- Well, hey everybody Man, I want to welcome you to Highlands today. I want to welcome all of you that are in our Bluefield location. Hey, I'm coming to Bluefield, I'll be up there a couple of days this week, I hope to see many of you. Thanks for just doing amazing work in the community and how you guys are supporting Pastor Robbie and Brittany and Ivy and Silas, that's awesome, so thank you so much. Also want to welcome everybody at Bristol and Marian, I look forward to being with some of you soon, and I want to welcome today, all of you that are online, watching on TV, and then we have some special guests that are joining us this weekend as well, all the way from South Africa, Pastor Jacob Male, I appreciate you every week. And a man we're cheering you on, Pastor David and so many others that join us on our global audience. We're grateful for you and we pray for you, and we believe and God's doing amazing things in your life. So a couple of weeks ago, we started this seven week study on thriving and the reason is, 'cause God doesn't want you just to survive, right? He wants you to thrive. And what we're looking at is all the aspects of our health as a whole, so that we can be a complete, healthy, whole, enriched person, serving God. So we started out building the foundation with spiritual health. Last week, we talked about the effects of stress in our physical health. We looked at Psalm 23 and today is going to be one of these turning points in this series, 'cause today's really, really important, just because of what we've gone through. Today I want to talk to you about mental health, mental health, and so many of you, actually, hundreds and hundreds of people. We know thousands of people in our area are struggling with their mental health and so today I want to talk to you, I want to see what God's word has to say about how to be healthy mentally and here's the big idea. I want to talk to you a little bit about the why. Why I need to learn how to manage my mind. It's so important, so we're going to look at that, we're going to go through so many things today that I want God's word and I want the Holy Spirit to help you and encourage you, so let's dig right into it, all right? The scripture, Paul says in Romans chapter 12, this is a familiar passage for those of you who are sort of believers and guys who've studied the Bible. Most of what Paul says in verse two. He says, "Do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, "but let God transform you into a new person." Now here's the thought life on mental health. "By changing the way you think. "By changing the way you think." Here's the truth about God. He is far more interested in changing your mind, than he is in changing your circumstances, because nothing really happens in your life, until you are able to understand, you can change your mind and God wants to renew and transform your mind. You can't really thrive in your life, until you begin to change your thoughts and your mind. When you change your thoughts, you change your mind. So why is it important that I have a healthy mind? Why do I need to manage my thought life? Well I want to give you three reasons, and these three reasons sort of set the stage for what I want to talk to you about as we wrap up the message. But here's the first one, it's important to manage my mind because my thoughts control my mental health. My thoughts control my mental health. Every single action that takes place in our life begins as a thought. If you don't think it, you don't do it. And honestly, guys, that's both good and bad, right? If it's a good thought, you're probably going to do something good, but if it's a bad thought, it may lead you to do something bad. But my thoughts control my life. In Proverbs 4:23, scripture says, "Be careful how you think, because your life is shaped "by your thoughts." Now this is what the Bible says, that the power of your mind and the power of your thoughts has tremendous ability to shape your life, either for good or for bad. And a lot of you were taught things as a kid and they just weren't true. And you're still acting and living on all this false information that you took in as a kid or as a teenager, and it's really, really hard to thrive when you're still living a life that's been based on your thought life from false information. But when you change the way you think, then you begin to move toward a healthy mind, so important. Here's the second thing. I need to manage my mind because my mind is where the battle for sin takes place. Have you ever thought about this? It is where my mind that I either win the battle, or lose the battle of sin in my life. In fact, all temptation happens in our mind. Now we often think temptation is something out there. And we say, these things are tempting me, but it wouldn't tempt you if there wasn't something in you that desires that and desire happens in your mind, temptation happens in your mind. Now when we walk and we walk into these areas of temptation, we talk about sins like pride and lust and envy and anger and bitterness and fear and resentment, where all those things? All those things that we are saying today are actually, they're conceived in our mind, they're all in your mind. And if you can learn how to manage your mind, then you've learned how to manage your life, this is where the battle ground for sin is. Paul teaches us here in Romans 7 Look what he says in verse 22 and 23. He says, "I love to do God's will," amen, all of us. "So far as my new nature is concerned, "but," Paul says, "there's something else deep within me "that is at war with my mind "and wins the fight and makes me a slave "to the sin within me." In my mind, I want to be God's servant. But instead I find myself still enslaved to sin. The truth is, all of us can identify with that, can't we? What's he saying? He's saying there's a battle in your mind and my mind 24 hours a day and Satan wants to control your mind, the world wants to control your mind. And there's a battle for the way you think, now, why is that? Because whatever gets your attention gets you, right? So I have to learn to manage my mind. And what are those reasons? Because my thoughts control my life. I got to learn to manage my mind because that is where the battle ground for sin and temptation takes place. Here's third reason you've got to manage your mind because my mind is also the seat of peace and happiness. And if you learn to manage your mind and you're actually able to get what I'm talking about today and you begin to apply this, I'm excited about the message, I'm truly believing. This could be a turning point in so many of your lives. If you get this and you apply it, then this is why the Bible says, it's not what I say it's what God says, that you can actually have peace of mind and your peace of mind will go up dramatically. And you will begin to live in what the scripture says. A form of happiness that only God can bring into your life. An unmanaged mind will always lead to tension, but a managed mind leads a peacefulness an unmanaged mind leads to pressure, a managed mind leads harmony. An unmanaged mind actually leads to conflict and chaos, but a managed mind leads to confidence. And this is what the scripture says, Paul goes on in Romans 8:6, this is what he says. "If your sinful nature controls your mind," he says, "there's death." If we're just going to let our mind be controlled by everything and the culture around us, and we're controlling it by our sinful nature, it's not going to be good for us, it's going to lead to death. "But," he says, "as a child of God," for all of us that are believers, this is a message. If you're saved today. And if you're not going to give you opportunity at the end, but if you're saved, the scripture says, "If the holy spirit controls your mind," here's the outcome. "You can actually have life," this is thriving life, "and peace." So how do you get that, right? That's the why. That's the importance of why we need to manage your mind. How do you get life and peace? How do you get joy? How do you get healthy mentally? Well I'm going to give you three things today to have a healthy mind. And before I unpack these three things, these are really three choices that you have to make and these choices are made every day. You make these choices on a daily basis in order to have a healthy mind. And a lot of people don't realize that you actually control your thoughts, you do. And often I think we believe this lie, that our thoughts are uncontrollable, but you control your thoughts. In fact, guys, satan cannot control your thoughts and here's the deal about God, God doesn't control your thoughts either, he chooses not to control your thoughts. He could, but he chooses not to and he gave us this amazing thing called a free will. You know who controls your thoughts? You do. You control your thoughts. So if I want to have a healthy mind, the Bible says gotta make three choices every day. Here's the first one, I have to feed on God's word every day. Now you say, well, I've heard that before you tell me all the time to get up and get into God's word. We really beg you, I beg you. Just, if you're a child of God and you want a healthy mindset in the chaos in which we live the first step to have a healthy mind is you got to feed on God's word every day, we get this physically, right? And when we know, when we give good nutrition and healthy food and good choices into our body, we're healthy. But if we junk food all the time, we're unhealthy. It leads to chaos, the same is true in your thought life. I have to feed my mind, not on junk, but I gotta feed my mind with truth and truth is God's word. Notice what Jesus says here in Matthew 4:4, he says, "People need more than bread for their life. "They must feed," catch this, this is is what Jesus says, "on every word of God." Guys the Bible is our soul food, it is. It's our owner's manual for life. You must say, well, okay, I get it. I need to do this, when should I do it? Well, honestly, I know this may just blow your mind a little bit, but the scripture really teaches that we should do this all the time, that we should think about God's word all the time. That's the reason we encourage you to get in it and read it gets get you an app on your phone, get you version of whatever it takes, begin to get God's word in your mind. And it's the only way to get a healthy mind. And when we think about God's word, whether it's morning, noon, or night, or just all the time, if you're constantly thinking about truth, you know what happens? It's going to renew your mind, just renews your mind, has to, it's going to change your mind. Let's look at David. I give you a lot of examples, but let me give you a David's example 'cause we're all familiar with David and just what God says about him. All the way back in Psalm, 119:147, notice how David starts his day it's what he says. He says, "I rise early to cry out for help "and to put my hope in your words." So David says, hey, every morning, start my morning. I'm just going to talk to God. I'm going to start my day with God. And I'm going to start my day with his hope. Then in that same chapter in verse 97, David says this, "Lord, how I love your word," he said, "I think about it all day long." I don't know, but if you can take some time to read the word and study it and actually memorize some key verses, then you can just have God's word in your life. Honestly, when things out there bombard you, you can have God's word that defeats those thoughts. And you sorta think about God's word all the time. David goes on and in Psalm 16:7, this is what he says, "Even in the darkest of night, "Lord, your teachings, your word fills my mind." So he's saying, hey, early in the morning, all throughout the day, hey, even late at night, I am thinking about God's word because it's God's truth. And that's why David is referred to over and over as a man after God's own heart, he gave himself, he fed on God's word every day. You want to have a healthy mind? You want to be healthy mentally? Get into God's word every day. Here's the second thing. And I'm going to camp out a little bit here, all right? Somehow we have to be able to free our mind from destructive thoughts. Now this is really important if I've lost you or whatever, zero back in it's really, really important, all right? So I want you to focus just for a second. Your mind, according to the scripture has to be delivered. It has to be released, and I've got to be able to free my mind from destructive thoughts. And I won't tell you something, guys, this isn't easy. This is not easy. And the reason it's not easy is because all of us, every one of us saved, unsaved. But every one of us, we have three enemies. Our enemies are all saying all these three enemies. Here's the first one. You have an old nature. These enemies will not give up easy. They're not going to surrender the battle in your life easy. You can't take ground easy from these enemies. You have to fight to free your mind. You have to fight for a healthy mind. Now this one is for Christians. When you got saved, the Holy Spirit of God came into your life instantly, immediately and he gave you power over sin. However, we're not perfect, are we? And we still have an old nature. And that old nature is one of our enemies. It's the source of all your bad habits you had up until you met Jesus are the sin nature that you were born with. We see it here in Romans 8, look at verse five. Paul says this, "Those who are dominated "by their sinful nature, think about sinful things. "But those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit, "think about things that actually please the spirit." Now notice Paul says, it's about how you think, all right? So I may have good intention for changing something in my life, but my old nature is always going to battle me on it. Just always. And it's not going to give up ground easily. Here's the second enemy that we all have, satan. Sometimes I'll get emails and they'll say, "Do you really believe satan is real?" Absolutely, I don't care if you believe it or not. He is real, he is real. And here's the deal about him. He wants to control your mind, he does. Now he can't, but he wants to. So what does he do? Well, he sends these ideas. These thoughts into your mind. Let me just be real clear. Satan cannot force you to do anything. If you're a Christian, matter of fact, the scripture says you have the Holy Spirit in you. He cannot force you to do anything. Why is that? Because we know as a child of God greater is he, that is in us, that's Jesus than he that is in the world, that's Satan. But he can make suggestions. And he does, he bombards our mind every day with his hellish suggestions and those suggestions. Hey, understand this as a Christian, they are very, very, very powerful. And he's constantly planing all these negative thoughts in our minds. He'll use other people. He'll use the internet. He'll use TV. He'll use anything to throw these negative assaults into your mind. Example, have you ever been praying, as a child of God, have you ever been praying? And you feel like, I'm praying and I'm seeking God and I'm praying about things that really I want to change my life, I'm praying for others. And you're praying real hard. All of a sudden, there's this crazy thought, this bizarre thought. Sometimes it's a hellish thought that comes into your mind while you're actually praying. Where did that come from? Tell you where it came from, it came from satan. He actually dropped this bomb shell right into your brain. And one of the most important things is you can't believe everything you think we get mixed up on this, don't we? You have all these ideas that you think and you think, well, I thought it must be true. No, no, no, no, no. Of course it's not true. So just because you thought something in your mind, it may come from your old nature. It may come from the devil. It really doesn't matter to me. If it's not true, guys, it's not true. You don't have to believe everything you think. And for some of us, we can go home today and that'd be worth the price of coming, all right? Because if you will just listen to that one truth, it will help you get on a road to mental health because everything you think is not true. Stuff you think about yourself, stuff you might think about God's stuff you think about your husband or your wife or your life, your kids or your community or the government. It's not all true, just because you thought it. Satan puts, he bombards our minds with all this junk and all this garbage. And he brings a full out assault against our mind every day. Our enemies, the old nature, satan. And here's the third one, we all have this one. It is the world system. It's the world's value system. And what do you mean by that? It's the culture around us, okay? The world is never helping you to become a more disciplined person and think about this as anything in our society, in our culture cause you to want to be self-disciplined, no, it does not, not at all. The world has a value system that's promoted by advertisers and media and movies and TV. The world is not encouraging any of us to live a responsible, mentally healthy life. So how do you fight this battle? You have all these best intentions for changing, but then you got this triple threat that comes against all of us, the old nature, the devil satan himself, and the world around you. And it's no wonder that we struggle with despair and discouragement and failure. And then, that's just average. You add a pandemic into the mix, it's crazy. I'm just like, whoa, it's just, all this stuff is coming against us. How do you fight this mental battle to stay healthy mentally? Well, God gives us an answer. Paul tells us over in 2 Corinthians 10, look with me what he says here in verse three. He says, "Though, we live in the world, "we do not wage war as the world does," okay? "The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world." Sometimes we get this really mixed up. He's talking about the mental battle here that we go through. He says, "Our weapons have divine power "to demolish strongholds." These are these enemies that come against us. "We demolish any argument and every pretension "that sets itself up against the knowledge of God." And here's the key, "And we take captive every thought "to make it obedient to Christ." So the reason most people are ineffective in life and actually fail at life. And actually don't enjoy life and get in dismay and discouragement is because they've never learned how to fight the battle of the mind. It is so important. I just want to explain to you, how does temptation work? Because this is the battlefield, right? How does it work? Paul says that we're not supposed to be ignorant of how satan works. We need to know how he works, how he comes against us. He doesn't catch us off guard, it's really a process. Look at how temptation works. It's always the same pattern. And I won't tell every one of us this is how temptation affects you, every one of us, your temptations are common to all of us 'cause sometimes you'll say, "Well, you don't know my situation. "I'm in a completely different situation. "My temptation is unique to me." No, no, no, no, no, it's not. We're all tempted in the exact same pattern, all right? Let me give you that pattern. James tells us what it is here in James 1, look at verse 14, this is what he says, "Temptation comes from the," catch this, "the lure of our own evil desires," that old nature, these evil desires lead to evil action. And then evil action leads to death. So notice temptation is always a process, it's how it works. It's not an isolated event 'cause a lot of you will tell me, "Oh, pastor Allen, "I was going through life and everything was great "and boom, all of a sudden I yielded to temptation. "It just caught me off guard." No, no, no, no it didn't, it didn't that's not how it works. There are a lot of things you gave into. Before you ever crossed the line and yielded and took action gave in to sin and committed the desire and gave into the temptation it's a process it's four steps. You can write this down if you want to, it's really good, all right? This is how the enemy works this is how temptation works. The first process of temptation is desire, all right? It's a desire that you have. If you don't have any desire for something it's not temptation for you. I'm not tempted by liver and onions, I hate it. I don't desire it. I don't want it, all right? What temptation does is it causes a desire to start in my mind. It's something that I conceive in my mind, something I want, it looks really good. And I start entertaining the desire. The second step is doubt, right? This is how the enemy works. Because when you get tempted, you do what Adam and Eve did. It's the same way that we give into temptation. And God says, hey, I don't want you to eat from this tree. And what do they do? Did God really say that, is that really? What's God, what's he trying to keep me from? I bet he didn't really mean that. Did he really say that and we begin to doubt the truth that we've been feeding on as we given ourselves to the word of God. Third step is deception. The third thing satan does is he tries to replace God's truth with his lie. And this is what James says. "He lures you to believe his lie." He baits you with something and that bait to you when it's coupled with doubt and desire, it just looks incredibly awesome. Now I'm not a big fishermen, but I understand the secret of good fishing is real simple. You gotta use the right bait. How many fish are you going to catch with a bare hook? Probably none, right? So obviously you got to put some bait on there. And here's the question, what kind of bait the satan use on you? Have you ever thought about this? 'Cause here's the deal about satan, we think he's nothing, dude, satan wants to kill you. He wants to destroy everything in you. He wants to restore your family, wants to destroy your kids. He wants to restore your marriage. He wants to destroy your mental capacity. He hates you. He is already doomed and he wants to take as many of us as he can with him, he doesn't get a second chance. He rebelled against God. He is cast into hell forever and ever and ever. And this is so important for you to understand. He throws this stuff at you. He wages this war against you and he entices you and he lures you with your desire. And we don't even see the hook that he's got in it, right? And all of a sudden, if we're not where we need to be with God, we give into the desire, we accept the doubt, we accept his lure of temptation and deceit, and then he hooks us, right? And he reels us in every time, there is a hook in the ways of temptation. Temptation always looks better than it is. Hey just a side note extra, you teenagers in here 'cause I got some. You started dating. Here's something for you to think about. You need to date. You need to go on double dates, all right? You don't need to be on single dates, you're teenagers. You're not ready for any kind of commitment at all. You don't need to go to your girlfriend's house and try to get down into the basement where it's just you and her. Let me tell you some stupid, all right? There's a lot of mistakes you can make in life and you can recover from. There are some mistakes that the consequences of those mistakes are life altering. You want to go on a date take your date to a football game where there's 5,000 people and you have some accountability because I want to tell you something, the enemy is always out to destroy you, always. And the fourth step of temptation is disobedience, right? We move from desire and something that looks so awesome to me to doubt. I doubt God's word I doubt his love to deception. I'm believing the lie that satan is telling me. It's going to be okay with me. I think God's going to give me a pass here. I can do this and still get away with it, just this once it's not that bad. And then you decide to cross the line and yield into temptation and defeat enters your mental ability to think correctly, that's how the enemy works. So what am I saying? Man, the best time to win the battle against temptation is before it begins, you set the standards ahead of time. You get accountability ahead of time. You set what you're going to do and what you're not going to do and it's so important. If you're going to win the battle over temptation and the world system and satan and our old nature, it just is the way to eliminate destructive faults. And if you choose not to eliminate destructive thoughts, if you don't get on a plan to do that, you cannot be healthy mentally. Here's the last thing. If you're going to have a healthy mental mind, you've got to get in God's word every day. You got to eliminate the destructive thoughts from your mind. And you got to focus your mind on the right things. You've just got to reprogram your mind. Three things I think will make the most in the differences you refocus your mind and your mental state. Here's the first one., think about Jesus. Think about him. Think about him. You've heard about the old cliche you become like what you think about the most. Now I get the pushback to your teenagers. I hear, when I was a teenager, hey, it's the wonder I didn't turn into a girl. That's what I thought about all time. I just thinking about it all the time. You become like what you think about. So if you think about Jesus and you get into his word and you read his word and you pray to him and you establish your relationship with him, you become like what you think about. You'll become more like him. Here's the second thing, think about others. Life is not all about you. Everything the world teaches you is to think about yourself. That somehow the world says life is about you and that you need to go through life with this me, me, me mentality, don't ever think about other people. One of the most cultural counter cultural things you can do is realize that life is not about you. It's not about you dude, it's all about God. And it's only in giving your life away and serving others that you'll actually ever understand what it means to live in joy and peace. You want to see miserable people, you go find the people who only live life for themselves. 100% are miserable, just miserable. There's nothing to that kind of life. Anybody can live life about me. But man, when you think about Jesus, you begin to get your life focus off yourself. You get rid of that selfishness. You start thinking about others, that's awesome. And then the last thing think about eternity. Think about eternity. It'll make the biggest difference in your mental state when you begin to think about that there's more to life than just the here and now. The problem today with so many of us, we have short-term thinking which we do. We only think about what's happening right now. Let me remind you of a couple of scriptures here. Look at Colossians 3, notice what Paul says in verse two, he says, "Let heaven," catch this. "Let heaven feel your thoughts. "Do not think only about the things down here on earth." A lot of you still read King James. I love this verse in King James, this it what it says, "Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. "Let heaven feel your thoughts." Those who are the most heavenly minded. We've heard that they're no earthly good, that's wrong. Those who are the most heavenly minded always do the most good here on earth, you just do. The most heavenly minded people get the most done here on earth. Paul says over in 1 Corinthians 2, last verse I want to give you the in verse nine, this is what he says about our God. He says, "No eye has seen, no ear has heard, "no mind has imagined what God has prepared "for those who love him." Oh man, think about that. And when you start thinking about all that, all the problems, these little nitpicky problems that are going on in our world they seem so inferior compared to the glory and the joy and the pleasure and the things that we have to look forward to in eternity. So if I want to be healthy mentally, I got to feed on God's word every day, I got to rid my mind are these destructive thoughts know that I've got the enemies of the old nature and satan and the world system. I got to know how temptation works. I've got to set some accountability in my life. And then I refocus my mind and I think on the right things. And that is a key the Bible says to have a healthy mental capacity. Man, I want that for you. I so want that for you because I know so many of us are struggling with that today. I want to pray with you and I want to give you an opportunity in case you've never trusted Jesus. Wherever you are today could be your day to trust Jesus Christ as your Lord and savior. And I just want to help all of us to think about how to be healthy mentally in the culture in which we live. Let's just ask the Holy Spirit to speak to us right now, Lord, you're awesome God, you're awesome. I'm convinced if we really understood how much you loved us, God how much you are going to care for us. Even though we may walk through difficult seasons in our life, even though we may encounter pandemics and division and tension, and sometimes the old enemy would try to bait us and say, God's not real or none of these things would happen. If that's God, why would you want to serve him? And we hear that every day. Lord, your word says that this isn't heaven and life's not fair. And in the seasons of doubt and difficulty, Lord, may we not run from you, but may we run to you. And instead of trying to become healthy mentally, by looking at the world and watching the media and seeing all the chaos and division, which will never lead to mental health, may we get back to where we're spending some time in your word, feeding on the truth, the real truth every day. And may we just take authority over our enemies because greater are you that is in you that's in the world and help us to understand every one of us, if we're a child of yours, we have victory over our old nature. We don't have to give into temptation over the devil himself, although he will consistently bombard us. And over this toxic culture in which we call the world's value system, God may we reprogram our minds to think on Jesus. And think about others and not ourselves. And know that if we know you, heaven awaits all of us and heaven's going to be an incredible place. It's going to be awesome. And when we think on those things, we are taken by your Holy Spirit to a different place mentally, it's much more healthier. I should trust God your Holy Spirit would plant those seeds today in people's hearts and lives. And if you're here today and you've never trusted Jesus, I get it, I understand why you're mentally incapacitated. I get your depression. I get your discouragement. If you're focused on life and it's been all about you and you're unhappy today and you're miserable and you're stressed out and tense, I get it, I get it. I've been that way before. And then finally I understood that if I was to yield my life to my creator, surrender my life and invite Jesus Christ into my life. And somehow in the midst of chaos, he could bring hope and he did. And he does every day. I just challenge you. If you want freed from a mental incapacitated mind, the only way to do it is through the Holy Spirit and the power of our God. He can spend truth in your life. If that's you today, you're so sick of living the way you've been living. You know if this is life I'm out, is there a better way? There is his name is Jesus. He came and died on a cross for you. And if you will, but surrender your life to him, admit that you've made mistakes, that you're a sinner. And just ask Jesus Christ to forgive you of your sin and cleanse you and heal you and make you whole and come into your life. And scripture says that he will instantly save you from your sins. He will instantly cleanse you from your sins. You will be instantly forgiven by him and you will be forever a part of his family. I just pray right now, those of you either watching on TV or watching online, just click that little button, I prayed that prayer today. I asked Jesus into my life that says a raised hand. For those of you, hey, let us know. That's the greatest decision ever. And for all of us that are believers, help us understand. We have enemies that want to destroy us. And until Jesus, you come for us, may we get in your word every day. And may we think about you and others and our eternal home. Thank you for loving us so much today Jesus. We love you, in your name we pray, amen.