Rick Warren - Change Your Life by Changing Your Mind - Part Two

Hey, friends, thanks so much for joining us today on

Pastor Rick's Daily Hope, the Bible Teaching ministry of Pastor

Rick Warren. We're so glad to have you with us.

And today Rick continues in his series called Transformed. Together,

We'll dive into God's Word and discover powerful principles that

can truly change our lives from the inside out spiritually, physically, mentally, emotionally, relationally, financially,

and vocationally. You'll experience how God's truth brings real transformation

to every part of your life. And now here's part

two of a message called Change your Life by changing

your Mind.

Number two, I have to free my mind from destructive thoughts.

That's the second thing I need to do. Free my

mind from destructive thoughts. Your mind needs to be lid,

Your mind needs to be delivered, Your mind needs to

be released because you are a prisoner of your own thoughts,

and you're a prisoner of things that people have told

you that simply weren't true. And as I said earlier,

it doesn't matter if it's true or not, if you

believe that it's affected your life. You may have been

told you were clumsy, and maybe you weren't clumsy at all.

But if you believed it, you're clumsy. And you see

yourself that way because you always act in accordance the

way you see yourself. And he says, I've got to

free my mind from destructive thoughts. Now that isn't easy.

And the reason it is easy is because you got

three enemies. And those three enemies are trying to team

tackle you and keep you from having your mind liberated.

These are the things that keep you from fulfilling all

your good intentions. You know, all those good intentions about

things you'd like to change in your life. Change this,

I'm gonna change that, and I'm gonna change this, and

I'm going to change that, and it never never happens. Why,

Because you have three enemies in your mind that are

battling in your brain to keep you from doing the

things all your best intentions would like to do, all

your good resolutions, things like that. And they're not gonna

give up ground easily. You're gonna have to fight to

free your mind. What are the enemies, let's write them down.

Number one. The first enemy is my old nature, my

old nature. I want to show you a Verse Romans,

Chapter seven, Verse twenty three, Paul talks about how his

old nature keeps him in mental bondage. She says this,

I see in my body a principle at war, a

principle at war. There's that battle for your brain. I

see in my body a principle at war with the

law of my mind, taking me captive to the law

of sin that dwells inside of me. He's using war

language here. Let me put it this way. Do you

ever find yourself doing things that you don't really want

to do? That's the battle? Okay, let me say it

this way. You don't have to raise your hands on

this one. But have you ever knowingly engaged in self

defeating behavior? I know this isn't good for me, but yeah,

what's going on there? The battle in your brain, the

battle in your brain. You have all of the best

intentions in your new nature. I want to do the

right thing, But the battle in your brain, and the

first battle is with your old sin nature. Your old

nature is not your friend. It is the source of

all your bad habits. Romans eight fives says this on

your outline, those who are dominated by their sinful nature

think about sinful things. But those who are controlled by

the Holy Spirit. Think about things that please the Spirit.

Notice it's all about your brain. It's about how you think.

So the first thing that's I may have a good

intention for changing something in my life, but my old

nature is going to battle me on it. The second

thing that's gonna fight me, the second enemy is Satan.

And Satan wants to control your mind. He can't, but

he wants to control your mind, and so he sends

these ideas, these thoughts into your mind. Now, let me

be real clear. Satan cannot force you to do anything.

If you're a Christian, you have a house Holy Spirit

in you. Satan cannot force you to do anything, because

the greater is he that is in me than he

is in the world. But he can make suggestions, and

those suggestions are very, very powerful. And he is constantly

continually planting negative thoughts in your mind. And he'll use

other people, or he'll use the television. If you know

you can't get a he'll just throw a thought in

your mind. You go where in the world that one

come from. Have you ever been praying and you're praying

real hard, and all of a sudden, the weirdest thought

comes in your mind. While you're praying. You know where

did that one come from? Well, I'll tell you where

it came from. The devil just dropped the little bomb

on your brain. Okay. Now, Martin Luther said you can't

keep the birds from flying over your head, but Rick

Warren says, you can keep them from pooping in your hair. Okay,

you can duck and you you know, and you can move,

and you don't have to accept a thought. One of

the most important things is don't believe everything you think.

That's one of the most liberating thoughts you'll ever get.

I don't have to believe everything I think. You see,

we automatically think that if we think it, it must

be true. Are you kidding me? You think a lot

of stuff that's not true. In fact, maybe a majority

of the stuff you think isn't true. And you have

all these ideas and you think, well, I thought it,

it must be true. Of course it's not true. So

just because you get a thought in your mind, it

may come from your old said nature, it may come

from the devil. It doesn't really matter. If it's not true.

It's not true. You don't have to think. You don't

have to believe everything you think. In fact, let's just

say it together. I don't have to believe everything I think.

Let's say it. I don't have to believe everything I think.

If you will listen to that one truth right there,

you're on the road to mental health. Because not everything

you think is true. Stuff you think about yourself, stuff

you think about God, stuff you think about your husband,

your wife, or a life or community or the government,

or it's just not all true just because you thought it.

But Satan puts these thoughts in the moment you wake up.

The moment you wake up, he starts dropping little seeds.

You're not gonna have a good day to day. Life

is gonna really be bad. Nobody's gonna like you. In fact,

you're flat out ugly. If I were as ugly as you,

I wouldn't even show my face. And you've got to

start getting all of this talk going on in your brain.

Why in the world am I even trying? It's not

gonna be any different. And he starts giving you all

these reasons to give up, and you haven't even started

the day yet. See if you get up in the

morning and you don't meet the devil face on, and

it just means you're going in the same direction, follow

that one, all right, And so he's gonna drop these

little thoughts on you. And then sometimes they'll say, go ahead,

you deserve it, really, yeah, go ahead, get angry? Good

even How dare they say that to you? Why don't you?

And he's just constantly dropping thoughts. When the devil gives

a thought, we call it temptation. When God gives a thought,

we call it inspiration. But both of them are putting

thoughts in your mind, and then you're coming up with

your own thoughts. We call that stupidity. Okay, now these

thoughts are going on in your mind, but you've got

this enemy called Satan. Look at this up here on

the screen, tewod Corindians two eleven says. Paul talks about

I've forgiven that man, a guy in the church. You'd

really messed everything up. He's really critical and problems. I've

forgiven that man so Satan won't outsmart us. What's he

saying there? He's going when I am unforgiving, I'm falling

into Satan trap. I've forgiven that man so that Satan

won't out smartest, for we're very familiar with his schemes.

Satan wants to keep you in bitterness. Satan wants to

keep you in bondage. She wants to keep you in resentment.

If you have not forgiven anybody, you've fallen into Satan's trap.

And Paul goes, hey, we're wise to this guy. He's

been using the same traps for so many He tries

to get you hurt, and then he tries to get

you bitter, and then he builds on that bitterness. He

gets a foothold in your life, and on and on

and on. Anytime you refuse to forgive anybody you've fallen

for Satan's trap. Point here is he says, Satan has

schemes and you need to be aware of it. So

you got the enemy number one, that's the flesh, and

you got enemy number two, that's the devil. Then the

third enemy is the world's value system, and that is

culture around you. The world the flesh and the devil,

and the world is not helping you be a more

disciplined person. Are they does anything in our society encourage

self discipline? No, not at all. In fact, every advertiser

saying you deserve a break today, have it your way,

We do it all for you. It's all about you.

Mountain Dew, my favorite commercial says, obey your thirst. In

other words, be an animal. Just do whatever it feels

like doing. Okay, obey your thirst. And so the world

has their value system and is promoted by advertisers, and

is promoted by movies, and is promoted by television, is

promoted in songs, and it's certainly promoted by celebrities. So

nobody in around you is actually encouraging you to live

a responsible, mentally healthy life. One John two sixteen says

this here on the screen, all that is in the

world the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes,

and the pride of life. In other words, that's passion,

possession and position, or it's it's the lust of the

flesh that's sex, the lust of the eyes that's your salary,

and pride to life, that's success and status. He's saying,

this is what everybody is going for. Okay, money, section power,

he says, all these things. It's not of the fathers,

but it's of this world. And so everything around you,

all the commercials, all the media, they're not encouraging you

to think smart, to think healthy, to think wise. They're

encouraging you to do the other thing. So how do

you fight this battle? I mean, it's so wonder you

have all these best intentions for changing, but then you've

got this triple threat of your own old nature the devil.

So you got the nature within you, you got the

devil against you, and you got the world around you.

Was no wonder. You keep struggling with discouragement and spare

and failure and things like that. How do you fight

this mental battle? Look at the next verse, tewod Corinthians ten.

We live in the world. We do not wage war

as the world does. The weapons we fight with are

not the weapons of the world. In other words, because

he's talking about the mental battle we're going through. Our

weapons have divine power to demolish stronghold. Circle the word stronghold.

We'll come back to that word in just a minute.

Our weapons have the divine power to demolish strongholds. We

demolish any argument and every pretension. That's the arguments in

your own mind, the pretensions in your own mind that

sets itself up against the knowledge of God. And here's

the important part. We tape captive every thought to make

it obedient to Christ. Notice this is warfare language, and

he's talking about this battle going on in your mind,

this mental battle. He said, we demolish strongholds. Now, what's

a stronghold. I want you to write this down. A

stronghold is a lie that I believe. That's a stronghold.

A spiritual stronghold in my life is a lie that

I believe. So the lie might be God really doesn't

love me. That's a lie. The lie might be I

know better than God what will make me happy. That's

a lie. The lie I should do what I want

to do, not what God wants me to do, and

that'll make me happier. That's a lie. I know better

what will make me happy than God does. That's a lie,

And that's a stronghold. Anything that I believe that's a

lie is called a spiritual stronghold in my life. Now,

stronghold can be a false value system like in the world.

It could be a philosophical system like hedonism, which says

the only that matters is pleasure. In other words, the

whole goal of life is to have fun. That's a lie,

it is not true. Or materialism is a philosophical worldview.

It says the only thing that matters is making money.

That's a lie. That's not true. So secularism, hedonism, materialism,

all that matters is money or sex or power. Those

are all lies and if I believe them, then I

get a stronghold in my life. Could be a worldview,

or it could be a personal attitude. A stronghold could

be an attitude like I'm never going to forgive that person.

That's a stronghold. I could never forgive myself. That's a stronghold.

I will never amount to anything. That's a stronghold. If

something bad's gonna happen, it's gonna happen to me. That's

a stronghold. It's a lie that you are believing. And

he says, if you're gonna learn to be mentally healthy,

you've got to learn how to demolish strongholds in your life.

Behind every sin is some lie that you're believing. The

Bible calls Satan the father of lies. Jesus says, I

am the truth and the truth that you're free. Satan

is a liar and he's gonna enslave you. You So

this stronghold needs to be destroyed. How do we how

do we fight this mental battle? Well, notice two phrases.

I want you to circle it. First, he says, we

take captive. Circle that phrase, we take captive, and the

word in Greek is akmalotidzo and it means it literally

means to conquer. It means to bring under control. It

means to capture. We take captive, we conquer like a country.

We amalotidzou a country. And then the other phrase, once circle,

he says, we make it obedient. We take it captive.

Every thought captive, and we make every we make it obedient,

make every thought obey Christ And that word there literally

make it obedient. Whopokoa means to bring in the submission?

How do you do that? What's he talking about here?

He's talking about how do you make your mind mind?

How do you make your mind mind? You? We bring

it into submission, We take it captive, we make it obedient.

Let's just have a little confession here. My thoughts often

disobey me. They often rebel. My mind often has a

mind of its own. It wants to go in another direction.

This morning I was studying for this message. My mind

didn't want to study. They wanted to sit down with

a big sandwich. Some jalapenia, potato chips. Okay, piece of

mud pie. I'm making you all hungry now here. See

what I'm doing. I'm messing with your mind. Okay, Okay,

you're already salivating on that kind of stuff right there.

You know. And if you got add or ADHD, your

mind often goes off in a whole different direction. And

you get ready to pray, and you're going, what do

I say? I don't know, I don't anything. Say you

got anything of that? Say Lord, I don't anything. Say

is anybody identifying with this? Okay? And you know I

don't know. You know I'm supposed to pray? What do

I pray?

Or?

Hello God? Amen? My mind often rebels when I need

to ponder. My mind wants to wander. It doesn't always

obey me. When I need to pray. My mind drifts away.

He says, we take captive, we make it obedient. What's

he saying here is you have a choice. Your mind

has to listen to you and your will. God didn't

give you just a mind. He gave you a will

and emotions. We're gonna talk about emotions next week. But

part of your will is to bring your mind into order.

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