Good evening. First place that we'll go is Genesis 6. I have some comments. You'll notice the past Sunday, Wednesday, Sunday, I've been teaching on things that I would call rudimentary or elementary, which I think there are times, and the Lord has led me to teach the things that I've taught the past few weeks. There was a famous football coach who took over a team and he said the first thing that we're going to do is we're going to teach the players how to block and tackle. It's like football 101. Like you can't really play the game and you can't really get into the really technical plays and doing things as a football team before you learn the very basics. I'm not saying that to say we don't know the very basics of Christianity, but there are things that we need to be reminded of. We always need to come back to, at times, the same things. So we looked at some things that are disciplines that should actually bring forth or produce certain things in our lives. Now, the Christian life, first of all, is not the life of you making a profession and then you don't do anything else. It's not a life of just professing, yes, I believe in Christ and then you just go to church on Sundays and Wednesdays and then you just go home and you never do anything else. No, it's a life that's lived intentionally. It's a life that's lived by discipline and by training in the things of God. In fact, that's what we looked at the first time is godliness. And you remember we said that no one's going to be godly unless they exercise themselves unto godliness. Now listen, when God saves a sinner, God changes that sinner and gives them a new heart. But you don't just stop there. If you're never in the Word, and if you're never exercising yourself in the principles of godliness, then you'll never be Christ-like, and you won't be conformed to the image of Christ. In other words, when the Lord saves you, you need to start drinking the milk of the Word, and you need to start walking in the truth of God, obeying the truth of God, practicing the truth of God. So the first thing we looked at was godliness. It means God-likeness or Christ-likeness. We ought to have that resemblance more and more to Christ as we grow. The second thing we looked at last Wednesday was devotedly giving ourselves to the Word, reading the Word of God, making spiritual deposits every day. Remember that quote from John Blanchard? He said, how often do you need the Scriptures or how often do you need wisdom from God every day. So how often should you be in the Word every day? So we need to be making spiritual deposits in our hearts each day. Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way by taking heed thereto according to thy Word. Thy Word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee. I mean, that's one of the chief desires that we should all have, that I don't sin. And if we think about that with our spiritual mind, which that kind of gives you a segue into where we're going today is into our minds, into our thoughts. If you truly think about your Christian life and the times when you have walked with God and not sinned, you will know that those were the best times. It's the times when you enjoyed life so much. Why? Because you were enjoying God. and you weren't sinning. Sin brings grief. Sin brings sorrow and hurt into our lives. So, second thing was reading and the last thing was getting wisdom. And getting wisdom is a little more than getting theology. It's actually taking that understanding of the Scriptures that God gives us and then walking in it and practicing it. And listen, when we truly become wise, that's when it becomes part of, I hate to use the word muscle memory, but it's how we live our lives. We live our lives in the wisdom of God. Now, We should be, if you're a Christian, you should be experienced and you should become more experienced and skilled in the wisdom of the Word with every passing day. You should become more disciplined in the Word. It should be an activity that you partake of every day. In other words, in fact, I will encourage you to do this, and I think I might have said this, but every day when you read the Word, There ought to be a verse or a chapter or a word that impacts you every single day. Write it down. Sometimes I write it on my hand. You might say, I'm not writing on my hand. Well, just write it down. And listen, that's part of cultivating a spiritual life. When we write things, I would encourage you to write out a verse that you want to remember. Write it out in a journal. When you write it, you'll remember it. It kind of imprints it in your mind. So those are important things. Listen, if you and I are going to mature in godliness and wisdom, we must be active and disciplined students of the Word, but also lovers of the Word. And this is where it's hard to understand, but take the psalmist, for instance. Just listen. The psalmist says, Oh, how I love thy law. It is my meditation all the day. So he loves it. He meditates on it all the day. The natural inclination of our mind is like, I can't do that. The song we just sang, oh, the single joy of a, or the, it talks about the joy of a single hour in prayer. We might think an hour, but understand that this was the joy of the psalmist's heart. So he says, oh, how I love thy law. or thy word, it is my meditation all the day. Psalm 119, 103, how sweet are thy words. There's exclamation points behind these passages. Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth. It's so sweet, I love it. But his delight, the godly man or woman's delight, is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night. Listen, that comes from someone who has prepared their hearts to read and receive the word. But if we don't prepare our hearts, and if we don't read the word like the psalmist did, then the word is going to fall upon our hearts like the rain falls upon a very hard piece of ground. It doesn't soak in, it just kind of runs off. Beloved, your Christian life and my Christian life needs to be a continuing breaking up of the hard areas of our hearts. We all have areas of our hearts that are hard. And so we need to break up, as Jeremiah says, the fallow ground, break it up. We need to break it up and make it ready to receive the Word. It's like a piece of well-cultivated or tilled up ground. When you water it, the water soaks in. That's how we want the Word to come into our lives. And that's what you need to do. And listen, all these rudimentary or elementary things that I say about reading, about writing it, about thinking about it, going back to it. Those are going to help you to hide it in your heart. Now, listen, the only way Christian that you'll love the word. Well, first you have to have the spirit of God need to be saved. And then it stands to reason that if you are a Christian, you will love the word. I believe that the characters in the scriptures are examples of all of us, what we should be. I'm talking the believing people in the scriptures. We look at Job and we say, wow, what faith. You are Job. We look at David, a man after God's own heart. Wow, look at David. You are to be a woman and a man after God's own heart. Now, David in the psalm here says, I love thy word. So Christian, the only way you will love the word like the psalmist is you must be in the word like the psalmist. And then the more you eat the word and digest the word, the more you will hunger for it. See, that's how that love wells up in you. Only then When you do those things and you exercise yourselves in the word, that's when you'll love it. But you have to do the discipline of reading it. Listen, it's like someone who jogs. I like to run, I like to jog. I hadn't jogged in eight months. I am dreading starting again, but I love to jog. But I can tell you, for the first probably month and a half, I'm gonna hate it. I'm not going to like it. You know why? Because I had not exercised myself. If you're not in the Word at all, it's going to be very difficult to start, but you've got to start. Don't try and bite off more than you can chew. Read a chapter in the Old and the New Testament. Begin to read the Word, but you have to discipline yourself, beloved. You need to prepare your hearts. Now, that brings me to what my Lord put on my heart for tonight is your thoughts. And I kind of gave it away earlier, your thinking. How do you think throughout the day? And there are certain ways that you think that are kind of always the same. Now, listen, if there are certain ways that we think and it's our paradigm or it's kind of the place that we're at, and it's the way we think about certain things in the world, and it's sinful, that's gotta change. You might say, well, that's just the way I am. I'm not gonna change. That's the way I think. That's not the way a Christian thinks. So listen, your thoughts should be established upon Christ and upon His Word. And the more you grow in grace, the more you are being conformed to His image, you should think differently about really everything in the world. You should begin to think different ways. In fact, you need to evaluate your thinking. It's what David said in Psalm 139. You remember that? He said, Search me, O God, and know my heart. By heart, you're actually saying thoughts. It's another way of saying thoughts. Your heart is your affections, your desires, thoughts. Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts. God, know my thoughts. Now, Chris and I were talking about this. Sometimes we are conditional Christians. We'll go only so far with Christ But we'll see some things in the Word, and we don't go there. Beloved, we need to go all the way. We need to forsake all for Christ. We must not be conditional Christians. We must be, as Ephesians says, renewed in the spirit of our minds. That's the Christian life. Your mind, your thoughts should be being renewed. You should be casting out the old, the old you, the old way you thought in the world, and you should be putting on the new. Listen, if we are going to be godly and wise, we must apply our hearts to the word, but then we must intentionally think upon it. and I'm not going to spill over into meditation. It's similar, but I want to just talk about our thoughts. Now, I had you in, let me just read one passage here in Genesis 6-5. This is how God viewed the world not very long after He created it. Now, by not very long, It was probably a good 800 to 1,000 years, I would say, perhaps. I'm not sure. But look, it says, And God saw the wickedness of man was greater than the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Now turn over to Genesis 8, 21. After the deluge, after the flood, nothing really changed. It says, and the Lord smelled the sweet savor, and the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground anymore for man's sake. For the imagination of man's heart, that is his thoughts, is only evil from his youth. Neither will I again smite anymore everything, living as I have done. And he goes on in the next verse to say everything's gonna continue. Now, in 2 Corinthians 10, go there. In this place, we are in fact commanded in the Word of God to capture, take prisoner, to captivate our thoughts. You are to deliberately think about certain things and you are to deliberately cast out of your mind the thoughts of obviously sinful, wicked things, worldly philosophies. And listen, the world is out there preaching its gospel, and the world is training itself, and it's trying to tell you what to do too. But you need to know what God's Word says. And so 2 Corinthians 10, look at it in verse 1. Paul kind of transitions here from talking to those or speaking to those that were saved in Corinth, and now he speaks to the ones that perhaps there might have been some resistance. He says, Now I, Paul, myself, beseech you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ, who in presence embase among you, but being absent, embold 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." He's saying that I won't be boastful in the flesh. Which think of us as if we walked according to the flesh. For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh. Now notice, for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. or not fleshly. In the world, beloved, we don't fight like the people of the world with each other. Our weapons are not carnal, but mighty through God. To the pulling down of strongholds, now notice, casting down imaginations. and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and this last phrase, and bringing every thought to the obedience of Christ. You know what that means. It's in the imagery of a person that has been shackled. You are to take your thoughts captive, like guards would take a prisoner. You are to bring into captivity. Think about those words. You know what captivity is. It's to make someone a captive. So you're to bring your thoughts and make them captives to Christ. This should be something that you really want. It should be something that you really want. I want my mind to be subject to Christ. And that's what Paul's saying here. And he says, "...and having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience." Notice, revenge all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled. So He's talking about our thoughts, our imaginations. Look at Philippians 4 and verse 4. Philippians 4, 4. I want you to think about how you think. And I want you to think about how you think during the day when certain things happen or you see certain things and you're tempted or you're inclined to think in a way that the world thinks or to think in a way that's sinful and really against Christ. Listen, when our thoughts are sinful, it stands to reason that our behavior is going to follow. And so we need to cast down those imaginations. And we need to take captive our thoughts to Christ. This is essential, beloved. Look at Philippians 4.4. Actually, just look at 4.8. Paul, in his closing of the epistle, he says, finally, brethren, I want you to think about some things. Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are pure or just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue or moral or spiritual excellence, And if there be any praise, think on these things. See, God's teaching us that we need to think on certain things, and I'll show you in a minute, and not think on other things, because your thinking is going to form your acting. And there's certain ways that we should not be thinking. You should be being transformed in your mind and how you think. And listen, you know, listen, I know that I still think wrong. When I see or hear certain things, it's wrong. I don't want to think that way. Part of us renewing ourselves in the spirit of our minds is recognizing that. Part of it is being immersed in the Word rather than being immersed in social media, immersed in the television, immersed in the world. If that's what we're taking in, that's what we're going to be thinking about. Proverbs 12.5, just one other passage here. Proverbs 12.5. The wise man here says, the thoughts of the righteous are right. That's a good, easy question to ask yourself. Was that a right thought? And listen, this all happens in the secrecy of your own heart. And we've all got things swirling around in our minds. We've all got thoughts that run through our minds. Have you ever had a thought go into your mind and you scream out, no! We should. We should. That's the good fight of faith. There will be those struggles. Listen, don't allow your minds, don't allow your thoughts to be mired in sin and wickedness. There's influences that will be all around you. They're all around you in the world. Don't allow your thoughts to become infected with the world. Don't allow your thoughts to be infected with how the world thinks. If you do, you'll start behaving like the world, reacting like the world. And that's exactly what the God of this world wants. Shame on me when I react and think like the world. Listen, Satan can't have you. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me, and I give unto them eternal life. And they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand, including the wicked one. He can't have you, but he'll do his worst to smear the name of Christ through you. And don't think that it can't happen. It can. It's happened to me. Listen, there are so many wicked influences coming at us in our day. Through computers, through media. Things happen in the world and it's transmitted to millions in a few milliseconds. There's so many wicked influences happening and it's so many things that are pelting us and it's non-stop. And they're all trying to tell us how we ought to think. Don't listen to the world, brethren. Don't get sucked in by Hollywood. Don't get sucked in even by politicians, by social media, by wicked philosophies on TV. Don't get sucked into it. Be so careful. Cast down those imaginations. Those imaginations, it means the reasonings of those that are hostile against Christ and His commands. That's what the word imaginations means, reasonings. People are going to reason with you. against Christ, you need to cast it down. Cast down every high thing or every lofty and arrogant opinion from the wicked who exalt themselves against the knowledge of God. And then bring every thought into captivity, into obedience to Christ. Beloved, that's what we need. We need to train ourselves to stop pelting ourselves with all of this information. It may not even be bad information, but we've lost the ability to think about one thing. If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sits on the right hand of God. Set your affection, it means mind. Set your mind. Set it means fix it, stabilize it on things above, not on things on the earth. And so, beloved, we need to be able to do that. That's what you must do. That's the work of exercising yourself unto godliness. Listen, this is the Christian life. It's almost as if sometimes professing Christians might see this and say, these are hard sayings. Who can hear it? That's what they said to Christ. Beloved, our saying to him must be, where else are we going to go? You have the words of eternal life. That needs to be what we say. But listen, if you're going to think right, you must possess the spiritual resolve and the intent within you to struggle against what you are naturally inclined to do. What you are naturally inclined to do. But if you're a Christian, you're not a natural man or woman. You're no longer natural. You're spiritually minded. See, the Christian is not of the natural mind. 1 Corinthians 2.14 says, but the natural man or woman receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God. What are the things of the Spirit of God? It's the truth of God's Word in that passage. And it says, neither can they know them. Why? Because they, the truths of God, are spiritually discerned, known. Beloved, for that, even as spiritual people, we need to direct our hearts toward God. We need to be like the psalm of Psalm 57, 7. My heart is fixed, O God. My heart is fixed. Also in Psalm 109. See, what you and I are naturally inclined to do is to not struggle and to not mortify the flesh, but rather to gratify it. I'm talking about me. Beloved, we must mortify the flesh. Listen, you and I, we need to fight against thoughts of wickedness, knowing that the Scriptures teach that the thought of sin is sin. The very thought of it is sin. Listen, Jesus taught this to those who thought, who thought, well, I didn't actually do the sin. I just thought about it. Look at Matthew. We'll just read two verses. Matthew 5, the Beatitudes. You know that place. Jesus says six times in this chapter, You have heard that it hath been said. In this place, in verse 27, He said, You have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery. But I say unto you, that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his thoughts." In his thoughts. In fact, Proverbs 24, go back there, I'll show you that. Proverbs 24, verse 8. Solomon writes here, he that devises to do evil, and where do we devise things? In our heads. He that deviseth to do evil shall be called a mischievous person. The thought of foolishness is sin. The thought of foolishness is sin. Look at Ecclesiastes 10. just so that you and I will all understand it doesn't matter if you're home and you're in your, the safety of your home and you're gonna talk about this with somebody in your home. Ecclesiastes 10.20, curse not the king, no, not in thy. Can't get more secret than that in your thought. Curse not the king. Curse not the rich in thy bedchamber. For a bird of the air shall carry the voice, and that which hath wings shall tell the matter. Secret sin is the worst kind, and secret thoughts are the worst types of sins, secret sinful thoughts. So listen, beloved, we must fight off these vain thoughts that would lodge within our minds. Jeremiah 4.14, we need to fight them off. Listen, we need to be spiritually astute enough to know, beloved, that we need to be walking with God or else we will be influenced. The world will influence our minds in the way we think. We'll allow it to happen. We must not do that. Jeremiah 4.14, Jeremiah says to the people of God here, Jerusalem, wash thine heart from wickedness that thou mayest be saved. How long shall thy vain thoughts lodge within thee? To lodge within you means that they took up residence. Listen, for vain thoughts to lodge in me, it means that that's the way I think now. I need to recognize If I have vain thoughts, if I'm thinking a certain way that's wicked and sinful, I'm not hurting anybody but myself. And listen, that's where we are to take spiritual inventory of our lives. Look at Matthew 15, 18, the first sin that Christ names here in Matthew 15 and verse 18 and 19, he says, but those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart, and they defile the man. The first thing. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts. The first thing. He goes on. You would say, certainly murder is worse. Well, he didn't list it first. Psalm 119 and verse 13. Listen, we not only need to change the way we think if we're thinking sinfully and in a wicked way, we should want to go on a search and destroy mission. We should want to go and and bring our thoughts into captivity. We should want to cast those thoughts out of our minds. Psalm 119 and verse 13, we need to have the spirit of the psalmist here. I hate faint thoughts. I hate them. But thy law do I love. And listen, Paul said this, and we'll finish up here. Psalm 139. He says in verse 2, O Lord, thou knowest my down-sitting. Well, verse 1, he says, thou hast searched me and known me. And this is the thing about it, Christian. God knows you. Thou hast searched me and known me. Thou knowest my down-sitting and mine uprising. Thou understandest my thought afar off. God knows that he understands it. And then, of course, Verse 23, search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts. Try me. And you have to understand what you're asking there. In fact, the gospel call goes out to the lost. Seek ye the Lord while he may be found. Call ye upon him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Forsake them. Listen, when God saves a sinner, the mind is renewed, but it must now be cultivated. It needs to continually be renewed. So think about your thoughts. Think about the way you think about certain things. Train and discipline your mind in the Word. Commit yourself to it as your most important daily business, Christian. And by God's grace and help, your thoughts will follow. Listen. It's Proverbs 16. The preparations of the heart in man and the answer of the tongue is from the Lord. All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes, but the Lord weigheth the spirits. Verse three, commit thy works unto the Lord. Commit your business, your labor, your occupation, your pursuit. Commit thy works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established. They'll be firm, they'll be right, they'll be fixed. They'll be on true north. And beloved, that's what we're called to do. Psalm 119 and verse 59, and I'll close. The psalmist here says, I thought on my ways. I thought on my ways. A lot of times we're thinking on everybody else's ways. No, I need to think on my ways. And I turned my feet unto thy testimonies as a result of thinking on my ways. That's, beloved, what I need, what you need. This is, yes, it's rudimentary, it's basic, but it's a necessity for us. And so I pray that you'd go and think about your thoughts. Think about where you're thinking wrong Think about where your thinking is not sanctified, where it's not God-like. Repent of it. Call on to the Lord. Obey Christ. Captivate your thoughts in obedience to Christ. And you'll grow in grace, and in godliness, and in wisdom. Beloved, that's what God's called us to. Amen. Let's dismiss in prayer. Father, please help us. Lord, I pray, O God, that we would not allow vain thoughts to lodge within us, that we would not allow our minds to be influenced by the world, by wickedness. Father, the world is so good at it. They make sin look so good. And our flesh wants it. But Father, How can we look upon sin when Christ is so beautiful and lovely, and he has died for our sins? Father, help us never to embrace that which killed our Lord. Forgive us for our sins. Father, forgive me for my thoughts. Lord, help us all, oh God, to be sanctified in our minds, to be every day being renewed in the spirit of our minds. Help us, Heavenly Father, and we'll give you the praise in Jesus' name. Amen.