Welcome to 721 Live. I'm Sam Hunter. I am so glad that you're with us. We are in a series on what I think is so, so dramatically important in your life. We're on the third show. We're going to get to that in just a minute. I've got my great friend and brother, Irv Philpott, in the studio for a third straight show. Thank you, Irv, for being with us. So excited to be here. You can find out all about us just by going to the website. We've got a lot of things on the website. We've got past radio shows. We've got a Pudding Green blog. A lot of the things we talk about right here, well, you'll find on that website, 721ministries.org, www.721ministries.org. We're on Facebook at 721ministries. Just check us out. You'll find out more about us. Erwin, on the third of these three shows where we've been talking about something that you and I have started to see with such clarity is Satan's number one strategy to knock us backwards. That's right. His number one strategy against you, believer, to distract and discourage you without question is busyness. Busyness. And now that we see it for what it is, we see it as this vile, even insidious, It is a forget, but don't forget the neon light sins like pornography and addiction and alcoholism any of those things But don't don't think you're okay because those aren't a major player in your life Busyness beware of this one as we've said several times because it's under the radar. It looks good. It looks good We applaud it we stand up and cheer your busiest person is the hero most important person the room no question about and it is how we define ourselves and It is how we find our self-worth. You just step back and think about it. The busier you are, the better you feel about yourself. Right, and this crosses gender, both male and female. Male and female. Hey, you know what? It even relates back to how busy our children are. The busier our children are, the better we feel about ourselves as parents. That's right, because they're so important. And we're so upside down. We're so upside down. What we're trying to do, what we hope to do, what we hope you're seeing as you listen to these shows, and if you miss the first two, we're going to run this back through. You'll be able to hear it again next week. We're going to run this through because we think it is so important for you to see with clarity that Satan's number one strategy against you as a child of God, against your Heavenly Father, quite frankly, is busyness. Show number one, we talked about the problem. We said that the villain, well, the number one villain is Satan. That's right. He uses as his weapons All these activities that we're involved in, that all look good, but the good is always in competition with the best. Always in competition with the best. So the number one was the problem, the villain that we have against us. Show number two is the effects, what it does to us, what the victims are. Relationships. Relationships. Show number three today, we're going to talk about how to push back against this. In show number two, when we talked about relationships, we first touched on sleep. your body, mind, and spirit, and then we went into relationships, because that is what Satan wants to do against you, is hurt your relationships. Today, we want to talk about how do you push back against this? How do you get the victory? How do you become a victor over this? We're claiming victory in the name of Jesus Christ. And you know what? In the name of Jesus Christ, we'd say, stop the madness. That's what Jesus would say if he stepped into your life right now. He'd say, please, stop this madness. And have you been flying upside down so long That you don't know what right side up is. That's right. I can almost assure you that most of you, you now, you listening to me today, you have been lulled into a C- life of busyness and you don't even know it. You can't even see it. We couldn't. We're not judging you. We just, we now can see it because we were there and we're out of it. We've been freed from that. Praise the Lord. Let me just make sure you understand who we are talking about this. We're not two guys sitting in here with shorts on and sandals doing nothing today and doing nothing this week. We are guys that tend to be busy. We are doers. We have things going on. We like to get it done. We're competitive. We were more competitive in our former lives. We're proactive. We like to see progress. We applaud getting things done. We have day timers. We have our list. We're very efficient. That's right. We're trained. We're disciplined. But we have seen the light. So don't think that we don't know what we're talking about. Believe me, we are reformed from this epidemic of busyness. And let's just get right down to what, if you're going to push back, if you're going to find any sense of victory in your life, any sense of balance to have that life that is truly life, life to the full, you're going to have to learn this one principle. Yeah, we're going to have to. And what you just said just really struck again something to me and another high being from the Holy Spirit in that when I go back and when we do, we go to several places or many places we've been doing my testimony. It is busyness that had me. It had you. That's what had me. I wasn't, you know, lying, cheating, stealing. I wasn't out doing the neon light sins. I was so busy. that I couldn't see. That's why this message just resonates with me. And everybody that knew you back then would say, what a great guy I was. And look how busy and successful he is. He's even busy at church. He's busy at school. He's busy. This guy, he's the picture of success. Got it going on. Just basically a good old guy. Bankrupt. Bankrupt. Upside down. Blessed of the poor in spirit. Your relationships were bankrupt. You didn't have a relationship with your Heavenly Father. You thought you did. Your relationship with your wife, your children, it was not there. No. But we're going to boil this down. We're going to chase a little rabbit there. We're going to boil this down. Here is the point. Here is the victory. What I'm getting ready to say will change your life. Will change your life. If you will implant this in your brain and simply say, anything I say yes to necessarily means I'm going to have to say no to something else. I'm going to say that one more time. I'm going to give a shout out to Matt Williams at Grace Church because he's the one that gave me this thought first. Clearly, anything you say yes to necessarily means you have to say no to something else. Now, as you let that roll over you, what we want to encourage you to do as we move forward from this, as we claim victory in the name of Jesus Christ, is that we simply start treating everything that comes at us as a potential villain. Potential? Potential. In other words, the opportunities, the invitations that come your way, which they come all the time. Not that they may be good things. Well, they typically are good things. They typically are. How many people that are listening to us today are going to get an invitation to go do something heinous? Right. they're good things, but we want you to begin to see them as potential villains because are they going to keep you those good things from God's best. That's the change. That's the issue. That's what we've got to get down to. Stop accepting invitations and opportunities without first thinking, okay, my plate, sadly or wonderfully, is full. What am I going to take off this plate to add this? Because you're going to hear a voice from Satan when that invitation comes, when that request comes. I can just look back at my own life and I see that person approaching me, at church for instance, or in the community and say, I just left a meeting and we were talking about you and we'd like to ask you, I'm telling you at that point, what we would like for you to think. Now we mean this, what we're trying to do is get you to get so much clarity that you, whatever comes out of their mouth you view first, As a potential villain, not because it's going to be a bad thing, but you have already set what's important in your life and your life is in balance. Yes. That's what we're hoping for. And we're going to talk about how you actually do this in the second half of the show. But we want you to have your life in such balance that anything new that comes into it has to be weighed out. With a prejudicial eye towards it saying, what if my life is in balance? I have my priorities straight. I have my relationship with my Heavenly Father. I have my relationship with my wife, with my children, with my husband. I have my body, mind, and spirit in balance. What is going to have to go? What is going to fall victim? What is going to be taken away if I say yes to this? That's right. Does that sound radical? Well, it may very well to someone who, as we say, is just now beginning to see what we've been talking about these last three weeks. But for you and I, we see it clearly. I see it very clearly that every invitation, every opportunity is a potential to knock me off of what God's got me going after. His A plus life. the life that is truly life, and His priorities. Every invitation, every opportunity, I have to weigh that out. I mean, I don't know, I mean, you and I both, of course, get consistently, constantly, you know, asked to do this and asked to do that, and they're great things. I mean, I mean, just time after time after time, and Sam, you have taught me, and I'm so thankful for it, from the Holy Spirit, to say, I absolutely, positively cannot do that. I couldn't possibly do it. Nehemiah told them when they wanted him to come down, he said, I'm doing a great work. I can't come down. I can't come down. And we're camping out on this because we really want you to hear this and employ this in your life. Anything that comes your way, you have got to understand that if you say yes, You're going to say no to something else. And this is tough. And the little story that popped in my mind that there was, my precious wife goes into a meeting at school and the teacher comes out and says, the first thing she said, doesn't say hello, does it? Will you be my room mother? Won't you? No. I think it's like, won't you please be my room mother? So you have to swim upstream here. You've got seven children. Seven children. And still all very much dependent upon their mother. And their mother doesn't mind and does all kinds of stuff with all kinds of dreams. More than I can imagine. More than we could dream to ask or imagine she does. But being a room mother is something we had talked about many times that we just simply couldn't take that on. That we'll provide and bring whatever we can, but that's just something we couldn't take on with the seven of them. But that's where she got hit. Because she's a sweetheart and she didn't automatically view it as a potential villain. And that's what we're saying. It's probably a good thing. But let me tell you, when that person approaches you, when that invitation comes, when that request comes, it's going to. Here's the voice you're going to hear. I'm needed. I'm important. Look how busy this will get me. Look how good this will make me look. That's the voice you're going to hear. And we're pleading with you. Stop the madness. And the pattern of this world is to take it on. Take it on. That's the pattern of this world. I'll add more. That's right. Because the pattern of this world is more. That's right. In everything it's more. And we think if it is to be, it's up to me. You have got to learn to say, to look at it and say, okay, if I say yes to this, I am going to have to say no to something. And typically the no that you have to say to is something you haven't thought out and later you realize what a hole it was in your life. How many marriages do we see? How many children do we see that the father, the mother, because they didn't realize we're going to have to say no. We're going to talk about the specifics of how to do it in the second half of the show. More straight ahead. We'll be right back. Welcome back to the second half of 721 Live. I'm Sam Hunter. I've got my great friend and brother Irv Philpott in the studio with me. We are talking about, we've been talking for three weeks about busyness because we see it so clearly now as Satan's top strategy against you. And by the way, This is the third show out of the series. We're going to roll it right back around next week and start with the first show. Because if you missed the first or the second, we want you to hear it. And even if you heard it, hear it again. Because this message is so important. The first half of the show we spent just desperately hoping, wanting you to see that I ask you to develop this mindset of anything that comes my way, any invitation, any opportunity, if I say yes, I'm going to have to say no to something else. And err of the victim to your not saying no. The victim to your saying yes to things that you haven't thought about clearly is your relationship. That's right. God's priorities. God's priorities. It's always. So we're talking about overcommitment. That's the problem. Now what are we going to do about this? Let's get down and practical. What do we do? First step, make a plan. That's right. And I'm so excited to be here to land the plane on this project we've been on. And that begins with the index card that you and I each carry around, and we encourage all of our men. Well, we simply sit down and say, what are your priorities? What are the priorities God has placed upon your heart? What is it that is in the box? And meaning by that, that they're non-negotiable. Non-negotiable. These are non-negotiables. And that is, on my card it says, my relationship with God through His Son, Jesus Christ. Non-negotiable. My relationship with my wife, and then my relationship with my children. And then after that, we begin talking about the ministry to the men. and how we deal with them. Well, I'll tell you, if you look at your card, you've got one thing before that, and it's your body, mind, and spirit. Because we'll never get that other part. I've got to pick my card up here. You're exactly right. You have to get through body, mind, and spirit. These have to be non-negotiables, my friends. Relationship with the Heavenly Father. If you're busy, that's going to slide. That's right. You're never going to drift into intimacy with your Heavenly Father. You're going to drift away. You've got to set your priorities. Relationship with my Heavenly Father. Relationship with my wife or my husband you don't make that a priority You don't make that a non-negotiable and you're gonna end up like 50% of the time and that one is above the children It's above the children because the other one will never the children then with my children Yes, and then with your body your mind and your spirit because we talked about the victim. I One of the major victims is your sleep. That's right. You'll never get your body back in balance if that is the case. Make an index card of what your priorities are. If you think Irvin and I, believe me, as we said earlier, we're not sitting in this studio with sandals and shorts on. We've got a lot of stuff going on, and I get asked to speak at, you cannot imagine, I got asked to speak at a wonderful junior high thing the other day, and I had to look at my index card, because I really wanted to help them. My ministry is with men. If I could have fit that in and not had to say no to something else, maybe. But if I said yes, I was going to have to say no to a problem. You looked at that opportunity as a potential villain. As a potential villain. Not that I was saying you had that kind of surly, sarcastic mind about life. No, we're saying to protect what's really important. And this is going to be difficult at first, but as you move forward, you begin to get green lights and red lights. You'll see those if you're not busy. That's right. Now, also, one other thing about the difficulties, you're going to make some people mad. People are going to be angry with you because they're not going to appreciate the fact that you refuse to swim along with the current of this. Our friend Mooney Player tells us if you're too busy, it's either you are lazy or you don't have any discipline. It takes discipline to say no. It takes discipline to do it. It's going to be something you may not really want to do now, but you have to do it so you can do what you really want to do later. That's right. That's the definition. That's why I tend to train you as I train myself. When someone asks you, the first thing that comes out of your mouth is, I couldn't possibly do it. Say that first and then you go ahead and weigh out what they're saying, but get it out there first. I couldn't possibly do it because if you don't, you'll end up saying yes without even meaning to say yes. Make a plan. Identify what your priorities are. Be real about this. Take the time to understand what are the non-negotiables. Put them on the index card. Then we want to talk about some specifics. One of the specific things that we wanted to talk about is television. It is, as we said, in our opinion, the number one weapon that Satan uses in this busyness scheme. And that is, it sucks your time. It's a vacuum. It evaporates your time. What I did this past summer, and it was against a lot of There was a lot of pullback on this from all sorts of sources, but we disconnected our televisions for 90 days. We had simply agreed as a family to do that. And so for 90 days, there was no television in the house. No TV. What we found almost immediately was what we were missing by having the television on. In other words, instead of vegging out in front of the TV, I was talking to my wife. I was spending that quiet time with her, that couch time, and communicating with her. Instead of the TV on as a background noise, we could actually hear each other. and talk and communicate. It was amazing the amount of time that it opened up for us. And I'm telling you, it changed our life. It changed the life of my family. Just simply saying, for 90 days I'm going to push back. Now, we brought the television back, but what we've done now is we put up some buffers. In other words, the television that's in the family room where people have access, we only have two TVs where they have access to, that television is not even hooked up. It's hooked up where you can watch a video to the videos that we know what they are. You can't just go in there and turn it on. You can't just turn it on. The family has to decide we're going to go watch a show and we go together and hook it up. There's one other TV set that my wife and I basically have access to. And what we've done with that one is it's in one of those big credenza. So we keep the doors closed. So you have to go up and you have to think, do I want to open these doors? Or am I just using this as background noise? See, we're asking you to realize. See, Irv's family didn't realize what they had said no to by saying yes to TV. They didn't recognize the quiet times, the richness, the ability to let your mind just vacate for a minute and let God fill back in. You didn't realize you were saying no to these things by saying yes to TV. And we're asking you to make a plan, get an index card, find out what your priorities are, and then you will start to see this. I followed Irv's I followed his example and I turned my TV off. And now I have realized it is a violation to have the TV on as background noise. It's become a violation to me. I don't like it. I have a visceral reaction. It is nonsense. And I used to think, well, look what I'll be missing. How will I keep up with the news and the sports? I'm not missing anything. And it's an amazing difference in terms of the peace that you have. You will be shocked. on this one, my friends. Please listen to us on this. I know you think we're crazy, but we are not. Push back on that TV. Push back on that TV. You won't believe the difference. That's right. And the other thing was sleep. And the thing we want to make sure everybody, if you can get this book, Sleep, It Does a Family Good, How Busy Families Can Overcome Sleep Deprivation, by Dr. Archibald D. Hart. He gives us several examples. What he talks about is, as you said, Sam, you've got to work backward. Figure out your wake-up time. What is your wake-up time? If that's 6.30 or 7, then you go backward from there. The book explains to you, you sleep an hour and a half cycles, and as an adult you need at least five cycles. So that's seven and a half hours. So don't tell me you only need six hours of sleep. You've got to have those five cycles or your body and your mind are not going to be rejuvenated. So you work backward from there. Take me back, what does that put us going to bed? If you've got to get up at 6.30, then you need to be going to bed at 10.30. If you're going to get there and be ready for rest, there's a few things he says that you must do. Number one, regular exercise. Your body's not going to be ready to rest. Number two, remember we talked about caffeine? Be real careful about caffeine. I could give you a lot of reasons not to have any at all, but if you're going to have caffeine, it's got to be done by 3 p.m. No caffeine after 3 p.m. Another thing he talks about is to try to push back from electronics. You need to do a little pre-prep sleep. by 8 p.m. if you're going to bed at 10 or 10 30 by 8 p.m. shut down the electronics the emails the internet those things and now that I have done that and when I don't do it I go to bed with a brain that is not ready to go to sleep. And if I do fall asleep, which I fall asleep easily, my brain is running around in circles because of that electronic. Now that's where you're going to get the pushback. It's cutting back on electronics at 8 p.m. But think about this. If you're planning to go to bed at 10.30 and you shut off all your electronics at 8, do you think you're going to stay up till 10.30? That's right. No, because let's understand. TV is a huge villain and a major major Major victim is your sleep. That's exactly right every hour. You watch TV. I would say is an hour You're not gonna sleep that it happens every time I think to don't forget what what a wonderful thing naps are when I give this talk to folks I've had people actually stand up and tell me that a nap is a dirty word. Yeah, that's a four-letter word I mean, who do you call up and say? Oh, how was your day? Oh, that's a great man What business man or woman would you ever ask that? But all that we have to do to change that is to realize that the message that we're getting here and the message from a Heavenly Father who made us to rest, all of nature rest, all of nature sleep, is this. By sleeping, by resting, you are being productive. Now, I want you to hear this because we're talking about making a plan. We're talking about being specific. We're talking about getting an index card out. There will be times when people ask me for an appointment. They'll say, can we meet at such and such a time? And I will say, I'm booked at that time. Now, let me tell you what I'm booked to do. Take a nap. Or I'm booked to work out. I am booked. That's part of my schedule. That's part of my priority. And I know that I'm behind and I know I'm going to need that nap. So I will just say, I'm booked. Now, you know what happens? They say, OK, well, can we meet another time? Sure. I'm not going to let, I'm not going to say no. I'm not going to say yes to that appointment at that time, which will make me say no to my nap or to my exercise. That's right. It has to be on the schedule. It has to be. So number one, you've got to get an index card. You've got to get your priorities of what they are so that you know what you're going to be saying no to or else you will not even be able to make that analysis. Based on God's priority. Based on God's. Number two, you've got to start eliminating. You've got to start eliminating because I know I don't even have to know you. You're already too busy. You'll never have a calm, relaxed pace until you get there. And number three, again, when you're approached, when you're invited, when you're asked, don't ask yourself, is this a good thing? Ask yourself, if I say yes to this, what will I have to say no to? Now, brother, thank you for being with us these last three weeks. I know there's so much more we could talk about, but let me just tell you, the final victory in all of this is when you get to the point where you say, no thanks, I'm full. I'm full. I'm not missing anything. No thanks, I'm full. I'm not missing anything. What we want you to see is that Satan's strategy is to make you busy. He doesn't even need to worry about making you bad if He can make you busy. We want you to see what a C-minus like that is. We want to expose this plot, this plan against you so that you can have that space, those quiet times. Your mind can relax. You can get your sleep. You can be my utmost for His highest. Amen. And you can have that calm, relaxed pace because that's God's will for you believers. God's will for you is to have that calm, relaxed pace. Please listen to us on this. You are too busy. You've got too much going on. Push back against the madness. I'm Sam Hunter. I've had Irv Philpott with me. This is 721 Live. So long. God's peace to you. I hope to see you next time.