Transforming the Mind for God’s Glory to Shine | Unbroken: Healing Minds and Mending Hearts | Pastor Exikha Santise

So this message today is for anyone that has been battling in

the mind.

This message today is for those that has laid up in bed at

night searching and stressing and replaying every what if, every

what went wrong, every what will happen next.

This message is for the believer who wants to break cycles,

not just spiritual ones, but emotional cycles, generational cycles,

and mental cycles that keep you from becoming who God said you

are.

So today I come to declare that your mind belongs to God.

Are you ready to press in?

Amen.

So I'm going to be reading from Luke chapter 11, verses 33 to

Luke 11:33–36

36.

No one lights a lamp and puts it in a place where it will be hidden

under a pole.

And instead they put it on its stand so that those who come in may

see the light.

Your eye is the lamp of your body.

When your eye is healthy, your whole body is full of light.

But when it is bad, your body is full of darkness.

See to it then that the light within you is not darkness.

Therefore, if your whole body is full of light and no part of it

dark, it will be just as full of light as when a lamp shines its

light on you.

We thank the Lord for His Word bringing us to my first point.

My first point today is perception is a spiritual warfare

issue.

Perception is a spiritual warfare issue.

See, Jesus said your eye is the lamp of your body.

So your eye is not just your natural vision, it's also your spiritual

lens.

Your perception is how you interpret what's happening around

you.

In psychology, we call this cognition.

The thoughts you think is the way you interpret reality.

In cognitive behavioral therapy, what it teaches us is that

the thoughts affect how you feel and your feelings affect how

you behave.

And as believers, we take it further because it's not just about

thinking positive or developing coping skills based on

your positive thinking, but it's about taking every thought captive

and having deliverance in our mind.

So like I said, it's not just thinking positive, but your perception

must be aligned with the Word of God.

Because if our mental representation is inaccurate, then

that means that your emotions and your behavior aren't disordered.

So I must align my thoughts to the Word of.

Yes, I must know the Word of.

And to know the Word of God, I must commit to studying and reading

the Word of God.

I must also make the decision to go deeper into the Word of God.

And for those that want to take it, an extra step in going deeper

into the Word of God, it is not too late and I'm throwing it

in there to join first year of V1 College.

So if you are interested in V1 College, you have one more week to

join.

Meet me at checkpoint and I will help you do that.

Okay?

So to give a better understanding about perception impacting

how we respond, I'm going to share the testimony about my mom's

cancer diagnosis.

Her piece versus my anxiety driven reaction.

When I said in the beginning, I'm talking to those that had stayed

up at night stressing and searching, that was me.

When I first heard my mom was diagnosed with cancer, I was searching

for the best care for her.

I was searching for the best surgeons for her.

I was searching for the survival of AIDS church.

I was not sleeping.

I was crying myself to sleep.

If I got three hours of sleep, that was a lot.

But you see, that was a response out of fear.

I was afraid of losing my mom.

I was afraid that my kids would grow up without their praying

grandma.

They know Abuela Carme is the huela Carmen that's always speaking

in tongues.

The one that's always praying.

And I'm just going to throw it in there.

When we go to restaurants, we don't let Abuela come and pray because

then my food is going to get cold.

Okay?

But that's my mom.

All my life that's been my mom an intercessor.

So when she was diagnosed with cancer, her response was, I'm praying

because this is a testimony that's about to be breaking out.

Her response is, your will, Father.

She was confident in yhvh.

Rapha, the God who heals was with her.

While I was panicking, she was angered.

See, I learned so much from that moment because our initial perception

becomes the birthplace of either light or darkness in our lives.

I was stressing losing sleep because of my perception and cbt,

it shows us that perception does not equal your reality.

It's what you believe about your situation that influences your

emotion and your behavior.

So my emotional spiral during my mom's diagnosis came out of fear

based perception.

And today I'm asking you, what story are you telling yourself?

Is it out of trauma or is it out of truth?

And this brings us to our next point.

Name the emotion before it names you.

And I'm talking about three years ago.

So that same year I had my own health scare when I got a call from

the doctor that something showed up on my scans.

But remember, my mom's response marked me and I didn't go

down that spiral.

When I got that phone call.

I didn't start googling scans and what the doctor's trying to tell

Me, I right away called my husband, Pastor Danny.

He came home.

And what we did is that we pressed in prayer with my girls.

And then I started to play on repeat the song, you said it, I believe

it.

So this time, I didn't react from fear, I didn't respond from

anxiety, but I responded from a place of faith, from a place of

worship, from a place of decoration.

So as I started to replay the song over and over again, and I started

to sing the song, you said it, I believe it.

All of a sudden, memories of how the Lord has saved me started

to come back to me.

And I started to thank him for that.

I'm like, wait a minute, Lord, you saved me from two horrific car

accidents.

That the doctors were so marveled at how I was still alive.

The women that hit me even went to the hospital thinking that

I was dead.

Because if you save me from those accidents, it's because there

is more.

I started to remember.

I started to remind myself of every single promise, that every

single promise is yes and amen.

And I said, lord, you said it, and I'm going to believe it.

So as I kept going, so the when later on, when I had to go to

the doctor's office to go over the scans, I kept replaying that

song.

And I'm like, wait a minute, Lord.

I'm going to remind myself of every single prophetic word that

has been spoken over my life since my childhood, that there is

more.

So while there's still breath in my lungs, I know that there is

more.

And I'm not going to let this thought of fear to overtake me, because

I know that there is more.

And that's how I overcame that health scare, by binding fear and

remembering his goodness.

So I'm speaking to those that are asking for God for something

right now.

But can you take a few seconds and thank God for something he did

a long time ago?

Can you take a few seconds and remember that he saved you?

Can you take a few seconds and remember that he saved your mind?

Can you take a few seconds and remember that he healed you?

Can you take a few seconds and remember that he pulled you out of

the addiction?

Can you take a few seconds and remember that he pulled you up out

of the mighty clay?

We need to keep that miracle fresh in our mind, because now we

have fresh oil to pull from.

So that's why I'm giving you a few seconds to remember that miracle

that you let fade away, because we need to pull fresh oil

and thank him for what he did then, for what he's about to do now.

There's more.

Are you ready?

There's more.

Because, you see, when I had my health care, cognitive behavioral

therapy calls that identifying faulty thoughts.

We call it taking every single thought captive and aligning it with

the truth.

So I named the emotion before it overtook me.

I said, this is fear.

But God has not given me a spirit of fear, but of love, power,

and a sound mind.

And for anyone that has been experiencing grief, the scripture

says that God is close to the brokenhearted.

If you experience worry, the scripture says, don't be anxious

in anything because prayer shifts away and it shifts it into

peace.

If you experience in confusion, the scripture says, God

is not a God of confusion, but he is a God of peace.

And if you're saying this is anger, disguise anxiety.

The scripture says, be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow

to become angry.

See, God calls us to slow down, to process and respond with

righteousness.

When we name the emotion, that's when we're able to answer.

Is this thought rooted in fear or is it rooted in faith?

And that's emotional maturity, being able to pause, being able to

reflect and respond in truth rather than trauma.

And I want to make a clear distinction here.

And it's like the parenthesis between believing in him and believing

for things.

Okay.

Because when you believe for an outcome and the outcome doesn't

happen, did you have faith at all?

The reason why I'm bringing that up is because a few months ago,

my mom calls me to tell me that she has precancerous cells and

is going to have to go to chemo again.

Her response?

I didn't put my faith in the outcome.

I put my faith in Him.

Once again, another lesson that marked me, reminding us that

when we pray, it's not to change a circumstance, but to believe

in him.

So don't worry about what's going to happen, but believe in him.

And that no matter what happens, that he wasn't just good

then, but he's good now.

The remedy today is to remember and believe in him.

And that's what my mom did.

That's what I did when I matured in my response.

And this is why I want to go deeper into Hannah's story.

I love Hannah's story.

Just because it reminds me so much of my mom.

Because I'm telling you, church, if I'm here, it's because

of a praying mama.

My mama always pray every time.

Let me tell you about my mom.

We will be in those vigils, and I'd be like, mom, you still going?

And she'll be like, till like 6 o' clock in the morning.

That was my mama all the time.

And every time I was going through something, I would go into

her room, okay, and she would put me to pray, but she would just

keep going.

So I remember to always bring my pillow when I went to her room

and put the pillow on the floor.

And then I would put my knees because I know I was about to fall

asleep.

But that was my praying mama.

So let me just go deeper into Hannah's story because her response

is a response to surrender.

Okay, we read in 1st Samuel, chapter 1, verses 10 to 11, Hannah

was in deep anguish, crying bitterly as she prayed to the Lord.

And she made this vow.

O Lord of heaven armies, if you will look upon my sorrow and

answer my prayer and give me a son, then I will give him back to

you.

So the scripture shows us that she was in deep anguish.

She was in the gut wrenching, snot dripping kind of prayer.

I've been there.

I've been there.

I'm sure many of us have been there.

She was depressed.

She was barren.

She was tormented by the other wife.

She was misunderstood by Eli the priest.

She was so distraught that she wasn't even eating.

Her feeling impacted how she was behaving.

Yet her response wasn't gossip.

Her response was in bitterness.

Her response was in disengagement from God.

She engaged the Lord with surrender when she said, then I will

give him back to you.

She didn't just want a child anymore.

She wanted the will of the Father in her life.

So you see, Hannah teaches us this truth of what happens when our

response is out of surrender.

Don't expect your life to be better just because you got what

you wanted.

Expect.

Expect your life to change when you surrender what you wanted.

Because here's the miracle.

Her situation didn't change immediately, but she did.

We read that in First Samuel 1:18.

1 Samuel 1:18

Then the woman went her way and ate something and her face was

no longer sad.

Her prayer changed her heart before God change her circumstance.

That's what happens when we have a response of surrender.

That's what happens when we have a response that I trust you,

Father.

That's what happens when we have a response that says, I believe

in you.

That's what happens when we win the war in our mind.

So let's take it back to Luke 11.

See to it then that the light within you is not darkness.

Let me ask you something.

What's playing on repeat in your head?

Think about it.

I'm gonna pause what's playing on repeat in your head.

What thoughts have taken residence that don't belong to God?

I want to highlight something that shook me.

It shook me.

The serpent didn't even have to tell Eve to sin.

He gave her a thought.

So let me break that down to you.

See, the real battle in the Garden of Eden didn't begin when

Eve ate the fruit.

Eve said, the serpent deceived me, and then I ate.

The serpent didn't give Eve a command.

He gave her a thought.

He planted a question.

He planted a doubt.

He planted a distortion.

The serpent said, did God really say.

He didn't tell her to rebel.

He told her to rethink.

And that's how the enemy operates.

See, he doesn't have to tell you to sin.

He doesn't have to tell you to end your life.

He doesn't have to tell you to give you up on your purpose.

All he needs to do is to give you a thought.

A thought that says you're not enough.

A thought that says God is holding out on you.

A thought that says this world will be better without you.

A thought that says you will never recover.

A thought that says they were right about you.

A thought that says they don't love you.

A thought that says you're a failing mom, you're a failing husband,

your kids won't remember you.

You're gonna die just like your mom died.

One thought.

One thought.

And if it's not captured, it becomes a stronghold.

Your perception is not your reality.

Check what's in your head.

Because if you don't check what's in your head, you'll walk

away from what God has called you to do.

Not because you're weak, but because something got in your head.

And what happens is that your mind is so malleable that it's either

being shaped by truth or is being shaped by.

By trauma.

Your mind is so malleable that it's either turning towards destiny

or it's turning towards destruction.

Check what's in your head.

Because when you check what's in your head, you're going to.

Are you listening to the Lord that says I'm chosen?

Are you listening to your trauma that says you're forgotten?

Are you listening to God's truth that says you're called?

Or are you listening to your trauma that says you're canceled?

Are you listening to the God's truth that says you're anointed?

Are you listening to trauma that says you're not enough?

Are you listening to his truth?

That says that you're breaking curses.

Are you listening to trauma that says this curse will never end.

But today in Jesus name we serve an eviction notice to every

lie in your head, every lie against your marriage, every.

Every lie against your children, every lie against your

calling.

Some of you don't just need to lay your sin at the altar, but.

You need to lay your mind at the altar because your mind has been

lying to you.

I'm calling out your mind right now to the one that has been

second guessing their calling.

To the one who almost canceled a God given assignment because of

anxiety.

To the one that has been asking God, is there any space for

my voice anymore?

Church, I did not come to preach a cute message.

I came to war for your mind.

I came to war for your thoughts.

Because the Bible says that weapons of our warfare are not carnal,

but they are mighty through God.

For the pulling down.

For the pulling down.

For the pulling down of strongholds.

And that word stronghold in Greek it means fortified arguments.

You see, the enemy has been building arguments brick by brick

since your childhood, since your rejection, since your betrayal,

since your abandonment.

But I come with a weapon stronger than the argument in your

mind.

I come with a word that says that you are fearfully and wonderfully

made.

I come with a word that says the weapons form but they did not

prosper.

I came with a worship that says he said it and I'm going to

believe it.

And I came with what Jesus did for me.

Because what Jesus did on the cross no thought, I said no thought

can undo.

So you're not what happened to you.

You're not what they said about you.

And it is not too late.

All the glory to God.

That's what happens when we have a response of surrender.

That's what happens when we start to win the war in our mind.

That's what happens when we put our trust, not just a little

trust, our whole trust in the Lord.

So I want to talk a little bit more about my family.

And I already asked Ariella if I could mention her.

She said it was fine.

So this year our church started something so powerful, the

Daily growth Journal.

Amen.

Thank you, God.

Because Apostle Mike had that vision to pressing the word together,

right, With a daily growth journal and shout out to Pastor Michelle

who put that book together.

And one of the prompts is what are you praying for?

And I will write and write and write.

I will pray for my family, prayer for healing, prayer for the

Long island building, prayer for the new home my family and I

are looking for.

A new home prayer for everything in my heart.

And one day I decided, and this is, I'm telling you, this is

like a few months ago to flip back through the pages.

And as I'm flipping back through the pages, I started to realize

my prayer had turned into petitions and not praise.

I was asking God for a lot, but not thanking him for what I already

have.

And you see, according to psychology, gratitude rewires your

brain.

It changes the default setting of your mind.

And a study found that practicing gratitude activates the

brain's prefrontal cortex and strengths and connection in the anterior

cingulate cortex regions that are tied to decision making, empathy

and emotional regulation.

And biblically, it aligns us with first theologians, 5, 18, give

thanks in all, not just one thing, in all circumstances.

So that's also kind of to be the way I start my day is going to

impact the rest of my day.

So if I'm starting my day with gratitude, it's going to help me

feel empathy, it's going to help me make decisions, it's going

to help me to problem solve.

So I started my day in gratitude, thanking God.

Thank you, God, for this home.

It's not our forever home, but you've kept us safe here.

Thank you, God, for every closed door because it was you protecting

us.

Thank you, God, because of the process that we're going through,

because I know you're just stretching us and you're growing

us in this process.

I'm going to share a little bit more about what happened.

As we're looking for a home, we've been taking the girls along

with us.

And Ariela had her heart set on a specific house.

And when we put an offer, because, you know, she had a heart,

the girls were like, yes, this one.

So we put an offer, but it wasn't accepted.

And when I told the girls the news, Ariela started crying.

I was not expecting that response.

I was not expecting that reaction.

I'm like, what happened?

She already had picture where her room was going to be.

She already had picture.

She already had imagined a bunch of things for that house.

But then I sat her down and I opened up my journal and I showed

her an entry where I had written, thank you, God, for the

closed doors.

I trust you will open the one that we can sustain and that we would

not lack.

And I'm like, ariela, God answered my prayer.

So he's protecting us.

Because who knows what would have happened if we would have gotten

that house.

Maybe we couldn't afford it at the end.

So God was protecting us.

And that moment became a seed planted in her, A picture of how

to respond when something doesn't go your way.

In psychology, we call it learned behavior.

In the Bible, we call it discipleship.

She was absorbing a pattern she could repeat when it's her turn

to face things in life.

Recently, a situation came up.

I'm not going to go into the details, but my husband calls me

and he's explaining to me what's happening.

And I immediately reacted and frustration was rising up and I was

like, what now?

And all of a sudden I realized that the girls were listening and

we try our best.

We try our best, okay, don't come at me.

We try our best to make sure the girls are not around where we're

having discussions, okay?

But this moment, it was divine because Ariela was listening.

And then I hear her tell her sister, those people are not the

problem.

The enemy doesn't want us to have church.

I was like, okay.

I didn't pause to reflect.

And my 9 year old just reminded me of what it says in Ephesians

Ephesians 6:12

6:12.

We wrestle not against flesh and blood.

She reminded me the very thing that I had taught her is not about

the what, but the who we become.

It's about our response when circumstances arise.

And in that moment, the Holy Spirit whispered, she could only

repeat what she sees you practicing.

That's when I realized this isn't about me controlling my reactions

from my own peace.

This is about breaking generational patterns.

Because if I respond out of offense, if I respond out of fear,

if I respond out of insecurity, that becomes a blueprint.

That's how trauma becomes secondhand.

Not because of what happens to them, but because they inherit how

I chose to respond.

So church life occurrences will test your peace when storms,

noise and drama show up uninvited.

But emotional maturity is when you no longer live at the mercy of

chaos, when you don't react out of impulse, but you practice

responding.

Practice responding from your identity in the Lord.

Learning to perceive, learning to act from who he says you are.

Psychology calls it emotional intelligence, the ability to recognize,

to understand and manage your emotions and to influence the emotions

of those that are around you.

Scripture calls it self control, a fruit of the spirit.

In church, that was a tough moment.

It doesn't mean that we ignore injustice.

I'm not trying to say that, okay, because the borico emi came

out that, you know, I just got my ears pierced and I just wanted

to do one of these, you know, kind of sort of thing.

But it means I guard my peace.

That's what it means.

Sometimes silence is not weakness, but warfare.

It's restrained fortune.

Prayer.

You choose stillness over shouting, boundaries over burnout,

purpose over pettiness.

And you realize not every battle is worth your energy and not

every voice deserves a seat in your spirit.

Proverbs 26:4 warns us to not answer a fool according to his folly,

Proverbs 26:4

or you yourself will be just like him.

Emotional maturity knows when to speak, knows when to pray, and

knows when just to walk away.

So it's also called discipline.

It's discipline to pause before you post, to breathe before

you scream, and to pray before you proceed.

So it's called guarding your thoughts so that they don't become

reactions, and guarding your reactions so they don't become cycles

that your children will repeat.

In short, you rise above not out of arrogance.

You rise above out of alignment.

You choose peace over pressure.

You choose clarity over the chaos.

You choose obedience over the outcome.

Because when you trust God to handle what you can't control, you

stop being shaken by what's happening around you and you start

shaping what's within you.

Bringing me to my last point.

False light is still darkness.

Jesus said in Luke 11:35, see to it then that the light within

Luke 11:35

you is not darkness.

This is a call to honest keyword here, honest self examination.

You see, not everything that looks confidence is confidence.

And sometimes what we call strength is just unhealed pride wearing

a mask.

And sometimes what we call righteous frustration is just pain

dressed up in church clothes.

And sometimes we have even learned to spiritualize dysfunction,

where we're labeling bitterness as discernment, where

we're hiding our anger under I'm just being direct.

So Jesus warns us about honest self examination in Matthew 7:3:5.

Why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye and pay no

attention to the plank in your own?

First take the plank out of your own eye and then you will see

it clearly.

In other words, our perception is distorted if we don't start with

ourselves.

Our perception is distorted if we don't start with ourselves.

We think we're discerning the speck in others.

But if we have a plank in our own eye, we're really just projecting.

So emotional intelligence can't survive without spiritual honesty.

You cannot truly walk in emotional maturity if you're unwilling

to ask yourself, is this God's light shining through me or is this

my ego's light?

Self examination is a bridge between what we think we're showing

the world and what's really in Our hearts.

Psychology tells us that self awareness is the foundation of emotional

intelligence.

Without it, you're just responding from blind spots.

Scripture says the same thing.

Search me, O God, and know my heart.

Test me and know my anxious thoughts.

See if there is any offensive way in me and lead me to the way

of everlasting.

If we don't let the Holy Spirit shine a light in our motives,

our light may be fueled by insecurity, Our light may be filled

by fear.

Our light will be fueled by old wounds.

And we will pass that same false light to the next generation.

That's why spiritual honesty is not optional.

It's a daily, humble, courageous act of asking yourself,

is this response coming from the Spirit or is it coming from scars?

Am I defending truth or am I just defending myself?

Am I walking in the light of Christ, or am I walking in the flicker

of my own understanding?

Because the truth is, your children, your disciples, the people

you lead, will learn more from how you process offense, how you

respond, than how you preach about love.

Emotional intelligence is not just about controlling your outward

reaction.

It's about inviting God to heal the inward reaction so you don't

have to fake the light.

We want his light to shine through us.

We want to make sure that when they're looking on us, we're reflecting

back the light of who he is in us.

Amen.

Church One of my greatest desires has always been that my girls

will see and remember what a life of prayer looks like.

They watch me kneel and pray and walk around the house, and sometimes

they join me and they're walking around the house and they're

praying.

Sometimes they do it to get away from.

No, to avoid bedtime, but they still join me.

And they always watch Abuela come and praying in tongues.

And then one day, Arila's like, is Abuela talking in Spanish?

I'm like, no, no, no.

She's praying in tongues.

And she's like, mommy, what's that?

I was like, well, this is the gift of the Spirit.

Do you want it?

She's like, yes.

She started to pray in her room every night.

God, give me the gift of tongues.

God, give me the gift of tongues.

And I remember the time we were in Amityville.

Apostle says, who wants the gift of tongues?

And I was like, oh.

I ran to the kids ministry because the kids ministry was in

a different building.

I grabbed Ariela.

I'm like, are you ready?

She's like, she looked at me like, what?

I'm like, don't be scared, because God is about to answer Your

prayer, Are you ready?

And at the age of six, she received her gift of tongues.

That's not a coincidence, Church.

That was her pressing in prayer and thanking the Lord that

she was going to receive the gift of tongues.

That's also called the power of proximity.

Faith is more often caught than taught because the Bible says

to train up your child in his ways.

So you see, the warfare we're facing is big, but so is the assignment.

So the enemy just isn't after your mind.

He's after the generations that are watching you.

More reasons to know why our thought life matters.

Because thoughts shape reactions, reaction shape habits,

and habits shape the legacy we leave behind.

Church, we're not just raising up kids.

We are raising up revivalists.

And revival, it starts in the mind, in my mind, in your mind, in

the mind of every person that chooses to think, speak and act in

ways that say, God, I trust you.

Even when it's not the answer I want.

God, I trust you.

You.

So this is a call to stop second guessing and start thanking

the Lord.

Stop analyzing and start aligning your response.

Today is building the blueprint for generations after you.

Church, let's stand to our feet.

If this word was for you, if you've been battling fear, if you've

been battling anxiety, torment, confusion, I want you to

lift your hands.

Praise you, Jesus.

We see those hands because today we take back the battleground

in our mind.

And today we say, let this mind be in me that was also in Christ

Jesus.

Today we say I have the mind of Christ.

Today we say I am not conformed.

I am transformed by the renewal of my mind.

Today we are taking every thought captive to obey Christ.

Today I will set my mind on things from above and not the things

on this earth.

Church, doubt and fear are a reality.

But can we remember his goodness then.

And his goodness now?

Church, we're about to sing it out.

We're about to sing it out.

And I need you to worship with all that you got.

Because we about to make a declaration and remember what he

did for us.

We about to remember that we are light in the middle of darkness.

Church, you will sleep again.

You will think clearly again.

You will live from truth and not from trauma.

You will live from light and not from lies.

Today your mind will be transformed for his glory to shine.

Come on, Church, let me hear you give a shout of praise to the

King of Kings.

Come on, Church, let me hear you shout.

Let me hear you shout.

I need you to press in.

I need you to press in.

I need you to give him the glory.

Come on, church, Let me hear you press in.

Let me hear you press in.

Let me hear you press in.

Today we are breaking generational curses.

Today we are breaking old habits.

Today we are believing for new minds.

Come on, church, press it.

Sa.