Pastor Malachi Maillot | Truth or Trash | August 9, 2026

Well, good morning.

We're gonna go right to Timothy, okay?

Uh 1 Timothy 4.

When you're there, say I'm there.

Fear of you, wait a minute.

First Timothy four, uh verses one to eight.

I'm just gonna start with this passage of scripture.

We're gonna pray, we're gonna get into it.

And this is Paul uh speaking to Timothy.

He's writing a letter to Timothy, and I would say that this letter is like an encouragement and a warning in the same breath.

And so he says this in verse one.

It says, Now the Spirit expressively says that in the later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and the teaching of demons.

Verse 2 says, Through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared, those people who forbid marriage require absence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.

Verse 4 says, Everything created by God is good.

Someone say, God is good?

God is good.

You guys got it.

I tried to trick you.

It says, Nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer.

Verse 6 says, If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Jesus, being trained in the words of faith and of good doctrine that you have followed.

Now, some of us uh need this next verse more than others.

Have nothing to do with irrev irrev irrelevant, sorry, silly myths.

Rather, train yourself for godliness.

Someone say, train yourself for godliness.

Nud your neighbor.

Say, start training.

We're gonna explain what that means.

For for while bodily training is of some value, so going to the gym is okay, it's not a sin, right?

It's good for us, but it says godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life now and the life to come.

So I'm gonna pray and I'm gonna get into what all this means.

So could you just bow your heads with me and we're just gonna pray?

Father, I just thank you so much for your word.

God, it is so relevant today as it was then.

God, that something could be written thousands of years ago and we could pull something so true and so applicable for our life today.

God, would you help us and speak to us this morning?

Someone say, Holy Spirit, speak to me this morning.

Holy Spirit, help me to hear your voice.

Holy Spirit, I'm ready to learn.

In Jesus' mighty name, someone say, Amen.

Amen.

Hey, give your neighbor a high five.

Tell them you're so glad they came to church.

Thank you, worship team.

I do have to say this, I have to gas up the worship team.

You get we have the best worship team, not gonna lie.

I think that's okay to say.

That's okay to say.

That's a great department of our church to be really excellent, right?

Is the worship ministry.

But you guys are awesome, so thank you so much.

Um, okay, so I have I'm back to my analogy days.

If you uh have ever listened to me preach, I like to show a lot.

And so actually, I have uh a need of my friend Ben.

Can we just give it up for Ben?

Newly engaged Ben.

Uh he's got a fresh haircut and a mullet.

Uh actually, Rebecca, if you could grab something out of my bag in the in the big container.

I also need uh my other good friend Matheson.

Where's Maddie?

Maddie, hey, good they can't miss him.

He's really big and tall.

Um, okay, so I need Maddie to come up on the stage.

This is this is kind of what we do in youth.

Is this okay?

It's you're gonna get a little taste of what youth ministry is like.

Is that okay?

Okay, so Ben, you're gonna stay down here.

Maddie, you're gonna come up, you're gonna come up to me.

Love your shirt.

Love the shirt.

Prayer works.

Love it.

Actually, if you could if you could just blindfold Ben for me, please.

No, I I mean I don't know actually.

I've never tried it.

You might want to double it up.

This is this is out of the costume bin, okay.

Uh it was the biggest uh blindfold I could find.

Okay, so we're gonna blindfold Ben.

Sorry, online church, if this is really confusing.

Uh, and then there's not a lot of context for this, but uh, I need everyone's help in this little demonstration, okay?

So um, Ben, Ben, you're gonna you're gonna kind of represent people in general, okay?

And Maddie, you're gonna represent the Holy Spirit, okay?

He's big and buff and he's strong and tough, and uh, but um your goal is to guide Ben across the church to the back of the room, okay?

But you can only whisper, okay?

Because because God's voice is a still small voice, right?

Like a whisper.

And so, and and everybody in this room, your job, and I need you to represent what would be like the world, okay?

Just don't like don't take it too seriously, all right?

Um, your job is to lead Ben astray, okay?

Your job is to tell him where the door is not, all right?

So I need everybody's help in this, and so we it's it's gonna get loud, and again, I'm sorry, online church, if you're watching and it's oh yeah, well yeah, we're gonna spin them.

Yeah, we are gonna spin them.

Thank you, Natalie.

You know, the detail-oriented Natalie's like, he's gonna know.

Um, okay, so Maddie, you're gonna spin them around.

Not that that's the Holy Spirit's job is to confuse us, but just for the sake of Natalie's suggestion, keep spinning them.

All right, so when I say I'm gonna go three, two, one, go, and your job is again, you're gonna lead Ben astray, okay?

And the world can be loud, right?

The world is very loud.

There's lots of voices, there's lots of opinions, there's lots of lies, there's lots of craziness that happens in the world.

So again, your job is to lead Ben astray, and Maddie, I'm sorry, dude.

You just gotta whisper to Ben and try to get him to the back, okay?

Three, two, one, let's go.

He's doing pretty good.

Come on, a little bit louder, world, a little bit louder.

This is the only time you get to yell in church.

He's really trying.

All right, we're gonna stop him there.

We're gonna stop him there.

We're gonna stop him there.

We can take the blind defold off, Benny.

You did pretty good.

Hey, can we just give it up for Ben and for Maddie?

You can keep that.

Thank you, buddy.

Love you.

Oh, that was awkward.

Okay, I love you.

Thank you so much for being a part of that.

Uh, I just wanted to show you, and oh, you kind of got a little bit of a picture of that, but I just wanted to show uh just a picture.

And I think pictures really help us to remember things, but this is really a picture of life, right?

If we're really honest, it's a picture of someone trying to follow Jesus in a very, very secular world, right?

As we're just we're kind of like just kind of like going blind almost, where we're just taking one step at a time, one step at a time, and and we're really trying to listen to that voice, that still small voice in a very loud, distracting world, right?

You guys gotta get a little picture of that.

Like everyone, uh everyone is talking at the same time, everyone is sharing their advice at the same time, everyone is sharing their opinions.

You should do this, you should do that, you should do things this way, this is the right way to do it, or this is the right way to do it.

And and and that's really the reality of our world, right?

Like everyone is everyone is talking over each other, everyone's trying to get their opinion.

And and the question is not, you know, who is the loudest, because we heard who is the loudest in the room, right?

Uh the question is not who sounds the most confident, right?

Because you can sound confident and be completely incorrect, right?

And it's it's not even the the people that maybe sound like an expert, right?

The door is definitely over there, right?

100% the door is over there, but it's not over there, right?

And and it's not about who's the loudest, it's literally the question is whose voice are you trained to recognize?

Right?

In a very loud, distracting world, whose voice have you trained yourself to recognize?

Now Maddie knows Ben really well.

Well, in the last couple years, right?

And so, and you could probably think, like, if uh out of out of the whole crowd, Ben should be able to pick out Maddie's voice because again, if he's trained to recognize Maddie's voice, he's gonna hear it through all of the calamity.

Right?

And so the truth is this the truth is every single person in this room, uh, whether you're young or what the Bible likes to say is advanced in age, like me, right?

Like whether you're young or old, doesn't matter.

Everyone in this room is being shaped a certain way.

You are being shaped and formed in a certain way.

Maybe, maybe as you get older, less shaping and less forming, but you're still, there's, there's still a constant forming that goes through on throughout our life.

Everything we listen to, everything we watch, especially at a younger age, that's why I'm really trying not to give my kid an iPad.

Uh, and it's just like you just kind of survive through the the restaurant times, like like just don't whine me.

I'm just not giving my kid an iPad.

But like every video, every like like she started watching Bluey.

I don't know if that was like a bad idea, because now it's like every day she's like, Yui, Ui, Ui, Ui, please, please, please.

I'm like, oh my gosh, how do I say no?

But it's like everything is forming us, right?

Everywhere we look, every video we watch, every podcast we we we we consume, or like even just people, you talking to people, we consume the news, there's all these things, every voice around us is trying to form our way we think, right?

It's trying to form us, and and ultimately it begins to start forming us in a way uh of our theology, right?

It forms the way we think about God, it forms the way we think about the world.

And the problem is not that it's not that we're being influenced, right?

Because being shaped and formed is a normal thing, right?

We're supposed to be shaped and formed in a certain way.

Most of what tries to shape and form you is a lie.

Right?

Most of what tries to come in is is misinformation.

What's what most of what tries to come in is trying to lead you away from getting to the back door, right?

Um, Matthew Henry, he's a great uh guy to read.

He he's uh he does commentary on on scripture, and he says this he says, false teachers don't just make things up out of nowhere, they reframe things as dangerous, or they or they treat optional things as a requirement.

And so they don't make like a false teacher or someone who's trying to lead you astray, or someone who's trying to get their point across, and it's and it may sound like there's like a little bit of truth in it, but it often ends up being a lie.

There's a there's a there's a saying that says uh a good lie has a little bit of truth in it.

And sometimes it's it's just enough truth to have you believe it.

Right?

So false teachers aren't just making up random nonsense, they're reframing things to to make it seem like it's a certain way.

And so the reality for us, and this is where I want to kind of come to land uh through Timothy and what this letter is talking about, if we aren't being shaped by the word of God, we're being shaped by something else.

It's kind of like this saying that I I think I I explained this uh in a different sermon.

If you're not moving actively towards God, you are actively moving away from him.

If you're not actively pushing and moving towards God, you are dr you are essentially like you're you're being pushed another way.

And it's the same thing.

If we aren't being shaped by God's word, we're gonna be shaped by all these other things.

We're gonna be formed by all these other things.

Our thinking, the way we act, the way we talk, the way we the way we rationalize things, we're going to be formed by everything around us.

And so coming back to uh 1 Timothy.

So Timothy, he he's awesome.

He's a young pastor, okay?

He's uh he's pastoring the church of Ephesus, and Tim and Paul is like his spiritual dad.

You could say that.

He's a mentor, he's he's helping him uh through this difficult task of pastoring this church in Ephesus.

And and he writes Timothy this letter, uh, and uh he's again he's encouraging him, but he's also warning him.

He's encouraging him, but he's also warning him.

He encourages Timothy, but he warns him, hey, you need to protect the flock against all this false teaching.

You need to protect against lies.

And there's and he says, he says there there are people that are going to walk away from the faith because of this very thing.

He says there's people literally walking away from God because of what he calls teaching of demons, liars, false teaching, misleading information.

And the the first point I want to I want to kind of bring out of this, uh, and and you can say this with me, is point number one, reject the false.

All right, let's try that again.

Reject what is false.

All right, now you remember it.

So 1 Timothy 4, 1, 2, I'm just gonna read it again.

Now the Spirit expressively says that in the later days, some will depart from the faith because they've devoted themselves to deceitful spirits and the teaching of demons.

This comes through liars whose consciences have been seared.

Now, again, now Paul states there's people gonna in the last days, there's gonna be people walking away from the faith.

And how many know that's so true?

Like in your life, I look at my life, and and I I'm astonished at the amount of people that I've you know walked through life with and they've walked away from the faith.

There was people, and my wife will know who I'm talking about, there's people in my life who who I thought their faith was greater than mine, and they ended up walking away from God.

And they're in a place right now that actually grieves my heart because I looked up to them as like spiritual mentors.

And it's like you'd think, like, I wouldn't have thought in a million years that person would have walked away.

But what happened, and it wasn't this like big moment, right?

Oftentimes it's never this like big catastrophic moment in their life.

It's like this slow dripping that happens.

It's like these slow, these small little movements, these small little compromises that come into our life, or this small little like, I'm just gonna listen to this a little bit, or I'm just gonna watch this a little bit, just for curiosity's sake.

And what ends up happening is these little moments, time after time, they start to wear away at somebody.

And as we let those things in, they continue to wear.

It's like that small drip.

I don't know if you've seen that uh that picture of like the water dripping on a rock in like I don't know if it's like science world, and you can see like the erosion, like it's just a small little thing that drips over time, and it's these small little adjustments in our life, and eventually we're way off course.

It's not often a big moment.

Giving attention to the wrong voices, giving room for for for like you could say false teaching and not actually checking uh what like checking with your Bible to say if it's if it's true or not, right?

And if you listen to the lie long enough, you start to believe it.

If you listen to the lie long enough, you start to believe it.

And this idea of what Paul can he talks about their conscience is seared, right?

This idea of uh a conscience being seared is people that no longer know that they're in the wrong.

Right?

Everyone has a conscience, right?

You you you you are kind of born with this conscience, and you and it kind of it kind of gets shaped and formed as you're growing up.

If I if if Vienna like hits me in the face, right, she doesn't quite exactly know if it's wrong, but she's beginning to realize, hey, don't touch this, don't touch like she's getting a conscience, and things are she's starting to to to realize things that are are not okay to do, right?

And as we get older, those things get stronger.

Like we all know it's not okay to run a red light, right?

We all yeah, all right, we're going back to driving school.

Um we all know that it's not okay to murder somebody, right?

Like we just and we know that it's our conscience, it's our like we know, like we know it's not okay to steal, we know it's not okay to hit our sister.

Like it's we we know these things.

And how do we know them by that little feeling that we all get, right?

Or that little voice that says, Don't do that, right?

It's it's that little piece of our conscience that's speaking to us, and we're we're we're all built with that.

But if I continue, and this was this is what happens, and I would say that this is what's happened in our world, is if we continue to ignore that feeling or that knowing or that nudging in our heart, if we continue on sinning and we continue to keep rejecting that, it actually, the Bible says our conscience will be seared.

And it's kind of a scary spot to be because uh if you continue to ignore that little voice that tells you, hey, hey, stop doing that, or or go this way, or don't go that way.

We continue to ignore it, it actually says that we're we'll we won't actually know that we're doing something wrong.

Right?

And it's kind of a scary thought because and I and I think that looking at our world right now, not to be like a bummer, okay, but I I look at our world and I think that's what it's come to because it's it's it's you look at this place and you look at culture and it's like logicless and moraless, because it's people that have been just rejecting that conscience inside of them, right?

It says it says that morality is written on the heart of man.

Whether you are saved or not, like God wrote what is like how do I know what's right and wrong?

Because it's written upon my heart by God.

He designed us to know what's right and wrong to try to discern, and and it's and it's this constant pushing uh that voice aside, it's constant pushing against that where consciences are seared, and we live in a very logicless, more moralist civilization.

So Paul goes on, he says uh in 1 Timothy 4 7, he has nothing, have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths.

And so I was thinking about this, and I I talked about this in youth ministry, and like obviously like social media is a big thing, but like any sort of like amount of internet scrolling, whether whatever you look at, whatever you kind of like uh like watch, it's gonna start to create like an algorithm for you, right?

Like it's your it's called the feed, it's what's feeding you.

And so if you watch some Christian content, it's probably gonna pull some Christian content for you, right?

If you watch stuff about the news, it's gonna pull all these different things for you.

And so as you're scrolling through the internet, whatever, you know, whatever you use, if you use Instagram or use anybody use like YouTube, any YouTubers, Facebook, anything, uh, like any sort of content on the internet, like we're going to scroll through, and you're most likely gonna come across like some Bible teaching on the internet, right?

Have you ever like you've ever experienced that before?

And I think I think there's so much, again, it's kind of like the analogy at the beginning, where there's so many different voices that we that we see on the internet, right?

And and it's like it's like it doesn't really matter how confident they are.

It doesn't really matter if it sounds true.

Some of it can be like, it can sound convincing, but we have to be really, really careful.

Okay, so you could be scrolling through and something could sound true when we watch it, we're like, oh, I never thought of it that way.

And and all of a sudden, it's like that small little drip.

It might sound like they're telling you the truth, like there's this, there's these these words that they use where it's like, I I you know, I I I tend to get myself into trouble because I try to like not engage with the comments on like Instagram specifically, but you you you know, you go through these videos and and it's like, oh, in the 19th century, they added this word.

So this was like added into the Bible after, or you know, you don't really need to go to church to be a Christian.

You ever heard that before?

Right?

Like there's people arguing for these points, or like, you know, Jesus was just all about social justice, right?

And you you have these like kind of like hooks, and people say them, and you're like, I don't know if that's like fully true, and they use scripture to back it up, and it's this really scary place to get to because we have all this, again, all this information, and it and it sounds good, but how do we know it's true?

Right?

And and here's what I'll say not every spiritual opinion deserves your attention.

Not every spiritual opinion deserves your attention.

We need to, here's what I'm gonna say.

We need to learn how to discern what is, I'm gonna say trash, right?

What we need to throw out, what is what is garbage, what we tune out, what we What we throw away, and we need to discern what is true.

What we build our life upon.

Right?

What we settle on.

What we hold fast to, what we let actually form our thinking.

Because again, not every spiritual opinion deserves our attention.

I think it can be so it's so easy just to like, I'm scrolling through and I'm and I'm watching good content.

And it's like, okay, have I checked in with what the Word of God says to what they're saying?

I might rant here because I was watching this clip, and it actually some of my youth leaders know because I've been ranting about this for months.

Um and it really bothered me because it's so misleading how some people can say this.

And and it and again, as as your influence grows, the more people listen to you and the more your the your your voice matters, right?

And so these were people on this podcast.

Okay, I'm not gonna say which podcast it was, you can go find it for yourself.

But uh it irked me in such a way that it because it because it affects like what I kind of deal with in in youth ministry specifically.

And and they went on to say, and I and I understand kind of what they were trying to say, but I think it's this idea, there's this really like I would say a fad, but it's kind of like say like big blanket statements and just say that, oh, it just evolves everything and and there's no nuance to it.

But but the uh the person on there, they were talking about like the ambition of people and the ambition of men specifically, and I can understand why they were getting to it, but they said something along the lines are like, yeah, pornography and video games are in the same category.

And I literally I wanted to throw my like I wanted to punch the screen because I was so mad.

I was like, do you not understand what you just said?

You're saying that that pornography and video games have the same effect on people.

And I was literally like, I was like, I don't understand how someone could say that with such confidence and such conviction in their heart, and there's no and there's no room for nuance, and this is kind of what I'm talking about.

We have to be so careful with what we consume, and we also have to be really careful what we say, because I just imagine a teenager who's like playing Fortnite.

You know what I mean?

Like, like who plays Fortnite?

Anybody?

There's a come on.

I know you do, Caden, I know you play a little bit.

He's like, me, no, liar.

Um I play Fortnite, okay?

Once in a while.

Exposed.

But it's like if some some kid that's watching this video, and like all of a sudden, he just he just feels this immense shame because he's playing a video game.

Right?

And and not knowing, like, to to say that out loud and not knowing the effects of what pornography does to you, it's like saying that that sugar and cocaine are in the same category.

Like I'm not kidding.

Like you see someone drinking a Coke, be like, oh, you're gonna die.

Like, okay.

Okay, if he drinks a lot of it, maybe.

Right?

And there's there's there's the new like you have to have nuance in those conversations.

And this is what I'm talking about the misinformation, and again, like very prominent voices in the church culture saying these things online for everybody to hear and everybody to see and to start, and it's like, well, they said this earlier, and this was really good, and I actually live my life this way, and now all of a sudden they're saying like video games and porn are in the same category, so I need to like I need to like throw out my whole like I need to throw my TV out, and we have this like really big extremism culture, right?

You see how I'm going with this?

It's it can be really dangerous.

And specifically for for younger minds who are being formed like this, all of a sudden it's like, whoa, like video games, this is crazy.

I should never play a video game in my life again.

Now I'm not saying that you know addiction to video games is a good thing, right?

Anything in excess can hurt you.

Water can kill you.

Right?

I always bug my mom because I I like drinking Diet Cokes, and she's like, that's gonna kill you.

I'm like, mom, like, you have to drink this much?

You know, I explained the math to her.

But it's like you drink enough water, it'll kill you.

Right?

So why are we saying these crazy blanket statements, especially when there's young people watching?

Because like maybe you and me would be like, that's crazy.

Like that's a stupid statement.

But what it actually angered me because it's like it's people that have these influences.

And again, if we're like we're called to be ambassadors of Christ.

Right?

We're called to be the voices in a very dark and evil world.

We're called to be the light.

And so our voices matter, and what we say matters.

What we say matters, especially on public platforms.

And so we I just ranted, I'm so sorry.

But again, coming back to that that idea of like just because someone sounds confident doesn't mean it's true.

Right?

And like the people on the podcast were like, oh yeah, yeah, amen, amen.

I'm like, there's no way.

Just because it's confident doesn't mean it's true.

Just because there's a Bible verse on the screen doesn't mean that that it actually correlates.

And just because it sounds spiritual doesn't mean it's from God.

Right?

Not every spiritual opinion needs your attention, and it's not always theology, right?

Like fear sells.

Anyone know that fear sells?

Right?

I was, you know, I had to expose my wife, but she was watching this video, she sent it to me, and it's like this guy going to the grocery store.

You ever see that?

He's like, Can't eat this, can't eat that, can't eat this, can't eat that.

There's plastics in this, and there's this is gonna kill you, and this is gonna make you infertile.

And it's like, and it's just that's the internet, that's the content that's on the internet, and it's and it c what does it do to you?

It causes anxiety and fear, and it's like, oh, I need to throw it all my tubware, which we literally did.

Costco loves us right now, okay?

Again, there's there needs to be nuance in it, right?

Maybe there is bad stuff in it, but again, but but if I'm just if I'm just here's it, here's my point.

If I'm just solely getting my feed, if it's just feeding me, right?

If that's my feed and it's just cont and that's all I'm eating, then what's gonna happen?

I'm just gonna be a fearful, anxious person.

But instead, what does the Bible say?

What does the Bible say?

Isaiah 54, 17, no weapon that is fashioned against you shall succeed.

Right?

First wow, Thessalonians 3.

But the Lord is faithful and he will strengthen and protect you from the evil one.

I'm not saying go jump off a bridge, okay?

But if if all you can like, I think they they said something about like Annie's mac and cheese, the healthy one, right?

They were saying, like, oh, now it's run by this big corporation, don't eat Annie's mac and cheese.

I'm like, don't take Annie's from my daughter, please.

But if I only have enough money to buy KD, right?

And I need to eat, right?

And it's like, oh, don't eat that, it's poison.

Okay, well you you see what I'm saying?

Like, but but again, again, coming back to that, if that's all your content is, and that's all that your feed is feeding you, what happens to you?

Right?

What's what is shaping you?

What is forming you?

What is what is uh dictating what you think and how you feel.

My last point on that is if you do not know the word of God, you will be easily misled.

If you do not know the word of God, you will be easily misled.

So number one is reject what is false.

Number two, train in what is true, and it rhymes to remember it.

Train in what is true.

Say that with me.

Train in what is true.

Paul tells Timothy, you know, he doesn't just say, like, avoid this and and and stay away from that.

He actually gives him something to do.

He says, rather train yourself for godliness.

Don't just avoid the bad teaching, don't just warn people to stay away.

But he says, train yourself in what is true.

He doesn't say just Timothy, like, shut the doors of the church, like hide in your room, stay away from all this stuff that's happening outside.

Pornography and video games are the same thing, like just avoid everything that doesn't have a little cross on it.

Like, he doesn't tell Timothy to do that.

He says, rather train yourself into what is true.

Train yourself so you know what is garbage and what is good.

Train yourself in godliness so you know how to discern what is trash and what is truth.

What I throw away and what I build my life on.

Right?

Don't just avoid the world.

That's not what he's telling us to do.

Don't avoid it.

Train yourself so you can discern what you let form you in your surroundings.

McLaren, uh, another commentator, he says this, and it's I just thought it was really, really good.

Uh he calls this passage uh the spiritual athletics.

If you want to go look up his commentary, it's McLaren's commentary on 1 Timothy.

He calls this the spiritual athletics.

And he makes us point about what godliness is, and it has three floors.

And I thought this was just awesome and just a really uh easy way for us to understand it.

So floor one is what we believe, right?

Our creed, our doctrine, uh, our understanding of why you believe what you believe.

So when you're having a conversation and you and you're and you hear someone like and their theology and they're like talking about how Jesus, you know, Jesus isn't divine or Jesus isn't God, and your ears kind of perk up.

Like it's it's ingrained in what you believe and why you believe it.

Number two, uh number floor or floor number two is what you feel, like your emotions.

Uh, in worship this morning, you probably felt like an emotion, like an emotional response towards the music.

And here's the thing God loves us to experience physical emotion.

Right?

It's not just all about head knowledge.

Like we talked about that a few weeks ago.

Like he doesn't want us just to know, right, the Bible back to front.

He wants us to experience him emotionally.

And that's what what uh worship does so so well.

We we get into this place and we're we're we're moved like emotionally.

It's on a physical level.

When when the Holy Spirit uh came in Acts 2 and He came upon the apostles, there was there was wind, right?

Like you could feel it.

It was a it was a tangible experience.

So God doesn't want us to to to get away from the the the emotional part of it, but it can't be everything, right?

And so floor number three is where we kind of bring it all together is what you do.

So you have what you believe, what you feel, and what you do about it.

Your daily conduct, your actual life.

Where these are where where what you believe and what you feel, they collide, right?

And it pushes you to the place of actually doing something about your faith.

Right?

You know, like the demons know who Jesus is.

Right?

But they don't have a relationship with him.

So that's where the two collide, where I believe the words of Jesus, I believe in who he says he is, and I and I and I experience him through his word and through worship and through the communion of the saints, and I and I then on floor three I live that out in my faith in a real way.

The problem is I think most of us tend to live on floor two because it's the nicest.

Right?

It's not tough.

We come into this place, like I said, we have an amazing worship team.

They curate this whole atmosphere for us to not have distractions, right?

And we we we we come into this place and we have this emotional experience, and some of us just leave it there.

Again, the feelings are not a bad thing, but they exist to bring us to floor number three, to where we actually get to live our faith out, outside of these walls, and our daily Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.

You guys with me?

Belief and emotion are meant to move us into action.

I'm almost done, I'm gonna invite the worship team.

But Paul uses this word train, not try, not feel, but train.

And that word is it's like athletic discipline.

And I I I think about like an athlete doesn't just show up to the game expecting to win.

Right?

The athlete from Monday to Friday is training daily discipline, watching what he eats, watching what he's eating, watching his feed, right?

And training daily, constantly, repeatedly.

And so for us, when we train in the truth, when we train ourselves into godliness, and it says, if you know the truth, it will set you free, right?

The knowledge of the truth in our hearts.

And if and if you know the truth, and you train in the truth, you're gonna know how to spot a lie.

So how do we avoid being spiritually confused?

It's simple.

Train daily in his word.

Train daily in his word.

Again, Paul doesn't just tell Timothy what to avoid, he gives him some action points.

And so I just want to give you just three quick action points, and we're just gonna get into a time of worship and then close in prayer.

But here's three moves.

Number one, someone say this with me, audit your feet.

You can also tag on this, be discerning, learn to discern.

And I think again, coming back to that truth, like something is training me, something is forming me, constantly forming me.

And if it's not God's word, something else is coming in and forming me.

And maybe it's not just like you know, media and your phone, but maybe it's like the people that you're surrounded by.

You know, maybe it's actually truly trusted people or people that you've you know been friends with for a long time, and and it's time to just come down to a place where we actually audit what we're intaking.

Audit what I'm eating.

Right?

If I'm just drinking Diet Coke for you know, breakfast, lunch, and dinner, I should I have a problem, okay?

Even though I love Diet Coke.

But it's it's just like it's like, okay, do I need to like do a 180 adjustment, or do I need to cut out Diet Coke in the morning and the afternoon and then have have it you know once in a while for dinner?

Okay, that I can do that.

But it's like, what in what in your life do you need to start adjusting?

Right?

And maybe it's not like this 180, like, wow, and I'm eating junk food every single day.

I'm using the analogy of food because it makes sense, okay?

But what am I intaking?

What is my feed?

Am I just like watching reels of this dude in the grocery store telling us what not to eat and like Annie's mac and cheese is no longer on the menu?

Like, is that what we're doing?

And we're just filling ourselves with fear and frustration?

Are we are we we angry all the time?

Are we just angry at what's happening in the world?

Instead of when we're like, okay, I'm angry, I'm gonna go to the word, and I'm gonna begin to let that become my feed.

We have this uh saying in in our youth ministry, uh, scripture before the scroll.

Scripture before the scroll.

It's where I'm gonna, I'm gonna, the first thing I do in the morning, I'm gonna go to my Bible instead of Instagram.

And insert whatever that is for you in there.

Scripture before the scroll.

And I would say this week, I would say today, you know, ask yourself to ask yourself honestly, what do I need to audit in my life?

What do I need to audit about the intake of my life?

Number two, start training.

Start today.

It's never too late.

You know, I had a friend, I was really struggling to go to the gym.

He's like, it's never too late to get in the gym.

I'm like, it's too late, it feels too late.

It's never too late.

Just get yourself a gym partner.

I got I go to the gym with Maddie once in a while and Aaron, and it's like they show up, and I can't not get into the gym.

Right?

So start training today.

You don't need a two-hour quiet time with God to start.

What you want to do is you want to work your way up to that to where it's it's talking with him all day.

I remember Pastor Dave, he was talking on one of our podcasts.

He says, prayer is 99% listening.

So he he says, I'm listening all day.

And I'm praying all day long.

That's why Paul talks about how we we should never cease to pray.

Like pray without ceasing.

And it's in it and it's that idea of I'm just in a space where I'm 24-7, I'm trying to listen to the Holy Spirit and commune with him.

Now you don't start there because that seems like impossible.

What you do is you start with one, pick a pick a time, pick a place, pick a chapter.

Just start today.

Whether you just need to like, you need to get someone to like have a Bible study with you, but train in his word, because again, you will be misled very easily if you do not know the word of God.

And remember those three floors, right?

Don't just feel your faith, don't just stay on floor two.

We build it, we build it, we live it, and we let it move us into a place where we have, we have, we, we go to God's word and we we get an understanding of what we believe, and we we experience Him and we let it move us into action.

And so my challenge for you is start today.

Find a time, scripture before the scroll.

And the third is what we're doing today.

This is why church is so important, but get accountable, get around people that know God's word.

Get around people that are gonna help you.

Get around people, don't do this life on your own.

Like you're here today at church, and that's awesome, but don't let it just stop here.

Don't just like rip out the door after and like go introvert.

Set up a coffee time this week.

If you're like, if you're in a place, and I wanna I don't want to say this, if you're in a place where you're like, you are like you want to know more about God, you know, call Norm, okay?

I'm just gonna get his number on the screen.

I'm kidding.

But I'm serious, like talk he will he will set up a time for you.

Maybe not everybody, okay?

Let's not all, but do you know what I mean?

Like, get around people.

Bug Pastor Brody, okay?

Not too much though.

But don't let it stop here.

And and and maybe and maybe you know, audit the feed, but audit your community.

You know, if you're if you're in a community that is like that is kind of pulling you away from church opposed to pushing you towards him, man, you need to audit that amount of time that you spend with those people.

I'm not saying cut them off.

Maybe it is a cut them off.

But it's it's getting into a place where you're surrounded by people who want to push you towards him.

And you and you're and that's why church, it's like it's like you we build each other up on a Sunday, we stir each other up, we encourage each other, we walk with each other.

It's not about walking alone.

Right?

So this week, if you don't have a community, find somebody.

One person here.

Like just come up and we'll we'll walk together.

Amen.

I'm just gonna pray for us and I'm just gonna um maybe just invite us just to stand.

We're just gonna uh respond this morning in a in a song of worship.

And and I want to just encourage you again, like out of those three things, maybe, maybe one of those things or something you need to work on.

Maybe it's auditing your feed today.

Maybe it's auditing what is your intake, maybe it's like an adjustment.

God, I need to, I need to put you back into the priority of my life.

Maybe for you, it's like I need this need to start somewhere.

And it needs to be like a verse a day or a chapter a day.

I need to pick a time and I'm gonna set that in stone.

And maybe some of you are just lacking community.

And I wouldn't just encourage you during this worship time, just ask God where He where He wants to work on you.

And I would just ask you to close your eyes.

I'm just gonna pray and we're gonna get into some worship for a moment.

So, Father, I just thank you so much for this morning.

I thank you for your word.

God, it is convicting.

God, it is like a sword to our flesh.

And God, wherever we need to adjust, Father, would you just reveal that this morning?

As all eyes are closed and heads are bowed in this moment, would you just, Holy Spirit, reveal what needs to be adjusted in our life?

God, let us not be the people, like in 1 Timothy that Paul's talking about, that walk away from the faith because we get distracted.

Let us not be the people that walk away from the faith because we we start listening to the wrong voices.

God, let us be the ones in 1 Timothy that train in godliness and know the truth and know what is garbage and what is true.

Not to puff ourselves up, but God to walk in a way that you would want us to walk.

God walking away as ambassadors of you, so that when people look at us, they know that we're solid.

And we can be a place where people come to if they have questions, if they have concerns, if they just need prayer.

God, let us be a church like that.

Father, whatever you need to do today, just as the song we were singing this morning, let your Holy Spirit do what he wants to do.

Let him remove things that he wants to remove.

Let him put things in place that he wants to put in place.

Call us out.

Not to shame us, God, but to convict us in the way that you want us to live.

If it's a small adjustment, let it be a small adjustment.

If it's a 180, God, help us to 180 this morning.

God, let us just respond to you in this time of uh worship as we have in this next few minutes.

Father, would you just speak to us, Father, in Jesus' mighty name?

Let's just worship for a moment.