Amen. Turn with your Bibles to Romans chapter 8 verses 5 and 6. Romans chapter 8 verses 5 and 6. I changed my water glass here. I don't have that water bottle sipping anymore for those who have commented on the noise that it made. So anyways, a little humor for you. Romans chapter 8 verses 5 and 6. Romans chapter 8 verses 5 and 6. We're going to do a number of review things today, but there will also be, we'll get to this verse later on, but I wanted to start off with this. And the truth of it is getting out of the hole of no hope is we need to be biblical. We need to see things the very way that God sees it. We need to stop saying, I think that's the way it is, or I hope that's the way it is, but we need to say, you know what, that's what the Bible says it is. Here in Romans chapter 8 verse 5, for they that are after the flesh do mine the things of the flesh. But they that are after the Spirit, the things of the Spirit, for to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. And the fact is, we've got to stop being carnal and be spiritual. And now as I get into the very truths, as I have stated before, we are in a battle. We are in a spiritual battle, Ephesians 6.12, as I've talked about many a times, for we wrestle not against flesh and blood. against principalities and powers, and the verse goes on. And when we find ourselves out of touch with the Lord, out of fellowship, out of not just reading the Bible, people may read the Bible and they may pray, but that doesn't do anything if you don't have an intimate relationship with the Lord. You're not meditating on God's word, journaling. And we can get ourselves in the hole of no hope and the circumstances of life can lower us down. And our heart can become sick as we find in Proverbs 13, 12, hope deferred, make the heart sick. We can have a sick heart that is hurting. And I mean, there's a lot of pain. And the fact is, is we have lost our security. We have lost our significance. And these two basic emotional needs we've lost, there is no security or very little security and very little significance. Maybe the person you've depended upon has let you down. It could even be a spouse. But we have to get back to the truth of the word of God, that God is my true security and my true significance. I find my satisfaction in God alone. Now, as we went through it, someone who's being lowered into the hole of no hope will ask the question, why? Why did this happen to me? Why am I going through this? Why did I do this? I mean, there's a lot of questions we can ask. They might even say it's not fair and compare themselves and then get to comparison and then bitterness. And when bitterness is not dealt with, it can even lead to thoughts of suicide. And we live in a world that has both a public world and a private world. And so the second set is the invisible world, the private world. You can't see with the naked eye. It's what's inside of our skin. And as I had said it several weeks ago, whoever controls your thoughts controls you. So it's either God is controlling your thoughts or Satan is controlling your thoughts or other aspects that we're going to talk about here shortly. But whoever controls your thoughts controls you. What are you allowing to control your thoughts? You said, Satan doesn't control my thought, I'm a child of God. But if you believe his lies, then you are believing the bait that he's given to you and thereby he is controlling you through the lies that you're believing. He says, be angry and sin not, let not the sun go down upon your wrath. And in that very truth there, it says, neither give place to the devil. In that anger, I'm giving place to the devil. And people have problems many times in their actions, addictions, habits, anger, et cetera, that is manifested. And we can see that. And in these problems, our heart is sick and there's things that are displaying how my heart is. There's things that my heart is sick. And as you see someone with an angry spirit, you see someone who's very bitter or you see something with bad habits and addictions and other sorts of things of life that are not healthy. These are surface problems that reveal that there's something inside. We can say that person has a problem merely looking at actions. But our actions are controlled by what? Our attitudes. Actions are the outcome of how we feel about something. Have you ever And someone at work or maybe your boss or someone even at church or other instances of life. And, and, uh, your mind that morning is festering upon that particular individual. And you said, when I get there, I'm going to give him a piece of my mind. I'm going to let them know what is going on. And with all of that being said, your act, your attitude, your heart is displaying some attitudes. And these are surface causes. Again, we've got to get to the heart that is going well. We need our heart to be healed. We need the Lord. We need to see the problems that are going in. Attitudes are controlled by academics. What I mean by that is the way we learn and think about something always controls our feelings about it. The attitudes are controlled by academics, what we're thinking. Right? What you're thinking and learning and what you're going through in life. And, and maybe you're learning some things that aren't so healthy. You're, you're, you're around some friends that are saying things that aren't well, well, it's going to affect your actions. It's going to affect your feelings. If you're around angry, someone with an angry spirit is going to defile others. Someone with a bitter spirit is going to defile others. But we need to get to the root problems. Academics are controlled by who is our authority. Whoever we are listening to is ultimately controlling us. We're gonna talk about that as we look at this. The soil where roots grow are growing. So whoever, really as I said on that previous slide, whoever you're listening to is controlling your thoughts. So someone, let me get to these four things, who are we listening to? There's four areas, as Ephesians chapter two verses one through four states, that we're listening to. Ephesians chapter two verses one through four, there's four voices. that we have a potential to listen to. The number one is society. Now that can be like the news, social media, that can be friends, that can be culture, that can be academics and university and all that. Society, if I listen to society on what is appropriate and what is not, It's going to affect me and it's not going to give me the truths and the peace and the joy that God promises. Because the very fact is in Romans chapter 12 verses one and two, I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And as you think upon these truths here, Romans 12 1 & 2 and be not conformed to this world God says don't be listening to the world and if I'm listening the news I like the news I have to sometimes I I just begin to watch a lot of news and after a while of watching the news I can get quite discouraged thinking oh man our world is falling apart it is it's a sinful world it's a wicked world But I got to get back to the word of God, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind that ye may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. As Dr. Coomer was speaking this last week there in Psalm 37, the flesh cycle, fret, envy, anger, wrath, evil. We begin to worry. And not only do we listen to society, we begin to listen to our own wicked heart. There is a saying, be true to thyself. Listen to your own heart. Nothing could be further from the truth. That is false. That is wicked thinking. I'm not going to listen to my heart. It's wicked. If I listened to my heart, I would have never been saved. If I would have listened to my heart, I would have not made some of the positive choices I've made in life because the spirit of God was leading me. But if I listened to myself, as we find in Romans 7, 18, for I know that in me that is in my flesh dwelleth what? No good thing. That which is good. I find out Romans chapter 7 is the Apostle Paul struggling with the flesh back and forth You see who we need to the fourth voice We need to listen to is Ephesians 2 1 through 4 discusses as a savior. I realize this is all review The spirit of truth I need what do we need truth? I need to listen to him But many times we don't listen to him we listen to Satan Genesis chapter 3 verse 1, what happened when Eve listened to Satan? Well, we know the result and we have the result today, a wicked heart. He's subtle. You see, the two most powerful influences, the two most powerful controlling voices, one is the Savior, ultimately is the Savior, but the second most is Satan. His goal is to destroy you. And as you think about that, one of these fishermen that uses a bait uses truth. That's the Savior. The other one will use the world, the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Come with me. It's okay to get angry at this person. It's okay for bitterness. It's okay to harbor that hurt. It's okay. The circumstances of life, we get through whatever the circumstances of life, and we look at the truth of what happened. Not through our perception, as remember, your perception affects your reality. But the truth of who is God. But Satan says, no, I want you to trust your feelings, trust your emotions, be true to thyself. One of these fishermen that uses truth, the only one that uses truth is the Savior, the other one is Satan. As we get to the next one, 2 Corinthians 4, 4. And whom the God of this world have blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, whose the image of God, should shine on them. Satan does not want people to have the light of God. They don't want him at the truth. That's exactly what he's trying to do in the world now. Trying to shutter churches and trying to do many other things. Get people discouraged. There is no power in God, as he might say. And our thoughts, and these thoughts can come in like a flood. I mean, just emotions and thoughts and discouragement and everything, the society and self and Satan, these thoughts begin to bombard our mind and we feel as though we're emotionally cluttered and we're not making any headway. So what do you do? Many times if it was like your basement was filling up with water, what would you do? You go rent a pump to get the water out. Or if there's a drain, you want to get down there and figure out how to unplug the drain or both. But it keeps filling back up and you think, I just got to pump the water out, pump the water out, but it keeps filling up. What's wrong? What do I do? What do I need to do? I need to turn off the source. If there's a water spigot or a faucet that's turned on that's overflowing and creating this leakage in this basement, I need to turn it off. I need to turn off these sources that are creating this emotional clutter. I need to turn off Satan's lies. I need to turn off listening to myself. I need to turn off society and social media and television and news that has a perspective that is not godly. I need a perspective of who I am and the clutter and the struggles and the hurt of life that is godly. And this book, my friend, has the answers. If we live by our feelings and we're one of those people that's like a roller coaster. As the circumstances of life are good, you're happy. As the circumstances of life are bad, you're in the lowest of lows and you're just like riding a roller coaster and people around you are like walking on eggshells just hoping I don't make a wrong move to make this person go back into that valley. Because that person's living by their emotions. That ought not to be how we ought to live. And Satan is that source, and I've got to get rid of those things. I need to listen to what God says. And many Christians are good at installing spiritual pumps when we ought to learn how to turn off the faucet. I need to learn how to listen to the Spirit of God. As was stated this week, the essence of the Christian life is asking God questions. I need to know God's voice. Invisible world can and does influence a human world. And for this reason, God gave us ministering spirits. He's given us angels if you want to think about them. Hebrews 1, 13 and 14, this is all review, but it says, are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation? Hebrews 1, 13 and 14, and you can look at that at another time, but God has sent us angels to help us. I give, and I want to make this very, very clear, I give absolutely zero, zero reverence or regard to the angels. Zero. The angels don't get my reverence. Yes, they're supernatural. They're ministering for God. They're not to receive any reverence from me. They don't want it. And every time in the scriptures where an angel appears to someone, And the person bows down, and if that person is not the pre-incarnate appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ, they'll say, stand up. They won't let them bow. But we have guardian angels, or ministering spirits if you want to call them that, and familiar spirits, or demons. And in Deuteronomy chapter 18, these demons, familiar spirits, and they are familiar with your family. Now the demons are not, so God gives us ministering spirits to minister to us during our lifetime. But not only, Satan is a copycat. Satan copies from God. These familiar spirits are really familiar with the family, the family tree. So all the way back up in the very truths as you look upon this, Exodus chapter 20 verse five, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation. Someone who's maybe struggling with anger or bitterness or addiction or immorality or other things. And you look back in the family tree three and four generations back many times. Those demons continue to try. That family has opened up an area in their life, a spiritual area in their life for that demon to continually attack. I know this works on that, that worked on the dad, let's try it on the son, and the dad's struggling with this, so it's opened up a hole for that demon to try to affect the children, and then those sins are there, and so it continues to perpetuate and perpetuate and perpetuate as we listen to the voices of Satan. There's generational spirits, the familiar spirits, generational spirits that continue to afflict families. Generational curses, though, guess what? Can be broken. And in the word of God, you'll find some wicked, wicked kings of Judah. You'll find other kings, and they're going through, and they come to a crisis point in their life, and they break down and say, oh God, forgive me. God says, okay. I'll withhold judgment on you, but not on your kids. But if those kids repent, God would say, okay, I'll hold back. Generational curses can be broken, but you have to want to be godly. You have to want to do what God says you ought to do. You have to be willing to say, I want to honor God above all. Many times it comes to the place where we come to the end of ourselves. We are absolutely out of answers, heartbroken, hurting, and we say, I don't know where to go from here. You have territorial spirits. There are demons that want to be in a particular area. That's where they've been assigned. The case in point of that is Legion. Kind of a freaky picture there, a friend of mine put together the slides. Mark chapter five, verses nine and 10. And the demons, they didn't want him to send him out of that country. Pleading with him, please don't send us out of this country. So he sends him in the pigs and the pigs jump off the cliff and away they go and they perish. I say all of that. It brings us back to where we left off last time. We need the help of God. We need the Word of God. We need God's guidance and direction if we ever want to get out of that hole of no hope. We have to be, as I had stated this week, transparent and truthful. And I need to understand what God says is truth and I need to receive it. So we have a public world and a private world. The second set of worlds is the private world and the public world, as you see, and each of these worlds have boundaries. When the private world and the public world crisscross, where our flesh crisscrosses with the spiritual world, you get emotional, mental, and spiritual problems, physical problems. There are things in your life that will begin to afflict you, emotional chaos. For instance, in the story of Rebecca, as I started this whole series off, was abused and violated by her uncle physically, but that affected her private world, her spiritual world. She was cluttered. Her mind was a mess all over the place. She couldn't keep it together. And so as we now pick up on your handout there, Roman numeral number one, skin is the boundary for our private world. Where the skin starts and up is the physical world. Obviously, as we go inside, that is your private world. Frequently an automobile will have a tachometer. It registers how well the inside of the engine is working. And based upon the revolutions per minute, the RPMs. And that tells us really what is going on in the engine. And as we do this, it tells us what's going on in our private life. If you want to think about it in the tachometer, from this perspective, a tachometer. We're going to be held, as your Roman numeral number two, we're going to be judged by Christ at the judgment seat according to our tachometer. And I'm going to explain these words here shortly. We're going to look at these verses. The tachometer, the T there is your thoughts. You're gonna be judged according to your thoughts. Realize this, God sees your heart. Number two is your attitude. You're judged according to your attitudes. Does it not bother you of how your attitude is going to be judged by God? Thoughts, attitudes, actions, it's already filled in, and number four is conversations. Your thoughts, your attitudes, your actions, and your conversations, everything you say and think upon, God is going to judgment at the judgment seat of Christ. Now, the judgment seat of Christ is only for Christians, only for believers, exclusively. It doesn't affect your eternity in heaven, but it definitely affects the rewards and blessings God gives to you. When you stand before the judgment seat of Christ, he's gonna say, what did you do with your life for me? Your faithfulness to me, your love for me, what did you do with it? In Romans 14, 12, turn there, I know you can see it there on the slide, but for Romans 14, 12, so then every one of us shall give account of himself to God. You're going to give an account to God. You say, well, at least I'm on my way to heaven. I would get out of jail free card. No. When it comes to the millennium, the thousand year reign of Christ, you're going to rule and reign with Christ or you won't. And it's based upon what you do here on earth to be faithful to Christ. Faithfulness to Christ is not just showing up at church. It's not tithing. That's requirements that God's given to us. It is using the gifts that God has given to us and using them for His glory. It is being evangelistic and telling people about Jesus Christ, being a witness for the Lord. It's taking those temptations and trials and persecutions of life and stepping through them and honoring the Lord through that. Matthew 12, 34, for out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh. You're going to say what is coming from your heart. And if it is something that is of anger, then the heart is sick. The Lord Jesus Christ would say in Matthew 12, 34, O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. And the truth here is Jesus was calling these religious Pharisees vipers. He was not cuddly and warm with them. He calls them snakes. That's a pretty harsh statement to call someone a snake or a viper. As you think about it, Jesus told them straight up, your thoughts come from a wicked heart. 2 Corinthians chapter 10 verse 5, casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalted itself against the knowledge of God. and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. I was just thinking upon this very truth last night. Fictional novels, fictional TV shows, you realize that what we are doing is listening to the fantasies and imaginations of the world on these things that we watch. This is bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. So what you're watching affects your thinking. And if what you're watching does not line up with the word of God, it's not going to edify in the way it ought to. In 1 Corinthians chapter 11 verses 31 and 32, if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. Verse 31 says, for if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chasing the Lord that we should not be condemned with the world. goes on, and as I just stated there, verse 32, I need to judge myself. It means I need to make an assessment on my life and say, am I pleasing to the Lord or not? Because when we are judged, we are chasing the Lord. The very truth is I don't want God to chase me. I would whole bunch rather have God express and display to me something wrong in my life and in obedience and submission say, okay, Lord, I'll make it right. Because when I don't, he chastens me and that's a painful, painful experience. when you're chasing the Lord and he's making life harder on you and harder on you. You said, why is, I'm praying and I'm asking God and life just seems like it's getting harder and co-workers are getting harder and family has more strife and this is going on and that is going on and life is falling apart and I don't know why. It very well could be God's chastening hand upon you. You're in that hole of no hope and I don't know what to do. God, I'm praying and I'm reading and I'm tithing and I'm doing what I think I should be doing. And so, as you take the truth here, Roman numeral number three, our thoughts are the most powerful part of our being. Your thoughts control everything you do, your thoughts. And then Roman numeral number four, our private world controls our life. He said, well, I know that, my brain. It's your heart. So we have in our tachometer, you have your thoughts. In Romans chapter eight, verses five and six, as we go back there with your thoughts, carnally minded. person in the hole of no hope is listening to their emotions. Listening to what they think is right. They're not following biblical precedents. They're not following the very principles of the Word of God. They're not spiritually minded. Someone with an angry spirit is listening to their emotions, not listening to God. He says in Philippians chapter four, verse eight, whatsoever things are true, honest, just, good, pure, lovely, of good report. And he goes on, if there be any virtue and there be any praise, he says, think on these things. That's why he says, stop, think, and turn it over. Brother Kumar was talking about. Think on these things. Then you praise the Lord and you thank the Lord. I need to replace the evil thoughts with good thoughts. That's what God says. That's not what I'm saying. That's not any man counseling. That's God counseling. That's God's discipleship. Think on these things. Bringing to captivity every thought, every thought. That's why if I'm thinking ill towards another person, I stop thinking, I turn it over. Because I want to bring it into obedience to God. I want to turn that person over to the Lord. I say, Lord, I don't want that thought to go that way. Lord, I don't want to be this way. Lord, I want to honor you. Bring into captivity every thought. To the obedience of Christ. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart. The meditation of your heart. God's Word. Next we come to the attitudes. Proverbs chapter 2 verses 14 through 15, do all things without murmurings and disputings. I like what one of my professors when I was going to training for the ministry, Dr. Childs, he's a gentleman in his 90s now, a faithful, faithful man, never able to have children. He and his wife, probably one of the sweetest people I've ever met and a godly man and he gave me the illustration of murmuring as a cow when it moos he goes murmuring kind of you're just contemplating complaining critical things are just ah this is dumb you know you just you find things wrong that's not of God it's your attitude there's something wrong there and our replacement to that is James 4 10 humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and he shall lift you up Stop, think, turn it over, and praise the Lord, thank the Lord, humble yourselves. Blessed are the poor in spirit, the humility. God brings blessings to a humble, but someone who's, sometimes our humility, we can think, oh wow, I'm no good, I can't do anything, blah, blah, blah, that's also pride. It could be someone that's egotistical, and you can see it, or someone that's kind of like an Eeyore syndrome, and that also, from Winnie the Pooh, Eeyore was also pride. I need to see myself from the perspective of God, how God sees me. Let nothing be done through strife or vain glory, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem other better than themselves. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. And it would go on to say, who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal to God, but made himself of no reputation, was made in the likeness of men, being found in fashion as man. He humbled himself and became obedient to death, even the death on the cross. Let this mind, Jesus's mind, that is what my mind is to think upon. So you have your thoughts, your attitudes, and your actions. Next. Galatians 5.1, in my actions I need to stand fast in doing what God commands me to do. In the liberty, there's a lot of new fads and other things that are coming about. But it doesn't mean I need to jump around. I need to say, what does God say I ought to be doing? What does God say I ought to be doing in my private life? What does God say I ought to be doing in my family life? What does God say I ought to be doing in my career life? What does God say I ought to be doing in my church life? What do I have to be doing in my public life, in society? I need to do what God wants me to do. Stand fast in the liberty. See, someone in the hole of no hope doesn't have liberty. They're in bondage. The way we get on the actions is we confess our sins. He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from what? All unrighteousness. So if I'm in that hole of no hope and you're asking God questions and saying, God, I'm struggling in this area. And as I had stated, if I were to ask you on a scale of one to 10 on the most painful, hurtful event of your life, and you might say, pastor, it's way over 10. I don't know a number, but it's way over 10. We've got to get back and find where the truths are there. Find what God says. And if there's any sin that I've committed because of that hurt, that bitterness, that anger, whatever in my life, because I've been listening to my heart, been listening to society, been listening to Satan and not listening to God, I need to say, Lord, forgive me. Because there's liberty there. Not only that, my little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth. In actuality. To love. And whatsoever you do, do it what? Heartily. It means with all your person. To whom? As to the Lord. If you're wanting to revenge, you're wanting someone else to get back at them. That's not to the Lord, that's of Satan. You need to put away those thoughts. Take those into captivity. Your actions, whatsoever you do. This is everything. Whatsoever. This is anything and everything. In that hole of no hope, you might say, I really don't feel like doing what God wants me to do. It just doesn't feel right. Whether you feel like it or not, you need to listen to God over listening to your feelings. It goes on to say, as heartily as to the Lord and not unto men, knowing that of the Lord you shall receive the reward of the inheritance for you've served the Lord Christ. You're either serving yourself, serving Satan, or you're serving Christ. And if you're doing actions because you want revenge, you want other people, you want to get back at someone, you want to, whatever the case may be. If that's the case, then you're acting satanically. You're not acting according to the word of God. And you say, pastor, I don't know how to go forward. It's confession. Lord, I'm sorry. come to the conversations. 1 Corinthians chapter 5 verses 6 through 8. Your glorying is not good, know ye not, that a little leaven, leaveneth the whole lump? Purge out, therefore, the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump. As ye are in leaven, for even Christ our Passover sacrifice for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, Neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth." And so as you reflect on this, there's the other verses, malice and wickedness and the hole of no hope. Well, they shouldn't treat me this way. I shouldn't be talked to that way. Neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness. Get rid of that leaven. Get rid of that sin. See, God is judging us by those actions. Should show forth the praises, 1 Peter 2.9, the praises of him who hath called you. I need to praise God, as we had said. Stop, think, turn it over, and then praise the Lord and thank the Lord. Praise the Lord here. Again, going back, by the mercies of God to present our bodies a living sacrifice. So there's some truths. Be not conformed to this world. So going back to the analogy of your basement flooding. You hear water running, you run down there. Get the pump, get the pump, turn the pump on. What would you do? You rent a pump or turn the pump on or try to see if the pump's plugged in. Whatever the case, you're focused on getting the water out, and we are focused on cleaning up that emotional baggage. Oh, if I do enough of this, and as we've said, the world says diet, medicine, and exercise. Diet, medicine, and exercise, that'll make you feel better. But it's not a physical issue. It is a spiritual issue. We've got to get to the truth here. Now granted, there are some physical things that affect us, the weather and the temperature. And I mean, there are, if it's cloudy for days, it does affect you. I understand that from that perspective. But what is coming out of our heart and our thoughts and our actions is coming from our heart. And Christians are good at installing spiritual pumps and let it, Roman numeral number five, Christians are good at installing spiritual pumps. when we ought to learn to turn off the faucet. How do I stop all of these thoughts? They're still gonna come, but they shouldn't be coming at a tidal wave or a tsunami into my mind continually, because that's showing that I'm not spirit-controlled. Satan is the source, so turn off Satan. Stop listening to him. When those thoughts come, turn them off. Stop, think, turn it over. Praise and thank the Lord. Times people say, well, you just need to pray more. When those thoughts come, just pray more. You need to be at church. Tithe, if you're tithing, then the thoughts will come. If you're out soul winning, then the thoughts will come. These are manifestations that are coming from our heart. Read your Bible, read your Bible, it'll be okay. It'll be better. These are spiritual pumps. Many times we can teach people to pump to survive. If we're not in tune to the source and we're not turning off the bad sources, the water is still going to come. The tidal wave is still going to come. The continual thoughts are still going to come. And I'm just saying, even if you're doing your walk with the Lord and you're meditating on the word of God, it doesn't mean the thoughts are going to stop, but they should. Lesson, you shouldn't have that emotional clutter. You should have a stability in your life where you're not feeling so like rollercoaster with your emotions or other people say, man, that person's a rollercoaster. They're up and down and up and down. I mean, it affects the family. It affects others. It affects the church. It affects the workplace. It affects other things. When we go through these ebb and flow, I mean, we're going to do a little bit, but if we're going through swings, It's not good. We teach people letter A. We teach people to pump to survive. We should be teaching others how to turn the faucet off. And that's what we had this last week during our conference. How to turn that faucet off. How to get in tune with God. How to be spirit controlled. I want to give you an illustration of how much thoughts can affect an individual. This is what the author of this book says, Dr. Souter. He says, James was a well-liked and well-respected grade 12 in high school in Texas. For the past few months, he had begun to lose the use of his legs and arms. By the time he came for counseling, he was confined to a wheelchair and had been unable to walk or feed himself for several weeks. The morning hours of counseling were spent in explaining the principles in the book, The Hole of No Hope. And after a lunch break, James and I spent an additional two and one half hours together. During this time, he was freed from the wrong thinking Satan had used to influence him in his private world. Wrong thoughts actually shut down the use of his arms and legs. When his parents came to pick him up from their motel room, James was walking. He actually pushed his wheelchair out to the parking lot to meet them. I'm not saying all physical, but I am saying Your spiritual and your thoughts can affect you physically. Am I saying this is always the case? I'm not. Please don't get me wrong. But you might want to ask God, is this the case? Our thoughts are the most powerful part of our being. And a person might go into the doctor and the doctor says, we've gone through all the tests. We don't find anything wrong. It very well could be a spiritual problem. I'm not saying it is. I'm saying the possibility is there. Our thoughts, the most powerful part of our being in our private world, controls our life. Your thoughts, your attitudes, your actions, and your conversations. You know what, my friend? We can get out of the hole of no hope. There is freedom in Jesus Christ. If we're willing to say, Lord, I'm going to check your word, and I'm going to believe it, and I'm going to follow it. In helplessness and hopelessness and the hole of no hope, I don't need to be in that hole. I don't need to get to the place of suicidal thoughts. I can have hope and joy. I can have an abundant life, John 10 10, because of Jesus. It's not just a cliche. It's not just a nice thing that Christians say. It is the truth of God's word. It is a promise from almighty God. And my friend, I trust that we would be obedient and submit our wills to God to do what is right in his perspective. May we walk with him and talk with him and be led and guided by him because he is worthy and he is caring and compassionate like no one ever will ever be. He's the one that created me, and he loves me as such. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, Lord, I do thank you for this evening and Lord, this morning. Father, I do pray for each individual, Lord, as we looked at our thoughts, our attitudes, our actions, our conversations. Father, as each and every one of these are really controlled by the voices we're listening to, the input, the stimulus. And Lord Jesus, I pray. Lord, as we have these thoughts that are coming, we would do as the Word of God desires. And even there in 2 Timothy 4 that the Apostle Paul would give over Alexander the coppersmith to the Lord to reward him. And Father, as we have individuals that may cause us struggles, Father, I pray that we would be willing to do what is right, give them to the Lord and let him deal with them. And Father, I pray that in our lives we would be found faithful. Lord, we would do what the Word of God says in regards to obedience and faithfulness. And Lord, on these hurts of our lives that are so deeply embedded in some of us, Lord, I pray that we would begin to uproot those lies, uproot those hurts, and Lord, find healing. As Matthew 11, 28 talks about, we can find rest. Give our burdens to the Lord. The painful incident doesn't go away. The memory of it doesn't necessarily go away, but the pain from that event can go away, can subside. And Lord, I pray that we would begin to just trust you, honor you, obey you, submit to you. And Lord, I thank you for your goodness and your grace in our lives today. In Jesus' precious name, I pray.