Kind of kind of like a relationship type stuff we've been talking to the boys about what God has called them as young men to be and We look over there in first Timothy and what the what that kind of looks like and some things that we talked about Was righteousness we talked about gentleness. We talked about being steadfast, you know, there's a whole list there and in first timothy faith love gentleness so as we're talking about these things and i'm harping on them how they're supposed to be we're also talking about things like valor and grit now grit was a hard one to come across with them because when you start talking about grit they're thinking that grits and that that is not the case it is really hard to come across on that one but they got it and we don't sugarcoat anything we we tell it blunt statement, like with authority, because it is what God expects young men to be. And I love doing this with the kids, because not only does it keep the young boys in check, but it also teaches the girls what they're supposed to be looking for as a man when it comes time for them to find a man, which is not anytime soon. I'm just saying. Amen. All right. But we also, We just finished that up with the boys, and we're fixing Gary's start on the girls, and we're going to be talking about being a virtuous woman. We're going to be talking about being a submissive woman. And when I start talking about submissive women, I try to put that in a situation so you're not a doormat. And I think that's something that really needs to come across to a lot of women today is that, yes, there is a time to be submissive, but you are not a doormat. And so we're gonna be talking about that here, probably starting this next Wednesday. We was gonna start it today, but given since I got a good variety of well outspoken women, I think it would be wise not to start harping on women tonight. As y'all know, and I know, and my wife really knows, I suffer from foot and mouth disease. I can put my whole foot in my mouth often. So we're not gonna be talking about that tonight. Tonight, I want us to kind of talk about a subject that hits us all, whether it be a young child or an older saint and everything in between. And it also hits us men and us women, y'all women, not us women, y'all women. We're gonna be talking about emotions tonight. Who struggles with emotions? Nobody struggles with emotions? Everybody struggles with emotions. My wife, nevermind, I love her to death. We all struggle with emotions, and sometimes the way a female will struggle with emotions is totally different than what a man struggles with emotions, because we're so full of pride, and we sell up, and we go off by ourselves, and we hem-haw around, and to where some females, they'll just act out expressively. I'm trying to be very low-key on this, okay? I'm trying. As I stated a while ago, we're going to be looking at the subject of emotions. What we need to remember is emotions is not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes we look at these emotions like they're a bad thing. They are not a bad thing. Remember over in Genesis 1, verse 27, it says that we were created in His image, the image of God. Our Heavenly Father has emotions. He loves, he gets angry, you know. He has those emotions, we're created in his image, and he gave us these same emotions. We love, we get angry, and there's a slew of different emotions. But that's instilled in us, and God gave that to us for a reason, and it's good. It's not bad, per se. At this moment, we're talking like it's good, because it's created in us, because we are in the image of God. So the difference is, though, God is perfect and can control his emotions because he is perfect. We are not God, and we struggle with controlling our emotions because we are not perfect. But we can control our emotions if we choose to. So that goes back to the free will that we have to choose how we're going to handle our emotions. I really wish my daughter was here. This would be, mm, mm, that'd be good. All right, so let's turn over, if you would, to James chapter one. We're gonna start at verse 12. You know, this thing is nice. I really like it. but it takes away from the sound that you hear when people turn their bottles. That's a beautiful sound. Thank you, Ellen. You're doing a good job. That's being submissive. So let's start there, verse 12. It says, Then when the desire has conceived, it has given birth to sin, and sin, when it is fully grown, brings forth death, brings forth death. So here, when we read the scripture, there's one thing that really stands out to me, is we are tempted, and we're tempted with our desires, our emotions. And when we're tempted, before it is conceived in sin, we get to make that choice on what we're gonna do with those emotions or that desire that we have. But look at this, it says that when we're drawn away by his own desires and enticed. So if you're an underliner, I would underline by his own desires. That puts that on us. That is our desires. When we're tempted and our emotions are going and we're pulled away, that is because we allowed it to pull us away. That is ours. So many times we live in a world today that we want to point the finger. You work in a corporation, that's all you see in management is they just want to point the finger and point the finger. And we see that from kids to adults, they just want to point the finger. It doesn't matter where you point the finger. The problem is you, myself. My emotions, the way that I act with my emotions, that falls on me. If I fall into temptation and I give in, that is my fault. If I give my thoughts, any attention, that's my fault. That's nobody else's fault. That's not my wife's fault. That's not my kids' fault. That's my fault. At some point in our Christian life, we've got to make a decision or come to the reality that this falls on me. When we come to that realization that this falls on me, then you can stand up and start growing. Until then, you'll be like the proverb says, that you're foolish. Anything that hits your mind, you speak it. That's foolish. When a thought comes across, we're to take control of it. But, I said all this The Bible does say that it is in our own desires, but we can be influenced by those that we surround ourselves with. One example, sometimes when we go to a basketball game, there's a guy that sits behind me, not Nelson. Nelson sits directly behind me. This guy sits way behind me. So if you go to a basketball game and you see Nelson sit behind me, it's not Nelson, okay? This other guy, he sits way behind me, and right as soon as the first quarter starts, he starts hammering these refs. And if I allow it, and man, I do often, often, that emotion that he's putting off, I start doing the same thing. I start yelling at the refs. My wife, she's a yeller, too. She'll start yelling at the refs. And before you know it, you just fill with all this rage, and it's just a basketball game. Whose fault was that? That guy that was yelling? No, that does not do it. You say, yeah, sometimes it's just he's so influential. I mean, this guy, I can't say he's wrong. But yes, the people that surround us, they can influence us. So you gotta be very careful on who you surround with, your friends and the company that you keep, because they can influence your emotions. And if you do not take your emotions in check, they will set seed and it will go to sin. And then your thought pattern, your process, it's all not where it should be. Unchecked emotions leads to sin. But especially anger, you see anger a lot. That's an easy one to talk about. Anger is an emotion that we all struggle with. Anger's not a bad thing. The Bible says that we can get angry and not sin. So how's that possible, to get angry and not sin? I'm getting angry. How am I going to sin? Yeah. Yeah. How do we get angry and not sin? Well, anger does. When we get angry in a situation, it's because there's something wrong. It brings an awareness that there's something wrong in this situation. But what the Bible teaches us, instead of just wreaking havoc and wrath, the Bible teaches us to take every thought captive. And what we're going to see a little bit later is we're going to see that the Bible teaches us to be slow to wrath. to think about the situation. Hey, I'm angry. Why am I angry? Instead of just erupting at the waitress because she got your food wrong, figure out why are you angry? Why is this making you so upset? And how important is it that you're about to go postal on this waitress because she got your food wrong? That really wasn't her fault anyway, right? We've got to learn to be angry and not sin, to be controlled. Controlled emotions is very important. When we stay controlled in our emotions, then we're in the will of God. He doesn't want us just going and just expressing all these emotions like what we see in the world today. Man, I'm telling you, this world is screwed up. It seems like every time you do something, you can walk out across the street and somebody's going to be offended. Who cares? You know, I hate that word offended anymore. Man, if I offend you, walk away from me, OK? You don't have to be around me and I don't have to be around you. Get over it. But I'm saying that not in, that's justified anger. But we can be angry and not sin. It's okay. That's a natural emotion. All the emotions that we have, when you start thinking about the other emotions that we struggle with, fear is an emotion that we struggle with. If you control your thoughts, if you control that fear, then it's okay. But if you just come out there with fear and fear of this, fear of that, and it's unchecked under the will of God, then it's not right. It'll just lead you to sin and lead to other things. So we know our emotions come from God, they're given to us from God, and that they're good. And we know that our emotions left unchecked will lead to sin. We see that in our scriptures here. It says, what happens? He is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin. And when sin comes to full growth, it brings forth death. So unchecked emotions, unchecked desires, unchecked thoughts can and will lead to sin. What's the number one thing I teach y'all, the youth, about emotions? Say it again. They lie to us. They can and will lie to you. Your emotions can deceive you because it's a part of you. But here's a good thing that we're going to talk about is you have something inside of you. If you're a born-again believer, except Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, you have something inside of you that will not lie to you. What is that? You can speak. I'm a speaker when I'm teaching. Y'all can talk. Your heart? Our heart can deceive us. I know this has been a couple of years back. There's this 10-year-old boy. He was madly in love. And I met him. Man, I can't remember where I met this kid at. I knew him. He never came to church here. And I saw this kid, and he was telling me. I've talked to him every time I see him. And he said that he was in love with this girl, and he's with this girl. He's with his girlfriend right there. And I said, boy, you don't know what love is. He said, yeah, I do. And he had a dog, and I know he liked that dog. I said, well, show me what an example of love is. He says, well, I love my dog, and I play with it and everything. And I said, boy, do you love your girlfriend like you love your dog? He kind of hushed for a little bit. He didn't say nothing. We talked about other things and started talking about Jesus and stuff. But our heart can deceive us quick, but we do have something else inside of us. The Holy Spirit. Yes, we have a spirit that was given to us when we receive Christ as our Savior. And he does not lie to us because he is in us, but he is not us. He is from God and God cannot lie. So and he he's in us and he teaches us. We just got to get in tune with him. So how do we. keep our thoughts and our emotions in check. That's what I want us to see tonight, is how do we harness our emotions? Let's turn over to 2 Corinthians chapter 10. I think I put verse 4 on there. Let's start at verse 3. Sorry. Am I doing good on time? All right. So it says, for though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty in the in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing here it is. Bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. How do we How do we calm our thoughts so that way we're not sinning, or letting our thoughts lead to sin? By bringing it to the obedience of Christ. I teach our youth all the time that our emotions lie to us, and that's partly true, because yes, they do lie to you, but they are also good. But your emotions will allow to you. You know when we're in this spiritual warfare. You got to keep in mind this. You're being enticed by your thoughts. You're being enticed by the devil and his means and the stuff that they put in front of you. So scripture says to take everything that comes before you and everything that comes out of your mind and put it before the obedience of God. So if you're thinking something and you think it's right or you think it's wrong test it. Test the spirits, scripture says. Take it before God. Pray about it. Is this right or am I being deceived? Look for the answers in the scriptures because the scriptures will not lie to you. You think you're in love? Look up what love is and see if you're still in love when you're done studying it. You think you're angry? Look up what anger is and see if you're justified in it. Scripture says that to bring everything under the obedience of Christ. Now, we are to deny ourselves daily, and this is part of it. Not only do we got to deny our flesh daily, we've got to deny our thoughts, because our thoughts are part of us, and they will deceive us. Let's look over to 1 Peter 5, verse 6. Here again, therefore, humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time. In the beginning of our passage, he said that blessed is the man who can be, let me re-read that, I don't want to paraphrase it. Blessed is the man who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life. Scripture says if we can endure the temptation, if we can humble ourselves underneath the authority, the hand of God, that we will be blessed. If we can come to the point where we can harness our tongue, harness our thoughts, we will be greatly blessed. We will be full of joy and peace and patience. And when trials come and we bring it before God, it's so much sweeter to go through than trying to do it yourself. So much sweeter. But that's what we have to do. If we want to check our thoughts and we want to check our our attitude and we want to check the things that we're thinking in our emotions or our heart, we've got to place ourselves in the obedience and under the authority of Christ. Bring it before God. You know, over there in Romans 12, too, it says, Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. That renewing of your mind is that mind of Christ. If you are a born-again believer, you do have this spirit that's inside of you, and you have a renewed mind. So we're not to be conformed to the world. So when we're surrounded by all these thoughts and all these emotions, we've got to remember that's not us. That's not who we are. We are a renewed mind. We have a renewed mind. We are a new creation in Christ. So we're to take everything under his authority. And that's so hard to do sometimes, so hard, because sometimes when these emotions come in, we don't know how to handle it. And I see this a lot in kids, a lot of kids, especially our young men and girls of our youth group, because I watch them often, while I'm teaching, and I see their emotions while I'm teaching and stuff like that. They're growing. I guess that'd be a good way to say it. And we're all growing in this. But we are to take all this under the authority of Christ with a new mind. And here's another way. This is one I want to end on. And this is something I think we can all strive to do every day. Every day do this. It's over there in James. It's also James chapter 1. I think it's verse 20, 19. Start in 19. So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to wrath. Now, if everybody that you knew was swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to wrath, how much better of a world would this be? It'd be great. But we battle this flesh every day. This is something we're to strive for, right? We're supposed to strive to be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to wrath. Why? Let's go to verse 20. For the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God. If we're a child of God, we should be producing His righteousness, His righteousness within us. And if we are not slow to speak, if we are not slow to wrath, and we don't listen, vomit everything that comes to our mouth, what are we doing to bring him honor and glory? How much has he done for us? Should we not be striving to be in his obedience, not just in the way y'all see me, but also in my thoughts? It's easy to act the part in the flesh for what y'all see, because y'all don't see what's in my mind. Y'all don't know my thoughts, and I can tell you, It can get pretty wicked up there quick in a hurry, real quick in a hurry. And we're all the same. Y'all are like that, and I'm like that. That's why it's so important to gather our thoughts. Man, if we could just focus on our thoughts and our emotions, everything else will fall in place. It'd be awesome. Questions, comments? Y'all get to talk much in here? All right. We'll close and we'll be dismissed. What are we going to do this week?