"The Lockdown" Pt.1

Hi, this is John O'Zanton, lead pastor of Evolved Church, and this is the Evolved Church Podcast.

Thanks so much for tuning in.

We hope that you find today's message encouraging and full of hope for wherever you're at.

Amazing.

This word lockdown hasn't been in our world's vocabulary for too, too long.

When I think about it, I often think about schools where situations are, you know, maybe a little bit dire in a school where they have to go on to a lockdown.

But I want to define it before we dig in today.

A lockdown is emergency protocol.

And it usually prevents people or information from leaving an area.

However, it can also be used to protect people inside of a facility or a system from a threat of external.

So a lockdown protects us from outside things that are coming in, but it also keeps us safe on the inside from anything that might be pushing at us.

So in a very kind of profound, maybe natural way, I'm not talking about a building lockdown today, but I want to talk to you about a lockdown of your heart.

And we want to spend a couple of weeks together just examining this picture of what does it mean for us in a spiritual way, whether you're watching it and you're all in in terms of faith and following Jesus, or maybe you're brand new to church, I want you to get a hold of a picture of your heart being on lockdown.

Being on lockdown.

Your heart as per preventing information from getting in and also protecting what's inside in a way that it continues to be viable for how you share it with other people, but a lockdown of the heart.

Proverbs 423 in the Bible, it says this.

Life starts in the heart.

Now you're already automatically thinking about like this physical organ, boo-boom, boom, boom-boom, boob boom, that life starts in the heart.

But this word heart is actually not about the physical organ pounding inside of your chest.

It's something very different.

The Hebrew word levav is the most common word for heart.

It includes, here's what it includes.

Are you ready?

Our thoughts, our will, our discernment, and our affections.

So I'm gonna be speaking today in the next few Sundays about a lockdown of your heart, a lockdown of your thoughts, your will, your discernment, and your affections.

Um this week was hard.

Uh I'm guessing it was hard for you.

I heard lots of stories about how it was hard for people.

But um the first half of this week, I'll be honest, I was in a funk.

I was right funkified.

And here's why.

Um I'm supposed to be in California today, like this day.

This is live streaming on Sunday morning, March 22nd.

We were supposed to be on vacation with our kids in Arizona, and in California, we're gonna surprise our kids, take them to Disneyland, and and we'd been gearing up for vacation.

You know, we planted Evolved Church a year and a half ago, and we've been just loving the team that's grown around us, and so we were really excited about getting away.

And you know what's like before you leave on vacation where you sort of double down, um, you're working extra hours, making sure everything's looked after before you leave.

And that was us a week and a half ago, uh, and getting prepared to go away with our kids.

And and this week is radically different than what we planned for it to be.

This week is radically different than what we anticipated and what we were hoping for.

And that actually really hit my thoughts.

It really hit my will, it really hit my my emotions and my discernment, and it really hit me hard in the first half of this week.

And without care, without even really thinking about it, I kind of slipped into a bit of a pity party.

If I'm gonna be completely transparent and vulnerable with you, I had a couple of rough days at the start of this week.

I just I just wanted to sleep.

I wanted to be sitting by a pool somewhere warm.

I wanted to be at uh Disneyland, experiencing Star Wars and making lightsabers with my boys.

Um, and here we are in in sort of like leadership mode, in crisis mode, loving and serving the church, figuring out creative ways to be in digital spaces with people and be effective as a church community.

I felt like we were in our launch season all over again, just like working hard, working full days.

And this low-grade sadness began to hit my heart and kind of began to crowd out and try and take control.

And thankfully, I became aware of that.

And not only did I become aware of that, but I was able to do something about that as I invited God's spirit, God's words, God's heart for me to kind of touch that disappointment, allow me to feel that sadness as it was appropriate, but not stay there and not stay stuck there, renew wrong thoughts that were funky and change them into helpful, beautiful thoughts.

So here's the big question for today.

How do we keep a vigilant watch over our hearts?

If Proverbs 4 says, keep a vigilant watch over your heart, over your thoughts, over your will, over your discernment, over your affections, then how do we do that?

How do we keep a vigilant watch?

The word vigilance is powerful.

It means be watchful, be on the lookout, be observant, be sharp-eyed, be keen-eyed, be on your toes, be awake, be wide awake, be unsleeping, be on your guard, be circumstect circumsect, be prudent, be heedful, be mindful, be prepared, be vigilant, be vigilant about your heart.

A couple of quotes.

Um, this one is attributed to Margaret Margaret Thatcher, who was uh a British prime minister.

Uh it's possible that Gandhi said this as well.

I had a hard time finding the source of this, but you've probably heard this before.

Watch your thoughts, for they will become your words.

Watch your words, for they will become your actions.

Watch your actions, for they will become your habits.

Watch your habits, for they will become your character, and watch your character, for it becomes your destiny.

What we think, we become.

What we think, we become.

It starts in our thoughts, in our heart, okay?

Marcus Aurelius, Roman Emperor, said, Such as are thy habitual thoughts, such also will be the character of thy mind.

For the soul is dyed by the thoughts.

Your soul is like a color dye by what you think about.

And this last quote from Ralph Waldo, uh Ralph Waddle Emerson, American philosopher, he said, sow a thought and you reap an action.

Sow an action and you reap a habit, sow a habit, you reap a character, sow character, and you reap a destiny.

Now those those quotes are inspirational, and maybe you've heard them before.

And all of them kind of share a similar sentiment that as go our life, so it begins in our heart, in our thought life.

The Bible said it first, though, okay?

And that's the cool thing.

The Bible actually said it first.

In Proverbs 4, verse 20 to 27, I'm reading from the message translation.

Proverbs 4:20–27

I love that this wisdom was in God's heart from the very, very beginning.

Proverbs 4, verse 20, in the message translation, dear friend, listen well to my words.

Proverbs 4:20

Tune your ears to my voice.

Keep my message in plain view at all times.

Concentrate.

Learn it by heart.

Those who discover these words live, really live.

Body and soul, they're bursting with health.

Interesting.

Verse 24.

Here it is.

Keep vigilant watch over your heart.

That's where life starts.

Don't talk out of both sides of your mouth.

Avoid careless banter.

Avoid white lies.

Avoid gossip.

Keep your eyes straight ahead.

Ignore all the sideshow distractions.

Keep your step, and the road will stretch out smooth before you.

Look neither right nor left.

Leave evil in the dust.

The impact of a well-guarded heart, a vigilantly well-guarded heart, is uh gonna be fleshed out in the words that we speak, the things that we focus on, the plans that we make, and the decisions that we act on.

The impact of a poorly guarded heart, a poorly guarded thought life will affect the words that we speak, the things that we focus on, the plans that we make, and the decisions that we act on.

The words that we speak, the Bible in Proverbs 4 says, don't talk out of both sides of your mouth.

The things that we focus on, it says, keep your eyes straight ahead.

Ignore the sideshow distractions.

The plans that we make, it says, watch your step, and the road will stretch out smooth.

Pay attention to your plans and the decisions that we act on.

Look neither left nor right, leave evil in the dust.

I love that the impact of a well-guarded heart is gonna affect the words that I speak, the things that I focus on, the plans that I make, and the decisions that I'm acting on.

Isn't that so important in this season of uncertainty and unrest and global pandemic, right?

This is what we're being told and talked about in the news media every day, all day long.

You still have the ability with vigilance to guard your heart, to guard your thoughts and your will and your discernment.

Whether you believe in God or not, here's something that's true, okay?

Wherever you're at in this faith journey today, your life flows out of your heart.

Your life flows out of your thoughts, your will, your discernment, and your affections.

It flows out of your heart.

So, this big question, how do we keep a vigilant watch?

That's what I want to spend the next few minutes talking about.

I've got two thoughts basically as we look at the Bible and kind of fit take this apart for us practically today, as we think about being vigilantly watchful over our hearts.

Okay?

First thought is this take every thought captive.

Everyone quickly weighing and measuring every thought.

Take every thought captive.

Well, what if they're good?

Take it captive, anyways, just in case.

Is that even possible to take every thought captive?

How many thoughts do you think in a day?

Do you know?

Uh, I did some research on this, and it's a really hard science to nail down.

So it's there's lots of opinions, but it's tough to find accurate data.

It's believed that humans have somewhere between 20,000 and 70,000 thoughts per day.

Okay?

And it's probably on the upper end, 60 to 70,000 thoughts per day.

That means you're thinking every day, all day, throughout the day.

But 2 Corinthians 10 verse 5, it says this we demolish arguments and we demolish every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God by taking captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

2 Corinthians 10:5

I love that translation.

Take every thought captive to make it obedient to Christ.

So we take every thought, all 60 to 70,000 thoughts we're having while we're awake every day.

We take every thought captive and we choose to make it obedient to Jesus.

2 Corinthians 10, 5 in the message translation says we use our powerful God tools for smashing warped philosophies, tearing down barriers erected against the truth of God, fitting every loose thought and emotion and impulse into the structure of life shaped by Jesus.

We fit every loose thought, impulse, and emotion, again, the heart, our our thoughts, our emotions, our discernment.

We take every loose thought and we fit it against the structure of life that was shaped for us by Jesus Christ.

Take captive every loose thought, every scheme, not just the thoughts that we perceive to be bad or wrong, because what if bad or wrong isn't the issue?

It's actually just about recognizing our thought patterns and making sure that we're taking them captive in a way that they line up to obedience to Jesus, to the way of life that Jesus set out for us.

So every thought, think about it, you're thinking a thought, then what do we do?

We push pause, we examine that thought, we ask, is this thought obedient to the structure of the life that was shaped by Jesus?

And if yes, proceed.

And if no, then make that thought obedient to Jesus, which means you have to tear it down and replace it with something that is right and beautiful and true.

Paul's using the concept here in 1 Corinthians of taking prisoners of war.

When he's talking about taking thoughts captive, he's actually using the analogy of a POW.

But in this case, the prisoners held captive are faulty patterns of thought, faulty ones that defy God's authority in our lives.

We have to take them captive like prisoners of war if they're faulty thought patterns that defy the surrender and the authority of God the Father.

A vigilant watch over your thought life starts with recognizing each and every thought that's flooding your heart, and then honestly assessing whether or not those thoughts or patterns of thoughts are in line with God's authority or are they in defiance of God's authority?

Here's the amazing thing: every single person watching and listening to this message, this applies to all of us.

We all get to be the commander-in-chief over our thought life.

No one's gonna do that for you.

No one's gonna be able to do that for you.

No one's gonna be able to keep a vigilant watch over your heart.

You need to do this.

You need to rise up with a spirit of boldness and faith and assurance in who your Jesus is to take vigilant watch over your own heart.

So, how do we do that?

By taking every thought captive and quickly weighing and measuring it.

Here's an example.

Let's say that you think thoughts along the lines of, I'm worthless.

I'm worthless, I'm helpless, I'm unlovable.

And let's say you have a pattern of thinking that takes you down that narrative.

And these thoughts hit your brain where you believe that you're worthless and that you're unlovable, and that you're helpless.

Those thoughts are gonna impact you, according to Proverbs 4.

They're gonna impact the words that you speak about yourself, they're gonna impact the things that you focus on, they're gonna impact the plans that you make, and they're gonna impact the decisions that you act on.

If those thoughts aren't caught, put into like POW camp and replaced with something that's God's heart for you, those wrong thoughts are actually going to take you down a path of destruction.

They trap you in this cycle of distraction and distortion and pain, preventing you from ever recognizing the truth that you need to believe.

Most detrimentally, they actually change how you view God.

They actually impact what you feel about God, what you think and what you discern about God.

Every lie that we buy into about ourselves becomes rooted in what we believe to be true about God.

And so if you believe that you're worthless and unlovable, you can read in the Bible, like let's say you read Ephesians 1 and it talks about how God deeply loves you, how he chooses you, how he adopts you.

You're gonna read those words, but because you believe the lies, you're gonna say God chooses, loves, and adopts everybody except me.

This is nice and good, but it can't be about me.

And so the lies that we believe in our thought life, the lies of fear and the lies of anxiety, and the lies of self-destruction and the lies of self-doubt, they all impact actually how we view the Father.

Even if you don't outright deny the validity of God's words, you still doubt that they're true for you.

They might be true for everybody else, but you doubt they're truth for your own life.

You nod at the true words.

You're like, yes, those words sound great, but I'm still unlovable, and I'm still unworthy, and I'm still worthless, and I'm still whatever lies you've believed.

Until you throw off any thought that lies and says God's love isn't for you, until you throw off those thoughts, get rid of them, discard them, until you do, your emotions, your decisions, your behaviors, your actions, your relationships will all remain twisted up in the mistaken belief that you are helpless, worthless, and unlovable.

You have to be vigilantly mindful, take guard over your heart by taking every thought captive and quickly weighing and measuring it.

How do we do that?

Number two, compare each and every thought to the father's thoughts about you.

Compare each and every thought to the father's thoughts about you.

Who are you going to believe?

The creator or the created?

Who are you gonna believe?

You get to choose.

Some of you, even that thought I can see is just setting freedom loose in your life today.

You're like, what if I chose to believe the creator and what he says about me?

But how do we know what the creator says about me?

Ask him.

Spend time with him.

Create lots of space for God to input into your heart, for God's word and Christian community and the relationships with other people and the Spirit of God who's lives inside of you.

Create lots of room for that to speak to your heart, to your thoughts, and to your will, and to your discernment and to your feelings and emotions.

You have to create time.

But the heart of the father wants to make it clear.

I'll never forget when Julia was in grade three, she came home from school bawling, crying.

I was like, What happened?

And she says, Daddy, a boy told me I was ugly.

And I said, Sweetheart.

I got right down on my knees and I grabbed her shoulders and I got it right up into her face, and I said, Sweetheart, what does daddy say about you?

She's like, Well, you say that I'm beautiful.

And I'm like, You are, Julia.

You're absolutely beautiful.

You're gorgeous on the outside, but you're also beautiful on the inside.

Who are you gonna believe?

That stinky boy or your daddy?

I'm gonna believe you, daddy, right?

And that's actually God's heart.

God, when we believe a lie and we come to the Father and we say, God, I'm worthless, God, I'm unlovable, God, I'm broken, God, I'm fearful, God, I'm so anxious.

God says, wait a second, that's not what your daddy says about you.

Who are you gonna believe?

Are you gonna believe the creator or are you gonna believe the created?

Who are you going to believe?

Proverbs 4.

The verses we started out with, dear friend, listen well to my words.

This is God speaking to you.

Listen to my words, kids.

Tune your ears to my voice.

Keep my message, keep my truth in plain view at all times.

Concentrate, learn my words by heart, memorize the Bible.

Those who discover my words live, really live, body and soul.

They're bursting with health.

Maybe the reason I'm not bursting with health in my body or in my soul today is because I haven't been tuning my ear to the voice of the Creator.

I haven't been listening to the words of the Father.

I've been too busy, focused on my own thoughts and wrong thoughts that I haven't taken captive and replaced.

Who are you going to believe?

Philippians 4, verses 6 through 9.

Philippians 4:6–9

I love these verses.

Here's what it says: don't be pulled in different directions, or don't be worried about a thing.

Don't worry, right?

Um, little Bob Marley there.

Don't be worried about a thing.

Be saturated in prayer throughout each day.

That speaks to lots of time marinating and saturating in a prayer life focused on the king.

Be saturated in prayer throughout each day, offering your faithful requests before God with gratitude.

Tell him every detail of your life.

You can go to God with this, and then God's wonderful peace that transcends human understanding will make the answers known to you through Jesus.

So when we bring our stuff to God, By the life of Jesus and through the Spirit of God, the Father's voice wants to take those things and then turn them into his things for us.

Keep your thoughts continually fixed on all that is authentic and real, honorable and admirable, beautiful and respectful, pure and holy, merciful and kind.

There's the list.

Do you want to know if a thought is against the heart of God?

If I have the thought pattern, I'm helpless or I'm worthless or I'm lovable, all I need to say is, wait a second, is that thought authentic and real?

Well, it kind of feels like it.

Okay, move on.

Is it honorable and admirable?

No.

Is it beautiful and respectful?

No.

Is it pure and holy?

No.

Is it merciful and kind?

No.

Then it must not be from God.

And we we instantly go, okay, then if that thought, then I'm thinking and I'm feeling, right?

I love that it starts with that.

It starts with, is it authentic and real?

Well, I'm feeling it.

It feels kind of real.

But then we can go on and say, well, is it honorable and admirable?

No.

Well, then we can pause right there and go, this is a wrong thought that I need to put into POW camp and with vigilance guard my heart from believing this thought to be true.

This is how we take wrong thoughts captive, fastening our thoughts on every glorious work of God, praising him always, following the example of all that we have imparted to you, and the God of peace will be with you in all things.

Author and teacher Jenny Allen puts it this way, and I love this as we close out.

When we begin to think about our thoughts, oh, there's an idea.

Actually, think about the thoughts that you're having.

In this season of uncertainty, financial crisis, for lots of people, just the overall health and the fear that's attached to COVID-19.

Have you even paused to think about the thoughts that you're thinking?

That sounds ridiculous, but pause and begin to think about your thoughts.

Jenny Allen says, when we begin to think about our thoughts, perhaps for the first time, we can stop the downward downward spiral.

We can reset and redirect our thoughts.

That's our hope.

Not that we would wrestle each and every fear, but that we would allow God to take up so much space in our thinking that our fears will shrink in comparison.

There it is.

Not that we would wrestle each and every fear, but that we would allow God to take up so much space in our thinking that our fears just shrink away in comparison to God's heart for you.

Have you been keeping a vigilant watch over your heart?

It's time to get our heart on lockdown.

It's time to get our thoughts and our will and our discernment and our emotions on lockdown.

Protect those thoughts from becoming belief systems.

If they're wrong, discerning that, praying into that, exchanging it for something from God's heart that is true, locked down, protecting our hearts from these outside thoughts trying to break in, and then keeping God's beautiful truth locked away in our hearts so that it affects how we speak and affects how we live and affects how we behave and it affects what we're planning and what we're moving towards.

In light of our world's current events and minute by minute updates and changes, you are to take every thought captive, quickly weigh and measure every thought.

And in light of our world's current events and minute-by-minute updates, you are to compare each and every thought to the Father's thoughts about you.

Who are you going to believe?

The creator or the created?

Who are you going to believe?

We're going to take the next few weeks and keep talking about this.

I want to unpack it even further for you.

But I want to leave you with this quote from Jenny Allen.

Not that we would wrestle each and every fear, but that we would allow God to take up so much space in our thoughts that our fears just shrink away in comparison.

Are you allowing God to take up ample space in your thoughts?

Early on this week, I was in a funk.

I was disappointed.

I was sad.

I was mourning.

I was mourning the fact that I couldn't take my kids away for a time of rest, which we were really looking forward to.

And those thought patterns hit my heart as a bit of a pity party.

And I just wanted to stay there.

I just wanted to roll up in a ball and cry about it.

But God reminded me that he is my strength and my sufficiency in every season.

And God reminded me that he's invited me, alongside with our Evolved Church family, to be his voice, to be his beacon of hope and life and light in this season.

And that there'll be lots of time to rest down the road.

But what's required of me right now is to rise up in faith and continue to invite God to use my life to love and serve other people.

And so that's what I'm trying to do.

And I want you to do the same.

I want you to create enough space in your daily routine for God's thoughts, God's heart, God's truth from the Creator, from the Father to hit your heart and remind you of who you are and whose you are and what you were created for.

And just because you're under physical lockdown doesn't mean you have to stay in isolation.

You can continue to rise up, reach out, build relationships with other people, be involved in building church, be involved in small groups, be involved in resourcing mission, be involved in loving and serving.

Pick up a phone, call somebody, reach out.

If you need to be lifted up, let us know.

If you can help lift others, let us know.

But protect your heart with all vigilance.

Guard it.

Guard your thoughts, your will, your discernment, your emotions with all vigilance.

Because out of your heart, so goes your life.

Let's pray.

God, thank you so much for your words today.

Thank you that we can gather around in homes, in businesses, in apartments, in condos, and we can take time to focus on you.

God, we want our thoughts to be so full of your heart and your truth that our fears shrink away in comparison.

We want our heart, our thoughts and our will and our discernment, we want it to be so preoccupied with your voice, with your love, with your truth, that no lie will stand a chance.

And where we've believed lies to be true, and where that's impacted how we feel about you, we've believed the lie that you're distant, God, and so that's how we see you.

We believe the lie that your love isn't for me, and so that's how we see you.

Holy Spirit, would you break through those lies today?

Would you allow the heart and the voice of the Creator to impact the created today?

Would you allow the voice of the Father to bring hope and encouragement and strength in life to your sons and daughters today?

Jesus, we invite you into this season of our life and we ask that you would take up space, more space, than any fear, any worry, any doubt, any lie, any wrong thought that we need to take captive today.

We ask in Jesus' name, Amen.

Amen.

Thank you so much for listening to today's message.

If you're ever in the Edmonton area, pop by for a visit.

And if you need any more information, visit Evolvechurch.com.

We hope to see you soon.