WholeHARD45 | Maximum Impact - WholeHARD45

Hey, I'm Pastor Steve Hole.

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.

So last week, you guys, I started talking about Whole Hard 45, and this was the booklet, and we really, really sold a lot.

I was actually very surprised.

I thought maybe a hundred people, but I think it was around 500 people bought these.

And there's uh there's I think a hundred or maybe seventy-five left.

Um, but the big question that everybody, I thought it'd be something spiritual, godly, like, you know, but the big question was, what's junk food?

And I even had I even had a guy ask me out in the lobby last week and this week, like, are these donuts junk food?

And uh, and I said, hey man, I'm not I'm not gonna get legalistic on this.

You have to define that, you have to decide for your own life.

But he said, well, what about what do you think?

And I would say, I'm not gonna tell you what I think.

Okay, but I'm not eating any of the donuts.

So, but um, but if you have the donuts, don't worry about it.

That's your call, and nobody's gonna get legalistic.

It this is about you.

This is about you being healthy.

This is about you being as healthy as you can be mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically, and relationally.

And I felt like that I had to go so fast last week that I should do a part two.

So we're doing a part two, okay, you guys?

So this is part two on whole hard 45, and I'm calling it maximum impact.

So maximum impact's what I'm calling it a day.

And then next week, we're gonna start First Peter.

And then 1 Peter, the title, I'll already tell you what the title is, Peter's Prevailing Principles for Working Out Your Problems, or something like that.

I can't remember exactly what my title was.

But we're gonna look through problem solving as it comes through first and second principles in our lives.

So last week we talked about loving God with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength, your neighbors, yourself.

And I broke that down into mental, emotional, spiritual, and relational in our lives.

And that loving God was loving others.

It was about taking care of yourself and being as healthy as you can be.

Now, this message today is a message I gave at a health conference that we had here at the church back in 2021.

I realized that I never gave it here except to the group that was at that conference back about three years ago.

So there's 18 pages in the appendix.

So I'll just let you know, I'm really giving you a thumbnail sketch.

So if you want the whole appendix of all the footnotes and everything of where I did the research, you can go online.

It's for we always have the sermon for a few days.

So you can go in the app, you can find the sermon notes, and it's all there if you're interested.

So turn in your Bible to 1 Thessalonians 5.

So I'm gonna come from a little slightly different perspective, but I think you'll see that this is a building on what we started last week.

And if you don't know what we did last week, I talked about a challenge, uh, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, relationally, called Whole Hard 45, of which this booklet contains the challenge.

And it's 45 days of some hard stuff, new habits you're gonna develop in your life.

Now, to give you some background with me, I've been doing almost everything in here for six months.

So this is time-tested.

I do it every day, I do it almost everything in here.

Maybe I don't necessarily do exactly everything every day, but I have done it for six months every day.

So I'm not asking you to do anything that I haven't done.

Look at 1 Thessalonians 5.23.

So we come to the end of 1 Thessalonians, and Paul concludes his letter with a very interesting statement.

He says this, now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely.

You might circle that or underline that.

Sanctify you completely, semicolon, then he says, and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Well, sanctify, if you're writing in your notes, write set apart.

That's what sanctify means.

Sanctify means set apart.

That's what we're talking about here.

We're talking about being set apart.

Listen, guys, hard times are coming.

Hard times are coming.

And this is an election here.

Hard times are coming.

There's either gonna be a war or there's gonna be some kind of a disease or some kind of a pandemic that they're gonna create.

I guess promise you that.

Okay, I'd love to be wrong.

I hope I'm wrong.

And that may be too obvious, and it'll be something else.

But there'll be, if you look at all the wars in history, every war is preempted by something that happens that not always, but a lot of times, the country that wants to go to war manufactures.

So don't be surprised if there's some kind of an attack or something and it's blamed on the Russians, okay?

So just be aware of that.

I I wasn't born yesterday.

I'm from Georgia, I'm not real smart, but I can figure out a few things, okay?

So be prepared.

Everybody else is gonna be freaking out, but at the robe, we're not, right?

Right?

We're whole hard.

You get hard by doing hard things.

You get hard by doing hard things.

Tonight I'm gonna talk about being a proactive person or a reactive person, okay, at the worship time.

We could divide you up in this room in two categories.

You tend to be reactionary, or you tend to be intentional and proactionary.

So you're either a proactionary person or a reactionary person.

What I'm talking about here with Whole Heart 45 is building habits in all of us to be proactive and intentional physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and relationally.

You will be a healthier person if you do that.

Okay?

And so that's what this is all about.

This is helping us be set apart.

So here's my thesis.

My thesis is this to have a maximum impact life, line up with God's purposes spiritually, emotionally, mentally, relationally, and physically.

You will become healthier, more vibrant, and more resilient when hard times come.

So, Pam Holloway with radical resiliency in her ministry, she's gonna be uh speaking after next week's third service and March the 3rd in the chapel, and she's gonna enhance a lot of what I'm saying as a professional nurse and a practitioner in the health arena.

So that's right after the service next week.

So let's look at a maximum impact diagram.

Would you look at this diagram with me?

And you see in this diagram that we are interconnected people.

We're interconnected relationally, we're interconnected physiologically, we're interconnected spiritually and emotionally.

And so, and so you know how it is.

If you've had anybody here at a back injury, anybody had a back injury, okay?

How many of you have had a knee injury?

How many of you have been in chronic pain at different times in your life?

Okay.

It affects you spiritually.

It's really hard to worship if you can't stand up because your knee keeps buckling.

It's really hard to have a close relationship with someone if you've got a massive toothache, okay?

So this all that's who we are.

We're all these things, and that's why I made interconnected, concentric circles with me in the middle, because that is who you are.

And so God knows that.

So to love him and to be set apart, to be sanctified mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and relationally, to love God with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and your neighbor as yourself is healthy living.

This is how we have a high impact life.

And you say, well, I don't want to be a leader, I don't want to have a high impact.

Well, no, you already are.

Everybody in this room is a leader.

Every one of you leads, somebody's looking at you.

It might be a little kid, it might be your daughter, it might be a son, it's a colleague at work, it's somebody at church or in a small group that you're in.

Everybody's a leader in some way, shape, or form.

Now, some are small L leaders and some are capital L leaders.

But in the sense of how we impact people, it's either positively or negatively.

It is.

It's either positively or negatively.

It's not really neutral.

You're either a person that when you walk in the room, everybody feels a dark cloud and they keep thinking your name's Eeyore, okay?

Or when you walk in the room, people get around you and they always feel better when they're around you.

Okay, so we're always affecting and impacting people in some way, shape, or form.

So at the road, I want us to be known as a people that are kingdom revolutionaries, that we bring the kingdom of God.

We love people wherever they're at.

We're gonna care about them and we're gonna love them.

Well, that's just impossible unless we're growing in all of these areas of our life.

And so we're a connection of all that.

So I want to start with this.

So, how do we get sick or who get sick?

How do we get sick or who get sick?

And I'm not just talking about physical, I'm talking about emotional and mental also.

So let me give a caveat.

The caveat is I am not a doctor, I am a doctor, but I'm not a medical doctor.

Uh I'm not a health professional, so I'm not telling people by what you hear me say, you shouldn't be on pharmaceuticals or you shouldn't be on medicine.

Now, maybe that might be true, but I'm not saying that, okay?

Um, so I'm I'm gonna be coming from a different perspective, one that you rarely hear unless you're one who actually does research on your own.

So the past 150 years have been interesting in medicine.

Uh, modern medicine started about 150 years ago.

And if you read my blog, I'm sharing about the blog about John D.

Reckefeller and the rise of petrochemicals and big pharma, part one was this past week.

I'll give part two this coming week.

But there's two, there's basically two lines of thinking about how we get sick, who gets sick, what makes us sick, and then what makes us well.

Because whatever's your perspective about why you get sick will determine how you get well.

So here's the first one.

And this is more my persuasion.

So I'm gonna tell you this is uh the perspective that I have.

And this would be what I'm I'm these are my terms, okay?

So you're not gonna, if you put this in, you're not gonna find it anywhere.

Or maybe you will, because uh someone else thought of it before me, which is probably true, but I'm gonna call it the immune strong movement.

Immune system or immune strong movement.

That if we drink clean water, we eat God-made food, and we get needed rest, have a strong emotional and spiritual support system, most of the time your body heals itself.

That if you get something, you're gonna get over it.

You're gonna get over it pretty quick.

You don't need to run and get an antibiotic for 99% of stuff out there, okay?

You just need to weather the storm and get better because your immune system is built by God to actually fight off pathogens and stuff.

Well, that changed in 1910.

So that was the prevalent view among medical doctors and stuff until 1910.

Now, number two, this was the new way of thinking, what I'm gonna call the pathogen attack movement.

The pathogen attack movement.

Science began to study pathogens or germs that invariably will cause a virus or disease.

Pathogen refers to bacteria, germs, or other microorganisms that have the potential to induce disease.

So science was moving in that direction.

There's this guy named John D.

Rockefeller.

Everybody knows who John D.

Rockefeller was.

John D.

Rockefeller founded and was the leader CEO over Standard Oil.

Okay, and he controlled.

Two things you can say about John D.

Rockefeller was one, he was a genius at business, and number two, he knew how to monopolize everything he touched.

So anything he touched, he took over.

So uh soon after Standard Oil was established, he all the 90% of the refineries were under John D.

Rockefeller.

But he started to see at the turn of the century that his oil profits were going down.

So he wasn't making, you know, 50 million a month, he was only making 49 million a month, okay?

He was the richest man that ever lived, borrowing none.

So if you take what he died with, when he died to our standards today, he was worth$400 billion.

And just to put that in perspective, the richest man in the world right now is$198 billion.

So he was twice that.

So he monopolized everything.

But what he began to see in science was you could use petrochemicals to create pharmaceuticals.

And so what he began to do is he took over with the Flexner Report.

Again, this is all in my blog.

I'm not gonna go into a ton of detail, but in the Flexner Report, he basically faked out Congress, which isn't hard to do.

He began to fake out Congress, and those that were the experts as the developer of the American Medical Association was simultaneously happening, and he was able to put together a system where if you taught this new way of thinking, I'm gonna call it path and attack movement, pathogenic attack movement, which means that you go after germs with pharmaceuticals which were petrochemical, he could monopolize that too.

So all medical schools, of which half of the medical schools in America believed in holistic medicine.

They believed in what I call an immune-strong system, they were pushed out, and basically all your medical schools and all your education through John D.

Rockefeller took over and we became a pharmaceutical-driven country.

Guess what was born?

Big pharma was born! Yay! Big pharma.

Okay, so my next blog will be part two of that when that comes out next week.

Um but Bob Dylan once said times they are changing.

Well, since COVID, and even before that, for the last 25 years especially, but COVID really accentuated the need for an immune-strong system.

Okay?

What we found was everybody was um exposed to COVID.

Um, everybody was exposed to pathogens.

And we're all exposed to pathogens, you guys.

We're we all drink bad water sometimes.

We all have we all have cancer cells in our bodies, we have germs and microorganisms that can cause disease all around us.

But why do some people get sick and constantly get sick and others don't?

So there's been this new movement studying science from the back door, which really is just simply going back to creation, really going back to pre-1910, before the Flexner report, that we need strong immune systems in in our lives.

And the stronger our immune system, the healthier we are.

So, physician Andrew Weil, research associate in ethnopharmacology at Harvard, and author of Health and Healing writes external material objects never cause the disease.

But these agents are merely agents looking for a susceptible host.

We have poor coping skills, deficient social support, and high stress, and our bodies become upset and our resistance is lowered.

An agent of disease then finds fertile ground and wish to develop or might act as straw ready for a fire.

So we're all around people who sneeze, we're all around people who cough, we're all around restaurants that have interesting people in the back making your food, um, who spit and cough and write in your food, man.

I guarantee it, you know?

I'm not saying don't eat out, I'm not saying that we eat out too, but I'm just saying that, okay, hello, you know.

So here's my thesis again.

Let me say the thesis again.

The more you line up with God's purposes spiritually, emotionally, mentally, relationally, and physically, the healthier you will be.

You'll be more vibrant, you'll be more resilient in your life, and the result will be maximum impact while you're on this earth.

So listen to God's word on health.

Proverbs 3.

Proverbs 3, 5 and 8.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart.

Lean not on your own understanding.

In all your ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct your paths.

Do not be wise in your own eyes, fear the Lord, and depart from evil.

Listen to verse 8.

It will be health to your flesh and strength to your bones.

So even Solomon understood that people who trust God, who don't just lean on their own understanding, but you lean on and you trust God, it actually is physic, the physicality of your life, the mental health of your life becomes stronger.

So what I want to do this morning was just go through seven habits.

I'm going to come from the back door a little bit from what I talked about last week.

So some of this will be repetitive, but most of it won't.

Now, I think I said this already.

Sometimes I get my services mixed up, but I think I said this already.

That there's there's an app, we have the Road app, and you can get that, and you can get my notes, and there's about 16 to 18 pages of the appendix, which is the research.

So I'm just gonna zip through stuff.

You can look it up if you're interested, and you can always call the church, and we can get you, we can get you a paper copy if you want that.

So seven habits.

I want to give you seven habits that are a little bit different, but they build on last week.

Seven habits for maximum impact.

The first one may surprise you, but it's really true.

Be wholehearted.

Be whole-hearted.

In other words, people who are wholehearted in the things that they love are people who are healthier.

So you show me someone who's got a passion for something, I'll show you someone who stays healthier most of the time.

Because they, their heart is engaged, their mind is engaged, their emotions are engaged, and usually their relationships are engaged.

Be wholehearted.

It's the first habit.

It's the most important habit.

In other words, if you're coming to the road and you love what we're doing at the road, you should dive in, man.

Don't just come to the services and just sit here, but dive into something that you have a passion for because you'll be healthier.

You'll just overall be healthier by diving in.

If you love coaching, then go coach, man.

Be a coach for some kids and help them out.

If you've got a heart for the poor, go help the poor, minister the poor.

In other words, God's placed things in your life, passions in your life, that nobody else has but you.

It's unique to you.

And being wholehearted and serving and loving others is one of the healthiest things that you can do.

Now, I'm not talking about burning out, and that's that's what always gets a bad, that's what gets a bad vibe to this.

Oh, well, you can get this pastor or this leader or this uh movement leader, he burned out or he or he had an extramarital affair.

I'm not talking, I'm talking about healthily doing it.

In other words, take good rest, take care of your immune system, eat well, exercise, work out in the morning or in the evening.

But when you're wholehearted, all the studies show.

You're just a healthier person.

You're you're fun to be around.

The problem for many of us though is that we're being we're being being forced to be wholehearted in things like our job or something like that that we don't really like.

Now there's if you're 75% fulfilled in your work, that's a grand slam.

That's a grand, nothing's 100%.

But if you've got 25%, 30%, 40% of your job you don't like, welcome to life.

Okay?

So that's just the way it is.

But you have all this other time, I mean, you're working eight, ten hours, you got 14 hours the rest of the day, what do you have a heart for?

It may not be your job.

That job may never be exactly what you want, but you can fulfill your destiny in other areas that God's given you a passion for.

So be wholehearted.

Dr.

McLaughlin of Women's Medical College in Philadelphia says that 65, this is crazy, 65 to 80% of all sickness is rooted in the mental and spiritual.

This guy's not a Christian.

99% of headaches, 75% of stomach disorders, 75% of asthma, and 75% of skin diseases.

Okay, so that that tells you that studies today are showing how important the way you think is and what you're committed to and what you have a heart for, that the more you're engaged, Spiritually and mentally, you'll be engaged emotionally and it will affect you physically.

It's huge, you guys.

And the healthiest thing you could be doing is committing yourself wholehearted to something that changes people's lives.

I feel like I'm healthy, and the reason I don't want to retire is because I just love being with you guys.

And I really mean that.

I love being with you guys in the lobby.

I love the whole week.

I really do.

I like speaking, but I mean I really enjoy the give and take of problem solving and growing a church and helping people become wholehearted disciples of Jesus.

The kingdom of God, write this down, it's really important.

The kingdom of God is God's total program for total health.

The kingdom of God is God's total program for total health.

So there was a physician's seminar, conference, large conference, thousands were there in Philadelphia in the 1960s.

And the reason they came together was to ask the question, isn't this amazing?

Who does this now?

But they came together, doctors came together to say, what's the healthiest way to live to have a healthy, physically healthy life?

Now, that's pretty wild because their livelihood is based on you being sick.

Okay?

So these doctors came together because they cared enough about emotional and spiritual and physical health that they were asking the question look, we signed up to be a doctor because we care about people's health.

Okay, guess what they said?

They said the greatest statement to all humankind on the way to be healthy was Matthew 5, 3 through 12.

Matthew 5, 3 through 12, which is historically called the Beatitudes, the be happy attitudes is what Robert Schuler called it back in the day.

Be happy attitudes.

That's blessed.

Instead of blessed are those who are poor in spirit, blessed are those who are meek, blessed are those who mourn, they decided at the convention to change that to healthy.

Healthy are those who are poor in spirit, healthy are those who are meek, healthier are those that mourn.

And it goes on.

There's eight pronouncements in that passage, verses three through two.

Matter of fact, it'd be really good to memorize those.

That's crazy.

So number two, number two, meditation in truth.

Meditation in truth.

Learning to meditate is huge, you guys.

It's gotten a bad name among evangelical Christians because they think of it as new age and all of that, and they, and it's a big mistake because meditation is all through the Bible.

The Bible is about meditation.

And what we do sometimes, I know because I talked to a lot of you, you meditate in fake news.

I mean, let's just change the name from fake news to unhealthy news.

You're meditating and unhealthy stuff, you're getting a little angry and mad about it, because how dare they say that, you know, and all that.

And then that's just making you bitter.

And that's that's not good for you, you know.

So, okay, you need to know some of that, but then meditate in truth that sets you free.

Because untruth is bondage, and meditating in truth is freedom.

And I want you to be free, man.

I want to, I want to walk in freedom.

So turn in your Bibles to Psalm 1.

So there's a reason in God's inspiration of scripture and in the way in which he designed the Bible through working through men, that Psalm 1 is the first Psalm.

Because Psalm 1 is the great prosperity passage of the Bible.

He said, Oh, is Steve a prosperity gospel?

No, I'm a prosperity pastor.

Okay?

The gospel is prosperous in our lives if we follow it.

But I'm not talking about always like health and wealth, but I am saying it's the healthiest way to live.

Okay?

And here's what he says: look at this.

Blessed is the man, beginning of all the Psalms, 150 Psalms.

This is the first verse.

These are the first three verses for all of the Psalms.

Blessed is a man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the city of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord.

And in that law, he meditates day and night.

He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf also shall not wither, and whatever he does, he shall prosper.

So if you go east, if you take 24 east out of Colorado Springs and you're headed toward Kansas, and you're driving along, and it's just like there's not like hardly any trees, right?

It's just so dry out there.

And then you'll see like this clump of like five to ten oak trees.

Promise you there's a stream flowing through there.

There's some kind of water in there, and they're down there and they're getting uh they're getting the sustenance that they need and they're growing strong.

That's the road.

That's road people.

Whatever's coming down, gang, we're gonna be ready for.

We're gonna be strong.

We're gonna be oak trees in the midst of the desert because we're prepared and we're ready and we know what we're doing, and we're gonna be proactive people, not reactive people.

And that's what he says meditate in truth and in season and out of season.

Do any of you know that you go out of season sometimes?

I don't care how healthy you are, I don't care how many good relationships you have, there's going to be winters in your life.

We all go through winters in our life.

And he's saying that if you'll meditate in truth, the truth that sets you free, that you'll even bear fruit in the hard times, even in the difficult times.

Instead of wringing our hands, we're ringing up our prayers to God, and we're thankful because we knew it was coming, we're ready, we're walking this thing out.

Because hard means you're ready for hard.

And that's important because we live in a in a convenient, comfortable, modernistic culture where everything's taken care of.

Probably do us all good.

Don't do this for one or two days because then your pipes will break because they'll freeze.

But it wouldn't be a bad idea to just cut off your heat.

Just cut off your heat for a couple days and just feel the cold.

What are you gonna do?

Maybe cut off all your, can't do anything with electricity for a couple days.

See what you're gonna, what are you gonna do?

Let's say you're not gonna have any food.

You can't go anywhere, there's no food available.

What are you gonna do?

Where are you gonna get light at night?

You can't flick on no electricity.

What are you gonna do?

Proactive people choose hard so that they're ready for hard.

Hello?

Does anybody know what I'm talking about?

Okay, so so you know, I don't know what to do, I wouldn't know what to do.

Well, find someone who does.

This church is full of people.

And I'm gonna talk about how radical resiliency, what put Glenn and Pam on their on their website, they've got a whole thing of how to prepare for hard things.

They're gonna come.

They are going to come.

And men and women, I want you to be ready physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, uh sociologically in your life by growing and learning to be the kind of person inwardly that's ready for the outward stuff that comes.

According to John Hopkins Medicine, positive thinking is linked to a wide range of health benefits, including better stress management and coping skills, enhanced psychological health, greater resistance to the common cold, increased physical well-being, longer lifespan, lower rates of depression, reduced risk of cardiovascular disease-related death.

One study of 1,558 adults, older adults, found that positive thinking could also reduce frailty during old age.

So clearly, meditating as truth makes you more positive.

And you see the benefits of that.

Number three, number three, prayer and journaling.

Prayer and journaling, the power of prayer.

Now listen to this.

I just discovered this the other day.

I was just reading one.

Whoa, this is really cool.

In Matthew 6, starting at verse 25, Jesus begins to explain all the things that we worry about.

So he says, you worry about your clothing, you worry about this, you worry about that.

And then in verse 32, Jesus says, Look, I know, doesn't your Heavenly Father know that you need all those things?

In other words, God made you, He knows that you need those things.

And then he says, Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you.

In other words, if you will take what you're worried about, quit focusing on worry and start targeting your life toward the kingdom, I'll take care of what you worry about.

Because you're an aiming people.

Everybody in here is aiming at something.

You're either aiming at stupid stuff or you're aiming at good stuff.

And you have to decide that.

Some of you are aiming at things that are not gonna make you happy, but you're convinced they're gonna make you happy because you were gossiping, you know, on the internet or on the phone last week with someone else who said, Oh, this is real, oh, this is like the coolest thing.

And then you've been hoodwinked into believing that, and so now you're you're focused on stuff that's not gonna make you happy.

It's gonna be a waste of time.

Okay, so you're aiming for you.

Everybody's gonna aim at something.

I'm challenging you to aim for the kingdom.

Okay, aim for the kingdom.

Right?

Now, listen.

This is what he says next.

Jesus says right after that, he says, seek and you shall find.

Knock and the door shall be opened.

Ask and it shall be given.

In other words, Jesus says, you're gonna become a people of prayer if you'll make the kingdom first in your life, because you'll realize you ain't got what it takes.

Okay?

So you go, well, Pastor Steve, I love what you're saying and everything, but man, you don't know my problems.

I got this problem and that problem and that problem, and I don't care about your problems, okay?

Come up and get prayer.

But what he's saying is, Jesus is saying, look, all of us have got those problems.

All of us have got all these setbacks in our life.

Setbacks are setups for comebacks.

And the way in which that happens is through prayer.

You start crying out to God, and he starts opening doors for you, and he gets all the credit.

Because he did it, because you prayed, because you knew you didn't have what it took.

And the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

Write that down.

The rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

The rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

Ask and be given you, seek and you shall find, knock on the door.

To everyone who has, this is Matthew 25, 29, to everyone who has more will be given.

And he will have an abundance, but from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

In other words, it seems like God's saying, I gave you this material to work with.

If you start using it for the kingdom, I'll give you more.

If you waste it, I'm taking it away.

I'm gonna give it to somebody else.

So if you're gonna waste your time on just selfish living, I'm gonna take you what you will you've been given, and I'm gonna give it to somebody who's really going after the kingdom.

So the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

Well, that's not fair.

I'm not saying it's fair, I'm saying it's kingdom.

Okay?

So here's my thesis again.

Let's go over my thesis again.

To have a maximum impact life, line up with God's purposes spiritually, emotionally, mentally, relationally, and physically, you'll become healthier, you'll become more vibrant, and you'll become more resilient in hard times.

Number four, this is really important.

Deal with trauma and shame.

Number four, deal with trauma and shame.

And this is where the vulnerability of our lives is so important.

Some of us have had massive trauma in our life that we've gone through.

I challenge you to deal with that in your life.

Number five.

Number five, get outside.

Get your daily dose of vitamin D called the Sunshine Vitamin.

National Institute of Health recommends 30 minutes a day with no sunscreen, and I forgot to put this in, no sunglasses to get your daily allowance of vitamin D.

So most of your vitamin D comes through your eyes, so no sunglasses, and your skin, so no sunscreen.

Now, some of you out there are gonna go, Steve said, don't wear sunscreen in color.

I did not say that.

I said for 30 minutes.

30 minutes.

Because some of you guys, you gotta have your tan.

Okay?

And so you go and you're out there for two hours and you're you're you know, you're gonna get skin cancer, man.

So, so 30 minutes is all I'm saying, is 30 minutes is good for vitamin D.

Um, recent studies indicate that vitamin D does three major things.

Number one, vitamin D fights disease.

Number two, vitamin D reduces depression.

Number three, vitamin D boosts weight loss.

Now, again, all those are on my app, if you go to the app, all the appendix gives all the background and data to support each one of those points.

Number six, work out.

Number six, work out.

Now, working out makes you stronger for sure, but the biggest thing about working out, men and women, is it oxygenates your brain.

That fires me up.

It oxygenates your brain.

Matter of fact, I would I would say that if you've got a major decision to make, let's say about purchasing a house or financial or a job change or something, or whatever it might be, it might even be a relationship, work out.

Work out before you make the decision.

And then when you make the decision, work out again.

Oxygenate your brain.

I worked out this morning.

I work out six days a week.

I work out wherever I speak.

When I'm gonna speak, a couple hours before I'm in that the gym working out because it's oxygenating my brain.

It increases your IQ.

The the neuroplasticity studies that are available today show that you can actually stave off aging and increase your IQ as you get older if you work out.

Your body was made to be active, your body was made to work out.

It's good for you.

Number seven, and lastly, blood-stained allies.

You need blood-stained allies.

You gotta have some relationships that you're close to.

And guess what, folks?

Sometimes those relationships are not in your family.

Okay?

They're people at church, they're people in similar hobbies or whatever, but we need bloodstained allies.

The quality of our one author writes, the quality of our relationships may have more to do with how often we get sick and how soon we get well than our genes, chemistry, diet, or environment.

So perhaps one of the most important studies ever done on the issue of relationships and health was called what I'm calling the Amaya effect.

The Amaya effect.

Leonard Syme, professor of epidemiology at University of California, Berkeley, says, quote, the causes of our health problems are often attributed to industrialization, urbanization, technology, pollution, smoking cigarettes, and the fast pace of life.

But the Japanese have all of these.

Indeed, they smoke more than any other nation.

They have the worst problems in all of the areas mentioned.

But despite those health hazards, Japanese have the highest life expectancy in the world, the lowest heart disease rate among nations, and the lowest rate of death from all causes.

How is this possible?

What we believe explains the protection found among Japanese is a Mae, a characteristic they value.

Amai emphasizes a belief that the well-being of the individual depends on cooperation with others and goodwill from a person's group.

In other words, social support is central to the values of Japanese practice and continues to provide resistance to disease, end quote.

You need the church.

You need a healthy environment like this.

Getting up in the morning, putting clothes on the kids while they scream, and then fighting with your spouse all the way to church is healthy.

Okay?

It's healthy for you to be in here.

It's healthy to worship you.

It's healthy to come tonight and worship and pray to you.

It's healthy to have conflict and then work it out.

It's healthy to go and help in the kitchen.

It's healthy to feed the poor.

It's healthy to minister at the pregnancy center.

It's healthy.

All those things, the healthiest thing you can do.

Take your mind off yourself.

Put it on others and love them.

It's healthy.

It's good, man.

It's what you're made for.

Isn't that exciting?

Thank you for listening to the Foreign 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 Steveholtonline.org.

God bless.