Express, Examine, Renew: Faith for Mental Health

That's that's the thing about lies man. They grow fast. Sometimes faster than truth and they're popping up everywhere. And you go to church one hour a week but you got a hundred and sixty seven other hours in your week. And you're gonna we talked about Romans 12, you're being conformed. If you're not renewing and being transformed, you're being conformed. [01:06:50] (18 seconds)  #RenewDontConform

All of us are in a fight. You're not just in a spiritual life, you're in a spiritual fight. You're in a mental emotional fight. You have an enemy and you will lose every fight that you don't know you're in. And some of you you wake up not thinking you're in a fight for your mind, for your heart, for your soul. You wake up and you scold because you feel like it, because you need that dopamine hit. [01:11:48] (24 seconds)  #FightForYourMind

The church is not a place where everybody comes in here and has it all figured out and their mental health is great and their emotional health is is dialed in all cylinders. The church is a place full of needy people. We all look a little bit more spiritual than we are. We're needy people before holy God and we come to church because we believe he hangs out here and he actually wants us to sing to him. [01:01:54] (26 seconds)  #ChurchIsForTheNeedy

And I'm gonna just sink deeper into this hole, you know what? Church doesn't care about me, God doesn't care about me, nobody knows me, and that all happens in the dark. And something crazy happens when you pull all that out of the dark and you bring it to the light. Scripture says, there is healing. [01:00:45] (17 seconds)  #BringItToTheLight

He's everywhere all the time. If you know Jesus Christ, he indwells you. Amen? You don't need to find him. He's here. And again, some of us believe the lie that's straight from the enemy that he's gone somewhere else and you gotta go find him. And And many times you gotta go by yourself to do so. [01:10:26] (19 seconds)  #JesusIsAlwaysWithYou

And that mental health doesn't get better, it gets worse. I just need to get away from the church. I just need to get away from the institution. And I'll say, no. You need to renew your mind with God's people, with God's word. That that idea of renewal, it's not just like a better version of you. It's not just making some tweaks. It's not some New Year's resolutions. [01:10:45] (23 seconds)  #RenewWithGodsPeople

It's not just some self declarations for your mind. It's a transformation. It's like a completely different operating system. If you've ever switched operating systems at work, it's like a whole new playing field. It's it's flipping the script of the way everything that comes in and comes out and filtering it through Jesus Christ. [01:11:07] (22 seconds)  #NewOperatingSystem

Maybe they're pure evil thoughts from the enemy. Maybe they're the thoughts of God. But every day, psychologists will tell you this, there's seeds being planted and as you dwell on those thoughts and those seeds and those trauma and that experience, things start to grow. Those seeds start to germinate. They start to grow and where your mind grows, it starts to shape the very direction of your actual life. [00:46:15] (28 seconds)  #ThoughtsAreSeeds

Every person I've ever talked to, hey, I leave here with a little bit something different. After we sing together, I don't know, after we go through the sermon, something after I pray with somebody, something breaks, something changes. That's because you brought your struggles into the light. That is God's recipe, his remedy for you. Are you doing that? [01:02:32] (17 seconds)  #CommunityHeals

And that's the beauty of the people of God. That's the beauty of the person of Jesus Christ. Did you know Jesus has been where you've been? You struggling today? You know Jesus struggled? Hebrews four tells us in every way you struggle yet without sin. Tim, mentally Jesus, in every way. Luke chapter 22 before he goes to the cross, he's sweating drops of blood. [01:20:35] (25 seconds)  #JesusUnderstandsYourStruggle

And you say, I feel feel feel feel feel but but God rich in mercy with the great love with with which he loved me. He gave his life for me and he bought me and he adopted me and he knows me and he wants me right now and not just to be about myself and feel like a little snowflake, [01:14:09] (24 seconds)  #ButGodStillLoves

And what I would say that the unique thing about mental health is it's like a garden. One author I read said it this way, it's picture your mental health and your mind like a garden and that every single day things are planted there, whether you plant them or not. Maybe our world plants them. Maybe they're in general neutral thoughts. [00:45:53] (22 seconds)  #MindIsAGarden

What is contributing to this? What seeds are being planted in my mind? Are they true or are they lies? Satan, he comes only to do three things, steal, kill, destroy. That's it. To still kill and destroy and scripture calls him an accuser, a father of lies. [01:05:08] (21 seconds)  #ResistTheAccuser

You're being shaped every single day. This isn't a sermon of like throw out your old CDs because I know we don't even have CDs, But it is a it is a warning to say, what's filling your mind? The songs you listen to, the movies you watch, the news station that you watch, the friends Facebook free that you follow incessantly, The group text. The Snapchat. [01:07:07] (26 seconds)  #CurateYourInputs

And they've been doing it and now here we are like a few months into the calendar and they're not more miserable. They're experiencing healing. In fact, one of them came down and placed their faith in Jesus last week and experienced forgiveness and freedom in Jesus' name. And you know where it started? She just said, hey, I don't want to come to church, I don't want to pray to God, I don't want to read his Bible, [01:03:13] (25 seconds)  #HonestyLeadsToHealing

but I'm just gonna tell him all those things. And I've never done that. But I'm gonna start now and I'm gonna come to church and tell other people those things because they're the people of God who believe the word of God. And I'm just even when I don't feel it, I'm gonna keep coming back and keep coming back. And last Sunday, she went from death to life in Jesus name. [01:03:37] (21 seconds)  #KeepComingBack

He came for your mind. He came for your heart and your soul and and he he came for it so hard and loved you so much that he gave his life, was buried in a tomb for three days and rose again to defeat everything that would inhibit you from experience full life in his name. [00:44:46] (21 seconds)  #JesusCameForYourWholeSelf

And you didn't come for a part of us, you came for all of us. You sent Jesus, all of Jesus, fully God, fully man for all of us. Help us to know that. Help us to not believe the lie that our emotions and our thoughts are the enemy. God you gave us these things as gifts but they do need to be redeemed. They are not the enemy, but they are not our authority. [00:41:24] (24 seconds)  #RedeemYourEmotions

and he didn't do that for the fake you or the compartmentalized you or the Tuesday you or the Sunday you. He did that for all of you, for the real you. You know, Jesus cannot love the person you're pretending to be. You know why? Because that person does not exist. He came for you. [00:44:26] (20 seconds)  #HeCameForTheRealYou

God writes about these things in his word and and what we tend to do is we compartmentalize. We we say, hey God, you're in a box over here and it's Sundays and it's and it's bible verses and it's khakis. And that's over here and then like the rest of my life is over here and it's Monday and it's Tuesday and it's work and it's the promotion and it's my thoughts and my anxieties and my temptations and my struggles. [00:43:17] (31 seconds)  #DontCompartmentalizeFaith