Where Focus Goes, Energy Flows - Peter's Principles for Prevailing Over Problems

Hey, I'm Pastor Steve Holt.

I want to empower you today to walk in your true identity as a worshiper and warrior.

Today, embrace the power of God's Word and the Holy Spirit.

Welcome to the Born for War podcast.

You may notice some people around here wearing green.

Saint Patrick's Day is on a Sunday this year.

And I thought I would give you a little history lesson.

So instead of doing our road declaration like we normally do, I'm going to give you a little history lesson on St.

Patrick.

St.

Patrick lived in the 5th century.

He's the patron saint and apostle to Ireland.

He is credited with bringing Christianity to the Irish, the Picts, and the Anglo-Saxons.

He is known only from two short works, the Confessio, his spiritual autobiography, which he was not a very good writer, and his letter to Corodicus.

Those are the only two things we have on him.

Very interesting guy.

He had really bad Latin in his writing, so some people have dismissed it.

But those who know and understand the history of Celtic Christianity, and you guys know that's the cross that's outside our church, because I've always been a big, big uh follower of Celtic Christianity.

My one of my degrees is in myssiology, so I love the way in which the Celts evangelized Ireland and then jumped across the uh the uh sea and took France in a mighty way and parts of Germany.

It's a great history.

We don't have time to go into all of that.

But Patrick was born in the Romanized part of Great Britain, but when he was 16 years old, he was kidnapped by Irish pirates.

Well, Irish pirates came across.

He grew up in a uh probably what we might call an upper class home.

He was uh whisked away, and for the next, let's see here, forget now, but I think he was enslaved for six years.

Yeah, so six years.

So he's a herdsman.

He's a herdsman in, and this is in the uh the 400s, and he has all this time on his hands.

And I don't know if any of you have ever had jobs like this where you had time on your hands that you never had before, but for him, he turned it into prayer.

So his his father, who was a deacon of the church, he had a little bit of upbringing spiritually, but he was not really born again yet.

He uh he just spent hours and hours in prayer and seeking God and in a dream.

He had a dream one night, and in the dream, he was told that there was a ship at harbor that would take him home.

And so the next day he woke up and he ran away from his herd, and he found the ship that he had seen in his dream.

He got on the ship and he went home.

So he goes home, and now he's got a vibrant faith.

So all the prayer he had done, all the time in God's word he had done, he now had a vibrant faith.

And uh, and one night he had another dream.

And he talks about this in Confessio, that a one Irish man named Victoricus delivered him a letter in the dream headed with the voice of the Irish, end quote.

As Patrick read it, he seemed to hear a certain company of Irish telling him to walk once more among them, and he wrote, Deeply moved, I could read no more.

But nevertheless, even with that dream, he felt like he wasn't qualified to go back, and so he got some education, became a bishop in the church, and then even as he was embarking now to go back as a missionary to the Irish, he felt like he was not prepared and he was he and he was not strong enough and that he didn't have the faith to do what he was gonna do.

But when he got there, holy smokes, everything changed.

Utterly confident in the Lord, this is one of the writings here, utterly confident in the Lord, he journeyed far and wide, baptizing, confirming with unmatched zeal the Celtic tribes.

St.

Patrick's humility and personal struggles came out in his writings, the confessio, not since St.

Augustine of Hippo, who wrote Confessions, had any religious diarist bared his inmost soul as Patrick did in his writings.

As D.A.

Benchi has written, the moral and spiritual greatness of the man shines through every stumbling sentence of his rustic Latin.

So there's a lot of legends about him, and I think this is part of my journey because I'd been a missionary, you guys know, for 10 years in the Orient, and I came back and I was starting to get influenced because of my experience of casting out demons, the demonic and healing that we had seen on the islands around Okinawa.

So when I heard about St.

Patrick in one of my missiology classes and the signs and wonders that followed his life, I was super interested in him.

So there's a lot of legends about St.

Patrick, and we don't have time to go into all of them, but one of the a few of the famous ones are that he cast out the snakes of Ireland.

So if you go in and if you put in St.

Patrick images, you'll see all these Catholic images and stuff of him, but a lot of them show him with the garb on, which would be typical of medieval times, with his finger, kind of like that, and then you'll see if you look down at the bottom of the picture, you see snakes.

So there's a there's a story told that he went up in this mountain, and you can go on a pilgrimage, and I want to go there someday, I really do.

But there's a pilgrimage you can take up on this one particular mountain in Ireland, which is the legend is that he fasted and prayed for 40 days and 40 nights, and then he came down from that mountain and he cast out all the demons and all the snakes of Ireland.

Now, probably the all part is where the legend begins, but he it does appear that he actually did the 40 days and 40 nights of fasting and prayer.

And you can take the pilgrimage up that mountain to this day, and there's a beautiful statue of St.

Patrick there.

There's a story told of him uh meeting up with these sailors that were in the uh deserty part of Ireland and they needed food and they were starving to death, and so he prayed, and suddenly the swine came out and they slayed them and everybody ate.

That's another one of his stories.

But the one that's probably the most interesting, and the reason I think this is this is actual fact, is because of the personality and the character of Saint Patrick.

He was not one who embellished stuff, he was very humble.

He he tended to take a modest perspective of himself and even his ministry.

But as I read, I'll read what it says here.

Patrick himself wrote that he raised people from the dead regularly, and a 12th century hagiography places this number at 33 men that he raised from the dead, some who've been dead for a long time.

So, amazing story, a very humble guy, and this is St.

Patrick's Day.

So let's pray as we open up and thank the Lord.

By the way, the Celtic cross that we have on our church is because of my background and my love for the Celtic for Celtic Christianity.

That is, some have called it the cross of St.

John.

I call it the Celtic cross, doesn't matter, it's the same thing.

But if you see the cross, the way in which it wedges out, it's representative of the 12 apostles, which I'm not going to go into all the explanation now.

In May, I will, as we go through the history of our church, I'll give you a little bit of background on that.

And then there's a circle in the middle, which is the idea of taking the cross to the whole world, to the whole globe.

So, Father God, we let we love you, we bless you, and I pray, Lord, that the life of St.

Patrick might be an inspiration to us of doing things hard sometimes, difficulties, leaving home, leaving our comfort zone, and being willing to trust you with all that we have and all that we know and all that we are, that you might flow through us.

And so, God, would you flow through us today as we open your word?

In your name we pray.

Amen.

All right, and here's what I want you to do.

I want you to close your eyes.

Everybody, close your eyes.

Close your eyes, all right?

Now, if I said think green, there's already enough green in here because it's St.

Patrick's Day that that doesn't work.

So think red.

Think red, think red.

How many of you can raise your hand right now and say, you know, you know without a shadow of a doubt of something red in this room?

Raise your hand.

Okay, now open your eyes, open your eyes.

Now look red, look right, find red, find red.

Raise your hand if you find something or someone who's got red on, raise your hand.

Whoa, a lot more hands.

Here's why.

Because where focus goes, energy flows.

Now that's not a phrase of mine, that's I might be Tony Robbins, for all I know.

But where energy goes, where your focus goes, energy flows.

And so if you think red, how many of you have been thinking about a car or a truck that you, you know, you come and looking at the list, you're thinking through gas miles, you're thinking about what it can do and what it can't do.

And then you start to decide, I'm gonna get, and if you're really smart, you're thinking Toyota Tundra.

Okay?

So you're thinking Toyota Tundra.

Any Toyota Tundra people in here?

Not very many.

How many Ford?

Yeah, a lot more.

How many Chevy?

Because you're buying American, that's great.

But when you decide, but when you decide on that, raise your hand if you don't start seeing them everywhere.

Right?

So you you're because because you're you're focused on it, and when you're focused, you you start noticing with the energy of your heart and the energy of your sight and mind what's out there.

So in our passage in 1 Peter chapter 1, we're in 1 Peter chapter 1.

1 Peter 1 · chapter mention 1 Peter 1 · chapter mention

If you're guests with us today, two weeks ago we started 1 Peter, the letter of Peter, and this is in the New Testament, and we like bringing our Bibles.

We're one of those, we're one of those Bible churches, okay?

So we like the Bible.

We still think this is like a cool book.

Okay, everybody look up here.

Say cool book.

It's a cool book, all right?

And it will change your life, you know, and I and I appreciate you guys that do it on the phone, but I don't like the phone thing because it distracts you.

You start doing emails, you know they come up, they'll come up ding, ding, ding, and all that stuff, and then you're off and running with something at work that you forgot about that you need to be ready for Monday on.

So stop doing that.

Don't bring those things.

Um, keep them in your pocket or leave them in your car.

And uh, and it's really smart to do that because it helps you focus.

Oh, we're talking about focus.

Okay.

So where focus goes, energy flows, and I want to talk about four ways to focus your mind for action, four ways to focus your mind for action, four ways to focus your mind for action from Peter.

So our theme is that Peter is giving us principles to prevail over problems.

Anyone have problems?

Okay, so how do we prevail though?

Everybody's got problems, but not everybody prevails.

And it seems as though Peter last week was talking about how to count it all joy with various problems, but this week he's talking about focus your mind.

He's talking about being focused with your mind.

So look at verse 10 of chapter one.

Of this salvation, the prophets have inquired and searched carefully, who prophesied of the grace, underlying grace.

Underlying grace that would come to you, and that underlying searching.

Searching.

This is focus.

He's talking about the prophets in the Old Testament searching for the Messiah.

That what or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ, who was in them, was indicating when he testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow.

Verse 12.

To them it was revealed that, not to themselves, but to us, they're ministering the things which now have been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit, sent from heaven things which angels desire to look into.

Verse 13.

Therefore, and underline this, gird up the loins of your mind.

Gird up the loins of your mind.

Be sober and rest your hope fully.

Rest, underline, rest your hope fully upon the grace that is to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Let me give you a definition of focus.

What is focus?

Focus is the ability to concentrate on a specific task or goal without being distracted by external or internal stimuli.

Let me give it to you again.

Focus is the ability to concentrate on a specific task or goal without being distracted by external or internal stimuli.

So these Old Testament prophets were focused, man.

They knew that what they were experiencing was not all that there was.

That the Messiah, this promised one that was gonna come through the line of David, was coming in the future.

And to the best of the extent that they could, they were filled with the Holy Spirit.

It appears that the Holy Spirit was alive in the Old Testament, mainly through leaders, servants, and prophets.

So you would see, even with King David, David was led by the Spirit.

Even Saul, with all the demonization and struggles that he went through, was led by the Spirit.

Okay, and what changed is that with the coming of Christ, and then with his ascension to heaven, we know in Acts chapter 2 the coming of the Holy Spirit.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

The Holy Spirit had been here.

The Holy Spirit had already been here, but now it was upon anybody who's a believer.

So the priesthood, Luther called it the priesthood of all believers, that we all now are priests and kings.

That was not true in the Old Testament.

So there was this, there was this foreshadowing of a type of what it would be for Christ to come, and they found themselves focusing in on grace, that there was something about the law, but yet the law wasn't it of a Messiah that would come, but it was a little bit murky.

It was murky to them, but they're focused on seeking God for that.

So in Hebrews 11, the great Hall of Fame chapter, we read, and all these, those who came before Christ, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise.

God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us.

So now we have the grace of God.

So I feel like when I'm reading this, and I've read it so many times in 1 Peter 1, it feels like a locker room talk.

I feel like I'm in the locker room with Peter, and he's saying, Look, you guys, um uh churches and Christians all over Asia Minor, focus your mind, man.

Get focused here.

Because if you don't, if you start going with the distractions around you, you're gonna miss out on these tremendous blessings that are there for you.

So here's his first thing he says, focus on grace.

You guys, he says, focus on God's grace.

Fully focus on God's grace.

Just like the Old Testament prophets were doing, even though they didn't know what to call it.

They weren't sure what to call it.

They didn't know what grace was to the extent that we do now.

Your NIV, some of you have uh New International Version, some of you have a new American standard, and it says, prepare your minds for action.

And you when I read that, men and women, I think in terms of intentionality.

It's the idea of girding up the loins, it's a word in the New King James Version, is the idea of them taking their robes and pulling them up in the center and jacking up that area and then wrapping it so they can run.

So it's like get ready for the race, man.

Get ready to run.

You're gonna stumble if you don't gird up your mind for action.

And same with us today, guys.

We have more distractions than ever.

I want to say we have more distractions than ever in the history of the world.

I don't know if that's true or not, because I don't know the history of the world.

But it seems like to me, if there's anything that will distract us, it will.

Okay?

Our tendency is to go with distraction rather than going with focus.

And that's why people who are focused generally are pretty good at what they do because there's not a lot of competition.

And so I tell my kids all the time, if you will focus on what you're called to do, and I've, you know, you guys know the whole family, I'm big on entrepreneurship, so start your own company.

All of them have.

Start your own company.

Don't depend on the boss, man.

You get out there and you make it happen, but you're gonna have to be focused.

You're gonna have to be focused.

So I was rem when I was writing this, I was reminded of this, like several incidents that occurred in high school.

So I was in I was in ninth grade, gone out for the gymnastics team, and what our coach did on Mondays and Tuesdays, he showed film.

Back then it was real to real.

Has everybody ever heard of real to real?

Okay.

So it was real to real, and it was the it was the 1960 and the 1964 and the 1968 Olympics.

That he had real to real.

And I still remember, you know, I've been a gymnast for like four months, and I'm watching the real to real from the 1960 Olympics, pommel horse.

So imagine, this is the only way I could describe it for you that don't know about gymnastics, but imagine this is a pommel horse, and then this is the gymnast with his two legs.

This is what you call a circle, okay?

You may have become familiar really since the late 70s with the Thomas Flair, which is like this, where they come like that.

But I just wanted to learn the first part, you know, A before you go to BC, but A was, and it's called an A move, actually, as a judge, but it was a circle.

So I'm watching the circle, and then I walk out into the gym and I do it.

I just jump up and I start doing circles, and everybody in the team's freaking out, like, who's this kid, you know?

And it's because I'd I was focused for, I mean, I didn't I lost it for the next three weeks, but I had it for like five minutes, okay?

But I was focused, right?

So I was focused on it, and then I could see it.

I could see it in my mind, and it actually translated physiologically into my arms and my legs, and I I kind of superseded my natural ability with that supernatural ability that God gave all of us in our minds to be able to focus and do stuff you shouldn't be able to do.

You shouldn't be able to do half the stuff that you do if you learn to focus.

Okay?

If you don't focus, then you can just be natural.

Just be a natural person, do everything natural, and you can be normal.

Okay?

Well, um, if you want to be supernatural, if you want to be super supra normal, walking in the power of the Spirit, what Peter is saying here is focus, man.

Focus intentionally with your mind.

And he said, focus on grace.

Now, what does that mean?

Well, I think what that means is that you can't do it.

So we can think of grace.

We the typical uh definition is unmerited favor.

It is unmerited favor.

That's great.

But it's also inability to do what God's called you to do if you walk outside of grace.

So what grace is, is saying, look, I've tried to follow the law, I fail.

I've tried to do the right thing, I fail.

I try to walk in holiness, I fail, which is a great prayer.

I'm a big failure, but with God's power, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

With God's power, I can move mountains.

With God's power, I can walk in holiness.

With God's power, I can be a witness for Christ, right?

I mean, that's what St.

Patrick did.

When St.

Patrick was getting on that boat as a bishop of the church, feeling all the inadequacies.

And you read more about him, it's like the bishops in Great Britain thought he was a schmo.

I mean, he just he was not very articulate.

He didn't speak.

Remember back then, man, Mass was all in Latin, so you're supposed to be really an expert in Latin.

He wasn't an expert in Latin, he kind of fumbled his way through it as you saw in that one quote that I gave you.

But there was something in St.

Patrick that knew he had heard from God to go back to Ireland and even present-day Scotland, into that area, and he was confident of God, he wasn't confident of Patrick.

So, men and women, I think focusing on grace is to not be self-confident, but to be God confident in the grace power of God.

So, grace, as I am talking about it here, is present power.

Write that down.

That's what grace is.

Don't get too high-faluting about religious terms about grace and law.

I want you to think in terms of grace being present power right now.

That's grace.

Grace is I can't do it, he can do all things.

I can't do anything, he can do everything.

And so to focus on grace is to realize that without grace, you're up to no good.

And so Paul, in writing about this, he wrote in Romans 6 14 for sin shall not have dominion over you, for you're not under law but under grace.

I think it's beautiful because what Paul's saying here is that the only way for sin to not have dominion over you is to realize you're You're not under law, but you're under grace.

So you guys know that the more we focus on do's and don'ts and the law, the more you focus on that, then the more self-defeating it feels like.

Because it is.

Because the reason the Old Testament law was given was to build in an operable, operating system of failure.

So it was to create your need for grace.

So that's why when you get around believers and their whole life is built around the law and following the law and all that, they are usually living pretty miserable lives.

I'm gonna tell you, quit thinking that way if that's you.

In other words, forget about the law, think about grace, and realize you can't do it, he can do it through you, and it's about falling in love with Jesus.

It's really simple.

It's like if I got married, I got married to Liz, you know, 38 years ago.

And I did not, I don't remember ever.

Some of you guys are funny.

Okay, I'll just tell you, some of you young people, because I've counseled you.

You're like, here's my ten things I want in a wife.

And I'm going, you're not gonna get any of those.

And then they go, what do you mean, man?

I'm really praying about these things.

I said, you're just gonna flat fall in love, dude.

You're gonna fall in love.

And and she won't have any of them.

And if you, and if that's you know, that's not gonna be a deal breaker because you're gonna fall in love and you're gonna go with love, and um, and there's some big things you need about being a Jesus follower and about being on the same mission and all that.

But other than that, I mean, I never ever once in 38 years thought through the ten things that I feel like I need to do for Liz.

I'm just in love with Liz and I wanna please her because I love her, and then I do the 10 things.

Now we've talked about expectations and things like that, for sure, but the reality is that the big rubric over all of that was love for her and her love for me.

And so we want to please the other one because we love them.

And so grace, focusing on grace is falling in love with Jesus.

Galatians 2.21, I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain.

In other words, if us gutting it out for Jesus is the answer, then there's no need for the cross, there's no need for Good Friday, there's no need for Great Easter.

New term.

Got Good Friday, Great Easter.

How about that?

Ephesians 2.8.

For by grace you've been saved through faith.

That not of yourself, it is a gift of God.

So it is a walk of faith.

So the gospel is not about a law you must keep, but receiving grace that will keep you.

Let me say that again.

So the gospel is not about a law you must keep, but it's receiving grace that will keep you.

So, in other words, what we struggle with, church, is we struggle with the could've's and the wish-oves and the should's, right?

Wish I'd done that.

I I could have done that, I would have done that.

That is so self-defeating.

That will just take you down, down, down.

Instead of, how about I can't have.

I couldn't have, because only Christ can do it through me, and so I'm gonna trust him.

And so some of you in this room have been through horrendous stuff.

I know I know a lot of your stories in this room.

Some of you have been to prison, some of you have been through lots of divorces, some of you have tried to commit suicide, some of you have been in drugs, some of you have been in alcohol abuse, I mean, the whole gamut.

So, by the way, if you're coming to the road and you're afraid to tell us what you've done, you just haven't been at the road long enough.

Because you can't surprise us with anything.

We've heard it all.

We got murderers in the room, we got thieves in the room, we got convicts in the room, and we dig them all because it's almost like the worse you were, the better you are.

Because you become what we call a trope, you're a trophy of grace.

You're a trophy, man.

You're in the trophy room of Jesus.

He's got a trophy room bigger than Deion Sanders' trophy room.

He's got a he's got a really big trophy room.

And um he's coach prime.

Jesus is coach prime, right?

And so follow the coach.

And so Peter's in a, we're kind of in the locker room with Peter.

Say, look, this is this is where it's at, you guys, is quit trying so hard and start trusting more.

Quit trying so hard, start trusting more.

Let me do it through you.

Surrender to me, and I'll take care of the rest.

Verse 13, look at verse 13.

He says, gird up the loins of your mind, be sober.

Be sober.

Focus, secondly, on emotional sobriety.

Focus on emotional sobriety.

Paul writes in Romans 12, do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

For I say, through the grace, there's that word again, through the operable grace of God given to me to everyone who is among you, don't think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.

So first, focus on God's grace.

Second, focus on emotional sobriety.

Now we think of sobriety as something to do with drugs or alcohol.

And you know, if you've ever gone by and seen, you know, a cop, or maybe you've been the guy, I'm not gonna ask for a show of hands, but where you had to walk the line, man.

They're looking for balance.

That's that's in in the Greek, that's what sober means here.

It means balance, your sober minus sobriety.

What about emotional sobriety?

I mean, have you guys noticed that you could have weeks, maybe months, of stability, and then you lose your temper once, and you lose so much ground.

It's amazing what anger can do to ruin your reputation, to ruin your leadership capital that you have with a group of men and women.

I know because I've done it so many times, where I just get ticked off at something, I over-respond, I overreact, I get angry, everybody sees it, and it's like, oh no, I just I just set myself back like two years.

And so you learn to apologize.

You learn to, everybody who sees it needs to be apologized to, and just say, I blew it.

Because we all blow it.

Everybody's gotten angry, everybody's gotten frustrated, and we get that.

But what if we started asking God, focusing on Lord, I want to, as I, as I grow older, I want to really mature in my emotions.

I really want to start getting my emotions under control, and I can't do it.

I just I just flip out, man, and I and I need you to help me to hear bad news or see something happening that really maybe hurts someone or someone doesn't follow through with their job, and then to actually have the emotional sobriety to go to that person and lovingly help them be a better person because of what you say.

Isn't that cool?

I do that all the time.

I've got this so act, I've got this so together.

I haven't lost my temper in like 15 years.

Okay, there's five great forces in your life according to psychology today.

First is genes, second is family of origin, third is popular culture, fourth is technology, and fifth is unexpected events.

So this is naturally what's going to wield, according to psychology today, this is what's going to wield the most influence over you.

So your genes, your family of origin, popular culture, technology.

I actually agree with all these.

Now here's what's interesting about number five.

There's another study, numerous studies on this, but there's another study that I really trust that says basically you never change after 25 years old.

Your character is locked in, you don't change.

Isn't that good news?

Unless, and this is the big unless, unless some unexpected event or trauma occurs in your life, and then you decide to change.

You decide to change.

So, you know, you take St.

Patrick, you know, he's if if our timeline's right, he's getting close to, he's about 22, 23, and he gets, he probably got saved somewhere in there.

Um and and so what happens is that we go along on our way, doing our own thing.

We're pretty confident in ourselves, and maybe we're even successful at what we're doing, and then bam, something happens.

Guess who's behind that?

Most of the time it's God.

God's actually behind some stupid thing that you do.

Okay?

And then you and then what you do is you have a choice.

I'm stupid, I'm an idiot, I'm dumb, and you go down into this deep thing of depression or despondency, you lose perspective.

And then for we in this room who've had this privilege, Jesus comes.

And Jesus says, Yes, you're stupid, yes, you're dumb, but you know what?

I created you in the image of God, and I can change you from who you are into who I want you to be if you will let me in.

If you'll let me in and then start focusing on the grace of God and let me do the work through your surrendered self, you actually can get control of your mental and emotional and even physical faculties because he created it.

So I had a Volkswagen bug when I was 16.

I bought it from my dad for$500.

My dad would never give me anything.

I had to buy it, I had to mow grass and all the stuff that I did.

But anyway, I had a Volkswagen bug and I had issues with the Volkswagen mows.

It was 1962, red Volkswagen bug, but I didn't take it to Pontiac.

And I didn't take it to Chevrolet, I didn't take it to Fort.

I took it to a Volkswagen dealership because they know how to work on Volkswagen.

So when you surrender to Christ, he's the creator of you.

He knows how you work, he made you the way you are.

Some of you guys in this room are writers, some of you are great thinkers, some of you are visionaries, some of you are totally selling yourself way short of who you are because you're still listening to the voices of those in your childhood who told you you're never gonna amount to anything, you're just this or you're just that, and those, and you're you're playing the tapes, the real to real, man, the real to real tapes.

And you remember when they were you were told those things and you're still believing that stuff, and you have got to tear that script up.

And you've got to go to God's word and you say, God, what are you what are you calling me to be?

Why am I on this earth?

What's my purpose here?

There's a purpose for everyone in this room.

And I dare say two-thirds of us have even discovered that yet.

And yet it's available to us.

God wants to give us visions and dreams.

God wants to speak from his word, but he needs us to change our focus.

So quit focusing on what you can't do and start focusing on what you can do in Christ.

So it's focusing on the grace of God, and then that brings an emotional sobriety because you don't have to brag about yourself anymore.

You don't have to tell everybody how great you are.

Because they don't care anyway.

All they're thinking about is themselves.

And so we think everybody's noticing us.

They're not noticing you, they couldn't care less about you.

They're just sitting there thinking about themselves.

And so quit thinking that they think that you think that they're thinking about you because they're not thinking about you.

Start thinking about Jesus and who he is and what he can do in your life.

And he'll set you free.

Number three, focus on being holy.

Focus on being holy.

Verse 14, as obedient children, not conforming yourselves to the former lust, as was your ignorance.

But as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, because it is written, be holy for I am holy.

So he's talking about purity, walking in purity in our lives.

Um, walking in purity builds intimacy with the Lord, a clear conscience and a focus for your life.

Walking in purity builds intimacy with the Lord, a clear conscience, and a focus on our lives.

And what's great about um holiness and walking in holiness, and we all fail in that, but as we walk more and more in holiness, the less do we have to think about how to tell lies.

Because, I mean, some of you are master liars.

And starting with your marriage, you know, your wife doesn't know half of what you're up to when you're on the internet, okay?

And so, and so um, it is pretty cool if you start walking in holiness and you're excited about the Lord, and then you don't have to think about what you didn't tell her that you lied about last week because you're not lying anymore, because you're a truth teller and you're walking in joy.

That's pretty cool.

So when I was when I was writing this down, I thought about nine practical things I do to gird my mind fraction.

Nine practical things I do.

And the reason I felt like, not that I'm the epitome of example here, it's just that these are these are not that hard to do.

And I think that sometimes we get ourselves in trouble in the arena of holiness because we're bored.

I'd say most men and women that I've had to counsel with adultery is not because they were lusting after someone, it was because they were bored with their life.

So I'm gonna fill your day right now.

Just listen to what I do, and then maybe you, maybe something in it is helpful to you.

Number one, I get a good night's sleep.

Get a good night's sleep.

All all the uh medical research out there shows that the number one way to lose weight, the number one way to stay strong, the number one way to be focused is to get a good night's sleep.

So, how many of you wake up about 2 or 3 a.m.

in the morning?

Yeah, I know.

I think that's about right.

Something like 75% of Americans wake up at 2 or 3 a.m.

in the morning.

By the way, don't get out of bed because it raises your heart level over 60, and suddenly you're gonna have a harder time going back to bed.

So you need to stay there, and by the way, even if you're there and your eyes are closed and you're resting, you're actually getting rest.

So it may not be asleep, but it is rest.

So get a good night's sleep.

Number two, first thing in the morning, I begin with a 30-minute workout.

So I do a 30-minute workout.

First thing.

You say, well, and I've got the privilege of having a workout room that I that I have in my house, but do anything.

I mean, seriously, it's uh doing a little a lot is better than doing a lot a little.

Doing a little consistently is better than trying to do a lot sporadically.

So it could be just getting out of bed, and if you can't do a push-up, then do a knee push-up.

Do three.

And then do three, you know, deep knee bends.

Just do three air squats, something like that.

Okay, and that's it.

Just do that.

And then the next time, do it again.

And then the next day, do it again.

Guess what?

You'll do five.

You'll get hooked, you'll do eight.

So here's why.

It oxygenates your brain.

It oxygenates your brain.

So I did a solid 45-minute workout before this.

I mean to do it every Sunday morning.

So every time I'm speaking somewhere else, I always get up in the morning and I work out because I'm I'm I've got clarity, I've got focus when I work out.

So all the studies show.

Listen, it's important.

It shows that you can increase your IQ no matter what your age if you work out every day.

Isn't that crazy?

Increase your IQ.

Number two, it oxygenates your brain so you're more clear thinking.

And then number three, I can't remember.

Okay.

All right.

So number three, number three, spend time after working out, spend time meditating on a passage of scripture.

Meditating this book on a passage of scripture.

Number four, pray and journal.

Pray and journal.

So we call it P B and J, prayer, Bible, journal.

Number five, look at your day and make three priorities.

Just have three priorities for each day, not ten.

And I'm not talking about like, remember to pick up bananas for my wife at the grocery store.

Um, but I'm talking about what are your priorities for that day.

Number six, sometime during the day, take a walk.

Get outside, get vitamin D into your system.

Don't wear sunscreen and don't wear sunglasses, because 90% of your vitamin D comes through your eyes.

Take a walk.

Rain, sleet, snow, freezing temperatures.

Get outside.

Even if it's for five minutes, or maybe it's one minute.

Um, but get outside one time during the day.

Number seven, have blood stained allies in your life.

And that means that the Christian life is not about just input, it's also about output.

That's the healthiest believer is somebody serving somebody else, serving others.

If you're not serving somewhere at the road or in the community, start doing that.

It's not about you.

The more you learn to give, press down and running over, the more God blesses you.

Okay?

Number eight, relax at night.

So we always eat dinner.

Families always eat always eating dinner together at night.

Do that, play cards.

We like Skippo and things like that, so play cards.

Um, read.

Good time to read.

You're trying to relax now.

You're trying to get that good night's sleep, so you're thinking like, don't be on the screen.

The screen uh actually wakens up your system and it's hard to go to sleep.

And then number nine, I have hobbies that I enjoy.

So you guys know I love fly fishing, I love hunting, I love cutting wood, I love reading.

So do stuff that's not necessarily spiritual, but it is spiritual.

And so you look at that, you ain't got a whole lot of time to go out and mess around.

So fill your life with good stuff, and you won't have as much time for bad stuff in your life.

And then fourthly, lastly, verse 17 if you call on the Father, who without partiality judges according to each one's work, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your stay here in fear.

Underlying fear, and that fourth one is focus on the fear of God, and I'm gonna cover that next week.

Next week, I'm gonna talk about the fear of God.

I think you'll be surprised at what I have to say about the fear of God.

Thank you for listening to the Forn for War podcast.

We hope today's message has empowered you to make a difference in your world.

To connect with Pastor Steve's sermons, books, and blog, visit Steve Holtonline.org.

God bless.