to you. Amen? So we're going to be back in 2 Corinthians again, 2 Corinthians in chapter 10. That's where we're going to be looking tonight. And we're going to read these verses, verses 1 through 6, and we'll have a very brief review tonight. And then we're going to get into the last two points of our sermon. The Bible says here in verse 1 of 2 Corinthians chapter 10, it says, Now I, Paul, Myself beseech you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ, who in presence and base among you, but being absent and bold toward you. But I beseech you that I may not be bold when I am present with that confidence, wherewith I think to be bold against some, which think of us if we walked according to the flesh. For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds, casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalted itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ, and having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience when your faith is fulfilled." So I want to bring to you tonight the second part of this series titled, confidence. And so last week we looked at two points. We looked at the present reality we have in our life. As Paul says in verse 3 of our text, although we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh, And it's important for us to understand that the warfare that we have in this life, and some are sitting here tonight undoubtedly dealing with some type of warfare in the life, and you say, preacher, how do you know that? I know that because we're human beings. I know that because it's Sunday. I know that because it's another church day. I know that because that's the reality of life, that when you get a room with this many people in here, there's gonna be at least one that are going through something in their life that is hidden and no one else may know about it, but you're dealing with it. So the present reality is tonight that if you're gonna succeed in the battles that you're gonna face, it's gonna take more, as we mentioned, it's gonna take more than education, it's gonna take more than energy, and it's gonna take more than excitement. Listen, I'm one of the most excited people in the world half the time of my life. The other half the time of my life, I'm not excited at all. Amen? So by that rationale, if excitement was part of success in life or succeeding in winning the battles, that means I'm only winning, you know, 50% of the time. Now, if I was a baseball player in the States, batting 500, that's millions and millions and millions of dollars in money, but I'm not a baseball player and a 50% on a test is a failure, okay? So it's going to take more than that. It takes more than those things. And what we ended on last week is something that I really want to kind of, I want to hammer just real quickly, if you'll give me three minutes to hammer this and we'll get into the next point, is where our trust, where our confidence rests. Obviously we know it's not the excitement, education, and energy, but the present reality that we're fighting a battle tonight that we cannot win in the flesh if we're trying to win in the flesh. We're not going to win in the tricks of the trade, but there is a power that is residing inside every saved and born again individual tonight. A power of the Holy Spirit of God. A power, the Bible says, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. I told you last week that every time you go by one of the bajillion castles we have in our area, I want you to think about those strongholds. Think about what a stronghold is. A stronghold is something that, it's a fortress, it's a castle, it's something that's fortified, and maybe tonight the strongholds in your life are opinions and preferences and ideologies, and maybe it's something in the past, maybe it's something of the flesh, maybe it's something that you just don't feel like you can get victory over, and it's just reaching inside of your brain and inside of your mind, and it's grabbing ahold of your every thought, and it's trying to pull you back to the place that Christ took you away from. That's a stronghold. That is an attack on you, an attack on the home, attack on the family, that is a stronghold, and we have to fight against that. That is the power that is inside of you, the Holy Spirit of God. I preached a long time ago, I haven't preached from the text in quite a long time, and I'm thinking about in the new year, bringing a message about good old Legion. Remember Legion over there? The maniac of Gadara? Jesus Christ went up to him and he said, you know, he said, what's your name? He says, you know, Legion, for we are many, okay? We are many. Hannah, you're a you and I'm an I, okay? It's me and the Holy Spirit of God, but it's still me over here, you understand? But when you got a you, when you got a they inside of you, there's something drastically wrong, amen? And legion had a minimum of 12,000 devils inside of him and a maximum of 36,000. Why? Because of his name. A Roman legion had anywhere from 12,000 to 36,000 men in their legion. Now I want you to imagine that with me. The Bible tells us of the maniac of Gadara that no man could tame him. They put him in fetters, he'd break them in chain. He ran around naked all the time. He was always in a graveyard. He was howling and hollering and screaming and always cutting himself, doing all of those different things. And nobody could do anything with him. And Jesus Christ, before he even got off that boat, those devils went, we in trouble now. Ran up to him, have thou come to torment us before the time. They knew their days are limited. They're not stupid. Have you come to destroy us before the time? And there was a herd of pigs over there, wasn't there? Some swine. And he said, we bid you. They asked the Lord Jesus Christ permission when he cast him out of the man to be put into those herds. I want you to stop for just a second on that because we're reviewing point number two from last week, the power residing inside of you. How do you get the Holy Spirit of God inside of you? You invite him in. You ask Jesus Christ to save your soul according to the gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord and Savior. At that present moment, you receive every drop of the Holy Spirit of God than you're ever gonna get. I covered that last week. There ain't no multiple blessings. You got all you're gonna need. It's up to you to yield your body over to him more and more and more in your thought life. So you're not getting the Holy Spirit of God, who is the most powerful entity in all of creation, unless you invite him in. Those devils are not leaving that maniac of Gadara unless they ask Jesus Christ. They had to ask permission, if you will, to go inside the swine. They wasn't doing it of their own volition. So now let's flip the coin. If the Holy Spirit of God cannot enter your body, the most powerful entity in the universe, the third entity of the Trinity, If he can't enter into you without you inviting him and asking him in, and those devils could not leave that man to go in those pigs without asking Jesus Christ permission, how'd they get into the man in the very beginning? He had to invite him in somehow. He had to open up a door in his life. Jesus Christ says that no man, no one comes into a man's house, I'm gonna paraphrase a bit, lest the strong man be bound. So we have this fortress that we're fighting against. We have the power residing inside of us to cast down every one of these thoughts, to bring them into captivity, to pull down these strongholds, these weapons of our warfare, it's already inside of us tonight. But if we're bound to ideologies of our own, if we're bound to strongholds of opinions and preferences, and the way things used to be, if we're bound to the sin of this world or the thoughts and things that are exalting itself against God, you know what we're doing? We're putting the Holy Spirit of God up in an attic of the house, and we're giving over ourself into a stronghold, and yet you have the power inside of you tonight by the Holy Spirit of God. You see, my friend, Where is our confidence tonight? What is holding you captive this evening? What is allowing you not to grow, not to have the victory in the Christian life? And I mean, most of the times we are held in bondage in our own mind more than anything. And we must recognize the power that is inside of us. The power that's already there. Not something that you have to go get. Not something that you gotta take a podcast on. Not something that you need a course in. It's inside of you tonight if you're saved and you're born again. The Holy Spirit of God. Amen? Again, where is our confidence? Is it in our ability? What the Bible tells us, you are of God, little children, and have overcome him, I'm sorry, I'm missing it, and overcome them because greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world. I said this last week, I'll say it once more, and we'll get into the third point. We only have two points tonight. I want you to understand what is inside of you. Now, the Bible tells us that your body, you don't own your body, by the way, Don't come to me afterwards and say, it's mine. No, it ain't yours. Before you got saved, it was the devil's and he did what he wanted to with it. Matter of fact, he did with what you allowed him to. And after you got saved and born again, it became God's body. Paul tells us by inspiration of the Holy Spirit of God, that your body is bought with a price. What is it bought with? The blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. And it is the tabernacle or the temple of the Holy Spirit. The temple, your body is a temple of the Holy, it is a dwelling place of the same being, okay, that moved upon the face of the deep, and creation took place. God the Father thought it, God the Son spoke it, and the Holy Spirit of God moved upon the face of the deep, and the worlds were created. and the galaxies were created, and the earth and the water and all of the things came all together because of the power of the Holy Spirit of God. In the Old Testament, they built a tabernacle, one that was mobile. They built that tabernacle, they carried it back and forth. There was a place called the Holies of Holies. That Holies of Holies is where the Holy Spirit of God dwelt. The high priest was allowed to go in there one time a year, and that was to bring those ashes to sacrifice for the sin of Israel. Later on, when they took the Promised Land, they built the temple. Solomon built the temple. It had a Holy of Holies. That's where the Holy Spirit of God dwelt. It was destroyed in 606 BC by Nebuchadnezzar. It was rebuilt by Herod. We don't think the Holy Spirit was ever there. That's a whole other teaching for another time. But we find that when Daniel, when they're in exile, Daniel mentions the God of heaven. He wasn't on earth anymore. But anyway, we'll cover that when we go over the book of Daniel later on. I'm saying all this to say this, here's the point. When Jesus Christ died, was buried, and rose again, and you accepted him as Lord and Savior, your living body became the tabernacle, the holies of holies, if you will, the same thing that was in the wilderness, the same thing that was in Jerusalem, is now sat here in these blue chairs. He's inside of you. That's how powerful you are tonight. That's what you have inside of you. That's where the confidence needs to come from. So therefore, if you have the power residing in you, There is a present reality that we are going to fight this battle. There's things that we're gonna have to deal with. Thirdly, tonight, there is a personal responsibility. Those of you that have known me for any length of time, you understand and you know, you know it from the Monday morning videos, you know it from behind this pulpit, I believe in personal responsibility. I don't believe it's anybody outside of these doors' responsibility to take care of your business. That's your business and you need to take care of it, amen? Verse five says, casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God and bring him into captivity, every thought through the obedience of Christ. The battle in this world, every battle begins in our mind where images are created either for or against the Lord. So we've already laid the foundation that that's the present reality. There's a battle in every one of our life, but there's a power residing inside of you. So now you know that power's inside of there. There's a personal responsibility that we have to take those imaginations, grab ahold of them, and throw them down and get them out of here that's exalting themselves against God. The word imagination is defined as a reckoning, a computation, if you will. Imagination, by definition, literally means the creation of images. Remember in Genesis 6? That is said, you know, God's getting ready to destroy the world. He called Noah, who was pure at his generations. He was perfect at his generations. He hasn't mixed with any kind of supernatural creature, and none of his family has. Eight people ended up being saved, and a handful of animals. Those animals on that ark and all that, he preached for 120 years. All of that to say this, the whole purpose, the whole reason was, was that God repented in his heart and his mind that he created man. One, he said that his thoughts, were wicked, they were wicked, the imaginations of their thoughts was wicked continually. Do you know what that means? That means that they had a continual creation of wicked, vile images inside their mind 24-7. Wicked, just vile people. God said, okie doke, you got 120 years to repent. None of them repented. Only Noah and his family got on that boat. Those imaginations, if we're not careful, will grab a hold of us, create in us a stronghold to where even our own very thoughts are continually evil, drawing us back. Some of us have to fight this every day. Most of us do. When we accept the present reality and understand the power residing within us, We have got to exercise our personal responsibility to cast down every created image in our mind, everything, every high thing which exalt itself against the knowledge of God. Things like our pride, our pride. But when we think of ourselves more than we ought to think of ourself, we're exalting ourself up against the knowledge of God. The Bible tells me in Proverbs, it says, for as he thinketh in his heart, so is he. If you start thinking you're better than the one sitting next to you, that's prideful, amen? That's prideful. I mean, think about it like this. Little worldly cliches, and I may not go over all of them, I don't know, they just annoy me, amen? I'm gonna end up, I gotta cast down thoughts in my mind as I read these things as I get aggravated, amen? Just believe in yourself. Yeah, how's that working out? If I just believed in my, you know, guys, if I depended on me, just BJ, Man, I'm telling you, I would be, you don't even understand the mess that I would be in. You create your own reality. No, you don't. The reality of our life was created when? When Adam and Eve fell. When sin entered into this world, guys, we had a broken world. You do not create your own reality. Life happens to all of us. Earthquakes, accidents, recessions, environmental consequences. Everything that's happening to you has happened to everybody. We don't create our own. You are what you are because it's exactly where you want to be. I'm not even gonna cover that one because it's just plain silly. That's like saying, you know what man, you took a wrong turn hand on the road and you just kept driving because you really wanna be there. And you go 20, 50, 40, 50, 90 miles away from where you're supposed to be. Nope, this is where I, it's just stupid man, you know? It's a cliche that people say and they throw it out there on social media and somebody buys into it and they run around like a bunch of little followers man and they don't understand why they're running around and going nowhere. Follow your own passion, that'll get you a lot of happiness. You're perfect just the way you are. Now I know that may be touchy, but it's painful when people give this advice. If every result in our life, health, happiness, peace, mental well-being, financial well-being, social, spiritual well-being, if all of those things were on from a scale to one to 10, how many people in here would say they're a 10? That your finances are a 10, that your health is a 10, that your mental well-being is a 10, all the time? I don't think anybody would say that. I ain't gonna say that. Man, I got places in my body hurting right now I didn't know I had till yesterday, okay? You say, is that working out? No, man, that's my old age. I mean, good night, man. And when you think that way, when you begin to process that in your mind and you say, well, I'm perfect the way I am, I don't need to make any improvements, you're never gonna change, you're never gonna grow. Matter of fact, Solomon said this, he says, very every man at his best state altogether, It's vanity. He ends that proverb by saying selah. You know what selah means? Think on these things. It means stop, pause for a second, and go, hey, let me back up a little bit and read that again. I'm not perfect. I'm never gonna be perfect until Jesus Christ comes down here and snatches me out of here, and I go through the judgment seat, and I'm bawling and squalling and crying about all the failures that I had. One day, 1,007 years later, then I'll be perfect in eternity. But until then, no sir. I got one quote in here that Tony Robbins said and I'm not even gonna put it in here, it's just lame. It's humanism, man, humanism. Pride, guys, how you think in your heart, so is he. Preeminence is another one. This is a big one today, especially I think it's probably bigger today than it ever has been. Maybe not in the heart of men and women, but it's bigger for our life because of the social media drive. Everybody's firing to be seen, and man, if you don't get posts out there every 15 minutes or so, man, you just fall between the cracks, and nobody knows who you are and what you're doing and all this and that. But preeminence, guys, is something that if we're not careful, we'll allow it to exalt itself against the knowledge of God. I remember over nine years ago before we got on that ship and moved over here to the United Kingdom, people were asking me about what do you want to do? I said, I want to plant churches is what I want to do. I want to see souls saved. I want to see lives changed. I want to see families put back together. I want to see, this is what I want to do. And I want God to get inside the boat with me, amen? And I thought, nope, I wanna get in his boat, and hopefully that's what he wants to do. Amen? The big battle you saw with a lot of guys is they wanna have that preeminence. They wanna be seen and known. Do you know where I really like to live? I like to live in the corner somewhere. You're not gonna believe what I'm gonna tell you, and I know when Thursday morning comes and Friday, I know, but in my heart, In reality, guys, I am an introvert. And I know the persona you see on the gym floor and here, I get all that. But I'm telling you, if I had it BJ's way, if I had it the way I normally am, I'd crawl up in a hole somewhere and you never would see me. I'd work till I was blue, I would work my fingers, but you never would see me. That's what's inside of me. You say, then how in the world do you do this? I've overcome that, but in my heart, I'm just as comfortable sitting in a restaurant by myself, having a coffee by myself, going here by my, I have no problem. Man, I was the only child. You know, I learned how to make toys out of rocks and sticks. And man, you want to talk about imagination. We had a coaster holder in our living room. That was, to me, that was a Buck Rogers spaceship that I ran around the house all the time. Mom in there yelled at me, Billy, put that coaster holder back down. It's a Buck Rogers. You know, that's what I'm trying to tell you. That's me. I don't want the preeminence. I don't like or want to be out front. God's placed me where I am and doing what I'm doing for whatever reason, but it's here, amen. A preeminence is a problem if we're not careful. Preeminence is an issue that will exalt itself against the knowledge of God. The apostle John wrote, he says, I wrote unto the church with diatrophies, who loved to have the preeminence among them, received this not. That's in his third epistle, verse nine. He was writing to them to encourage them. Now, later on in that epistle, I think in the next verse, he basically says, I'm gonna deal with him when I get there, all right? Because Diotrephes wanted to be out front. He wanted to be the front man. Here's the beloved John, one of the sons of thunder, the last and living apostle there was. I'm writing unto the church. We want to come and we want to encourage you. And Diotrephes says, nope, I don't want any glory taken away from me. He goes, I'll deal with him. Again, beloved, our mind is a battlefield. It's a war for our thoughts, and it results in actions, and some people have thoughts which produce immediate actions, and often the wrong ones, but we're driven in society to have preeminence today. Our pride takes over, and it gives way in our life, and we lose the battle. Paul said in the book of Colossians, he said, and he is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things, he might have the preeminence. One of my daily prayers, I write my prayers in the morning. In journal, write my prayers and write my daily verse. In my prayers nearly every morning, it's me asking the Lord for the Lord Jesus Christ to be seen in me and what I do every day. Not me, him. The one who died for me. The one who we just sang about who can wipe away all the failures. Aren't you glad about that? The one who died and was buried in a grave, but he could put that behind him as he got up and left, rose again. He's the one that needs the preeminence in our life. The third thing, and then we'll get to the final point to be done tonight. Another thing that can exalt itself against the knowledge of God is position. It's a tricky one here. Abraham Lincoln said, nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. I've been at This Game Guys preaching in the ministry for nearly 30 years now, right at 30 years. I was in business for well over 20 years. And out of those 20 years, I've seen managers and leaders and presidents and CEOs, man, they were awesome. I mean, good men, humble men, knew how to control a room, knew how to speak, knew how to talk. But I've seen men and women. I knew one lady who she was head of the administrative department within the company. 4,000, 4,200 employees. And buddy, she knew how to control a room. And she became a good buddy of mine. She was a big Tennessee fan. I'm an Alabama fan. She'd come to our office, man, and she would want to use, well, I'd let her use my office, and this was always the reason why. I'd let her use mine to do all her work, and I'd decorate that thing with everything Alabama known to man. Denise even made an Alabama cake one time, because she came in on her birthday. She came, and she had a real raspy voice. She goes, BJ, I'm going to kill you. And I was like, roll tight. Her name was Diana, Diana's precious, I gotta be honest with you, I loved her. But I watched her control this administrative division of our company, and I absolutely loved how she did it. There was times when she needed to be firm, there was times when she didn't. I'm telling you this story because she didn't look for the glory for herself. There was an amputee one time who worked for the county, lost his leg, and the county did everything they could do to put him on disability so that he would never have to work again, never would work and this and that, and we made his prosthesis, we got him up and walking. This guy was fit as a fiddle, strong as a horse, and he goes, listen, I wanna work. And I watched Diana go, she's on the administrative side, she's on all the paperwork, insurance, all that stuff. I watched her like a bulldog, man. And I remember thinking, they ain't got a dog's chance. And no, it wasn't the county, it was the state. He worked for the state of Tennessee, the Department of Tennessee, of roadways, highways, highway department. And it was the first case in history that had set a precedence that was won. to force them to allow him to come back at work, do what he wanted to do, provide him a job and not be on disability and sit home and do nothing. And I watched Diana, I mean, you could almost see a glimmer in her eye because she knew she was going to win. It wasn't about the preeminence for her. It was about giving that man what he wanted, getting him back in the workforce. You know, guys, preeminence, she could have taken that and ran with it and said, look what I did. And she didn't. She says, look what he's doing now. Position, preeminence, power. Position is one of the sneakiest things, it's a subtle area in mankind's struggles. Beloved, it is a personal responsibility of Christians to keep themselves in check so that our confidence doesn't rest in our pride, our confidence doesn't rest in preeminence, that it doesn't rest in position. But rather, guys, the question now is not where, but more than less how. empowers our confidence to rest in Christ, His Word, etc. It's because of a promise that is revealed. Verse 6 says, "...and have it in a readiness to revenge all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled." The key word in this verse is not any other word other than this simple word, when. Beloved, there is a personal responsibility we have as believers to use the weapons of our warfare, our spiritual warfare through God, who has a readiness to revenge all disobedience when our obedience is fulfilled. Our duty is the personal responsibility. There is a promise that is revealed in our life that God will fight the battle, that He's done won the war, that He'll do what needs to be done. We must not feel as if the Lord is going to enact vengeance upon people, upon those who disobey. who stand against his word, a falsely accused of church, as Paul was dealing with in that chapter there. But we do need to understand that he's never gonna leave us nor forsake us. You want confidence tonight to walk with your head high and your chest stuck out? Trust that the Lord Jesus Christ is never leaving you nor forsaking you. You know, there's a painting that's gone real popular online, and it's a little bitty teeny sheep, a little lamb, in the middle of the wilderness, and you see him focused very, very beautifully. You can see the detailed part of this little lamb, and he's out in the middle of the wilderness, and back in the back, blurred out, is Jesus Christ running toward him. That's him leaving the 90 and nine and coming after the one. That's what that painting is about, and to me, it's powerful. I absolutely love it. I'm here to tell you tonight, guys, that He's gonna protect you. Don't ever lose that sight. He's gonna provide for you. Don't ever forget that. Guys, listen, He never said that it would be easy, and it's not supposed to be easy. Life is not easy. Deadlift is not easy. Squatting is not easy. Work is not easy. That's why it's called work. It ain't called ease, amen. But He did promise it would be worth it. He did promise it would be worth it. Marriage is not always easy. Parenting is not always easy. But it's worth it. It's worth it, guys. So that's your confidence tonight. Paul's confidence did not rest in his power. It didn't rest in his position. It didn't rest in his preeminence. It didn't rest in his pride. It didn't even rest necessarily in his personal responsibility. It rested in the power that resided for him to perform the personal responsibility. Why? Because he understood the promise that's revealed. Paul's confidence was in the promise of God. It was through his word. Beloved, the same Lord that saved the apostle Paul, the same Lord that called John, the same Lord that called Matthew and Mark, and Peter, the same Lord that spoke to all of these men that we read about in the Bible, the same Lord that saved Mary Magdalene, a woman possessed of seven devils, the same Lord that healed that woman with an issue of blood for 12 years, the same Lord that had the paralytic get up and leap and walk by the pool of Siloam, who was paralyzed for 38 years, is the same Lord that saved you. And if he's never gonna leave or forsake any of them, he is not gonna leave or forsake you. That is the promise tonight. So my question to you this evening as we close, do you believe the promise? Do you believe it tonight? Is that where your confidence is? When you get in your car tonight and you get ready to have the conversation that you probably ended with in the vehicle, are you gonna come back to the promise now or are you gonna pick up where you left off in the car? I don't know what your conversation was. I don't know where your heart and your mind is right now. I can tell you this. I can read some people like a book. And I'm going to tell you now that you need to get back into that promise and not get back to where you were. God's promised he loves you guys. He'll never leave you nor forsake you. That's the promise revealed to me. That's the promise revealed to you. And that's where our confidence should rest. Will you bow your heads tonight? Father in heaven, we thank you, Lord, for who and what you are, for all that you've done. I thank you, dear God, for the promise that you've given us, that you'll never leave us nor forsake us. For the power residing inside of each saved and born again individual tonight of the Holy Spirit of God, I thank you and praise your name for it. Lord, I thank you for the personal responsibility that each one of us has tonight to pull down those strongholds in our life that's exalting themselves against you, Lord. I thank you for the present reality that we're living in, that we're not living in yesterday or last year or last month or decades ago, but we're living right here right now. And that's where our confidence needs to be in today's world with the promise that's been given by you and you alone. So let us put our faith and trust in you tonight, just like we did that we have our soul saved in eternity. Let us put it there for every issue, every problem, every circumstance, every situation, every blessing, and every miracle that comes our way. In Jesus Christ's most holy and wonderful name, we ask these things tonight. Amen.