Transforming Habits: A Path to Spiritual Growth

"I wanted to get habits out of the category they're often in for folks of just behavioral modification or some kind of secular or psychological technique to be able to exercise better or get my finances in shape no no no no Jesus talked about how there are available to us rivers of Living Water that can be flowing out of our belly that just as The God Who created the Earth and all of its magnificence brings water to bring things back to life so God is present spiritually and our habits are a very important part of that." [00:01:18]

"A habit is a kingdom extender, and here's what I mean, you were made by God to exercise Dominion to be able to have influence and impact for good that goes all the way back to the beginning of Genesis God makes us in His image and says let them Reign let them rule let them have power now where does that start that starts with your body your body is the beginning of your kingdom that's the part of all of created matter where your will can hold sway." [00:02:42]

"Habits are always about freedom and they're always about power anytime somebody's going to lead an organization the way that you lead is you delegate you have more and more people who come under your sphere of influence and you delegate to them the authority the power the ability to do things under your overall sway well the place where that starts is our body habits are the way that we delegate powers to our body to enable us to think and do increasingly complex and wonderful and fruitful and good things thank God for habits there is great gift but precisely because they're so powerful they can be extremely destructive when they go south when they become negative and of course what has happened to us is sin has gotten into our habits." [00:03:50]

"The Apostle Paul is writing about when he writes in Romans the seventh chapter, starting verse 22 for in my inner being as I think about this now part of me that's unseen I Delight in God's law and what is good in being a person of integrity and love and so but I see another law at work in the members of my body, Waging War against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members." [00:04:06]

"Jesus is the master of habit, and so when we look at change, this very deeply involves coming to grips with habit, it's just fascinating I wanted to read this for you this is from a neuro-researcher Christian Northrup, who writes not only do our physical organs control receptor sites for neurochemicals of thought emotion, our organs and immune systems can themselves manufacture these same chemicals what this means is our entire body feels and expresses emotion all parts of us think and feel the mind is located throughout the body the mind is located throughout the body." [00:05:23]

"What needs to happen if we are going to be spiritually transformed is we need to change at the level of our habits. I'll quote one more person uh Dallas Willard in his book The Divine conspiracy quite famously has a long section on what he calls a curriculum for Christ's likeness, he says uh that process of transformation that curriculum will always have two parts one is to enthrall the mind and heart with love for God how good God is and how much God loves me but then the second objective he says is to remove our automatic responses against the kingdom of God to free us from domination or enslavement to the old habitual patterns of thought feeling and action." [00:06:30]

"The training that leads to doing what we hear from Jesus must therefore involve first the purposeful disruption of our automatic thoughts feelings and actions by doing different things with our body and then through various intentional practices we place the body before God in such a way that the whole self is retrained away from habits of the Old Kingdom in other words spiritual formation is habit formation." [00:08:06]

"Today I want to give you one habit, and it is incredibly easy it's a modification of a habit talked about by B.J Fogg in his book tiny habits you can do this we will learn as we work on habits that one of the biggest problems is if we try to change too much to fact grandiosity does not serve us the desire for instant gratification instant change doesn't help us we have to be humble one little habit at a time." [00:08:53]

"When your feet hit the ground pause and say this is the day the Lord has made I will rejoice and be glad in it and then smile and then take two or three seconds of pause to reflect on that statement because simply trying to program our minds is of no use if the thoughts are just hype if they are not true if they're not embedded in reality." [00:09:42]

"It may be that you're going through a horrendous time, part of why I have needed to add so many habits to my life over the last couple years as so much of other infrastructure has been really difficult their circumstances have so if you're facing a day and there's great suffering and I know for some of you there is then you can add this word this is the day that the Lord has made I will rejoice and be glad in it somehow." [00:11:08]

"God is The Giver of habits, habits are the process of delegating to our bodies the task of life so that we can exercise Dominion habits are Kingdom extenders, habits are great blessings habits are also huge problems When sin gets into them we are on the journey together of habit Reformation so that increasingly we can be free and effortlessly do what God calls us to do but we only do this one tiny little step at a time." [00:11:23]

"Tomorrow morning when you get up, do not pick up your phone don't start scrolling through don't be overwhelmed by all the difficult my feet hit the ground this is the day the Lord has made I will rejoice and be glad in it and then smile." [00:12:17]