Luke chapter four and look at verse 16, speaking of our Lord Jesus, and he came to Nazareth where he had been brought up and as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up for to read. So here's speaking of our Lord Jesus, he went back home, to where He had grown up, went to the synagogue as His custom was. Our Lord Jesus had a custom, or our modern word would be habit, He had a habit of going to the synagogue on the Sabbath day. This would be kind of like us going to church in this age on Sunday. But it was His custom. It was His habit. And when we're talking about the importance of stewardship in our lives, I think all of us would agree that it's important to be a good steward, to strive to be a good steward with the things God gives us. But how can we instill these principles of stewardship into our daily lives? So, especially, you know, you get this idea of stewardship. You want to start being a good steward. You want to start ordering your life after the Bible and living like Jesus. Or you find out that you're doing a lot of things that either don't lead to good stewardship or are not what Christ would do. And we need to start doing these things. How can we instill these principles of good stewardship and of daily Christian living in our lives? And the answer may surprise you, but I think part of the answer, a large part, and one of the secrets of living the Christian life is found in the word habits. Habits. There are good habits, there are bad habits, but everybody has habits. Most people don't give too much thought to the habits that they currently have, and I want you to take just a moment. If someone were to say about you, boy, this is so-and-so's habit, this is his custom, what habits would you have that you can just think about just right off the bat? I have a habit of doing this, I have a habit of doing that. Sometimes we're not even aware of our habits, but our spouse or our children or our parents might say, oh, no, you always do it that way. I don't always do it that way. No, you always do it that way. Or no, this is how you always do it. My wife and I, you know, we'll be talking and there's certain things, it's like pushing a button. If I see something, it's like I always say the same thing. You know, you see something, it's like, always say the same thing. Or she sees something and the response is always the same. And we'll kind of joke with each other about that. I knew you were going to say that. Why? Because you always say it when this comes up. You always say it whenever you see that. And sometimes we're not even aware of our habits. And I think that all of us need to put our habits into view. We need to pay close attention to our habits because if you learn to leverage the power of a habit, you can find greater consistency and faithfulness in serving Jesus Christ. Now, what is a habit? Merriam-Webster's Dictionary says that a habit is, quote, a settled tendency or usual manner of behavior, an acquired mode of behavior that has become nearly or completely involuntary. Think about that. It's something we do so often that we don't have to think about it. It's almost involuntary. You just do it without thinking. I remember back trying to teach my children how to tie their shoes. And boy, it's incredibly frustrating trying to teach someone to tie shoes that has never tied a shoe. You know, something that if you're wearing laces on your shoes, you did it today probably without even thinking. Your hands know what to do. Your fingers know what to do. Don't even think about it. You can think about other things and do other things. Boy, a child, you know, okay, you got two little laces, and then you cross them, and then you put this underneath, And then you make one rabbit ear, then you make the other rabbit ear, and then you, and it takes weeks and weeks and weeks and sometimes months of diligent learning trying to figure out how to tie these shoes. But after you get it, it becomes a habit you don't even think about it. Think about the hours of fretting and frustration it took to learn how to drive. We've got one learning how to drive. Our daughter, Stacey, is getting ready to learn how to drive as well. And man, you get behind the steering wheel that first time, and they're grabbing the steering wheel too tight. And they're kind of driving like this, too afraid to go anywhere. They start going this way, so they yank this way. And then they start going that way, and they yank that way. And they push the gas too hard, and they push the brake too hard. and they're afraid to pull out and they're afraid to go and it's it's a lot of frustration you know then they get on the highway and all these big trucks going by and but those of you that drove to church today you probably didn't even think about it just get in the car put on your seat belt you know everything's just automated you're driving down the road changing the channel thinking about the day Maybe talking on your Bluetooth, you know, ladies are putting on makeup, driving down the road, you know, daring us half to death. And guys are like, have a coffee in one hand, a donut in the other, driving down the road. You don't even think about it anymore. It's a habit. You'd learn to make that such a part of your behavior that it's become almost involuntary. Think about reading. Boy, I'm reading my outline. I read the Bible this morning. Remember when you first had to start to read and you had to learn how to make the sounds and k, k, a, a, t, cat. You know, and you're trying to teach someone how to learn, and now, boy, you're just zipping through things without even really thinking about it. There's so many areas in life that we have created habits that are beneficial. And I really think habits are a gift from the Lord. The ability to learn habits and make these behaviors such a part of us that they're almost involuntary is a wonderful thing. Imagine if you had to stop and think through everything you did during the day as if it was the first time. Getting dressed, putting on your shoes, brushing your teeth, making breakfast, getting in the car and driving. Thankfully, God has given us this ability to automate behaviors so we can keep growing and learning and multitask. However, what if the habits that we learn are now destructive? What if they're what we call a bad habit? This means that we've learned bad habits that are hurting us and they've become such a part of us that they're almost involuntary. We do them without thinking, but they're hurting us over and over and over. They're stunting our growth every single day. And so bad habits are the things we do without thinking that hurt us and those around us. For example, ignoring the alarm clock. Bad habit. Saying whatever comes to your mind. That's a bad habit. Raising your voice when frustrated. It's a bad habit. A few cuss words without thought when angry. It's a bad habit. The list goes on and on. You ever see somebody cuss and it's like they don't even know they're cussing? They've done it so much, they don't even know it's coming out. Somebody being rude, that's like they're not even aware they're being rude. I had a family member that used to smoke cigarettes. And as a young man, I marveled that he didn't just smoke cigarettes. I mean, you talk about a chain smoker. It was when one was gone, another one was on its way in. He used to sit there. He'd have it hanging out the side of his mouth. He'd be talking. That thing would be wagging. And then he used to, I don't know how he would do it, but he had just the right I guess saliva content, he would loosen that thing and it would literally hang off his lip. He could have his mouth open, it'd literally just like hang off his lip and just like wait for it and then he'd pull it back in. Just a crazy thing. I remember one of my grandpas used to smoke rolled cigarettes. No filters, the end of his fingers would just be black, teeth would be black. But here this chain smoker just light, smoke, repeat, light, smoke, repeat, just without even thinking about it. And I wonder though if you and I could name our bad habits, and we're not going to name them out loud here, but what would your bad habits be? And at least the first step of growth is to recognize them. You know, I get up and I get moving and I don't take time for God no more. That's a bad habit. Maybe you don't get up early enough to take time for the Lord, that's a bad habit. Maybe at work you've got bad habits where you're on your phone too much while it's time to work, bad habit. Maybe the way you treat family members, the way we treat people, ignoring people when they're talking, boy, that's a bad habit. And so we have to be aware of our bad habits so we can stop them. And then we have to identify things that we want to make such a part of our character that it becomes almost involuntary. For example, prayer. A prayer, you can make prayer such a part of your life where you almost pray just involuntarily. That's your first response to anything that happens is prayer. You can make Bible reading such a thing to where, boy, it's odd for you, it would be weird for you to wake up in the morning and go about your day without reading your Bible. And all of these things. A lot we could say about that. Good habits improve your life. They put success on autopilot because you're doing things that help you every day. Bad habits kill you slowly. They suck the potential from your life. They are the chains that make you feel like a prisoner to your current life. Now, the good news is, with God's help, you can change these habits. I often talk, I'm seeing it more and more in these days today, people feel like a victim. They just feel like, well, this is what life is, and I can't really do much about it, and they just feel like a victim. But whenever you feel like a victim, you've got to understand that you're basically giving away your agency. You're giving away your ability to do anything about it. But when you say, you know what, I may not like my circumstance, I may not like my situation, but God has given me a will, God's given me power, I am in Christ, I have agency in this, then you realize you can change things. We are far more in control in some areas of our lives than we think. And on the other hand, we spend too much of our life trying to control things we can't, and too much of our life ignoring the things that we really could control if we wanted to, or if we decided to. And so, are habits spoken of in the Bible? Yes. The Bible words are custom or tradition. And so here in Luke 4.16, our Lord had a habit of going to the synagogue. Look at Acts chapter 17. Acts chapter 17, we see the apostle Paul had a habit. Acts chapter 17, verses one and two. Now when they had passed through Amphipolis, And Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica where there was a synagogue of the Jews, and Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three Sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures, opening and alleging that Christ must needs have suffered and risen from the dead, and that this Jesus whom I preach unto you is Christ. And so here we find the Apostle Paul had a spiritual habit. It was going into the synagogues to try to win people to Christ. Now, we know Paul preached in the markets. We know that Paul went house to house. But here, he said, listen, these synagogues are open every Saturday. People can come in. He had the credentials to get up and speak. He would go in and speak and preach Christ every Saturday at the local synagogue wherever he was. And so this is a good habit. Imagine if we had the habit of just sharing Christ. Every week, we just shared Christ. We made sure that it was just a habit. What about instead of the habit of feeling afraid when we're supposed to witness, what if we turn that around to, no, we witness all the time. It's just what I do. As a matter of fact, you can get to the place where you do it without thinking. I mean, the track comes out before you're even thinking about it. The words start to come out because that's your habit. Your habit is to speak of Christ. And it's a good thing to do. Look at 1 Corinthians chapter 15. 1 Corinthians chapter 15, we see Verse 33, be not deceived, evil communications corrupt good manners. Now the word manners in this verse means moral habits. So we habitually do the right thing morally. That's where we ought to be. Some people have a habit of doing the wrong thing morally. But God's people should have the habit or the custom, the manner of doing the right thing. But evil communications corrupt good manners. If you're listening to the wrong people encouraging you to do the wrong things, then that's going to corrupt your habit of being right morally or doing the right moral thing. You know, the Bible warns us that who you hang around matters. Who you listen to matters. The influences in your life, they'll either lead you to God or away from God. And so listening to people who are speaking evil and teaching us to do the wrong thing will corrupt good manners. And that's not just saying please and thank you in the manners that we speak of in our current vernacular. It has the idea of moral habits, which is part of that. Of course, please and thank you and politeness is part of that, but it's a much broader term. All right, some people have the habit of skipping church. The Bible tells us not to be like them, but to attend church more regularly as we see the end approaching. Hebrews 10, 25, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some is, but so much the more as ye, but exhorting one another and so much the more as ye see the day approaching. So some people have a habit of skipping church. And by the way, you skip one service, it's easier to skip the next one. and it's easier to skip the next one. A good rule of thumb is never miss two church services in a row if you can help it. Never miss two days walking with God if you can help it. And so, because it's easy for one to turn into two, two turns into three, three turns into four, now you've got a bad habit. it's easier to do the wrong thing than the right thing, right? But the opposite also works. If you're in a bad habit and then you do the right thing, then it's a little easier next time to do the right thing, a little easier next time to do the right thing. You get that momentum going and it can help you, you can automate success by building in godly habits. So we each need to choose to create habits that will improve our lives. Think about this. Often our failures are a result of not doing what we know to do. How often would we keep ourselves out of trouble if we would just do what we know to do? David should have been at war. He stayed home. He saw a lady taking a bath. The rest is history. You know, none of that would have happened if he just would have been where he's supposed to be. You know, the list goes on. How many times have you and I got in trouble because we, I know I shouldn't, but. Or I know I should, but. Whenever we choose to do what we know we shouldn't or we choose not to do what we know we should, we're gonna hurt ourselves. And then those things become a habit. So the bank account is overdrawn, not because you didn't have enough money, but because you didn't balance the checkbook. The marriage is on the rocks, not because your spouse is lousy, but because you come home and ignore him or her. The kids are unattached because you got too busy to build a relationship with them. Not because you're bad kids or you're a bad parent, you're just not habitually connecting with them. Every day, connect, connect, connect. We feel lousy and unproductive all day because we went to bed late, didn't get enough sleep, and then we had Dunkin' Donuts for breakfast. That's just a recipe for a bad day, right? And so my pastor used to call donuts giant sleeping pills. And you know, I found that to be true. And especially the older you get. You know when you're young, your stomach's like a garbage disposal, right? You just eat whatever and keep on going. But the older you get, I find we have to pay more attention to what we're eating because it affects us more. And wouldn't it be sad if just every day we're feeling lousy and unproductive from something simple like we're staying up too late watching TV and not eating a good breakfast? That's changeable, that's fixable if we just get good habits. All right, so good habits automate success. I want you to take just a moment and think about what area do you have a bad habit that you need to change? I mean, think about it right now. Just the first bad habit that pops in your head. You know, I've got a bad habit of doing this. I need to change this with God's help. Go ahead and think about it. Go ahead and write it down. I need to change this. I need to correct this with God's help. And then also, I want you to think about, OK, what good habit could I start this week? I'm just going to start building this into my life, doing it repeatedly until it becomes a habit. What good habit would really improve your life if you just said, you know what, I'm going to make this a habit in my life by God's grace? Go ahead and write that down. They say it takes about six weeks of doing something on a regular basis for it to become embedded into your character or to be a habit. But what if every two months you picked one thing and you said, you know what? I'm going to make this a habit. At the end of the year, you could have six new beneficial habits that put success on autopilot in your life, and it just becomes a part of you where you do it almost without thinking. Wouldn't that be a blessing? Now, spiritual things are You can get a spiritual habit, but Satan's going to try to break that habit. So you're going to have to fight for the spiritual things a little bit more. Satan understands the power of spiritual habits. Let me give you a couple thoughts here. I'm not going to get through all of these, but I'm going to give you 10 areas of your life where you should focus on your habits. I've got a lot of habits under each one of these, but I just want to give you 10 areas, or however many I can get through here, where you should look at the habits in your life and say, can I build habits, or do I have a bad habit in this area that I need to stop, or what habit can I create in this area of my life that would be helpful? Number one, spiritual. Spiritual habits. What about talking to God each morning before your feet touch the floor? That's a good habit. What about follow a Bible reading plan with a chart to track your progress? That's a good habit. What about using a prayer list? Almost every week of my life I have someone say, preacher, I pray, but I don't have a prayer list. You don't know what you're missing until you get a prayer list. Because as much as you think you're remembering everything, you're just not. And the prayer list is like, it just opens up wonderful doors in your prayer life. All right, attend church faithfully each service. Pass out a track every day. Witness to someone every week. All right, there's all kinds of good benefits. Number two, area number two, financial. We're making healthy habits, spiritual healthy habits, financial healthy habits. I get in the habit of returning the tithe to God by writing His check first, or some of you give online, give online first before you do everything else. In the Bible, they called it the first fruits. God got His first. And although you can pay other things and give God His later, I think it's a good habit just to get into because you're prioritizing God first. It really does something in your heart and your mind to say, I'm gonna give God His first. And there's a lot of wisdom to that. All right, pray if there's anyone that you should help. Follow a budget. Balance the checkbook with each deposit. Those are good financial, of course, monthly when you get your register. Those are good financial habits. Number three, marital. We have spiritual habits, financial healthy habits, marital healthy habits. What's a healthy habit look like in your marriage? Say good morning. It's a small thing. You'd be surprised how often married couples ignore each other in the morning. And maybe they're not up, so say good morning the first opportunity you get. Kiss and hug when you first meet or when you leave. I don't know anybody in a healthy marriage that doesn't want more smooches and hugs. Why not? Give them a kiss and a hug any chance you get, but especially when you come home or before you leave. Always kiss goodnight. That's a good habit to get into. Say I love you often. Schedule a weekly date night. Make eye contact when speaking. Ask what can I do to help you. So those are all good habits we can get into in our marriage. Number four, parental. Parental habits. These are good habits for parents to get into. Give a good morning hug. So in our house, everybody gets a good morning hug. If you wake up grumpy, if you wake up happy. If you wake up grumpy, you're probably getting a longer good morning hug, right? But I just love the idea of touching base before we get going. You know, a lot of times I'm up first and then the kids wake up and I'll walk over and give them a hug if I'm up. Or if I'm sitting down, they'll come over and give me a hug. It's a good habit to get into to start the day with a connection. Look at them in the eye and say, I love you every day. Ask how their day went, have a family night, and other good parental things. All right, number five, social healthy habits. Social healthy habits. You say, well, I don't have a lot of friends. Well, build in good habits socially, and it's amazing how you'll start to get friends. I'm not very good with people. You don't have to be good with people. Build in these healthy social habits, and now all of a sudden, people think you're a good people person. And then they become where you don't even have to think about them. Say hello. I know it's a small thing. You can just say hello. Remember when I first came to Wakefield, I'd be driving down the road waving at people. And they'd be like, you know that person? No. You know, just like, you're just waving at random people. Yeah. It's like, were you going to learn not to do that here? I still do it. You know, and right after he said that, I waved at one guy and he waved back, not with a full hand. But they're like, see, I told you. It's like, well, I'm still going to still going to do it. I still do waving down. Somebody walking down the street, this, if I'm walking down the road here and you drive by, unless I'm deep in prayer or thought, I'll try to wave at every car. Hey, it's an arm workout, too. You know, you're getting this, getting your bicep workout as you're waving at people driving by. Yeah, in the village. And so it's a good habit to get into. You know, when you walk past someone, say hello. Make eye contact. Be friendly. Look for people to talk to each day. Get to church early. and find somebody to talk to. Those are all good habits. All right, number six, mental. Mental healthy habits. Take a few minutes each morning and evening to clear your mind. Read a good book each day. Be in the moment. Stop thinking about tomorrow, what's gonna happen tomorrow, and all your fears and worries, and stop living in yesterday. Be in the moment. and obey the Lord, help somebody. Meditate on scripture. Live by a schedule. It will help you mentally if you kind of live by a schedule or have a to-do list. It's just a way to structure your life. If you just have all these random thoughts floating around in your head, you're gonna feel overwhelmed. Another big one is don't have a bunch of loose ends. The way God made us is if we have a loose end, something we haven't finished or something that still needs our attention that we haven't written down or haven't addressed, it will bother our mind and you'll wear yourself out. So have some good mental healthy habits to where your mind is calm and at peace and healthy. All right, number seven, physical. Good physical healthy habits. Go to bed on time, take appropriate vitamins and supplements. Eat healthy. Choose a plan and set some time to exercise. So on. Number eight, emotional. Emotional healthy habits. Some people's emotions are just out of control. They have an unbridled spirit. So there's ways you can do that. Get up on time. Boy, it's a terrible thing to get up late and feel like you're behind all day, isn't it? It's easier to get up early and be tired than to get extra sleep and feel like you're behind for the next 12 hours. And so just know that emotional healthy habit of getting up. Pray each morning. Prayer gets your thoughts in order. Talks to God. Give thanks. Appreciate the small things. Interact with loved ones. You know, some people, they're so depressed, and I think in large part, It's, if you talk to them, they don't appreciate the small things. Matter of fact, they usually don't appreciate the big things. But it's, you can work yourself into a depression or into discouragement by choosing what you focus on. If you neglect the positive and focus on the negative, anybody is gonna get discouraged and depressed and emotionally down. But what if you not just thank God for the big things, but you thank God for the little things? Do you know for most of American history the fact that you can walk 10 feet to somewhere in your house and turn something and water comes out? Do you know most people in human history would think that was some kind of miracle? And it doesn't just come out, it's hot. And so what about being appreciative for the little things? Hey, thank God for a comfortable bed. If it's not comfortable, thank God you're not sleeping on the floor. If the floor would be more comfortable, thank God you're not sleeping on a rock. I mean, there's always, you're not sleeping on a bed of red ant, fire ants, you know? There's always something that you can be thankful for, but these emotional healthy habits, I do a fair bit of counseling, and one of the things I really try to help people with who are struggling is their thinking, and their emotions, and their mental state, and their emotional state has a lot to do with how they've trained themselves to think. If the glass is always half empty, if something's always bad, if the shoes are always ready to drop, if you're not appreciating the small things, you're gonna be a mess. All right, we can ask the mind of Christ, interact with loved ones, so on. Number nine, vocational. Vocational, these are good work habits, get to work early. My father-in-law, he and I used to laugh at each other because he would get to work early. When he worked at the bus place in Indiana, he would leave 45 minutes, an hour early, and he'd get there and sit there, I don't know, 15, 20 minutes every day before work started. And he'd say, well, if something ever happens, I don't want to be late. And I'd say, yeah, but you're going to be on time for like five years wasting 20 minutes a day. And we'd go back and forth. He'd be like, it's worth it. It's worth it. And then one time he got a flat tire or something happened on the way to work, and you know what, he was right. He was able to deal with that and still get to work on time. He's like, see, Paul, it works. And I'm like, okay, maybe you got something there. But you know, it's better to be early than to be late. And that's something that I've learned from him. And so it's good to be early. It's good to get in the habit of getting places early. And work, get there a little early. Employ a start of work routine. We don't have time to talk about that. Set a Christian example at work. Work to improve at your job. Those are all good habits. All right, number 10. And lastly, avocational. Avocational or recreational. You need to plan some time off each week. And when you have a day off, Plan something. Now that might be you plan to just rest. That's valuable. It might be that you plan to just have a pajama day morning and it's your day off and you're gonna, just everybody's gonna sleep in a little bit and gonna make a good mess of pancakes or something and rest. Or it might be that you schedule a hike and say, you know what, I'm gonna go for a hike, I'm gonna go for a walk. I talked to a preacher friend recently, and it was like a zero degrees, and he took a walk up a 4,000 foot mountain in northern New England. And to him, that was recreation. What you'll find is you need a way to rest your heart and your spirit and recharge, not just rest. And if you pay attention to yourself, you'll find that doing something recreational will recharge your batteries more than just sitting around watching TV. For some reason, sitting around watching TV doesn't seem to recharge the the emotional batteries and the mental batteries, but playing a game with family, getting out and taking a walk, doing a project around the house, taking a vacation and going somewhere, doing something, going to a museum. For some reason, those things tend to recharge you mentally and emotionally more than other things. And so, plan something, do something fun, go out to eat, try a new restaurant, But those are healthy habits to get into. All right, so this list is not complete, but I'm hoping that it will just get you kind of started on this idea of healthy habits. So if all you remember is this, you'll get the point. Healthy habits automate success. Bad habits automate failure. We need to pay attention to our habits. Stop the bad ones, replace them with good ones. And this year, if you just focused on one new habit every two months, just make sure you did it every day or every week, then at the end of this year, if the Lord doesn't come back, you could have six brand new habits that are improving your life and you have to give barely any thought to them because they're a habit. Make sense to you?