Spiritual Boot Camp

Very good about putting the slideshow together for us. A very enjoyable thing. So if you will do that, I know that they would appreciate that. And we'll all look forward to that as well. I think I started off, and I didn't welcome the people who are listening in on the web. If we have any visitors with us, welcome to you. Welcome to you as well. I don't normally mention anniversaries, but I see we have a notable one here.

Doug and Belinda will be celebrating 20 years of marriage tomorrow. And congratulations to you. We have the others as well. The Douglases over 60 years, and the Pratulas and the Balroops as well. Let me remind you just briefly of a couple things there as well.

You know, we had this local church bulletin board that was put together for us. It hasn't been used much, if at all, over the last few months. And I've noticed people have asked questions about could this happen and could that happen. We'd like to share this with someone. I would like to see us start using that. It could almost become like, as much as I hate to use the word Facebook, it could almost become like Facebook for the church.

You know, it's a place for us to just kind of share announcements with each other that we don't have to take the time through email, emails, or put them in there. But if you have something notable in your life, pictures you'd like to share, things that you have to offer that you're getting rid of that you think someone else might be able to make use of, that's the place for it. And we will get to you again. You got the URL for it there in the announcement.

But I'd like to see us start using that. I noticed in talking to one of the pastors up in Jackson, not in Jacksonville, in Jekyll Island, you know, they do that. They do it all through email. And he said it can become overwhelming at times. And I said, yeah, we have a venue for that. We just haven't used it much. So I'd like to see us start using that. And what else do we have coming up? Yeah, if you would like to serve, sometimes when we come back from the face, we kind of like starting a new time now.

If you would like to serve in some areas, please see Doug, John Johnson, or me, or Dave Permar, and we will let you serve in whatever you want. Teens, we talked before the face about a teen weekend where you'll be doing the ushering, the counting. We got a servant volunteer as well as a song leader volunteer. So we've got that scheduled for November 3rd. So you and Dave Permar and Kathy Johnson could be preparing for that, and we will all be looking forward to that weekend.

I think that's enough. I think that's enough for announcements. We can talk more about that as the month goes on. But let's get into the sermon. You know, the first week back from the feast, I always contemplate and ask God, what does the congregation need? What do we talk about when we first come back from the feast? For nine days, if we count the Sunday opening night service, and I hope everyone realizes the Sunday opening night service at the feast, this is much a part of observing the Feast of Tabernacles as the first holy day and the last holy day and the Sabbath in between.

As we come back from the time where we've been able to be with each other for nine days, and if you were up in Jekyll for the holy day or the Sabbath before, ten days, we've heard messages every day, we've been to the Bible every day, and you come back, I hope, on a high.

And I hope on Tuesday you missed. You missed being able to be with everyone and being able to be in church and being able to share good conversation with everyone in the fellowship that comes along with the feast, because that's a very important part of our fellowship and training, as well as the church services that we go to. So I hope we all came back more committed to God, more determined to be in His kingdom. Now, I was here for part of Doug's message to have that vision before us that that would motivate us that we really want, and we really believe what God has offered to us.

So what do we talk about on the first day? And I thought, well, you know, it's kind of like when the kids come back from summer camp, and we have many of the children who go to summer camp, and they come back, and after seven days with each other, they are motivated, they're on a high, and the challenge to parents is how do we keep that going? How do we keep that going throughout the year? And how do we not just... they just not fade back into the way they were as they go back to school and back in the neighborhoods and all the things that they do?

How does that happen? And the same challenge is for us, because as we come back from the feast, we go back into the world, back to our jobs, back into school, back into our neighborhoods, back into our, you know, maybe routines that may or may not be all that good. But God wants us to keep the motivation and keep the momentum going. That we need to be... if we really did appreciate the feast, if we really did get a taste of God's kingdom, if we really want it, we have to be determined and we have to make ourselves, make ourselves be ready.

Now there's a quote that I'm going to give you by Bobby Knight. Everyone's heard of Bobby Knight, I think. I was in school at Indiana University in the early years of Bobby Knight when... and he's a very interesting character. Later on, a company I worked for, we brought him in as a guest speaker and he's, you know, he is controversial and he's got a lot of problems, but he had some good insights on how to motivate people and what it takes to be, what it takes to make it, to what you want it to be.

Let me read you this quote that he gives. He says, The will to win is not nearly as important as the will to prepare to win. Everyone's got the desire to win, right? If you're on a college basketball team, you want to win. If you're an NFL player, you want to win. If you're on a high school team, you want to win. If you're in the Church of God, you want the kingdom of God, you want to be there.

Everyone has the desire to win and that's a good thing. But that desire and that will is not as important as the will to prepare to win. Because if you aren't willing to put the time into it, if you aren't willing to make yourself do what needs to be done, you're not going to win. You're not going to be a champion. In the Church's standpoint, in the spiritual end, you're not going to be in the kingdom of God.

If you're not willing to do your part, the preparation that it takes, you're simply not going to be there. God will give us the tools. He will give us His Holy Spirit. But the Holy Spirit alone isn't going to get us into the kingdom. It's what we do with the tools that God gives us.

It's what we do with the opportunities that God gives our way for education, fellowship, the time to be together, the learning that we do, the study time we do. It's all there, but He won't do it for us. His kingdom will come with or without us. But we have to put the time into it. We have to put the effort. We have to have the will to prepare for His kingdom. And if we're not willing to do that, then one day we're going to be very, very sorry. So He says, the will to win is not nearly as important as the will to prepare to win.

Everyone wants to win, but not everyone wants to prepare to win. Now, in the Church, that's certainly true. Everyone wants the kingdom of God. Does everyone want to do what's necessary to be in the kingdom of God?

Because, sadly, the Bible tells us not everyone has the will to do what it takes to be in the kingdom of God. Not everyone has the will to use the Holy Spirit the way that God wants us to. Not everyone wants to win, but not everyone wants to prepare to win. Preparing to win is where the determination that you will win is made. Now, without God's Spirit, none of us are going to be in the kingdom. Without God's Spirit, none of us win in that form of the phrase there. With God's Spirit, it's possible. Without it, it's impossible. So, in one way, yes, he does it all for us. Jesus Christ did it for us. Yes, he did it all for us, but we have our part to play. Back in 1 Peter, he kind of outlines for us some of the things that we do. How do we prepare to win? What is God looking for us to do? How do we be sure that we're doing our part, that we will be ready for the kingdom of God? And not just wanting it, but actually preparing for it, and doing the things that is required of us to be there. Because God is very clear in the Bible. This type person, this type person, this type person won't be there. It will be people who are dedicated. It will be people who, through their lives, and through the choices they make, have shown God, I want what you want. I want to be who you want me to be. 1 Peter 2, 1 Peter 2 and verse 1. He says, Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking, putting all those things behind us, as newborn babes, desire, desire the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby.

It takes desiring the pure milk of the word to grow. There are analogies throughout the Bible on what it takes to grow. Paul is very good about talking about the desire that we need to have. He uses the sports analogy. And talking about the people who run races. They have to be ready. They have to prepare. They just don't go out one day and say, hey, I want to ruin a race. They prepare for months and months in advance. He talks about soldiers. Soldiers have to be prepared. You're not a good soldier because you put the uniform on and say, I want to be a good soldier. There's boot camp that you go through. And all the men who have served in the Army or Marines or Navy or somewhere know what boot camp is. We are in a spiritual boot camp. As we go forth from the Feast of Tabernacles, as we look toward the Kingdom, we have to discipline ourselves to be in a boot camp to get ready for the Kingdom of God. To develop that desire to prepare. To develop that will to prepare. To do and not just hear and know what God says. We heard many good messages at the Feast wherever you are. But if we don't desire and if we don't have the will to make it happen, if we don't have the will to do what is required instead of just hearing it and knowing it, we're going to be very sorry individuals one day to abloan the opportunity that God has given us. So he says, as newborn babes desire the pure milk of the Word, that you may grow thereby. If, if indeed, you have tasted that the Lord is gracious. So at the Feast, did we taste that the Lord is gracious? At the Feast, did we taste that the way of God is good? As what we experience there, is that the way we would like to live in harmony and peace and with people all believing the same thing? Not having any of the ill effects or influences of the world. Having left all that behind and being able to enjoy those eight and nine days apart from our everyday lives. And knowing that for eternity it will be that way, if, if indeed we have tasted what God has given us, then indeed we will, you should have the will to be in the kingdom. Do we have the desire? Do we have the desire or the will to prepare for the kingdom? Because God isn't going to accept any of us just the way we are. It simply isn't going to happen. So, let's talk about that a little bit today. Let's talk about spiritual boot camp and what we can do in our lives to be sure that we are doing what God wants us to do and expects Christian soldiers.

Christian people who are preparing themselves. Christian people who are putting themselves on a diet, if you will, a healthy diet, a healthy spiritual diet, so that they can become spiritually healthy, spiritually vibrant, spiritually energetic, spiritually awake, spiritually zealous.

Let's go back to Romans 12, verses 1 and 2. Verses that you know well, but verses that we can talk about here because here Paul tells us what the process is.

In chapter 12, verse 1, he says, A living sacrifice. We have heard those words hundreds of times if we've been in the church for a while. A living sacrifice.

But have we really taken the time to know what does it mean, a living sacrifice? What is God looking for us to do?

Is He looking for us just to not work on Saturdays and come to church? Is He looking for us just to be there on Holy Days? Is He looking for us just to give tithes?

It's a living sacrifice. A day-to-day, 24 hours a day, seven days a week sacrifice that God is looking for. A living sacrifice.

And if indeed we've tasted of the graciousness of God and we want that, then it's a living sacrifice that we need to be working toward.

If indeed we want the kingdom of God and we're willing and we want it, then we have to be willing to prepare for it. And part of that preparation is a living sacrifice is the goal of God.

Not one foot in the world and one foot in the church. Eventually, both feet, firmly, in God's way, living His way, at home, at church, with people in the church, and our dealings with people outside the church. One hundred percent committed. Living sacrifice.

You know, Jesus Christ talked about—I'll say that for later. Let's go on chapter 12, verse 1. I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.

Jesus Christ died that our sins could be forgiven. He saved our lives. He's given us life. He's given us a future. God has made promises to us. It's our reasonable service. How can you say anything other than, oh, everything to God? So if He says, I want your bodies as a living sacrifice, that's reasonable. Because without Him, without His promises, we have absolutely nothing to live for or to look toward.

Verse 2, and don't be conformed to this world. Don't be like them. Don't try to win favor with them. Don't be conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

You have to change the way you think. The way you thought before, that has to, over the course of your life, as you prepare to win—and I put win in quotes—as you prepare to be in God's kingdom, you have to change the way you think.

You can't think the way you used to think anymore. There's a transformation that's going to happen. That doesn't happen automatically. When you're baptized and you receive Holy Spirit, there are some things that change, but we don't change the way we think automatically. We have to make some conscious decisions along the way. And when we're in boot camp—when we're in boot camp, those of you who have been in the military—you know you have someone thinking for you. This is what you do now. You're not doing that. You're not going there. This is the time you'll wake up. This is the time you'll eat. This is the time you'll go to sleep. You're not going anywhere this weekend. Everything is decided for you. God expects us to put that ourselves through that same drill. Not easy to do. Not easy to do. He'll tell us what we need to do, but He doesn't make us do it. In one sense, if He would come down and every time, like it says in Isaiah 30 of the millennium, tap us on the shoulders and say, No, no, no. That's not the way to do that. This is the way to do that. This isn't the way to react to that comment that's been made to you. This is the way to do it. It would be easy, but He expects us to do that ourselves and to be monitors using His Holy Spirit and using His Word to see how we react and to patterning ourselves after Jesus Christ. Transforming your mind. It's not an easy thing to do. Be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. And then in verse 3, He tells us the very first thing we need. We have to be humble. If we're thinking of ourselves highly, if we're thinking that we're someone, you know what? We're missing the boat. Don't think of anyone more highly than yourself. Be very humble as you go about the process of preparing for the Kingdom and developing the will to prepare for the Kingdom. So today I want to just talk about three steps. Three steps that we have in getting ready for the Kingdom, in preparing for the Kingdom, in developing the will to prepare for the Kingdom.

Point 1. Point 1, and those of you who are in Jekyll, this will sound very familiar to you, so I'm not going to spend a lot of time on it. We have to choose and commit to God's way. In Jekyll, I gave a sermon on choices and how our choices are so important. If we turn back to Deuteronomy 30, verse 19, the only Scripture I'm going to turn to in this section, but I can't give this sermon without bringing this up. Deuteronomy 30 and verse 19, one of the hallmark verses of the Bible, under inspiration, you know what's recorded, I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. You have two choices. You can win or lose, basically. You can be a winner or you can be a loser. I set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore, such an easy choice. Choose life. Who wouldn't choose life? If I went out on the corner and said, I'm setting before you two days, choose life or death, blessing or cursing, what would you choose? Every 100% of the people would say, I choose life. You'd have to be an idiot not to choose life. So he says, choose life, that both you and your descendants may live. But choosing life and saying the words is easy.

Doing it is another story. Doing and choosing life is something. You know, at the end of our lives, God's going to look at the choices that we make, every choice that we make, day in and day out. Will we be at services or do we sleep in?

Do I be a little dishonest at work or do I be perfectly honest? Do I cheat on my taxes a little bit or am I perfectly? Every choice we make, no matter how little or how insignificant, it tells God and programs our mind, we choose life. At the end of our physical lives, or when Jesus Christ returns, whatever comes first, he will be looking at what we've done, the pattern of our lives, the choices that we've made, the decisions that we've made along the way, and he'll say, you know what? What they've done, they've chosen life. They've proved it to me that they will choose life because what they did, day by day, they were faithful in little, and now I see they will be faithful in much. What we do, day to day, counts. What we do, day to day, and the pattern that we're setting for ourselves, the way we're training our minds, the commitments that we make, the choices that we make, matter.

And every day of our life, we're in boot camp. Every day of our life, we have to look at ourselves and think, what are we doing? Are we patterning ourselves for life? Or are we kind of hedging our bets and still on the way to death? I'll just kind of hold this over here and do this. Well, the question we have to ask for ourselves, is the kingdom of God worth it? Is the kingdom of God worth committing, truly committing, and choosing, and making the choices every day? Every day that will tell God, I choose life. I choose life. And there's a pattern of thinking that goes along with that. It only happens. Well, we are disciplining ourselves and we are making ourselves do what God says through His Holy Spirit He will give us the power to do. Okay, so that's point one. Point two. Point two, we just read here in Romans 12.

We have to sacrifice. We have to sacrifice. The old saying is, those who have played sports have heard it, no pain, no gain. No pain, no gain. If you're not giving up something, if it doesn't hurt a little bit, then you're not preparing. Then you're trying to take the easy way out, and there is no easy way into the kingdom of God.

There is not the Broadway that we enter into, but by the narrow gate we enter into, and few there be, the Bible says that find it. Sacrifice. Sacrifice. If we play sports, if we're shoulders, soldiers, we're sacrificing. Our life is no longer ours. If we go on a diet for health reasons or just because we want to be a different weight, there's sacrifice involved.

Just don't do it automatically. The world will want to tell us, you just eat this for a few days and whatever, a few weeks, and everything will happen. But no, there's some commitment that's there, too, because the sacrifice that we make as we're soldiers, as we commit to God, it has to be a lifelong commitment.

The rest of your life. Not just until you graduate from boot camp. Not just until you hit that desired weight. Not just until the sickness goes away or the illness goes away. The rest of your life.

Sacrifice. Sacrifice. It's not easy to do. But it's something that we have to program our minds for as God leads us. That we are willing to give that up forever. Whatever that may be.

You know, Jesus Christ, back in Matthew 16, talked about that very thing.

Again, words we know very well, but I don't know that we actually stop and think about what He has said about what we need to do if we're going to follow Him and if we're going to be in His kingdom. Matthew 16 and verse 24. Christ said to His disciples, That's them then, that's you and me today, if indeed we're following Him. If indeed we are studying Him and the words He said and realize our goal is to become like Him, because He is the example that we need to be following. Christ said to His disciples, If anyone desires to come after me, but that's what you want, let Him deny himself. Let Him deny Himself. You've got to say no to some of the things that you maybe really find fun to do, that aren't commensurate with God's Word. Maybe the things that aren't healthy to you that you've got to say, no, I can't do that anymore. Maybe you have to say to yourself, no, I can't do that anymore. I can't be lax. I can't be apathetic. I can't be complacent. I can't allow myself that, because that isn't what God's Word says. I need to know it. I need to discipline myself. I need to sacrifice my will and give it to God. If we're not willing to do that, I don't know. I don't know that we'll be ready for the kingdom of God, the way that God expects us to be, developing the will to prepare for His kingdom. If anyone desires, if anyone says, I want you, I want to follow you, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it. If we think we're going to fool God and say, I've got one foot over here yet, God's okay if I do this and I have an exemption from doing this, I don't have to obey Him in all these things because I don't like that, or I don't want to do it, or it's not convenient, or this family member doesn't want me to do it, or I really want to do this instead. Whoever desires to save his life, that means I want to do the things that I want to do, as opposed to the things that God clearly says I need to do, or I should be doing. Whoever desires to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life, whoever sacrifices his life, whoever is willing to give it up to follow God implicitly, but whoever loses his life, for my sake, will find it. He'll find eternal life. No pain, no gain. That's just simply the way it is. That's what God has called us to. And if we're baptized or if we're considering baptism, that's what we commit to. We choose life, then we do the things and are willing to sacrifice whatever may impede on our convenience, comfort, family relationships, whatever it might be, we're willing to sacrifice that in order to please God. Let's go back to the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5. In Christ is speaking here, he kind of really uses a graphic example of how serious he is about the sacrifice we need to make. Here in Matthew 5, he's talking about, and he expands the commandments. He says, it's not okay just to not physically kill your brother. I don't even want you hating them and wanting them dead. He says, it's not okay just to not physically commit adultery. Don't even look at another woman to lust after her. And in verse 29 of Matthew 5, he says this, If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you. Now, we've read those words a lot of times in our life.

He isn't saying that he really wants people to go out and pluck their eyes out, but he's making a point. If there is something that you are doing that's keeping you away from God, something that just kind of always tempts you, something that you always fall prey to, that you're simply disobeying God because that's the way it is, he says, get rid of it. It's better to pluck your eye out if there's something that you're doing, something that you're looking at, something that's there that keeps you from being totally yielded to God. Pluck it out. No one's going to really do that, right? No one's going to go physically do that, but he's making a very graphic point. And he says, for it's more profitable for you that one of your members perish than for your whole body to be cast into hell or into the lake of fire. And verse 30 follows it up. He says, and if you're right hand, if there's something that you're doing that that's causing you to be apart from God, if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off. Cast it from you. It's more profitable for you that one of your members perish than for your whole body to be cast into hell.

Words that we read over, but they have real, real meaning behind them. He's saying, lay aside everything that comes between you and God. And we know, we know what we're doing if we're not obeying God completely. We know, and many times we've justified in our minds, it's okay. It's not okay. Maybe we need time to come to the realization that what God says He really means, and that the only people that will be in His kingdom are those who have fully yielded to Him, and that have learned through the course of their lifetime to continually improve themselves, continually purify themselves, continually becoming more like Jesus Christ. The only ones.

And He'll do that, and He'll lead us to it, and He'll give us the strength to do it, but we've got to make the decision. He's told us what we need to do, but He's not going to make us do it. It'd be so much easier if He would, but it has to be us. We have to sacrifice. We have to, as it says in Hebrews 12, verse 1, we have to lay aside every weight of sin that does so easily ensnare us.

And we have to go on to perfection if we want what God wants us to have.

So a spiritual boot camp is not for the faint of heart. A spiritual boot camp or any endeavor that we take.

No matter if it's improving health, improving finances, improving relationships, we have to do it God's way, and it's always going to require some sacrifice on our part.

Let's go back to Isaiah 58.

You know, as we talk about food, and the Bible uses an awfully lot of analogies where food is concerned, fasting is certainly a sacrifice, isn't it?

I mean, what we have to do without food and water for a day, or even if we do a modified fast where we just don't even have a certain thing in our diet for a period of time, or maybe for the rest of our lives that we just determine that is no longer the thing that is healthy or that I can be eating. And there's plenty of choices that we can make in our lives today of things that, you know, may be lawful and may not be unclean in the definition of the Bible, but probably just aren't good for us physically. And there's certainly a lot of things in our lives spiritually that we have to look at and say, that's just not good for me spiritually either. I need to cut that out completely. I need to cut it out completely and be committed to that for the rest of my life. In Isaiah 58, you know, it talks about the fast. We talked about this a little bit on atonement. I'm not going to read a lot about it here, but it fits into this section well. In verse 6, God says, you know, fasting is a sacrifice. It's something that we give up because we seek Him, because we are preparing ourselves for Him, because we want what He has to offer. Verse 6, He says, isn't this the fast that I have chosen? To lose the bonds of wickedness. And isn't that what God wants us to do? Make choices, sacrifice, because we no longer want our minds, the influences of this world, the influences of our friends and family, to negatively affect us anymore. We want to be free to worship God and to grow closer and closer to Him. Isn't this, and we can just replace fast with sacrifice, isn't this the sacrifice that I've chosen? To lose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens. And some of those heavy burdens can really hold us down. If we ask God, He can eliminate those over time. To let the oppressed go free and that you break every yoke. Isn't it to share your bread with the hungry? Isn't that a sacrifice? That when you see someone in need, you go, and you kind of do what they need done? Isn't it to share your bread with the hungry that you bring to your house, the poor who are cast out? When you see the naked that you cover Him and not hide yourself from your own flesh? Those are the sacrifices I'm looking for. That's the attitudes that I want. I want you to do those things, not just know that you should do those things. I want you to do those things. I want you to build them into the pattern of your life. I want you to build them into your mind that over time they become you. And when you think and when you see, you spring into action. Not the way it used to be when we might have done something far different than what these verses say. And when we do those things, when we truly see God, when we are willing to do the sacrifices and do what He says in the detail as well as in the much, in verse 8, look what results. Your light will break forth like the morning. Your healing shall bring forth speedily. Your righteousness will go before you. The glory of the eternal shall be your rear guard. You will call, and the eternal will answer. You will cry, and He will say, Here I am. Isn't that what we want? Isn't that what we're thinking? Isn't that what we want to have? That relationship with God that we're so close to Him?

Doesn't happen automatically. But as we discipline ourselves and as we sacrifice and consciously make the decisions to deny self and choose God day to day, we will see, we will see, and we will begin to feel that closeness with God and the joy and the, the joy and the, well, just the joy that's there. You'll see your attitude improve. You'll see, you'll see the positive begin to improve. You'll see your health and your spiritual health and you'll feel alive and you'll feel energetic and you'll feel motivated and you will be looking for the kingdom of God and you will begin desiring it more than you ever had before. But it won't happen until we make the choice to do it, to use what God has given us.

And as we feel that, and as we feel God's presence in us, just like I hope we felt God's presence in whatever feast site we were in, I hope we make the decision we would never go back. We never want to go back to life the way it was before. We never want it to be the way it was. We want it to be the way it is, but improving even beyond that. Never go back. And when we taste what is righteous, when we taste God's goodness, when we taste His graciousness, we never want to go back. Just like when we succeed in whatever endeavor we have, when we taste and we know we've done it right and we've done the detail and we've prepared to win, whatever that might be, you determine I will never go back. Because it just doesn't have the appeal anymore, because we know what our lives led us to.

And now, when we begin to do what God's will is, we see what life can be beyond that. But it takes sacrifice. It takes us wanting to do that and disciplining ourselves to do it. So, point two is you've got to be willing to sacrifice. You've got to be willing to sacrifice. No pain. No gain. Point three, I've kind of touched on—I'm going to go into a little more detail—we have to focus. Focus and discipline ourselves. We simply have to make ourselves do things. You know, 2 Corinthians 10.5, you don't need to turn there, but you remember the set of verses that Paul's talking about bringing down strongholds, the things in our mind that hold us back, the things that are just so in there that it's just really hard. We don't even realize sometimes how strong those opinions are or those situations in our lives. And it's God's spirit that has to kind of make that realization to us, and then we have to chip away at it with decisions we make to get rid of those strongholds. But he makes a comment at the end of that section. He says, we must bring every thought into captivity, into the obedience of Christ. Every thought into captivity. Do you know how important that is? Do you know how detailed that is? Every thought? None of us are there. None of us are there at all. That we brought every thought into captivity to Christ. That takes focus. That takes us thinking about everything we do every day. That takes us asking God, reminding ourselves every day, several times during the day, who we are. What we want. What we're here for. What God wants us to be. What we need to work on. The strongholds that need to be brought down. The sacrifices that need to be made. Focus. Total and complete focus.

Bring every thought into submission. Our goal is to bring every act into submission to God and into obedience. Bring every choice we make into concert with what His Word is. To bring every attitude into agreement with what His Bible is and what His Word says.

That's what we need to do. Jesus Christ is our standard. He was perfect, and that's what He wants us working toward. Not 75% there, not 50% there, not even 95% there. He wants us to have the goal of perfection. Perfection. We'll never attain it in this life. But when Jesus Christ returns, or if we're alive when He returns, we'll have it at that time. Because our lives will have become a pattern that we seek God and do His will and have the focus and determination to do what He wants us to do. Just like the basketball players have to go through the drills every day. Just like the basketball players, you know, Bobby Knight's time, I know he was verbally abusive, and he would let them have it. But you know what? The sound players and the good players, they listened to Him, and they adapted their game to what He did. Just like coaches do now, just like God wants us to do, listen and adapt yourself to the pattern that is Jesus Christ that's bringing every thought into submission and every action into submission because He's shown us the way. Shown us the way to the Kingdom. Are we willing to invest the time and sacrifice our minds and hearts to do that? I've got a quote here. I don't remember who gave this. I didn't write it down. It says, Retraining the mind, the body and the soul involves the continual process of readjusting our thinking. It's an adjustment of our moral and spiritual thinking to the mind of God. Retraining the mind, body and soul involves the continual process of readjusting our thinking.

That's a tall order. Through all our lives, we have a pattern of how we do things. Even in the Church, we have a pattern of how we do things. We get here at a certain time. Mo, several, are here every single week no matter what. Some decide it's okay to take a day off.

I use the Sabbath often because it's the easiest thing to talk about. Some have a pattern of thinking, and they've adjusted their minds to thinking it's okay. God's given me a free pass on this one. No, He hasn't. He's waiting. He's waiting. How do we act in our lives? How do we act in Sabbath services? Are we paying attention to what is being said? You know, there was a time in my life when I was much younger, and an area that we were in, I wasn't just getting much out of services at all. One day, I told myself, you know, I have got to make myself learn something from every single message I hear. No matter how it's delivered, no matter if I've heard it 100 times before or whatever. And I made myself listen, and I made myself go home, and out of every sermonette and sermon I heard, I made myself learn something from it. And I made myself focus on it, and I made myself realize, and you know what? I began to appreciate every message I heard. Because I had gotten myself into a pattern of, I kind of know it, I've heard this since the time I was 10 years old. We never, we never stop learning. We never stop growing. We never stop doing those things. We need to continue to do and make sure we are using the tools that God gives us, and not allowing ourselves to just pat ourselves on the back and think, I've heard it all before. Because that's an attitude we never want to have happen to us. Let's go back again to 1 Peter.

You know, if we're going to transform our minds, transform the way that we think, transform the way that we act, react, make decisions. We started off here, let's go back to 1 Peter 2.

And he says we've got to do some things consciously. In verse 1 he says, You have to consciously lay aside all malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking. You have to make the choice, I'm not doing that anymore. I'm going to be the same at church as I am at the office, as I am at home, as I am in the neighborhood, as I am when I'm playing sports. I'm going to be a Christian 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I'm not going to speak evil anymore. I'm simply not going to let myself do that. Now, I may catch myself doing it, but I'm going to stop. Because I have to retrain my thinking. The only way to retrain your thinking is to stop in the process and say, I can't do that. That's not what God wants us to do. That's not the way we are.

All those things in the sin that does so easily beset us, we have to say, I won't do that. I have to lay it aside. That's part of the past. That can't be me if I truly want to be in the kingdom, because that's part of our preparation. The will to prepare, the will to get ready for the kingdom. And then he says in verse 2, As newborn babes desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby.

You know, the Bible is the basis of our faith, of truth. It is the only source of complete truth on the face of the earth today is the Bible. This is our Constitution. This is our life book. This is our instruction book. This is our motivation book. This is our future. This is our present. This is everything. This is the book that we need to be looking to. We need to desire it. And not find ourselves thinking, I don't want to read the Bible today. I've read it through six or seven times. Now we need to desire it. You know, we eat the same things. I mean, if you don't eat steak four or five times in your life and say, I've had steak enough. I don't want to do it anymore. You still desire it. You have to develop a desire for the word. And that's where we have to be. And that's where we need to be. Now he says here as newborn babes, and certainly as babies, as we're growing up and as we're children, they need the pure milk that comes from the mother. As Christians, we need the pure milk that comes from the Word of God. We need to know that. This is where our time should be. This is where our reading should be. And there's times in our lives, if we've been around for a long time, that we may need to go back. We may need to go back to the point where we go back to having the pure milk of the Word again. Let's go to Hebrews 5.

In verse 11, the author of Hebrews here, as he's writing to the Hebrews, he sees some people who have been in the church for a while. And they should have progressed more. They should have progressed beyond having just the milk. They should be doing more, he says. But he says in verse 11, I'm just going to look at the last few words of verse 11 there, because it's a situation or a condition that we all better beware of. He says, Since you have become dull of hearing, you're not listening. You're not paying attention. The words have become commonplace, and you think, eh, I heard it before.

Do you know what dull of hearing means? That sometimes it just doesn't get through. Not me. Dull of hearing, I'm not paying attention anymore. I've tuned it all out. I don't want to hear it. Since you've become dull of hearing, 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, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. Wow! You need to go back and you need to reprove again what the truth of the Bible is.

You need to go back to some of the basic doctrines. Earlier in the next chapter in chapter 6, he talks about doctrine of repentance, baptism, laying on of hands. For everyone who partakes, while you've become 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.

We partake of the word of God. We begin to learn it, but just knowing it is not enough. James tells us that, right? James 1, what is it, 22, 25 in that area? Just knowing it is not enough. There's no credit for just being able to recite back what the way of God is, or the plan of God is, or the commandments of God is.

You don't get any reward for that, except maybe on a Sabbath school you might get the gold star. But the job is applying it, doing it. And that's where focus comes in. We know the commandments. We know what we need to do. We have to make ourselves do them. And that comes from knowing. We're showing God day by day, do we choose life? Or do we choose the way of the world? Do we choose our own way? Do we choose the way of death and futility?

It comes from sacrifice, because the things that we have to give up are the things that we need to focus on. Often it means we put ourselves against what the word of God is and say, I can't do that. Or I must do that, even though I don't want to. Even though it's inconvenient, even though it's not the thing I want to do, I must do that.

I must develop that pattern in myself. So he says, you know, as we grow, early on, we learn the word of God. We understand it. We take it in. But then we have to apply it. We are never skilled in the word of righteousness until we start practicing what we learn. Solid food belongs to those who are of full age. That is, those who, by reason of use, have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.

Practice. Progressing through life. Being able and going closer and closer to the way Jesus Christ was and having the mind of Christ more and more as time goes on. It only comes by a conscious decision. God's not going to make us do it. He's going to give us the tools, but we have to use the strength He gives us.

We have to use the understanding He's given us. We have to use the tools, the Bible, and the tools He gives us. But we have to know the word of God. And if we feel that we've drifted a little bit, if we feel that we're not really preparing for the kingdom of God, if we feel that we're just kind of there but not really excited about it, and we think that we're okay, and that God's okay with how we are, think again. There's not one of us in this room, there's not a human being alive today, that can say, and that God would agree with them, you're okay the way you are.

Not one. Not one. We all have a ways to go. And we have to exercise what it is, and we have to train our minds using God's Holy Spirit and allow Him to renew and restore and transform us into the mind that He wants us to have. Back in 1 Corinthians 3, Paul faces the very same issue with the Corinthian church. And you remember the Corinthian church? We've talked about it in some of our Bible studies. In the Corinthian church, they were all baptized, they were people of God, but as Paul looked at them, they had some issues that they were dealing with. And so he wrote this book of 1 Corinthians to them, in chapter 3 and verse 1, he says this, That's what he said to them.

Here are church members, they've been going for a while, and he says, I can't speak to you as spiritual people, I'm speaking to you as babes. I see carnality among you. I see your own pride in front of you. I see you doing what you want to do. I see you tolerating what you want. I see you choosing your way rather than God's way. I see you not sacrificing anything. Throughout the book, he lays it out for them the things they need to do.

I fed you with milk and not with solid food, for until now, until now you were not able to receive it. And even now you're still not able. After all these years, you still don't get it. You're still back at the principles, the basic principles that you have to work on. By this time, they should have become you.

They should dominate your thinking. There are things that you should automatically think. God first. There's a choice, it's God first. Not family first, not friends first, not convenience first, not comfort first, not work first, not school first, God first. It should be the automatic way of thinking that we have. That when we practice it and we train our minds and let God train our minds, that's where we go to.

I, brethren, and even now you're still not able, for you are still carnal. For where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal and behaving like mere men? If there's any envy in our lives, if there's any strife in our lives, if there are any divisions in our lives, if there's anything left unresolved in our lives, we're still carnal.

We're still carnal. And we need to go back to the Word of God and see what His will is and be willing to sacrifice our own will, anything, to get back to where God wants us to be. If we're not willing to sacrifice self, we won't be in God's kingdom. If we're going to stand on ourselves and stand on our merits and stand on what we want to do and insist that God's okay with it, we're not going to be there.

We simply have to do what God wants us to do, and that takes focus. Determined focus day by day. What am I doing? Why am I doing this? What should I be doing? And training ourselves, just like you were in boot camp, this is what I need to do and I will make the determination to do it.

Paul, the Bible, they talk about food. It's the same thing you do when you go on a diet for health reasons or weight reasons. You've got to measure everything. You've got to weigh everything. Is this what I should be eating? Is it okay for me to just cheat on this a little bit? And it's also got to be I'm progressing because for the rest of my life, the rest of my life, I know what happens when I eat the spiritual things that I eat. I know who I am. When I eat the physical things I've eaten, I know who I am and what I've become. And if I go back to that way, it's going to be the same thing all over again.

The change that God wants in us is for the rest of our lives. For the rest of our lives, and that's a mindset that we must determine. Let's go back and look at a couple verses in the Old Testament. Job, Job 23.

Job 23 and verse 12.

I'm going to read verse 11 too because it follows the same principle of what we've been talking about here. Job 23.11, God gives the Holy Spirit. He enables us to do it. We have to do it. I've kept His way and did not turn aside.

Verse 12.

Isn't that interesting? I treasure God's words more than my necessary food. The things that I have today, I would rather have God's word. They're more important to me than the food and water I have every day.

You know, there's food that we eat. There's food that we eat.

And, unfortunately, sometimes we have to take supplements as well because we don't have all the nutrition in our food that we would want. And so there's a whole industry out there with supplements, and I know a lot of us take the supplements. And it's a good thing to take those vitamins and those herbs and whatever that we do to supplement what we're doing.

But no one lives on supplements alone. No one lives on supplements alone. Not going to go very far. If you're living on supplements alone, you've got to have the food first and supplement that. It's the same with the Word of God.

The Bible is the Word of God. It's the necessary food.

We've got Beyond Today programs. We've got Beyond Today magazines. We've got websites. We've got sermons online. We've got a whole host of things that you can spend all your time looking at those things and listening to those things.

They're great supplements.

But if we don't have our eyes and our minds in the Bible, then we are missing the boat. We are becoming nutritionally deficient.

All those things are good as supplements, but the Word of God is the food that we need to be looking at, studying, and making ourselves be part of every single day.

And I would say do whatever it takes to do. Some people tell me, I don't even know what to study. I study and it's like, it's the same. I've read all this before.

You know, if you have to take a pen and paper out and start writing down, start in Genesis and just start copying every verse. Go to Deuteronomy and start writing it all down. Go to Matthew. Go to Acts. Go to Romans. Start writing it down. I guarantee you, when you engage all the senses and you show God, I'm determined to read your word and to understand it. You will begin to feel His Spirit flowing and you will begin to understand.

Do whatever it takes. But use first, and our primary food is the Word of God, and use the other supplements, but don't use only them. Don't use only them.

Okay, let's look at Jeremiah as well. Jeremiah 15. He's got something to say about the Word of God and food as well. Jeremiah 15 and verse 16.

Jeremiah 15, verse 16.

Your words, your words, God, were found, and I ate them. Your words were found, and I ate them. And your word was to me the joy and rejoicing of my heart, for I am called by your name, O Lord God of hosts. Eat the Word of God. Focus on it. Make yourself do it. Do what God wants you to do.

It takes discipline. It takes focus. It takes making yourself do it. Consciously making yourself do it. Let's go back and look at an example here of Nehemiah. You know, to focus and to discipline ourselves is something that we simply have to do. And God listens when we do those things. Back in Nehemiah chapter 1, remember Nehemiah? He was the one who eventually went and he completed the building of the temple in Jerusalem, built the walls and the gates around and everything. Before that, it was just kind of laying in ruin. The building had just stopped. Everything had just stopped on it. It was just laying there without anything to do. Maybe some of our lives are the same way. We started the building, but we haven't really completed it. We haven't allowed God to do things. And we're not really working at it anymore. We're just kind of letting part of our lives lie in ruins and we're not really working on it the way that we should be. Here in Nehemiah 1, verse 1, it says, In the month of Kislev, in the twentieth year of the reign of King Artaxerxes, I was in Shushan, the citadel, and Hanan and I, one of my brethren, came with men from Judah, and I asked them concerning the Jews who had escaped, who had survived the captivity and concerning Jerusalem, and they said to me, The survivors who are left from the captivity in the province are there in great distress and reproach. The wall of Jerusalem is broken down and its gates are burned with fire.

The state of disrepair. No one was finishing it. No one was working on it anymore. They kind of just got okay with the temple where it was, and it'll just stay that way. But Nehemiah asked, what is it? And notice his reaction. So it was when I heard these words, I sat down and wept, and I mourned for many days. I was fasting and praying before the God of heaven.

God...

Something needs to be done. That temple needs to be completed. The work needs to keep going on. It's been sitting there in ruins. It's been sitting there at the status quo. There's stuff that has to be done yet. And Nehemiah, God urged him. And sometimes in our lives, God will urge us, and he'll put a thought into our mind, and we know we need to do that.

Sometimes we do it. Sometimes we might just after a day or two think, we just get on with our lives and kind of let that thought fade. Nehemiah didn't do that. He sat and he mourned, and he fasted, it says. And then he prayed a very notable prayer. He says, I pray, Lord God of heaven, O great and awesome God, you who keep your covenant and mercy with those who love you and observe your commandments.

Want God to answer your prayers? You need to be observing His commandments and love Him in the way that He asks us to love Him. Let your ear be attentive and your eyes open, that you may hear the prayer of your servant, which I pray before you now, day and night. Not just once. Day and night. I will continually implore you, because this is what you have urged me to do.

I don't know how to do it. Nehemiah was a cup bearer in the king's court. He didn't have the latitude or the opportunity to just go where everyone wanted to do. He was a man under authority. He could only go where people told Him to go. I don't know, God. I want to do this. I know it needs to be done. I'm going to ask you day and night. And He continued to do that. He continued to do that. You can read through the rest of His prayer here.

He admits something that we have to do in our prayers as well. Repent before God. Acknowledge the mistakes we've made. Acknowledge we're not perfect. Acknowledge the sins that we individually and even collectively make before Him. Ask God to lead us and correct us. In verse 11, He concludes, He said, O Lord, I pray, please let your ear be attentive to the prayer of your servant and to the prayer of your servants who desire to fear Your name, who are preparing their minds and who want to fear Your name, not just want the temple built, but who want to do what Your will is. And let Your servant prosper this day. I pray. This day. God, my will is that You would do it today. Open up the door for it to happen today. Sometimes our prayer is like that, right? God, I need this today. God, I need healing today. God, I need this answer today. God, I need the answer to this relationship problem today. God, I want it done quickly. And that's kind of natural. We all have that process. Nehemiah wanted it done, too, that day. God doesn't always answer on that day. Because God wants us to have our training and our focus and to see where our will really is. Is it just a passing thought? Is it just something that kind of caught our fancy at that point and we'll just, in a day or two, forget about it?

Didn't happen with Nehemiah. Chapter 2, verse 1, it came to pass in the month of Nicin. That's the first month of the year, but you go back and you can see for four months. Four months, He was asking God, open up a way. This is important. The temple needs to be built. It has to be completed. I want to do it, and I don't have the... I need you to open up the door to do it. It came to pass four months later in the 20th year of King Artaxerxes. When wine was before him that I took the wine and gave it to the king, I had never been sad.

In his presence before. Well, if you're a cupbearer in old times, the king expected you to be cheerful. He wasn't interested in having someone there who had a sad face and a sad countenance. That wasn't what his job was at all. He was supposed to be cheerful. And Nehemiah says, I've never appeared that way before. And the king had the latitude if he didn't like your disposal or your attitude, or the way you look to say, away with him. Life is over. And Nehemiah knew that. But here he was. And this day he was sad. He'd never been like that before. And the king said to me, why is your face sad since you are not sick? This is nothing but sorrow of heart. So rightfully, Nehemiah became afraid. Oh, wow. I'm not pleasing the king. He can kill me. He can kill me. I've never been this way before. But Nehemiah didn't let his dreadful fear stop him from doing what he had to do. Through months of training, through months of channeling his thoughts. Training his thoughts. Training his mind. Praying to God. Let this happen. Open the door. Be attentive to our prayer. The temple needs to be done. We need to do something about it. When the king told him, he was ready, without hesitation, to say exactly what was in his heart. I said to the king, may the king live forever. Why should my face not be sad when the city, the place of my father's tomb, lie waste? And its gates are burned with fire.

This is why I'm sad. He didn't hesitate. He didn't try to cover it up and say, Oh, you know, everything's okay. Sorry about that. Whatever. He was ready. He knew what his mission was. He wasn't afraid. He didn't let that do it. He was ready with an answer because he had trained his mind. That's where his focus had been. For four straight months, day in and day out, he made himself do what was right. He made himself pray that prayer. And sometimes when we're facing the things, we have to be like that widow in Luke 18 that kept petitioning the judge, not giving up faith to the point where finally the judge said, Okay, I'm tired of hearing it. Give her what she wants. And God wants to see, are they really? Is he really? Is she really committed to this? Or is this just a fancy and a weak, we'll never hear about it again. We have to train ourselves to do what God wants us to do day and night. Boot camp. Focus. Every thought in submission is the goal. Every action in submission to the goal. And then seeing the light and seeing the spring in our step and seeing the energy and seeing the vitality and seeing the zeal that results from that. Nehemiah did it, and he was ready. When the opportunity rang, he was there with his answer because he had trained his mind and that's where his focus had been. And the king said to me, What do you request? Notice what Nehemiah did? The first thing he did because he'd been trained, I asked God. I prayed to the God of heaven. Is our minds trained that way? Well, when we ran into a problem, it was the first thing we think, I need to pray to the God of heaven. When we get sick, it's the first thing we think, I need to pray to the God of heaven. Or as our first thought goes someplace else, and then we pray to the God of heaven.

When the troubles arise in our life, the first thing we do is we pray to the God of heaven because that's what we've trained ourselves to do over the course of our lifetime. Is that we pray to God first. We ask his will first. We petition him first. We put him first in everything we do. It's a pattern of life, and we have to discipline ourselves to do that because God's the very first commandment. You have to put me first. You have to think of me first. You have to trust me first. You have to ask me first.

And like Nehemiah, you have to be patient. And you have to be committed. And you have to wait. And sometimes you wait, and that's a blessing because God sees what's in our hearts, and eventually he will answer.

It's a training aspect and a training process that we go through in life. Let's go back to Hebrews 10.

Hebrews 10.

Hebrews 10, verse 37.

When we do it, when we do it, when we try it, when we commit ourselves to God, when we sacrifice, when we make the decision and we put ourselves through the spiritual boot camp, just like we might in some other activity of our life, we will see the results. We will see the results.

Verse 36 of Hebrews 10 says, You need to endure to the end. You need to keep strong. You need to keep yourself focused. You need to not give up. You need to not just go back to the way you were. You have need of endurance so that after you have done the will of God, you may receive the promise.

For yet a little while, and he who is coming will come and will not tarry. Now the just shall live by faith.

Their faith is in God and God alone.

They wait for God and God alone. The just shall live by faith, but if anyone draws back, my soul has no pleasure in him.

If you give up along the way, if you think, I'm going to backslide a little bit, I'm going to go back to the way I was, it will be okay. My soul has no pleasure in him, God says. Keep moving forward. Keep focused. Keep that this is the rest of your life. What you are doing, you will do from here until the day that Jesus Christ returns. Hebrews 6.

Verse 11.

Hebrews 6. Verse 11. We desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end. That's what we should pray for each other. That's what all of us want to see, that we would all have the diligence, the commitment, the focus, be willing to sacrifice our own will, our own ways to God. The same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end. That you don't become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.

We've enjoyed a great feast. We've tasted the goodness of God, and he would say, Keep up that work. Keep up that motivation. Keep your focus on him. Put yourself through spiritual boot camp. Train your thinking. Make yourself do what God wants you to do. Never forget him because he's the author and finisher of our faith. And without his spirit, we will fall short. Without his word, we will fail as well. Let's develop not only, or have not only the desire to be in God's kingdom, but let's desire and have the will to prepare to be in his kingdom.

Thank you, Mr. Shaby. Well, if you take your hymnals and please stand. We have one last opportunity to sing our praises to our great Creator. Page 26. Oh God, we have heard. Page 26, and afterwards, we will be led in the closing prayer by Mr. Joshua Amido. Page 26.