hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing." Okay, the problem with the people back in those days was that they were dull of hearing.

They weren't real active doers. In fact, they weren't even very active hearers. They were even dull of hearing.

So they needed to be stirred up.

He says, "...for though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God." Speaking of the truths of God, the commandments of God, the God scriptures, "...and you have come to need milk and not solid food.

For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. But solid food belongs to those who are of full use..." I'm sorry, of full age. "...that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil." So exercise is also resisting sin.

It's also resisting sin and then doing what's right. The Bible says that we should resist Satan and he will flee from us. So it does take resistance. That's part of training as well. We have to resist certain things. There's a certain kind of exercise where we resist and that makes us stronger. We have our senses exercised by being doers of God's law.

The word used here in verse 14 is the Greek word hexis. It means habit or practice.

The word for exercise in the Greek is gumnazo, G-U-M-N-A-Z-O. It referred back to practice naked in the games or to train. Back in the old days, a long time ago, they would actually practice naked in the games. They would train naked, which seems very foreign. I don't think that's something we want to bring back.

This was something that they would do back in these days to practice or to train for these precursors of the Olympic-type games.

So strong meat is referring to being able to apply and use godly principles in our everyday choices. We all have choices to make every day of our lives. Satan tries to tempt us to make bad choices, sinful choices. Of course, God wants us to make good choices that will strengthen us, that will bring blessings upon us. Those who are eating strong meat know evil when they see it, and so they reject it. If we're eating strong meat, if we're being exercised by studying the word of God, we know what God's word tells us. God is the one that tells us what's right and wrong. It's not something we're supposed to make up on our own, is it?

I mean, we're not supposed to lean to our own understanding. We're supposed to read it in the Bible. And God tells us what's acceptable and what isn't. He's got lots of laws in the Bible.

The Ten Commandments are fundamental, and we're not only to keep them in the letter, but we are to keep them in the spirit of God's law. And when we do that, we are blessed by observing those laws. When we go against God's rules and laws, then we pay a price. It's called blessings for obedience, curses for disobedience. Really, God's law is pretty simple. It's not very complicated at all. It's all outlined for us. It's very simple. If you obey God, then God blesses you. That doesn't mean everything is easy in life, but there are blessings that come through obedience. It's an axiomatic law. We just don't get ourselves into as much trouble if we're obeying. If we're disobeying, then it brings all kinds of grief upon us. It's really not difficult when we lie to someone. That usually brings some problems. People don't really like to be lied to. And when they find out they were being lied to, they don't appreciate it. So they take exception to it, and it causes a lot of friction, usually, between the liar and the one who is lied to. And when we steal from someone, again, that causes friction. If you steal my iPhone, I'm coming after you. You can't have it. It causes friction. There are blessings for doing the right thing, for not stealing my phone. Then, of course, I'm not going to really cause too much grief, probably. But anyway, these are simple. They're fundamental laws. If we keep God's law, then there will be blessings for obeying the law, and there will be curses for not. People can even get locked up for stealing things. They can go to prison. We have prisons full of lawbreakers, don't we? The prisons are full of lawbreakers, and actually, this room is full of lawbreakers. But some laws are worse than others. Some laws we break, and they have more dire consequences. But it's pretty simple. We don't have to belabor that. The important thing is that we learn to exercise spiritually through prayer, through Bible study, through meditating and fasting. This is a quadralathlon. It's hard to say. I looked it up. There is such a thing as a quadralathlon. Those are the things that you need to start exercising. Kayaking is also the fourth aspect in a quadralathlon. It's swimming, and kayaking, and biking, and running. Okay.

I'd like to just share a few comments from some of the people on The Biggest Loser. I want us to try to get the vision that some of these people got in a physical way. We need to get it spiritually. We need to grasp that we can make changes in our lives spiritually that will make us happier spiritually and stronger spiritually. Rachel said, I think it was on the last show, not the grand finale, but the one before that, several weeks before the final show. It was like 14 weeks into the program. She said, I can't believe I'm seeing this day because she was still there. She was still on The Biggest Loser. She's referring to herself. She says, Rachel, in week one, would be absolutely floored at how much progress has been made in 14 weeks. I have come so far on my journey and I have arrived at who I love. She felt a lot better about herself 14 weeks later. She looked much happier. She looked just very motivated. She says, keep pushing hard because it is so worth it. To her, it was worth all the extra effort that she was putting into it. This was right after she won a Ford Fusion Energy, by the way. I think it was because of that triathlon. She won that and then she got a car for it. I think the car gets about 108 miles per gallon in the most efficient mode. I don't know how long you can go. It's probably electricity for a while. It lasts for a while. You can get about 108 miles per gallon for a while.

Now, Jillian was one of the trainers and she was always pushing the people to work harder. She was yelling at one of the contestants to get up there, to jump up on this platform. She said, get up there, let's go. You want it, show me how bad you want it. That was part of the theme, is how bad do you want it? How bad do we want to change? How bad do we want to become like Christ? David, whose first wife died of cancer, promised her that he would lose weight for their four children's sake. He said, I told my family I was going to finish strong. Here I am in the last week working out with Dolvett in the final week, looking back to week one where defeat was part of my vocabulary. Okay, back in the early stages, defeat was part of my vocabulary where going home was an option. David changed his mind as he went along through this program. He started to realize that he really could make changes that could last a lifetime. They would be positive changes for not only him, but also for his family. He says, look at me now, look at how strong I am becoming. There was something deep down inside me, and it was that heart of a warrior that I knew was in me. I've been able to reveal that guy a little bit more each week. He says, how do you like me now?

He had made a lot of changes in his life, and he had a proper sense of accomplishment.

It's okay to have a proper sense of accomplishment as long as it isn't too much pride and vanity. It's good to feel good about making progress, accomplishing something worthwhile.

Jennifer said, the feelings I am having today are so much different than the ones that I had in week one. This was 14 weeks later. Then I was nervous, I was apprehensive, I was scared, but today I am excited about working out. I've been chipping away and busting through my safe zone since I came here. This has become my life now. I wonder how many of us haven't gotten in a safe zone again. We've been in the church a long time. We know what it takes.

We're here every Sabbath, pretty much.

But maybe we're just going through a lot of the motions, and we're not really as zealous as we should be. Maybe we're not praying as zealously as we could for one another. Maybe we're not reading the Bible as much as we ought to. Maybe we're not learning the lessons that God wants us to learn. Maybe we're repeating some of the same mistakes over and over and over again and continuing to be comfortable doing that.

We shouldn't get so comfortable in our sins. I'm going to read the Bible. Chelsea said, It's been six years since I have been in the hundreds.

She was in the two hundreds for the past six years. Chelsea, week one, would not even believe that Chelsea today. I knew that Chelsea could do it, but I don't believe she knew just how far she would come. I realized how much I neglected myself. Now I'm so much stronger and more positive, happy, and want to live life. She had a whole different perspective, outlook on life.

Bobby said it's nice to feel strong for once. Bobby had felt weak for a long time. He was 400-plus pounds, and he'd gotten very weak over the years. He said it felt good to be strong. Now, our journey is a much longer and more arduous one than just a few months of intense, physical exercise. It would be very difficult to keep an exercise regimen going—a very strenuous exercise regimen going—our entire lives. But thankfully, we don't have to.

But we do have to get a good start if we're not there.

If you don't have a good start, then you have to get yourself started.

Then you can maintain. If you don't have anything to maintain, then there's just a lot of neglect.

Neglect is very destructive.

In this life, it can be discouraging at times, as it seems to be a slow process. We can become impatient. We can stop trying because the spiritual weight doesn't come off fast enough. The process of conversion is not an instantaneous one. It takes continual effort. We must focus on the goal of God's kingdom, and that one day we will have the perfect spiritual mind and the body of Christ. We must not be discouraged by how much weight we still have to lose. I mean, none of us are perfect yet. None of us are perfect yet. We still have that weight to lose. We mustn't allow ourselves to be discouraged by how little we may seem to look like God right now. You know, none of us look like God perfectly. We all fall short. We all have a ways to go. So it can be discouraging. We need to take time to look back at our spiritual journey. We need to ask God to help us see the progress that we've made, how much we have changed our lives since the journey started. You know, how much have how much how many changes have you made? And have you stayed faithful to those changes over the years? Some of you came out of the world a long time ago. You changed some bad habits spiritually.

You stopped sinning in a variety of ways, and you've remained faithful. You know, you're not perfect. You may slip up once in a while in certain ways, but you are continuing to fight the good fight.

Are you still working hard and exercising spiritually? Or are you neglecting to read your Bibles? You know, some of you may be neglecting to do that.

Maybe you're neglecting to pray daily, fervently, faithfully. Perhaps you are spiritually lazy to some degree.

Are you resisting temptations or are you giving into them? Are you becoming a spiritual couch potato again? Is it time to get off the couch and into the gym?

If you're doing everything that you can and you aren't shedding that spiritual baggage and putting on the mind of God as fast as you'd like, you may look at where you've come from and then push forward. Continue to do it. Just start reading the Bible. No matter where you start, just start doing it right away. In fact, this Sabbath, if you haven't been doing it, start today.

Sometimes we hit a plateau and we don't seem to be moving much beyond that, but if we will continue to do the things that will get us there, eventually we'll have a breakthrough.

In Hebrews 12, verses 3 and 4, let's go there for a moment as we draw close to wrapping this sermon up today, Hebrews 12, verse 3, For consider him who endured such hostility from sinners against himself, lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.

Consider our Savior Jesus Christ, lest we become weary and discouraged. You have not yet resisted to bloodshed. Jesus resisted to bloodshed on our behalf, striving against sin, and you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons. My son do not despise the chastening of the Lord, nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by him. You know, God does love us. He will continue to rebuke us as we need to make changes in our lives. Sometimes we look at others and we seem to be making more progress than we are. Even though they may not be working as hard at it, they are putting forth an effort and deserve to be making progress, but their path seems to be much easier than ours. Of course, the Bible says we should not compare ourselves among ourselves, because that can cause a problem for us. We certainly ought not to resent the fact that people are making progress spiritually and growing spiritually. We should rejoice with them as they grow. I remember on the ranch, this season, Hap mentioned how frustrated he was because he worked a lot harder than Bobby. You know, Bobby really didn't seem to be working near as hard as Hap, but Bobby would shed a lot more weight in the week. The weight was falling off a lot easier for him.

Sometimes, if we're not careful, we can have a, it's not fair God-type attitude. We can begin to resent the fact that we aren't growing like we want to grow.

Spiritually, God wants all of us to grow, and God will help us grow, but we need to, again, put Him first in our life and then continue to run the race that is set before us.

2 Corinthians 10, verse 12, is where it says, For we dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those who commend themselves, but they, measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise. We need to take responsibility for ourselves.

Maurice said that setting a goal and reaching it is the best feeling in the world. You know, we should all have some spiritual goals. 2 Timothy 2, verse 15, says, Don't make excuses for not being diligent in studying to show yourself approved. 2 Timothy 2, verse 15, says that we should show ourselves workmen that need not be ashamed, but rightly dividing the word of truth.

So the fourth step on the road to salvation and becoming a big loser is to develop the good spiritual habits that will heighten, maintain, and sustain our spiritual focus.

So, brethren, as we approach the Passover season, again, let's be extremely grateful to God and Christ for our calling. They are our coaches. We look to them first and foremost. We follow them. We know that Christ is our Savior. We know that we all are sinners that need to be repentant.

So let's continue to examine ourselves. Let's continue to repent of our sins and commit ourselves more fully to obeying God and putting sin out of our lives. And let's do this fourth step. It's a very, very important one. It's exercising spiritually through prayer, through Bible study, through meditation, and through fasting. So if you haven't been doing these things, I would encourage you to start a program right away, a more diligent program, so that you can make progress spiritually and so that you'll be ready for the Passover. You know, Matt was one of the contestants on The Biggest Loser, and he postponed his wedding to be on The Biggest Loser. He said, I can't put it in words what has happened to me on The Biggest Loser. This has changed my life. This was several weeks into the course of the program. He says, this has changed my life. I want to present the best version of myself to my fiancé. So he put off getting married because he had to go to the ranch for 14 weeks. He didn't get married right away. He wanted to drop some of the weight that was weighing him down, and he did lose a lot of weight. He wanted to present the best version of himself to his fiancé. Now, does that remind you of something spiritually that we're supposed to be doing?

When Christ returns, we are to become the bride of Christ. We are to marry Christ at His return. We are the bride that's preparing itself now. We are a church that's supposed to be without spot or wrinkle or any such thing. So as those preparing to be the bride of Christ, we want to do the same thing. We want to present our best selves to God, to Christ. We want to get that sin out of our life. We want to become without spot or wrinkle. Christ was a lamb without blemish, without spot or wrinkle. We are called to become, just like our Savior, Jesus Christ. So, I did pretty well until right now. So let's prepare ourselves to become the bride of Christ. We do so by putting the sin out of our lives, becoming more like Christ. So let's all be big losers in this life. Let's be big winners, though, as we prepare for God's kingdom.