Hope Church LV Sermons
Four Lies of the Enemy
Several years ago, the National Science Foundation did a study, and the goal of that study was to determine how many thoughts pass through the human mind on a daily basis. And they surveyed different age groups, they surveyed people with different gift sets, they surveyed people in different career paths, and they came to the determination that on that average day, over 30,000 thoughts go through the human mind. Now that's average. Some people, it's more like 15,000. Other people are around the 45,000 number, but on average, you and I will have 30,000 thoughts pass through our mind every single day. And do you realize that of the 30,000 thoughts that go through our mind, all of them fall into one of two categories, they are either based on the truth or they're based on some form of deception. And it is very important for us to be able to discern of those 30,000 thoughts which ones are truth, and which ones are lies, because as we all know, we are a product of our thoughts, because thoughts become actions, actions become habits, and habits ultimately become our lifestyle. And so we must take serious the battle that takes place on a daily basis inside of our minds, and we must have a serious understanding of what things that pass through our mind fall in the category of truth, and what things fall in the category of deception. And that is the topic that is in the conversation of Jesus in John chapter 8. So if you have a Bible this morning, would you turn to me to the fourth book in the New Testament, the fourth Gospel, the Gospel of John. Jesus here is having a conversation with some Jewish leaders, and they're talking about just that, the truth and deception. And these Jewish leaders are confused about the teachings of Jesus, because Jesus is teaching about the truth, and that people need to come and be set free by the truth. But these Jewish leaders don't understand it because they feel like they've got everything figured out. There's no need for them to be set free in any way, because they understand right and wrong. They understand the truth. And so what I want to do with us this morning is look at John chapter 8 verses 31-36. And Jesus is going to talk about the truth and the source of truth. I want to read that and kind of paint the picture, and I want to come back and read one more verse in John chapter 8. So look with me at verse 31, if you don't have a Bible this morning, we're going to put it on the screen so that you can follow along. Verse 31 says, "So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed him, 'If you continue in my word, then you are truly disciples of mine, and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.'" The Jewish people answered him, they said, "We are Abraham's descendants, and have never yet been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say you will become free?" Jesus answered them, "Truly, truly I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. The slave does not remain in the house forever. The son does remain forever." Verse 36. So if the son makes you free, you will be free in thee. These Jewish leaders had believed a lie, and they didn't even realize it. They thought that they had it all figured out there was no need for a Savior, there was no need for rescue, and Jesus points out that every human on the earth was born under an evil nature and a slave to sin, not knowing the truth, but he clarifies there that there is such thing as a truth, and he, in fact, is the source of that truth. But then look over at verse 44, Jesus here is going to give us the source of deception, and the fact that there is evil among us. Verse 44 says this, "Talking to the Jewish leaders," he says, "You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar, and the father of lies." So Jesus in this part of the chapter is having a conversation about the truth and about deception, and this morning what I want us to do is pull one biblical principle out of this text. But before I give you that biblical principle, here's what I want to do. I want to give you a little bit of foundation for the truth and some foundation about deception. So here's a couple realities about the truth that will help us as we process this text, this morning. First of all, the Bible is the only source of truth. The Bible, God's Word, is the only source of truth. In John chapter 8, Jesus only associates one thing with the truth. He says, "If you continue in my Word, then your my disciples and you will know the truth." Now there are many people across the globe, and the number is growing every day, who would stand before an audience or stand before a group of people with a certain group of writings and say, "This is the truth." But Jesus only gives credit to one set of writings being the truth, and that is the words of God, and that's why at Hope we hold this book in these writings in high regard. We believe that these are the very words of Jesus, and they represent His heart, His character, and His intentions for humanity in the most accurate way possible. In 2 Timothy, we read this verse, which says, "All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness." That word inspired means breathed, that all Scripture is breathed. It is written by God. So this morning, when I reference the truth, and we talk about the truth, we are specifically talking about the Word of God. Here's a second reality about the truth this morning. The truth has the power to set us free. The truth, the Word of God has the power to set us free. Jesus says, "If you continue in my Word, you'll know the truth, and the truth will do what? The truth will set you free." You see, we believe these are not just words on a page. This is not just a well-written book. These are the words of God, and it is in fact alive, and every weekend, and every week as we preach the Word of God, or you spend time in God's Word, that the Holy Spirit of God takes the Word of God and brings about transformation inside of us as we abide in the truth. Hebrews chapter four clearly communicates this in verse 12. It says, "For the Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. The only source of truth is the Bible, and the truth has the power to set us free." So that lays a foundation for us. When we talk about the truth, that's what we're talking about this morning. But now let me give you two realities about deception that can kind of lay a foundation for us. First of all, we have an enemy. We have an enemy in verse 44 of John chapter eight. Jesus makes it very clear that there is an evil one out there. He is the father of lies. He has been a murderer from the beginning, and we have an enemy. If you hear this morning and you have a relationship with God, I want you to know this. The enemy hates you. If you hear this morning and you don't have a relationship with God, the enemy hates you too. He wants to destroy us. He wants to come against us in any way possible. And where God is here this morning saying, "I want you to believe in me." God is saying, "I want you to put your faith in me." The enemy is saying something much different. Here's what he's saying, "I don't want you to believe in me. I don't want you to believe that I'm real, because if you don't think I'm here, it's going to make it so much easier to come against you day after day." And believe it or not, there are a lot of people who are believing that. Did you know Barna, George Barna did research, and here's what they came up with, that six out of ten Americans, 60% of Americans, reject the existence of Satan, indicating that the devil or Satan is merely a symbol of evil. Another stat that they determined is that 45% of born-again Christians deny Satan's existence. That means of the people in this room, that this entire section on average does not believe that there is an enemy. But as we talk about deception this morning, I want you to clearly understand that we have an enemy. He's referred to as Satan, he's referred to as the devil, but he is our enemy. I want to give you a couple facts about the enemy, because the Scriptures from the book of Genesis, all the way to the book of Revelation speak of there being an enemy that is opposed to the things of God. A couple facts about the enemy, first of all, he is 100% evil. Everything about him is made up of death and darkness and evil. He's not just a being who is kind of on a streak for a little bit, where he's trying to get back at some people, everything about the enemy is evil. It's not just a symbol, it's not just a figure of speech, he is real and he is evil. Clyde Cranford said in his book, "Because we love him, it's imperative to know something about our adversary." Satan has been a murderer from the beginning of creation. His heart towards Christ was a heart of hate and murder, and thus it is towards us as well. He is our mortal enemy and will stop at nothing to destroy us. As we think about deception this morning, we need to realize that we have an enemy, and he is 100% evil, but here's another fact about the enemy that is very important. He has limitations. The enemy has limitations. Some people believe that the enemy is just an evil form of God, and that they're in some way on the same level, working with the same power and the same authority. That is incorrect. The enemy has limitations. Clyde Cranford said later on in the same book, "Because we love him." This brings us to a lie quite prevalent even in the church, which is that Satan is a rival to God. Listen to this next part, Satan cannot compare to God in any way. The very thought is ludicrous. God is infinitely superior to Satan. Three of the attributes of God will aid us in drawing a proper contrast. He says God is omnipresent. What does that mean? That means that God is everywhere, and he's in everything, but Satan can only be in one place at one time. The second attribute he says is that God is omniscient. God knows everything. God knows your heart. He knows your mind. He knows my heart. He knows my mind. Satan, on the other hand, does not. Satan only knows what God allows him to know, and Satan has limitations in the area of knowledge. Then the last attribute that Clyde gives, God is omnipotent. Does that mean? That means that God is all powerful, that all power belongs to him, where Satan can only have the power and authority that God allows him to have. So don't think for a second that as we talk about the enemy, that him and God are at some way on the same level, they are not. The enemy is limited. Another fact about the enemy is that he knows the Bible. The enemy knows the Scriptures. And one of his greatest tactics is coming to us and in some way, shape, or form, slightly twisting the Word of God. And because it sounds good, we fall into his trap of deception. In Matthew chapter 4, the enemy is tempting Jesus in the wilderness, and one of the ways that he tried to deceive Jesus was by sharing the truth of Scripture, but twisting it ever so slightly. So this morning, when we talk about deception, we understand that we have an enemy. He's 100% evil. He is limited, but he knows the Scriptures and has schemes and traps to try to trick us into believing his lies. The second reality about deception is this, the enemy has a plan of attack. The enemy has a plan of attack. Look at the first part of John chapter 10. It says this, "The cease purpose," meaning the enemy's purpose, his goal, is to steal and kill and destroy. The enemy has a threefold mission, and here it is, steal, kill, and destroy. And everything that he does, if that's a lie, if that's trying to get someone angry, if that's trying to mess up relationships, if that's trying to create a divorce, whatever that might be, the enemy does everything he does with those three goals in mind. He wants to steal our joy. He wants to kill us, and he wants to destroy everything that is healthy in our lives. That's his mission. And anything that he puts inside of our mind, the lies, the deception, the anger, the evil, he does to try to get us to think that what we're believing in is actually the truth. And every day he has 30,000 opportunities to come at us and in some way plant something inside of our mind that we might believe and put our confidence in that would lead us away from the things of God and toward the things of evil. So now that we have a foundation about truth and a foundation about deception, let me give you the biblical principle from John chapter 8. And it's good news. Here's the biblical principle. The truth of God has the power to set us free from the lives of the enemy. The truth of God has the power, has the authority to set us free from the lies and the schemes and the darkness of the enemy. You see, I know this morning in a crowd this size, people came in and there's some form of a lie that right now you're believing. All of us in some way, shape, or form are believing a lie. And here's what typically happens. We try to have a conversation with the devil and we try to outwit him and he's spitting out deception. He's spitting out lies and we try to have a conversation maybe to get around what he's trying to tell us and every single time we fail. Others of us have just tried to outlast the enemy and we've tried to put all our effort into it, put all our smarts into it and just try to figure out a maneuver to outwit what he's trying to put in front of us and it doesn't work. Listen church, our only refuge, our only retreat in moments of temptation when the devil is trying to feed us, some form of a lie is to run to the truth of God. That is our only hope. We don't have the strength, we don't have the wisdom, we don't have the power. So we must, in those moments of deception, when the enemy is creeping in us and trying to take over one of those 30,000 thoughts that passes through our mind on a daily basis, we must retreat, we must run to the truth because the truth has the power to set us free from the lies of the enemy. That's good news this morning and if we're honest, all of us struggle with it and had a guy who woke up to me last night after the service and said, "Man, I didn't know anybody in the world felt the way I've been feeling but I've been believing lie after lie after lie and I've just been pounded and pounded emotionally and never once have I ran to the truth, have I looked at what the truth says knowing that the truth has the power to set me free from all that junk?" The truth of God has the power to set us free from the lies of the enemy, not our efforts, not self-help material, the only thing we can run to in moments of temptation is the truth of God. Clyde Cranford also had this quote in his book, "We may not like to admit it, but we have all been deceived by Satan innumerable times. It may very well be that even at this moment we are deceived about something, yet we do not know we are deceived. If we believe a lie, we do not know we are believing a lie, only as lies are exposed to the truths of God, can we begin to walk in truth and really grow as Christians?" And here's the reality this morning. The place where that battle is won or lost is in our minds. Here's the process of the enemy, and this is very important to understand because we've all fallen for it, hook, line, and sinker, but here's what he tries to do. He tries to put a thought in our mind. One of those 30,000 thoughts that passed through our mind on a daily basis, he tries to make one of those a lie, and he tries to get us to entertain it. He plants something about sin or something our emotions want to do or something else, and he tries to get us simply to entertain that thought. You know what those are for you? I know what those are for me. He tries to get us to entertain that thought. And here's what he tries to do. He tries to get us to turn that thought we're entertaining into an idea and put together a plan of action. Well, if I'm going to accomplish this thought, here's what it would look like. It would mean me going here and doing this and talking to this person, rearranging this part of my schedule, being a part of this group, he tries to get us to turn that thought that we entertain into an idea. And then here's what he does. He tries to get us to turn that idea into a behavior. That's his plan. That is the strategy of the enemy overall all the way back to the book of Genesis, moving our thoughts to ideas and our ideas to behavior. And in those moments, our flesh will give in every single time. And that's okay just to agree on this morning. The Bible clearly communicates that we are weak. We are helpless and hopeless left to ourselves. So in those moments, the only thing that is going to push that away that will remove that idea that could become behavior that will eventually be sinned in your life is the truth of God. Charles Stanley in his book, When the Enemy Strike, says this, "Tentations, doubts, accusations, justifications, and speculations begin in the mind. Our feet, hands, and bodies follow where the mind leads us. It is with our minds that we remember, we understand, we make decisions, we fantasize, and we evaluate truth from fiction. It is with our minds that we believe, we acknowledge God, and we make choices. The battleground with Satan is the mind." So it is very, very important what you choose to and not to allow inside of your mind. I'm a guy I love watching TV, I love movies, I love music, I love all those things. But I just came to a place in my life where I realized I need to be very, very conscious about what I allow to go into my mind knowing that Satan can twist anything and manipulate anything and use anything to try to get me walking down a path of temptation. And my motive in not watching certain movies or not watching certain television shows isn't the rating, isn't the review, here's the filter I work through. What is this going to put in my mind? Am I giving Satan any foothold, any stronghold he could take and somehow manipulate a thought to an idea that would eventually become a behavior? So in our time remaining, here's what I want to do. I want to give you the four most prominent lives of the enemy, things that you hear and I hear every day. And I want to hold those up to the truth of God's Word. And hopefully for some of us in the room, allow there to be some freedom from some of this stuff that we've just been living in. Because the number one way that enemies going to get us is by putting thoughts in our minds that are thoughts of deception. So here's the first prominent lie I believe the enemy communicates to us all the time. You cannot trust God. You cannot trust God. You see the enemy wants more than anything else for us to begin to doubt our Heavenly Father, to doubt his character, to doubt his goodness, to doubt his holiness, to doubt his motive, to doubt our Heavenly Father. And we see this all the way back to the garden in Genesis chapter 3. I want to read this for us this morning where the serpent is talking to Eve. And I want you to listen to it with this reality in mind that one of the prominent lies of the enemy is that we cannot trust God. Here's what the serpent said to Eve. Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, "Indeed, has God said, 'You shall not eat from the tree of the garden?' The woman said to the serpent, 'From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat.' But from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, 'You shall not eat from it or touch it or you will die.' The serpent said to the woman, 'You surely will not die.' For God knows that in the day you eat from it, your eyes will be opened and you will be like God knowing good and evil.' That is Satan in essence saying to Eve, 'You shouldn't trust God.' That's been his oldest lie since the beginning that we as the people of God can't really trust God. But the truth of God's words says something much, much different. The truth of God's words said that he desires the best for us, that he created us, he loves us, he knows everything about us and wants to give us hope and wants to give us a future. And I think this lie has a couple of forms that I want to point out to you this morning. First of all, here's one way that this lie may come to you. The enemy will say, 'You cannot trust God to forgive all of your sins.' It's came to all of us. I won't say that every single sin can't be forgiven, he'll point out one. And maybe it was a sin for you that affected a lot of people. Maybe it was a sin that was really, really messy. Maybe it's a sin that's really just been in you emotionally and he'll say, 'You can't trust God to forgive that.' That was too big, that was too bad, that was too ugly. But here's the truth, that when Jesus Christ died on the cross, all of the punishment, all of the wrath, all of the bad for sin that had to be poured on that sin to pay the penalty for it was taken care of. Jesus paid for all of it on the cross. And three days later when he came back to life, God raised him from the dead, it showed that God was pleased with the sin penalty. So there would never need to be for all eternity another payment for the sin of humanity. That's the truth this morning. In regardless of how dark it is or ugly it is or whatever it is that you engaged in with your sinful nature, listen the Bible says, where sin is huge, grace is bigger. And there is nothing that the grace and forgiveness of God cannot take care of. Here's another way this law will come to you. Not only you can't trust God to forgive your sins, but you can't trust God to provide for all of your needs. And I know right now that's something a lot of us are struggling with. The economy is tough, jobs are few and far between, there are a lot of us who are going paycheck to paycheck, trying to figure out what's next and the enemy would love to plant a lie inside of your mind and my mind that says, God doesn't care about you. You can't trust God to truly provide for your needs. Listen to this quote about your all-standing. The devil never points out the abundant blessing of God in your life. The devil always points out what is missing, lacking or negative. He may point to what is good and right, but it will always be in the context that these things are missing in your life. The devil sends thoughts and impulses that register as wants, need and must have. That's the lie he'll communicate to us. But here's the truth of God's Word. I'm going to read from Matthew chapter 7 real quick and then I want to kind of paint a little bit of a picture for you. But here's what the Bible says about the way your Heavenly Father loves you. About the way your Heavenly Father wants to provide for all of your needs. Matthew chapter 7 verse 9 says, "Or what man is there among you when his son asks for a loaf will give him a stone. Or if he asks for a fish, he will not give him a snake, will he? If you then being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give what is good to those who ask him?" And here's the best picture I can think of of what this text is trying to communicate to us. Maybe you've been in this situation or you've seen someone in this situation. You know the first time that a parent holds their baby for the very first time and they're looking down at that child and the child's kind of crying and not really knowing what's going on, but the parent's face is just glowing because they're holding this baby for the very first time. And inside of that parent, here's what's going on. There's nothing I wouldn't do for this child. There's nothing I wouldn't do to love this child, to provide for this child, to make sure that this child has the best life possible because they love their child. Well God is our Heavenly Father, has that same heart towards us as his children. Now it's not always going to look the way we think it needs to look, but ultimately we can trust our Heavenly Father to provide for our needs and so, so much more. The first prominent lie of the enemy is that you cannot trust God, but church we can trust Him. Here's the second prominent lie of the enemy that a lot of us face and a lot of us struggle with, your plan is better than God's plan. We hear it, that our plan, what we have figured out, the scenario we've worked out in our mind 50 times over is better than what God has intended for us. And here's the deal, this lie will come to you most of the time when emotionally you want to latch on to something. If that's a purchase, if that's a relationship, if that's a certain action or some type of sin you're wanting to engage in, the enemy will come to us and here's what I'll say, what's your want to do? It's way better than what God has for you. And he'll plant that thought inside of your mind. He'll say things like God is holding out on you. God cannot meet your need. And in that moment, here's what you naturally want to do. You want to follow your heart. Enemy says, what God has planned for you, it's no good. You need to do what you're thinking, follow your heart, but listen to me. Our hearts, our emotions will flat lie to us and send us on a path of destruction. We cannot trust our hearts and in that moment, don't retreat to your heart, you must retreat to the truth of God's Word, which says the future God has planned for you is one of hope and one of fullness. It's one of abundant life and great hope for all eternity and the enemy can never guarantee that. And so when he comes to you in those moments when emotionally you're wanting to latch on to something, don't believe the lie that says your plan is better than God's plan, because it's not. God desires great things for us. He desires for us to be conformed to the likeness of Christ so we can experience the abundant life he designed for us. And he's going to discipline us because he loves us, he's going to walk us through some dark valleys to teach us some principles, but ultimately God desires for his people to experience great hope and abundant life for all eternity. Don't believe that lie. Here's a third prominent lie of the enemy. Your sin only affects you. Your sin only affects you. The enemy would love for us to believe that if we are engaging in some type of sinful action and no one around us is involved, that it's okay. That if it's just us in the room or it's just us at that certain location or doing this certain thing, then it doesn't necessarily affect my family or my church or my job or my friends. The enemy would love for us to believe that lie, because in essence that makes sinning so much easier. And as long as we do it in the context where it's just us, it doesn't matter, but that is a lie from the enemy. You see, any sin that we commit, whether it be in a group or individually, impacts our fellowship with God and ultimately steals from our intimacy with God. The enemy knows he can never rob us of a relationship with God, but he can put sin in front of us that we jump on and all of a sudden it robs us of our intimate fellowship with God. And it's just amazing to me thinking about this lie that we never think about in the midst of it. But I know there's a lot of people who struggle with a lot of different things. That may be financially, that may be bitterness or thoughts emotionally or things that are just going on in your life. That may be I know for a lot of guys struggle with pornography and stuff on the internet. And the lie that the enemy sends to you is that it doesn't affect anybody else. It's just you, but it is amazing if you look over the course of history, how many fathers sat in front of a computer screen looking at junk on the internet and very, very soon in the next generation their sons were doing the same thing. Don't believe the lie that says your sin only affects you. Don't make that sacrifice. It's a lie from the enemy. Whatever it is, whatever arena of life it involves when you sin, it does affect your family. It does affect your church. It does affect your job. It does affect your friendships because it affects your influence and your ability to be effective for the sake of the kingdom of God. Don't believe the lie that your sin only affects you. Here's the fourth prominent lie of the enemy. God cannot use you. He says it to all of us. He comes to us and he says, "You know what? You cannot be used by God. You've went too far. You've done too much. There are too many things happening. There's no way that the God of the universe could ever use your life to be significant in his kingdom." And there are a couple of examples of what this looks like. Here's one. He'll say, "God cannot use you because of your past." All of us have heard that in some way. God sparks inside of our hearts some ministry or some way he wants us to step out in faith and really pour into someone's life or be a part of something. And the first thing the enemy says is, "No way. Why are you wasting your time thinking you could be involved in that? Do you remember what you've done?" And he pushes that up in our face. Don't believe that lie because here is the supernatural work of God that I don't understand. I can't even explain it, but it's just true that somehow, some way God can work all things for our good and his glory. And it is amazing to me that people who used to be an addict in some form, whether that be drugs or alcohol or whatever, on the other side of the cross, after they experience rescue, they can pour into people who struggle with addiction like the way I never could. People who are single parents, people who have been homeless, people who have been depressed, people who have been abused, people who have had medical conditions, they can go back and minister to people who were walking in those same situations because they've been there and they understand and God uses that for our good and for his glory. So don't believe the lie of the enemy, God can use anything. God can change anybody, so don't fall into the lie in the trap that God can't use you because of your past. The Bible says he separates our sins as far as the East is from the West, and if you want to know what God wants for you, he wants to use you regardless of the baggage. He wants to set you free from that lie, but this lie has another form, and it's that you cannot be used up by God because of your schedule. An old preacher once said, "If the devil can't make you bad, he'll make you busy." Everyone sitting in this room has been uniquely gifted to serve the body and contribute to the overall mission of the kingdom of God. And some of us have just been sitting for a long time. And you've believed the lie of the enemy that says, "Man, you're too busy." You have too many things going on to think about serving in your local church or engaging in some type of ministry opportunity or going to speak the gospel to the nations. You've got way too much going on to even think about that. If your schedule is so demanding that you feel like it's impossible for you to contribute to the overall mission of the church, you are doing more than God wants you to do because every single person who was born into the kingdom of God is uniquely gifted to contribute to the mission. That may be serving in the local church, that may be going overseas, that may be a mission opportunity somewhere in our city, but every person who follows Jesus has been called and empowered and equipped to go and contribute to the overall mission of the church. So don't believe the lie of the enemy that says, "You're too busy." Your schedule is too demanding for you to ever be used of God. The reason God has left you here after you experience rescue is because he wants to use you. The question is, how are you letting him use you? How are you saying, "God, here's my gifts. I don't really know how it's going to work. I don't know what it's going to look like, but God, any way you would want to use these gifts to contribute to your mission, my life is a blank slate. You interrupt it, you change things, you show me what to do, but God, I just want to be used in your kingdom. I know that you can, I know that you want to, and I want you to know I am available. Some of us in the room need to believe the truth this morning and embrace that reality and say, "God, however, whenever I know you can use me, what do you want to do?" Thirty thousand times a day, there are thoughts passing through our mind. Every one of those thoughts is either based in the truth or it's based around deception. And only the truth of God has the power to set us free from those lies that we believe and the deception that we fall into. A couple of takeaways for us this morning. First of all, we need to make the truth of God a priority in our lives. We need to walk in this truth. We need to memorize this truth. We need to sing this truth. We need to have this truth constantly in front of us, constantly abiding in the truth. So in those moments, when the enemy comes at you, just like he comes at me, we can retreat to the powerful word of God that can break bonds, that can break death, that can break evil and set us free and allow us to experience the abundant life that Jesus intended for us to experience. Moving forward, we need to make the truth a priority. We need to find people that we can be honest with. I know that's awkward, it's tough, but we all need people that we can just be honest with and say, "You know what? Last night the devil was telling me my sin only affects me." And I believe that. We need people in our lives that we can be honest with. Otherwise, we build up this superficial act of how great we are, how strong we're. Listen, we're not strong. Left to myself, I'm weak, I'm broken, I'm helpless. And I need people in my life who can speak into me the truth of the word of God. And I can just be honest with them about how the enemy is coming at me. But thirdly, this morning, as I take away, remember this. Jesus wins. There was a moment 2,000 years ago when Jesus died on the cross and Satan began to celebrate because he thought, "I've been trying to kill this guy, I've been trying to take his life away to murder him to destroy his ministry, and finally, after all of this time of trying, Jesus is finally dead." Three days later, the tomb started shaking and Jesus kicked the thing open and walked out in all victory, in all righteousness, in all glory. And from that moment, Satan's fate was forever determined. He is condemned to die, to be in the pit of hell for all eternity. And Jesus is all glorious and all reigning and the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and says to us today, "I don't care what your bondage is, I don't care what your junk is, I want to give you my resurrection life so that you can walk in the victory of life." We got to get our hearts around that this morning. Because as we live week after week, month after month, here's what happens. We just start getting beat down, and we begin to believe the lives of the devil, but hear me this morning, Church, the truth of God has the power to set us free. Not partially, not sometimes, not on certain occasions. It has the power to set us free both now and free eternity from the lives of the enemy. What I want to do now is I want to lead us through a time of kind of process, and then we're going to do something in a moment that's kind of special that I'm pretty excited about. So if you would where you are, would you just bow your head? And I want you right now to think about you. 30,000 times today, a thought is going to pass through your mind. Are you letting the lives of the enemy dominate your thoughts, and become ideas, and become behaviors, and become lifestyle? Or are you embracing the truth and the power of God that can set you free from that stuff? Maybe for you this morning, you have the realization that the truth just isn't a priority in your life. Maybe you're understanding, wow, I've been trying to fight this. I've been trying to out talk the devil, and I'm losing. And this morning, you realize your only retreat, your only refuge in those moments is to clean to the truth of the Scriptures. Maybe there's some things about your prayer life that need to change. Maybe you need to begin to sinner your time with God around praying for victory in some of these areas, and just letting the truth live in your heart and live in your mind and confess those things and begin to walk in victory from that stuff. Maybe you're here this morning and you realize for the first time there's somebody who hates you. But there is an enemy who is seeking to steal, kill, and destroy everything about your life, and you've never realized that before. Would you just talk to God for a second? I don't know what he's stirring inside of your heart. Would you just talk to him? Ask him to guard your mind. Ask him to guard your heart. Ask him to put somebody in your life you can be honest with. Ask him to show you how the truth becomes priority on a day in and day out basis in your life. Ask him to remind you of the victory that is found in the cross and the resurrection of Jesus. If you're here this morning and you would just say Travis right now, I'm just in some deception. I believed a lie and the enemy's got me bound up and you would just like for me to pray for you. Nobody's looking around. Would you? Would you just maybe raise your hand real quick if you just know you're in some junk and I can just pray for you. I'd love to pray for you. Thank you. Put your hands down. I want to pray specifically for you. I want to pray that the truth of God would set you free from that stuff. So God for those who indicated by raising their hands that there's some form of a lie or something that they've believed, God, I lift them before you. Holy Spirit, would you flood their heart? Would you flood their mind and supernaturally with the truth of your word? Put them on the path of righteousness. God, give them your wisdom to know what that needs to look like, what steps need to be taken, what needs to be removed, what needs to be added to their life to make that change. But God, I just placed them before you. I pray you would just encourage them today in the victory and the resurrection of Jesus. God we're in this together. We all struggle. It's all tough. We all have good days and bad days. But God, we're so thankful that together as a body, we can run to your truth. We can run to your power and you promise that you will set us free. God, I pray over the next few minutes as we just declare this declaration that we could fill this room with your praise. Lord, the enemy's been defeated, he is limited, and God, you are all glorious and all powerful today. I'm going to ask you just right where you are, would you just stand up, would you stand right where you are? I'm going to read a passage of Scripture over us and we're going to sing together. It's right where you are. I want you to hear the words of Paul in the book of Romans. He says, "But in all these things, we are overwhelmingly conquered through Him who loved us, for I am convinced that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor depth nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." We are free today, and we're going to sing this song with excitement knowing that Jesus is alive and the victory belongs to His church. [music]