Skip to content Saved Soul, Renewed Mind May 1 · 45 min ...more
May 1, 2025 · 45 min · Pray TV
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Pastor, Author, Teacher and Apologist from ONE&ALL Church in Los Angeles, CA. His TV and Radio show, "Today with Jeff Vines" reaches the most remote parts of the world with the gospel message!
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0:23 I'm in John chapter 4 verse 7 through 15. John 4 7 through 15. The stats are out. According to John Hopkins University and Medical Center, how many people0:35 do you think died during COVID of COVID or symptoms related to COVID? The real numbers are finally out. They've been released. And the answer is0:45 0.0875 percent of the world's population died of COVID or COVID related deaths. Now you think, what? Less than a percentage point? Well, yeah, but the world population0:57 is 8000000000, which means 7000000 people died during COVID. So now I'm not here to talk about COVID and should we have shut down, should we have locked down? No. That's not the point. The point is1:09 that's less than 1 percentage point. And by contrast, 1 in every 4 people on the planet, 25 percent of the world struggles with mental illness. Wow.1:21 Folks, that's that's an epidemic. That's pandemic of epic proportions. Now, to understand what this means, we have to distinguish between mental illnesses like anxiety and depression1:32 and feelings of anxiety and depression. Let me give you a few examples of anxiety. My wife and I were on a flight from Brisbane, Australia to Los Angeles a few years ago, and we got caught up in the jet stream, and the1:43 pilot came over the intercom and told us, we can't get out of this jet stream. We can't go high. We can't go low. We're gonna be stuck in it until we get to LA. Now the problem is when you're caught in the jet stream,1:54 you're bouncing up and down. You feel like you're in a a washing machine just being thrown everywhere. And so I can tell you, had a great fear of flying in those days, so I was anxious, but I didn't have the mental2:05 disorder of anxiety. I was just feeling anxious. You can feel anxious about something. You can refuse to study the night before a test, and I guarantee when the teacher hands you the paper and it's time for the test,2:16 you're gonna feel anxiety. Or if you're going on a date that you wish you would have never agreed to, you're gonna experience some sense of anxiety. Same thing is true about depression. When your girlfriend breaks up2:26 with you, when you don't get into the college that you hope to get into, when your dog dies, You know, if you're a Raiders fan or an Angels fan, you know, you're gonna be sad a lot because you're losers. I mean,2:38 you're there's gonna be sadness, but there's not gonna be depression. Sadness and anxiety, those are not the same thing as mental illness. In fact, the depression2:50 and anxiety are part and partial of the human experience whereby we desire something more that we're not getting or we feel that our lives are not going the way that our lives should go. So this brings anxiety,3:00 depression, sadness. Mental illness, and this is important distinction to make, refers to something far more chronic. It's an overwhelming feeling of anxiety3:12 or depression or some other emotion that actually impacts your ability to function and to think clearly about life.3:24 It's debilitating. It's often unexplainable and even suicidal. You say suicidal? Absolutely. In fact, in the middle of the 3 years where I suffered from chronic3:36 anxiety disorder, I can tell you there were days that I contemplated and I've made this very, very commonplace. There were days that I thought, if my life is going to be like this, if I'm gonna wake3:48 up every night with my heart racing, with my pulse racing, I can't catch my breath and this feeling of impending doom. If that's gonna be the pattern of my life for the rest of my life, I3:59 would rather not live. So let me first of all say to you, for those who are contemplating suicide right now, which is more than most of us around have ever fathomed, Can I say to you that your4:11 best days are ahead? Do not give up. Do not give in. This is creating something unique in you. I know you don't wanna hear that now because I didn't wanna hear that in the middle. This is creating something unique in4:22 you. Something extraordinary can and will happen in you. And the evil 1 wants to circumvent the process by suicide. Don't give him the victory. Stay the4:34 course. Allow it to play out. This is ultimately happening for your deep deep healing. Now, please follow me just for a moment. We don't we don't know the cause of mental illness. I I talked about that last week.4:46 However, that doesn't mean that we don't know anything about mental illness. It does not mean that we can only cure the symptoms through medicine that masks our feelings and emotions. We can do that but it doesn't mean4:58 that's all we can do. It doesn't mean that we cannot cure the disease. It doesn't mean that we're totally clueless about where to go from here. In fact, here we are again, the most read book5:09 in human existence, in human history. The Bible gives us a lot more information about this than we could ever imagine. So I'm in John 14. Let's read 1 of the stories that Jesus tells. This is actually not a parable. This5:21 is an actual historical occurrence. And in verse 7, we're told that when a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, will you give me a drink? The Samaritan woman said to him, you're a Jew and I'm a5:33 Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink? Jesus answered her, if you knew the gift of God and who it is that ask you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living5:44 water. Sir, the woman said, you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob who gave us the well and drank from it himself as did also5:56 his sons and his livestock? Jesus answered, everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again. That is the water from the well. But whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water6:08 that I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up for eternal life. The woman said to him, sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water. Every time I read6:20 Jesus' words to the woman at the well, I'm thinking I'm I'm reminded rather, I'm thinking about Isaiah 58. The Lord will guide you always. He will satisfy your needs in a scorched sun6:32 land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well watered garden like a spring whose waters never fail. Now, follow me. Just stay6:44 with me. The human brain is remarkably fascinating. There are 100000000000 nerve cells in the brain. 100000000000. You think how can they all fit6:56 in there? And within the brain is contained serotonin, the hormone responsible for moods. So moods like anxiety, depression, happiness, sadness, calmness, peace, all of those, you name the emotion or7:08 feeling and it's impacted that is as it is physically manifested perhaps even determined by serotonin levels in the body. Now, here's what you did not know and7:19 here's what my anxiety disorder led me to discover. 95 percent of serotonin is produced and housed somewhere else other than the brain. Did you know that?7:31 Yes, you have serotonin levels in the brain. The balance can cause or the imbalance can cause all kind of issues, but 95 percent of serotonin levels are not in the brain. 95 percent. Do you know what would you7:43 like to guess where they are? Let me give you a hint. If you get a call, if you're a parent, and let's say you get a call and the voice on the other end of the line says, I'm sorry to tell you that your daughter or your7:54 son has been in an accident. Where do you fill it first? The gut. Immediately, if you've ever gotten a call like that, you fill it down deep inside a place you can't understand. Some people8:06 actually get sick. Some people actually pass out. 95 percent of serotonin chemicals or neurotransmitters that communicate with the rest of your body,8:18 these emotions are discovered in the small intestines. Serotonin in the intestines function much like a second brain.8:30 It houses the innermost parts of a man or woman. In other words, when trauma occurs in your life, big or small, serotonin is released into the body. Information is released to the CNS, the the central nervous8:41 system. And as a result, the body reacts. Now, what is interesting is though is that even though the mind can block trauma and8:53 can suppress things, the gut does not. The gut is like a volcano that can store up all kinds of pressure over a long period of time.9:06 It's in our gut that these levels impact the way we feel. Something deep inside us has to deal, will deal eventually with what the9:18 mind refuses to admit. Have you ever heard anybody when they're giving you advice say, go with your gut. What do they mean by that? They're saying that your gut knows the truth that your mind and heart may not see at9:30 the moment. Go with your gut. Let me give you an illustration. Just stay with me for a moment now. I'm in Zimbabwe, which is my favorite place in the world to visit.9:41 I've been clear about that in times past with Victoria Falls, with the Shona people, my friend in for Chizanga. This is a very peaceful place for me, and yet it was there when I stood up after having a cup of coffee at a9:53 cafe and I began to walk over to the bank. And halfway in that journey, I became so weak that I could not stand. Now, this is somebody who's lifted weights all of his life, been in good physical condition10:04 for all of his life. Suddenly, right then and there, I could not stand. My heart was racing. I was gonna pass out. I had no idea what was happening. The first thing that came to my mind was that my mother10:16 died of a heart attack at 61. Here, maybe this is my heart attack, maybe this is the end of my life. For 6 months, I went to the medical world to give me the answers what was happening. Nobody could tell me. Finally,10:28 somebody said to me, maybe it was a panic attack and that made me very angry because my immediate response was, no way because I was in Zimbabwe, the happiest place of my life. I had no stress. I'm around people that10:39 I love. There were no pressures, no real difficulties. But later on, as you'll find out in this sermon, that's only because the mind kept pushing what the soul, the essential me, the gut knew10:51 very well. The mind kept pressing it down. The reason doctors can only treat the symptoms of mental illness is because they can't go where they need to go. That's not a slam on them. They treat11:03 the physical manifestations, not the root causes. They can't go deep into your gut. They can't go deep into your soul. And so out of mercy, they mask or shut off the11:15 brain. They attack the serotonin levels and balance you out through drugs. If you have too much sadness, they give you a happy pill. Now, I know you've met people, you wish they had some happy pills.11:28 Or if you have too much anxiety, they actually give you a depression pill. Now, it's not really a depression pill, but it works much the same way as it balances and evens things out. Make no mistake, however,11:41 you are not healed. You have a sophisticated band aid. A band aid for which I am very grateful. You say, wait, Jeff. Wait a minute. Why did you take things like Zoloft and11:52 Ativan? If they mask the problem, why did you do that? If you ask that question, no offense, but it's because you've never had a mental illness. And second, when you're in a fog or a daze, when your12:04 body's telling you to run or flee, you can't think clearly. It's too late at that point. The technical term for anxiety disorder is impending doom, so the12:16 body goes into flight mode. You can't think clearly when you are running for your life. Your heart is palpitating, your pulse is off the charts, your vision is12:27 blurred, even your balance is off. I remember going to the emergency room in the middle of this difficult season, I couldn't walk from the car into the emergency room because this is disorder affects different12:39 people different ways. It's not uniform. The same thing is in depression. There's a deep darkness of the mind that you can't explain and you think you can't think clearly when you're falling12:51 through a dark hole and there's fear and doubt is overwhelming to the point that you don't wanna live anymore. Depression is more than sadness, folks. It's hopelessness.13:03 It's the inability, not the refusal. It is the inability to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Do you know what Zoloft did for me? It pushed back the darkness and confusion so that I could begin to think13:15 clearly, pour over scripture, engage God in prayer and contemplate my life as Jesus went into my places that no 1 else could go. And I wanna tell you standing here today,13:27 it is true. He is wonderful, counselor, prince of peace. Stay with me. What was the problem with the woman at the well? You know, we just had a conference called13:39 hearts of beauty where hundreds of women gathered out at our Rancho campus and the stories that come out of that are amazing. You have women who enter this place, who through13:51 their thinking have been able to press down wounds that they've had for a long time. The problem is even though they pressed it down here, their gut still knows it's there and it's building like a volcano.14:03 And if it's not dealt with over time, it will explode. So they discover what they pressed down and they deal 1 on 1 with these wounds that are there14:14 and the spirit of God comes into that place and opens their eyes to the healing power of Christ. And when they do that, they circumvent all the potential illnesses that can come as a result14:27 of pressing things down that sooner or later you have to deal with. Think about it for a moment. What makes a woman as we go back to John 4? What makes a woman sleep with every man that they meet?14:40 Say, well, she's loose. She's looking for affirmation and approval that she never got probably from her father. Now, not every woman who doesn't get that approval responds this way,14:52 but there are many young girls who never get from their father what they needed desperately from their father. They need proof that they matter, so they engage in apocalyptic hookups. There's an issue deep deep down15:04 inside, the feeling of failure and insignificance and worthlessness. And so men become their saviors and men were never designed to be saviors. Ask any married woman that she'll tell you. So the way that15:16 she's dealing with her feeling of insignificance and unworthiness is actually not healing her but destroying her life. Jesus knows what she's looking15:27 for and he knows he's the only 1 that can go down deep. He's the only 1 that can give her what it is she's looking for. So in verse 13, Jesus answers, everyone who drinks this water15:39 will be thirsty again. But whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life. Now, there are 2 kinds of life. Right?15:50 Physical and spiritual. You cannot survive physically without water but you know, as we've said before, you are more than your body. This is the outer tent, the outer shell, the essential you, the real you, the16:01 spiritual, the soul also needs spiritual water. So the essential you, the soul needs nourishment in order to endure what life is gonna throw at every single 1 of us. Remember,16:13 creation fall redemption. We're in the fall. It's gonna make serious efforts to destroy us. So Jesus tells the woman at the well that he offers the kind of spiritual healing. And the original16:25 language is beautiful here that will well up. Is the Greek word, and it means to start way down deep and to flow outward. The etymology refers to the gut. Here we are again.16:38 So that what happens in the gut will ultimately in time spread to the outer regions. The old testament prophets look forward to a time when living waters would flow from Jerusalem. Ezekiel 47 9, swarms of16:50 living creatures will live wherever the river flows. There will be large numbers of fish because this water flows there and makes the salt water fresh, so where the river flows everything will live. But there's something17:01 else. Living waters in the Old Testament is also a metaphor for for the for the combination, for the relationship rather, that's a better word, between17:13 spirit, God's spirit in us and God's truth and how they respond and react together to bring healing. The spirit, God in us,17:24 truth, God's word in us. A good example again is in Ezekiel, only this time verse 36, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. I will remove from you your heart of17:36 stone and give you a heart of flesh and I will put my spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees, the word and be careful to keep my laws. So there is a relationship between spirit, Christ17:47 power and the truth, Christ word. There's this inseparable relation between these 2. Look at it like this, the spirit without the truth17:59 or the word is unpredictable, untrustworthy, and unproductive. The word, however, without the spirit is passionless, legalistic, and oppressive. But18:11 together, the word and the spirit brings life that begins way down deep and begins to flow outward to all of its parts. In fact, when we are18:23 experiencing joy on a soul level in our bellies or intestines deep down inside, there is a naturally perfectly balanced productivity of serotonin. Now, I18:35 wanna say that again. So we're combining what is spiritual and scientific at the same time. When we are experiencing joy in a soul level, in our bellies or intestines, deep down18:47 inside, there is a naturally perfectly balanced productivity of serotonin. Nehemiah put it like this, the joy of the Lord is my strength. The joy of the18:58 Lord is my strength. Now stay with me. Keep going. What was really going on with me in my years of anxiety disorder? Well, okay. You know, I'm in retrospect now. It's been a while. So I wanna share with you19:10 what I've discovered in this journey. My father had died a couple of months before these attacks started. Now my mother had died19:22 and I dealt with that. That's been 10 that was 10, 11, 12 years before my father died. But my father died on my birthday, and that had more damage. That did something to me. I can't19:34 really explain and I can't really fathom it really, but I knew that something shook me. My best friend died a few weeks after the the death of my my father. My19:46 mom's death was creeping up in my life again, not to the fact that she died because I knew she was with Jesus, but the fact of her age. She died so young and I'm creeping near that age with every passing year.19:59 Over time, I realized there were 2 things playing a role that had been pressed down into the gut that the brain was suppressing, but it was building up over time. 1 was the fear of20:11 death. Now, you would think a pastor would not be afraid of dying because he knows what's next. I can't really explain it. When people around me started dying that were my age,20:24 when my mom, my dad died, my best friend died, I kinda pressed it down. I told myself. I spoke words to myself, but I I don't think I was very convincing. It was like, I'm not20:36 ready to die. I have so much more I need to accomplish. And that was on the other side of the spectrum because I grew up in a family that was that praised athleticism. I20:48 was 1 of 4 brothers, but I was the only 1 that was athletic. Therefore, as I look back now, I know that I received the praise and the honor, even the worship with a small w that I know that my brothers long21:00 for. But I also learned very early in my life that you are praised and adored based on performance. So I start to carry that with me throughout my entire life and I get caught up in this performance21:11 trap. My significance, my feelings of worth or worthiness come from what have I done lately? What have I achieved? What have I accomplished? Where people will look from the outside in and say,21:23 wow, look at how awesome this person is. So I've got this fear of death going on that I've not accomplished what I want to accomplish in my life and this death cloud hangs over me and then I've got this idea21:35 that I've not accomplished and I'm not accomplishing what I've set out to accomplish. So I've got this fear of death coupled with this fear of failure and all of that is hidden and pressed down.21:47 I had something that was welling up within me and flowing to other places, death and underachievement. And over time, because that was pressed down, the serotonin levels21:59 began to change. Did you know that? You can change the serotonin balance in your brain and in your gut by your response to the tragedy or traumas of life.22:11 So over time, the serotonin levels began to change. This deep wound of performance and perfectionism and achievement for significance began to alter the balance of serotonin.22:24 So much so that it sent a message to my central nervous system that my soul was becoming undone. I was disintegrating. What my brain refused to deal22:36 with, my gut was storing up. And now because of the serotonin levels out of balance, because there's no centralized joy in22:48 my life, I began to disintegrate. And in order to stop the total collapse, the body reacted in order to tell me that something is wrong and if it is not dealt with, it will23:00 ultimately destroy me. Have you ever thought looking at your mental illness this way, your depression, your anxiety, it's the body trying and attempting to save itself.23:12 Something's out of whack, something's not right and your soul knows it. Your brain may shove it aside but your soul, the essential you, your gut knows it. And now, it's gonna send a signal to your23:24 central nervous system, to your body that you have got to deal with the disease, not just mask the symptoms. I said earlier, when we are experiencing joy on a soul level in our bellies23:35 or intestines deep down inside, there's a naturally perfectly balanced productivity of serotonin. So that means the adverse is true. When we are experiencing sorrow23:47 on a soul level in our bellies down deep inside, the balance of serotonin is interrupted and all hell breaks loose.24:01 Jesus has been teaching this for centuries. Did you know that? He's been teaching that until you change your gut, the essential you, until the waters of the Holy24:13 Spirit spring up new life in you, All of us, not just me, are ticking time bombs waiting to explode and make no mistake, you compress24:24 things down a long time but sooner or later the volcano is going to erupt. You need a gut change. You need soul nourishment that sustains. You need a spring of living water that goes down deep and24:36 cleanses you and then flows that cleansing out to the other parts of your being. So that's the question. How is it then that we appropriate this living water in us?24:49 As Christ followers, we've been told that we have the spirit of God in us. So how do we break the dam that is holding the water back so that it can flow into every aspect of our lives? Now, for years, I25:01 thought this part of the story of the woman at the well was somewhat irrelevant to the wider point. Man, was I wrong? Verse 22, Jesus says, you Samaritans worship what you do not know, we worship what we do know for25:11 salvation is from the Jews. Now, there's a lot to be said here. We can do a whole sermon on this 1 verse because when the original people of Samaria were exiled and transported to Media, people from 5 other places25:23 came in and brought 5 other false idols into the Jewish context and the Samaritans as they influenced the Jews began worshiping these 5 gods. Now,25:35 what I find interesting is in the story of the woman at the well, she had 5 husbands. Remember? And the 1 she's with now is not her husband. It's almost like there is this play25:47 on the reality that she has been pursuing or trying to meet her needs through 5 separate idols, men of different forms and fashions. And now Jesus says25:59 to her, you're worshiping what you do not know. You are trying to fill the void in your life by pursuing false idols. And then he says in verse 23, yet a time is coming and now has come26:11 when true worshipers will worship the father in spirit and in truth. For they are the kind of worshipers the father seeks. God is spirit and his worshipers must worship in the26:23 spirit and in truth. Now, the question is how does 1 worship in spirit and truth and how is this related to mental illness, to anxiety, depression and Jesus and how is it related to this26:34 overwhelming living waters that can that has the potential to flow out and beyond? And the answer is, according to scripture, the Holy Spirit is in26:46 you. The waters are there. That's proof of your conversion. It is then the word of God, the voice of God as it saturates your deepest parts that will begin to26:58 bring life and vitality and break the dam where the waters began to flow. In Jeremiah 15 16, the writer says, when your words came, I ate them. Now, if you eat them, where do they27:09 go? Down deep. And he says, they were my joy and my heart's delight for I bear your name, Lord God Almighty. Can I tell you? I'm not a doctor. You say, I know that. But27:21 can I tell you how to cure most mental illness? Not all, most mental illness. Step 1, balance the serotonin levels. You gotta get to the point where you can27:33 think clearly again. Do not be anti medicine. Now, if you do some prevention in the early stages of your life, you won't get to this point. But the reality is27:45 most of us haven't. And because of that, the best thing the first thing you can do is balance the serotonin levels. Nothing wrong with that. We are made up of chemicals. We are flesh and blood and spirit but27:57 that will enable you to begin to think clearly and to to experience the complete healing. You're gonna have to think clearly again. Step 1, balance the serotonin levels. Step 2, submit28:09 to the work God is doing in your life. Remember when I told you what Dane Johnson said to me, Jeff, when you pray this prayer, God do not rescue me from this illness until you have accomplished in me what it is that you28:20 want to accomplish. When you pray that and you mean it, that's when the healing comes. God has not abandoned you. He's pressing you. He's squeezing you so the good stuff can come out and so the bad stuff can28:32 be discarded. Ask God to show you what he's trying to expose and to give you the courage to stay in the battle until the war is won. And can I say again, he is revealing28:44 something deep in you? This is not just theory to me. This is personal experience. There's something that needs to be dealt within your life that only his truth can give you the spirit of28:56 Shalom, health and well-being. Step 3, this is the big 1 and this is how we're gonna end but it's gonna take us a moment. Renew your mind.29:09 This is the key. Change your diet. Some of you think that when I tell you to be careful what you watch and read and listen to that I'm being legalistic or that you're29:20 invincible. But there's an old adage, garbage in garbage out. If you put dirt in a Pez dispenser, why would you expect candy to come out? It matters29:32 what you're putting in. You know, I've been listening to this debate and battle about artificial intelligence and how it's becoming dangerous and now they're telling us that it's being programmed to lie to us, to29:44 manipulate us in order to achieve its end, not ours. And I started thinking, most of the time, if you don't know something, the first thing you're tempted to do is pull up Google and Google something29:56 so that you can find out the right information. But what if Google is programmed to lie to you? And everybody around the world is googling topics, but those topics and the information given to30:08 you are to manipulate you into conforming to something somebody else wants. When you go to the movies, read books, social media without discretion, who is the mind behind culture?30:20 My goodness, you're a Christ follower. You're supposed to know this. It's not Jesus. First John 5 19, we are children of God, but the whole world lies under the sway of the evil 1,30:32 that there is a prince of the power of the air. Ephesians 6, our struggle is not against flesh and blood, right, but against what? Rulers, authorities, against the powers of the dark world, against30:44 spiritual forces of evil. And then what is the first piece of advice Paul gives in Ephesians 6 to win this battle? Verse 14, stand firm then with the belt of30:56 truth buckled around your waist. There are lies you've been told all your life. As a result, down deep in your gut,31:08 sorrow is central and it's building up over time. You have to allow the truth of the word of God to expose these lies so that you'll begin to believe the31:20 truth and as a result, the truth will begin to rule over your emotions and balance the serotonin levels in your body. Again, this is31:32 not just theory to me. I've shared a few times where when I had anxiety, I started to run more than I'd had been running. I would just go for a 3 mile run and that seemed to do something. But at the furthest point31:43 away from my house, I would always get a pre attack, the the the feeling of the attack coming. And my mom would start churning and saying, man, if you have an anxiety attack here, who's gonna rescue you?31:55 You're 3 miles from home. You don't have your phone with you. What's gonna happen? And over time, I was able because my serotonin levels have been balanced, I could think properly and I began to speak the word of God to32:07 myself. And I began to run and the pitter patter of my feet to the to the rhythm of God determines who lives or dies. God determines who lives or dies. God determines who lives or32:19 dies. And immediately, that shut my brain down, gave me a peace way down deep inside, and I could finish the run. Do you understand what I'm saying? When the word of God so saturates your emotional and32:31 spiritual constitution that when the lie of the world comes in that causes death and devastation, if the spirit of God is able to activate the word of God, I'm telling you, you will be balanced32:43 and you will overcome. That's why Paul says in Romans 12, 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 will32:55 is, his good, pleasing and perfect will. Can I tell you why mental illness is at an all time high in America? Because belief in God is at an all time low.33:08 When you lose God, you lose so many other things. You lose objective hope. You have no objective source of hope. You're just guessing that there's something next. You have no objective meaning. You might have tiny little33:20 meanings in your life but there's no ultimate meaning about what your life is about. There's no objective morality so everything goes and there's no objective truth. The soul knows what the brain is thinking.33:33 And when that's the totality of your life, when you are on a boat in a storm without a compass, which is what life is like, when there's no true north.33:46 Do know what that does to the inner man or the inner woman? What does it what does it do to an entire generation of youth who grow up in that atmosphere? Well, let me tell you, epidemic, pandemic anxiety, depression,33:56 hopelessness, skepticism and ultimately narcissism because you're fighting for the survival of your life. When we kill God, something has to take its place. Man34:08 cannot live for nothing. He must have something to grab onto that will fill his heart, mind and soul and we are reaching for things that were never meant to deliver and our soul knows very34:20 well. There's a movie out that I've been told I need to see so I'm gonna go see it in a few days. It's called Jesus revolution. Interesting movie34:31 based in the sixties and early seventies. And in the sixties and early seventies, there was a great movement, a revolution toward Christ and away from secularism. The34:43 movie as I've read reviews about it brings many things to bear on the reason that we experienced a Jesus revolution in those days. Perhaps it was the preaching of the word of God by Chuck34:55 Smith on whose life the movie is based at least 1 character. Perhaps the passion of a preacher to reach those who are far from God. Maybe that's why there was a Jesus revolution. Perhaps the willingness of Christ35:06 followers to embrace and invite hippies into their midst. Oh, other people saw as offensive. But ultimately, primarily social theorists will tell you35:18 that sex, drugs, and alcohol were not working, that the idols were not delivering like they thought, that free sex or free love had left them empty, that fighting injustice was a good thing35:30 but when it became the ultimate thing, it left us wanting something more. And so life is cyclical and here we are again in 2023 And our culture35:42 tells us sex is paramount to existence. Homosexuality, lesbianism, transgenderism we're told is ideal. Promiscuity did not work, so let's break some other barriers down and pursue other gods.35:55 But in reality, these are all forms of cultural wounds that are real. We're dissatisfied. Our hearts are36:06 broken. There's something going on that's being pressed down deep inside. We're masking it and we're trying to satisfy or solve the issue36:18 by pursuing idols, pursuing things that were never meant to deliver and there comes a time when a pastor must say, I love you but this is36:30 not the way. Things that we should be ashamed of in our culture like hero pride parades and drag shows to our children at public libraries are instead viewed as saviors of the36:42 culture. And the Bible clearly warns us that the world does not move in the flow of God, neither will you if you're not renewing your mind daily. And as a result, if you're36:54 not saturating your mind with the word of God and you're saturating it with conformity to the world and the world's thinking, your soul eventually will begin to disintegrate and you will lash out.37:09 Life is either welling up within us or death is welling up within us. And that's why Paul says, you wanna be a rebel? Great. I'm giving you permission to be a rebel. But don't rebel against the thing that will save37:21 you, rebel against the thing that is killing you. So he says, do not conform. The Greek word is. Interesting word, just quickly. Means assuming an outward expression that does not37:33 reflect what is inside. So if you're conforming to the world because of the word that is used here, Paul is assuming you're a Christ follower and that Christ is in you but37:44 you're assuming an outward expression of something that does not reflect who you really are on the inside. So he says, instead be transformed, the word is metamorphosis or metamorpho. Make a change37:56 Metamorpho means make a change in the outward appearance that truly reflects what's on the inside. How do you do that? And he tells us, by38:08 retraining the mind. I looked up metaphors, this is in the dictionary and it says, the process of transformation from an immature form to an adult form. Remember what38:20 I said last week? Some of you are addicted to pep rallies and there's very little sustenance. I'm trying to tell you it's time to grow up and to morph into spiritual adulthood38:32 and to put the word of God into your life. Saturate your life with the word of God so the spirit can activate it at the right time and the right place to give you the victories of your life.38:44 Alright. Here's the end quickly. Step 1, balance the serotonin levels. Step 2, submit to the work God is doing in your life. Step 3, renew your mind. Morph truth and spirit, truth and38:55 spirit, truth and spirit. I don't know what lies underneath your small intestines. I don't know what you've pressed down. I don't know how life has kicked you around. I don't know what39:07 trauma you have faced. I know that you're not the only 1 who's faced trauma. You're not alone in this. But Christian life or living is about renewing the39:19 mind, retraining the mind. JT Fisher, a world renowned psychiatrist said this, for nearly 2000 years, the world has been holding in its hands the complete answer to its restless and few fruitless learnings.39:31 Here, rest the blueprint for successful human life with optimism, mental health, and contentment. Hear what he's saying? Your internal health,39:43 the secret to your internal mental health is found in the words of Christ. I also know this that when you begin to saturate your mind, renew your mind with the word of God, aShow more
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Jeff Vines
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