It's good to be with you guys here today.
I'm excited to get into what we are about to get into as we've been getting
into this series that we're talking about finding God's will.
I think it's created a lot of chatter around our church as you have been trying
to figure out what does this look like for you and it's a good chatter.
I'm glad that we're talking about this and all these different things
that we're trying to figure out.
What does it mean for us to find God's will because here's the thing.
Here's the reason we're doing this is because you're many of you are in places
where you need to make decisions and you're making decisions
that are affecting the rest of your life and that's a big deal, right?
There's a lot of things that are hinging on some of the things
that you're deciding right now.
Who are you going to date?
Ultimately, who are you going to marry?
What major are you going to lead to?
What career are you going to choose?
All these things have major impacts upon your life and where you're going.
And for us, as we begin to think, we started off in the very beginning talking
about the fact that you have more options and more choices
than any generation in the history of the world.
And so that sometimes creates in our hearts this kind of angst, right?
This angst of if I choose this, I'm saying no to all of these things.
If I choose that, I'm saying to know all those things.
And so we get kind of paralyzed.
We I don't know what to do and we get full of anxiety and we don't know
exactly how to navigate some of these situations and what this looks like.
And the good thing is, is that for those of you who follow Jesus Christ,
for those of you who have allowed Jesus to become Lord and that's
given you access to God, God is a helpful person to have in this process
because God knows everything.
He's created you.
He knows your future.
He knows where you've been.
And we looked at a promise that from the very beginning I said that
he has a desire to guide you on the right path.
And so for those of you who are maybe new to church or are just exploring
this, I want to give you good news that there's someone outside
of yourself who wants to guide you.
And the thing is that we some of you here like, okay,
I'm all for God guiding me, but I don't know how that works.
I don't know how to engage that.
And so we have all these formulas and we talk through all the formulas
that it looks like for us to try to engage God.
And really, as we begin to think about all the things we could do to engage
God, one of the things that we want to be able to focus on is this,
is how do we do this without formulas?
How do we do this without some sort of method?
And how is it that we pursue God in his will in a way that aligns
with what God desires, not just what we desire.
And so we don't just come into this saying, just selfishly,
I want to get God's information so it helps me with my life.
We talked about that in the very beginning that God doesn't play
those games with us.
God is not just the cosmic Santa Claus that just, if you do this
little thing just right, you'll get the information that you need.
That's just not how God works.
And so as we begin to pursue this, I want to give you some,
some hopefully helpful things for you to know.
How is it that when you're up against that situation,
when you're making that decision that you know how this is to work
and you know how God wants you to live in this.
And so last week we talked about how God uses people around us
and God uses people around us to help give us some information
and help speak through us.
But I think that there's some places and there's some times
where those people that might be around us is,
there might not be the right people.
There might not be those people that we can rely on.
And so God has given us something else.
And that's what I want to talk to you today about what God has
given us in order to be able to rely on this.
And I want to go back and I want to begin this journey today
in a place, one of my favorite scripture passages.
It's a guy named David and David has been named King,
but he has been named King while there's still another King.
And so David is, is to be King, but not King yet.
And there's a guy named King Saul and King Saul wants his
descendants to be progressing, progressing on being the King
of Israel and yet God is named David in terms of being able
to have a new direction.
And so Saul is not too happy about this.
And so I was waging war in one place with the Philistines.
He goes and he chases David.
And here's what we begin to see.
This is 1st Samuel chapter 24 and we're going to start in verse
one.
I'm just going to read this to you.
It's a great story.
It says this, after Saul returned from pursuing the Philistines,
he was told David is in the desert of Ingeti.
So Paul, sorry.
So Saul took 3000 able young men from all Israel and set out
to look for David and his men near the crags of the wild goats,
which I just think that's kind of interesting.
Like, okay, these are the crags of the wild goats.
And so that's where David is hiding.
And so here's what happens.
He comes to the sheet pins along the way and a cave was there
that describes the wild goats, I guess.
And so then Saul went into relieve himself and David and his
men were far back in the cave.
You got to understand, there's tons of caves.
They're littered everywhere around this region of the world.
And so in this specific area, there's hundreds of caves.
And what we see is this, this fascinating thing, this fascinating
story, David and his men are hiding in the back of this cave.
Saul is, is, is marching along looking for David and Saul has
to go pee or whatever.
And so he goes into the cave, right?
And so everybody stops when the king has to pee, right?
So they go up and Saul goes into this cave and he goes in there
and he's in the most vulnerable position possible, right?
This isn't about, I love the story.
And so it's the men said to him, this, this is the day.
They're whispering this.
So Saul, this is the day the Lord spoke when he said to you, I
will give your enemy into your hands for you to deal with as
you wish.
And here's what David did.
So then David crept up, unnoticed and cut off a corner of
Saul's robe.
Afterward, David was conscious stricken for having cut off
the corner of his robe.
He said to his men, the Lord forbid that I should do such a
thing to my master.
The Lord's anointed or to lay a hand on him.
For he is the Lord's, for he is the anointed of the Lord with
these words, David sharply rebuked his men and did not
allow them to attack Saul and Saul left the cave and went
his way.
I think this is a fantastic when we're thinking about what
decision making is looking like.
What we see in terms of what David did in this situation is
a fantastic help to us because when we begin to look at this
here is, here's a situation that, that is this amazing
situation.
Saul is chasing after David. David has his 70 year men.
They hide in this cave out of all the caves that Saul could
have gone to.
He goes into the cave that David was hiding in, right?
He's in the most vulnerable position.
Absolutely possible, right?
And so his men says, here's the open door.
Here's what you've been hoping for.
In fact, this, we will say that this is God.
This is such a fantastic experience.
This is such an amazing open door here that only God could
have done this kind of thing.
And so David climbs up.
He gets close enough to Saul that he cuts off a piece of his
robe, crawls back and David says to his men, let me tell you
why I made this decision because this does not align.
This is not the way that God works.
It may look like an open door.
So David had all these circumstances that said, this is,
this is what this looks like.
David had his, his friends around him that says, and his, his
guys that say, it's the Lord.
It's definitely the Lord.
And yet David had a foundation on something else.
And those two things, even in light of those two things,
there is a part of the decision making process that David
leveraged that I want to share with you today.
Because here's the thing, not only does God leverage his people
to help clarify his will to us as we talked about last week,
but God uses his word to reveal his will.
God uses the Bible.
And so David says, this is a guy at the very beginning.
Is it, this is your words and your commands.
They comfort me.
They drive me.
David would, and the Bible and David's time was just a sliver
of what we have, but he understood who God was as he got
into the text, as he understood the Bible.
And this allowed him to know how to act.
This allowed a knowledge of him understanding how he was to
make a decision, even when the door seemed to be wide open,
even when his friend said, this is God, there is something
here that we have to leverage in order for us to make right
decisions.
And, and here's the issue.
The issue goes all the way back to this.
You make decisions and I make decisions based upon a baseline
of intuition.
We make decisions based upon what we believe to be true.
Capital T true, right?
The truth of your life is somewhere.
It's a foundation that each and every one of you has and the
decisions that you make, you rarely go against that intuition.
You rarely go against what you feel like is the foundation
of truth in your life.
But the problem with that is what the foundation is in your
life is different than the foundation of who God is and
the way that he works in this world.
And so when we're trying to say, God, you know my future,
what is your will?
Sometimes these aren't an alignment.
It says this in Isaiah 55, 8, 9.
For my thought, this is God speaking to us.
For my thoughts, are you not your thoughts?
Neither are your ways, my ways, declares the Lord.
It's the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are
higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.
So you need to understand intuitively where you land is
not where God lands.
God says, I think about things differently than you.
The way that I see the world is different than you.
And so when we go and we say, okay, how do I make a decision
that is in alignment with what God wants me to make?
How is it that I make a decision that is in alignment with
how God was working in my life so that I can go down
the right path that he has for me?
We need to understand how do we as people who have foundations
not built upon God begin to understand the thoughts of God
like David did in order to understand this?
Because here's the thing, God was doing something.
God promised something to David, but God did it on his own.
And if David had done this, who knows what would have happened?
But God didn't say to David, take this in your own hands.
And it was clear through the way that God worked and the nature
of God and how God understand and was working through the world.
David understood this.
How do you and I understand it?
Paul helps us.
The Apostle Paul wrote the book of Romans.
Romans is a detailed understanding and explanation of how we
are to understand the mind of God and how God works in this world.
And Romans 12 verse two, it gives us some clarity in this.
It says this.
It says in Romans chapter 12 verse two, it says,
do not conform to the pattern of this world,
but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is,
his good, his pleasing and perfect will.
So it's really obvious here is we're thinking about what is God's
will for our lives.
How do we know God's will?
How can I align myself and be able to know what God is doing?
It's an equation.
And it's really simple for us to begin as saying there's a cause
and effect in this thing.
And so I want us to dive into this and understand what is going on
and how do we live in this?
It says this.
First of all, do not conform to the pattern of this world.
The first step in understanding God's will is refusing to be
conformed to the pattern of the thinking of the world.
And so here's the reality.
All of your life, there's been a pattern of thinking that the world
has instilled within you.
And if you don't believe that there's a pattern of thinking
that you have because of the place that you live and the time
that you live, you should go to another country, right?
You should go to another country and to see how they do things
because there's inherently things that they do that are different
than the way that you do things.
There's ways that they do things.
You know, you go to a hotel room or you go to a bathroom there
and you're like, what is that thing?
You know, and someone says it's a bidet, you know?
And it's just what we do.
What does it do?
Okay, this is weird, you know?
And so when we begin to think about all these things, okay,
we do this this way and all the things when you begin to think
about all the ways that your mind has been conformed to this.
As you begin to think about all the ways that you're kind
of normal has been shaped by your environment, there's a pattern
of thought that's there.
There's a pattern of thought that has become a part
and you need to understand where did you get truth?
For you to have a belief in something or for you to have
an opinion of something, where did that come from?
Where did you get that?
You need to understand each and every one of you, the genesis
of truth, where is it?
And it's likely that a significant amount of truth has been put
into your life and the way that you believe and the way
that you see issues in the world, the way that you see the
decisions that you make, the way that you see even yourself is
based upon its ideas that have been put in you by the culture
that you live in and you don't even know it.
And it's not something that's conscious.
It's just the baseline of what this looks like.
It's just the foundation for how you think.
And it's just, it just happens.
But God is saying, if my ways are higher than your ways,
then here's what has to happen, that your mind cannot be
conformed to this.
Where do you receive truth?
When you think about all of these things, what is that based
upon?
Is that based upon where you've seen the news and your friends
and lyrics and songs?
Things, articles that you read online or is that based upon
God saying, this is the truth that I have in my word.
This is discoverable.
And so let's just honestly think, how much time have you spent
in one or the other?
And if you say, I haven't spent a whole lot of time in the Bible,
the thought for all of us has to be clear.
Then it's likely that the pattern of your thinking is not a
biblical way of thinking.
And it's probably a little bit like this.
I think this is for a lot of Christianity, the pattern of the
world and the way of thinking with an overlay of morality.
And most Christians tend to think like the world, but try to
be a better version to fit into the standards of God that
they believe.
And the thing is, what that does is that creates a tremendous
amount of tension in your life and a tremendous amount of
confusion.
Because on one hand, you have this idea, I want to serve God.
I want to worship God.
And yet you're thinking like the world, and it's this overlay
of, I'll just do the best I can to be a good person.
And so in our mind, heaven and hell is just a good person thing,
right?
It's not the integration of the gospel and who God is and the
nature of God being manifested in the decisions that we make
and the way that we see the world and the way that we can
watch the news and say that is right or that is wrong, not based
upon what I think is popular, but what is godly and what God
has said, this is the way that I see the world.
This is the way that I operate versus this is the way that all
of my friends on my dorm are all the people that I think are
all the TV shows or all the songs.
This is at odds and it does destruction in the way that we
make decisions because we are always trying to figure out how
do I balance these two?
And it's likely that we're trying to merge these two things
that do not merge.
It says do not conform, but be renewed.
Now, I'm sorry, be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
There's a new thought process that begins to have to be the case
in your mind for you to be able to know and to be able to live
in God's will.
So what does this look like?
How do we navigate this?
Let me give you two things of what it looks like for us to renew
our will.
One is awareness and the other one is alignment.
And so if we're just kind of putting this equation together,
it's awareness plus alignment equals renewal.
And so if you're to say what does this look like for me to not
be conformed to the pattern of the world's thinking,
but to be transformed by the renewing of my mind,
how does this look?
The first step is first to understand this awareness factor
in Colossians 3-10 that says this and to have put on the new
self.
This is saying we're not who we used to be, right?
That the inner part of us, our heart has been transformed.
We now crave God and not ourselves.
It says this, which is being renewed in the knowledge in the
image of its Creator.
It's being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator.
This, what you've got to get is that when we begin to understand
this, there becomes an awareness of who God is.
And again, I am not giving you a quick self-help.
Take this, these five steps and then all of a sudden determine
the will of God.
I'm not wanting to do this.
There's so much in our world that is like, you know,
these five quick steps to this and we just want quick and easy.
But the problem is when it comes to your soul,
quick and easy never works.
When it comes to your mind, quick and easy never works
because there's a pattern of thinking.
And this requires us to be able to have a new pattern and to be
able to put that on top of it and say, if I'm going to act like
I need to understand what is the knowledge of the image of our
Creator, what does that mean?
How can I begin to put that?
How can that become normal?
And when that becomes normal, immense amount of clarity happens
in your life.
This last week, I got to hang out with one of our villages as
we talked about the wisdom of hearing godly wisdom.
And when we began to process this, there's a guy that was
telling a story and he was saying that there's this moment
where he realized that he had gotten more money for tuition
in an unexpected way than he was expecting.
And in that, he was excited about that because there were some
things that he wanted to spend and then all of a sudden he was
talking to another guy who was struggling to be able to have
this tuition issue and some of the support didn't come in,
some of the financial aid didn't come in.
And then he was in a bind because the next day he had to do
this and he just, this guy was saying there was just immense
amount of clarity.
I knew in that moment that God had called me to help this guy out.
And the amazing thing as I begin to like just hear that story
is hearing him say the clarity of which that worked and the
clarity that happened in that moment because he was aware of
who God said he was to be in his life.
So we have all of these things and really when we begin to
think about what does God say about this versus what does our
culture say about this?
There's a couple of things that merge together, right?
So there's an awareness of what God says about my money.
So when we begin to think about what God says, we say we're a
steward that God has given us this money, but we are spiritual
beings, we're going to leave it here.
So we're just stewarding what God has given us.
It's not really ours.
And so we can be generous with that and the spirit of generosity
is there because it's not really ours.
And the other thing is this kind of this combination of being
together in community and being able to look out for the needs
of the people around us that we have each other's back.
And that's not a normal thing, right?
We live in a very individualistic thing that I'll give to you
if it doesn't really sacrifice anything in me.
I'll make sure that there's no sacrifice for me.
And then if I have extra, I'll give that.
But that sacrifices kind of a subjective thing, right?
Is that going to sacrifice something I just kind of want?
You know, I'm not necessarily going to sacrifice something I
need, but, but, or I'm not going to sacrifice something I need
and maybe not even something I want.
But the combination of this, of being able to say it is God's
money and I live in community help bring an immense amount of
clarity.
And so this person is talking about this and is talking about,
I knew exactly when I heard this from God that if I was to
not do this, this would be sinful.
This would be against God.
I understood God's will.
Why did someone say, did God speak to him in an audible voice?
No.
Did God somehow do something crazy and there was a sign?
No.
This was a principle of God found in the, in the text, in the
scripture of God saying, here's what you should believe about
your money.
Here's what you should be believe about community.
And now we get into the situation and it's incredibly clear.
And I want that clarity to be the hallmark of your life.
When you, when you come into, into these decisions, when you're
trying to figure out, what should I do in this?
You know, because you are aware of the mind of God, you know
how God works.
And this awareness thing is huge.
I know the image of my creator.
I understand how God is working in the world around me.
And that knowledge of who God is begins to have an awareness
of what it looks like in your life.
Not only this awareness, but also alignment.
So this is kind of the connection between these two.
One, I know who God is.
I know what God wants.
And I begin to understand the nature of who God is.
And I'm also in alignment, which means that I am walking in
obedience to the thing that I already know.
And so for some of you, you're asking God about your life.
You're asking God about this relationship.
And yet you're walking in disobedience.
And you're saying, God, give me clarity while I pursue my desires.
You have this thing where you've put God into a box and say,
I'd like that job because I'd like a lot of money.
I want to do this thing because it won't require me to work hard.
Alignment is this.
And let me just help you to have a clear moment.
I'm not saying you have to be perfect.
But if you're walking in blatant disobedience
and at the same time asking God for clarity,
it's not going to happen.
This is not how God works.
And again, I'm not saying perfection.
But in this situation, if you already know that you're walking
out of alignment with a scripture, with what God has said
obviously, and yet you want clarity, God's saying,
I'm going to wait until you have alignment
with what I've already given you.
And then I'll make what is unclear clear.
And I'll make what is hidden revealed awareness
who God is alignment with what God is saying equals renewal.
And then you will be able to understand what God's will is.
Again, not trying to be complex.
Just saying, get into the word.
And as you get into the word,
I want you to look for two things.
Here's the practical thing.
I think oftentimes the Bible is kind of pushed aside
because of how it's been misused.
But if you'll look for these two things,
I promise you your pathway to knowing God is going
to be infinitely expanded.
One, throughout the scriptures, throughout this book,
there are all of these principles.
And when you begin to find something that is a principle,
I hope that you begin to write it down every week.
I don't know if you know this, but we talk about the Bible
and we talk about the biblical principle.
So every week I'm pulling these things out,
but likely I'm only getting to spend about 30 weeks
with you a year.
And there are far more things.
And it's likely that things that I'm pulling out
don't necessarily have to do with where you are at in your life.
And so if you just rely upon me or you podcast,
this is not going to hit you where you're at every time.
It's a reliance upon you to be able to find these things
in scripture.
And when you're looking through scripture to find principles.
And here's the difference in a principle and a command.
A command is breakable.
You can do or not do a command.
A principle is just a timeless truth
about a cause and effect relationship
or something that cannot be broken.
It's just the way things are.
And so when we begin to think about these principles,
we begin to think about all of these things.
We start to see them throughout,
describing an outcome of behaviors of what happens.
So some of these are stated.
And oftentimes you're stated in like proverbs.
And we begin to see things like you reap what you sow, right?
What you put into something
is what you can expect out of something.
You might say that doesn't sound like the Bible,
but this is where it started.
And it's permeated our society because of its wisdom
or things like this.
He who walks with the wise grows wise.
He who walks with fools grows foolish.
Basically saying that's the people around you
determine your future.
You look at the five people around you.
You can see the pathway that you're headed.
This is just a truth.
It's not something you say, I don't believe in that.
I'm sorry you don't believe in that.
Does it make it true or does it make it any more true or false?
It's just the way it is.
You begin to see things that are not just stated but implied.
You begin to see things like unconditional love.
Throughout the Bible, there's not one verse
that it would be able to say this is it.
But when you begin to read the Bible,
you begin to put the pieces of the puzzle together
and you begin to realize that the most powerful thing
in the world is unconditional love.
When you desire something,
when you desire influence in someone's life,
the pathway to that is unconditional love.
Not force, not coercion, not shame.
But unconditional love is more powerful than all of those.
It's just a principle.
We begin to see the implied principle of purity.
Meaning this, that purity now leads to intimacy later.
When you begin to think about this principle,
it's found in the word over and over.
When you begin to see the way that you walk
in a relationship now in purity leads to intimacy later.
And if you have a lack of purity now,
it leads to consequences later in terms of intimacy.
This is something, it's not just a good idea.
This is just how you've been created.
This is how this works.
You can talk to people that are Christian, non-Christian.
It's just how it works.
All throughout the Bible, there are these principles.
There are these things that are being stated that reveals
all of these things that as you begin to go,
so this is just a truth.
I need to be able to insert this.
Not only the principles, but the second thing is this.
Looking for things that reveal who God is
or reveal the nature of the character of God.
So when you begin to get into scripture
and you begin to read this, that you approach it
and say, God, I want to know who you are.
How do you work among people?
How is it that we begin to understand the ways
in which you desire to be known,
the way that you desire to operate in the world?
And as you begin to read scripture and have an eye
to say, God, reveal yourself to me.
I want to know your nature.
I want to know who you are.
This begins to allow you to see things in a different way.
And you begin to look at things in a way
that doesn't align with your culture.
It doesn't align with what you see in the media
or TV or music, the news.
But also, you won't deal with the paralysis
and with the second guessing and with the confusion
that marks your generation.
I'm calling you to be different.
I'm calling you to be people that choose something different
for the sake of your future
and for the sake of your alignment with your Creator.
You can look around.
It's a broken system to rely upon the best knowledge
that you have now and hope for the best.
And then if not, then just divorce them
or just change your career or just relocate.
It's pathways of destruction that people try to fill
with hobbies and more money.
And it's just this endless cycle.
I'm just calling you to be different.
I'm calling you to say, if you will ground yourself
in Scripture and understand your Creator,
this is the pathway for your wisdom.
This is the pathway for you to understand how to test
and know what is the will of God.
Open doors, closed doors, who cares?
If you have the Scripture, this guides you
and this allows you to have clarity in your life.
And here's what I want for us to look like.
As we begin to think through what this looks like,
as we begin to have this integration of God into our life,
it's a little bit like translation.
And I don't know another language.
It took three years of German and no zero.
Barely no English.
So this is just this place.
But when you start, you are talking in English,
except for those of you who,
English is not your heart language here.
You understand this probably better than all of us.
You start in this and say, this is,
this is kind of I'm processing this.
You think in English, you process this
and you kind of have to overlay that
with the understanding of this other language.
And so you're constantly slow and it's inaccurate.
Have you ever been around inaccurate translations?
It's great.
It's awesome.
I'll give you a few.
When we don't understand each other,
there's things that happen like this.
Like in a cocktail lounge in Norway,
there's a sign that says,
ladies are requested not to have children in the bar.
In Acapulco, the manager has personally passed
all of the water that served here.
These are signs, right?
In a car rental brochure in Tokyo,
when passengers afoot, heave in sight,
toodle the horn.
Trumpet him melodiously at first,
but if he still obstacles your passage,
then toodle him with vigor.
You know, so when we begin to have all of these things,
Tokyo hotel rules and regulations,
guests are not requested not to smoke
or to do other disgusting behaviors in bed.
And so in a hotel in, in a Norwegian,
sorry, Nairobi, customers who find our waitress rude
ought to see the manager.
And we begin to see a New Zealand restaurant.
Open seven days a week and weekends too.
We have to see all these different places that's in
Hong Kong for your convenience.
We recommend courteous, efficient self-service
outside of a Rhodes Taylor shop.
Order your summer suits
because is big rush.
We will execute customers in strict rotate rotation
on a sign in the Philippines on a car.
It says car and owner for sale outside of Hong Kong.
Ladies might have a ladies may have a fit upstairs
on in a Bangkok dry cleaners.
Drop your trousers here for best results
and an advertisement in Hong Kong dentist
teeth extracted by the latest Methodist.
That's very just a little religious humor there.
Then one of my favorite might be this this YouTube video.
We can throw that up on the screen
about what it looks like for us to misunderstand each other.
Cracks me up.
We begin to think about all this.
We begin and there's this stuff that we don't understand
and we're living in this in this in this kind of connection
between these two things.
But as we begin to grow more and more of an integration,
we begin to kind of have a foot in both worlds, right?
We're thinking in this language and but being able to speak
in this and then there's something that when I when I talk
to people who become fluent, here's what happens.
When they become fluent,
they begin to think in the other language that there's a
progression from thinking in their home, their heart language
and being able to have this progression to where they are
thinking and they're dreaming in another language.
It's been fully integrated into their life.
My heart for us is that we might be people who do not conform
to the patterns of thinking of this world but are transformed
by the renewing of our mind and what that means for us is
that we begin to think like God thinks.
We begin to act as he acts.
We begin to dream in the language of God and what he's given us
to do that is his scriptures is the Bible.
These are God's words that allow you to have access
to who God is.
He's described himself.
He's told you about himself and in this, this is this beautiful
moment and so no longer you, someone who thinks on the pattern
of the world and just overlays that with trying to be as good
as you can morally, but you begin to integrate the word
into your life.
And so how do you do that?
You get into scripture and you say what translation,
whichever one you'll read.
This is the thing.
Just find something that you'll read.
I don't care.
There's not enough distinguishing marks between these except
for the things that are written by Colt, right?
But the Bible, in terms of being able to do this,
if you will just get into it, God will speak to you.
God will reveal.
Don't worry if you're reading the right or wrong translations
of this, just integrate it into your life.
Put it on smart.
It doesn't have to be a bound copy, right?
It doesn't have to be something that you have to,
you can put it on your smartphone.
It's God's word.
It doesn't mean it has to be leather bound.
Just get it into your life any way that you can to be able
to integrate this in a way that is the routine
and the rhythm of your life because the world will never
stop integrating what it thinks into your life.
We will never stop bombarding you with the way that it thinks
and for you to understand that that is not the only way
to think that God's ways and the knowledge of who God is,
that's the beginning of understanding his will.
And this is what I desire for our church.
This is what I desire for you, an alternative script.
You've seen it around.
It doesn't work.
The pathway to this is to get the scripture into your life.
You can go to our website.
You can find scripture reading plans, Bible reading plans.
If you say, I don't know how to do this,
how do I get it systemically in there?
Just go to our website.
You can download some stuff.
There's all kinds of helps and there's all kinds of tools
to making this happen.
But the thing is, you need something other than the world
describing what is truth and helping clarify
what to do with your life.
Let me pray for us.
God, I ask that you would bring great clarity, Lord,
that we might be like someone who is learning a new language
that at some point begins to not have to have that foot
in both worlds that doesn't have that difficulty
in being able to have, this is what I think
and this is what I should think.
But being able to have this moment
where we just naturally begin to think like you think
and we begin to make decisions
as you would have us to make decisions.
We have clarity that we've never had before.
Allow us to walk in that God.
Give us a passion.
Lord, I pray that there's some people here
that just become desperate for your word.
There's some people here.
It's like water in the desert to them.
That they cry out for it.
Lord, give us, stir within us a passion.
Stir within us a desire to know who you are,
to understand your principles and your character
and your nature, God.
We put our lives in your hand
as we put the text into our hearts in your holy name.
Amen.
