It's a joy to be with the Sister Church and just celebrate together the fact that we love the Lord. We just glory in his gospel and commend each and every one of you coming out to be a part of the Sunday School class. So if we could, let me open us in prayer and then we'll just jump into our material. Father, we come before you. Lord, I see my need, and I just want to pray, Lord, that you would, by your grace, help me to communicate in a clear way. We pray that the glory of your gospel, the word and message of your scripture is what comes through clearly to care for these wonderful Christian brothers and sisters. Lord, we ask, I ask your grace. Bless our time together, Lord. May it be to your glory, and may it be to the equipping of the saints. Lord, we ask this in your holy name. Amen. You know, we want to become more like Christ, but I think we often get cloudy on, okay, exactly what happens? How does that work? How does that work in my own heart, my own life? And how do I help someone else? You know, if you're a Christian, you're called to disciple other brothers and sisters in Christ. Right, we're called, there's a lot of one another's in the Bible, and if you start doing all the one another's in there, then you're gonna find yourself caring for one another with God's word, praying one with another, weeping, encouraging. Right, how do you do that? How do you listen to someone in the foyer when they're sharing their difficult week or difficult day? How do you listen to them and bring biblical help? Other than just, listening and then I'll pray for you. Which is great and we should be, right? But sometimes we can say that because we don't know what else to say. Or maybe it ends the conversation in a way that seems godly. Well, what I want to do today is look at how the Bible would communicate that we change. Because the more we understand that what's going on in our hearts when life happens, and where my life intersects with the power of Christ at work. When I understand how that happens and how that works, I began to see how to participate with Christ's work in me. And then I began to understand how to listen to someone else and maybe how to help them, how to bring God's Word to bear. So that's what I want to invest this morning in. in discussing biblical change. And you can see the top of your outline. Christ changes us by His grace. Let me read this passage in 2 Corinthians 3, verse 18. It's in your material there. It says, And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed. Present tense. Every Christian in this room, the Holy Spirit is at work in your life, informing you to become more like Christ. He, Christ, is changing you. How do we participate? The power comes from Him, but how do we participate? So let me continue to read. "...are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit." The work of Christ to change us is what we want to focus on. How does that work? Back to your outline. The way that we change as Christians will never be disconnected from the power and work of Christ in our lives. Therefore, knowing how we biblically change informs what our starting place for this change should be. And we all, reading it again with unveiled faces, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another, for this comes from the Lord. that are being changed. That comes from the Lord who is the Spirit. Helping people change always begins with helping them look to Christ. We must begin aware of our position in Christ as children of God. This makes us aware of His unconditional love and unconditional acceptance for us as believers. It then positions us to trust Christ for change, not trust ourselves, not trust others, not trust a process. Timothy Lane and Paul David Tripp said this, living a Christ-like life and discipling others to do the same is more than a system of change or a set of techniques. The process of change rests on the presence and power of a living, active Redeemer. The personalness of this process encourages you to look at yourself in the mirror of God's Word, to know and rely on Christ's grace is no formula or strategy. The presence of your Shepherd enables you to step out into life with renewed faith and courage. All right, what I'd like for you to do now is just kind of close your outline and put it on the chair next to you or whatever, because I'm going to walk you through a process kind of slowing down. I used to say the videotape, but that's old technology, the DVR, you know, hitting it frame by frame. Let's see what's going on. Because when we slow down life and we begin to look and say, okay, now what is going on? Where does God intersect this? Because if you're like me, it's not during my issues or events or situations, but it's afterwards I'm thinking, what happened? Why did I react that way? I don't wanna do that. I do that way too much. Okay, next time I won't. What's happening in those things? How is the grace of God at work, where? So I'm going to give you kind of a model, a template of how to think about that. Now it's not something I developed at all. It's developed by a group, the acronym, and Biblical Counseling has, hey Pete, a lot of acronyms, CCEF, Christian Counseling Education Foundation, developed by a gentleman named David Pallison. It's called the Three Trees. So we'll look at that in a moment. Rather than just look at the model, I'd like to kind of give you an illustration and almost get your help to kind of fill in some of the blanks. Okay? So I want to share an event in my life that happened, I mean it could be anything, but this particular one happened about a year ago, maybe a year and a half ago. and it was concerning two precious little grandchildren of mine. I've got four children, they're all married, and we've got 13 grandchildren, and the youngest are two little twins, precious little twins, my daughter's girl, boy and girl. So anyway, as a pastor, just to kind of set the stage a little bit, Mondays is the day off that I have, and so I kind of think about my Mondays a little bit different than the rest of the week. Mondays are kind of like my day. You know, I like to get up and kind of do whatever I'd like to do. Now, in the mornings, typically, unless it's in the fall and winter when I let my grass go brown so I don't have to mow it, I'm up early mowing the grass and doing all the stuff in the yard. And then the rest of the day is mine. Well, this particular Monday, I got a call. I didn't get a call. My wife got a call from my daughter and said that she needed to run an errand and had to do something. Could we take the twins? And they were about eight months old at the time. And my wife just said that she always says, absolutely. What do we need to do? Now, on the outside, I'm doing this. On the inside, I'm going, wait a minute. I was thinking Cabela's would be a good place to go. Okay. All right. Great. So anyway, she gets off the phone. She says, OK, Trey, we're going to take the twins. And there's some things we need to do. And we need to go over to the Chandler Mall to do that. So I thought we'd just take the twins. OK, great. So we drive over to her house to pick up the twins. And then I realized that you can't take the two car seats that are in the back of her car and put them in the back of our car because there's these, I don't even know what they are. There's these like support structures that are built around that that are like in the car. And so you can't take all that out and transfer it. So easier to do, take her car. Now, the problem is her car is a Mini Cooper. And if you know what that is, it's just a little bit bigger than a roller skate. Now, okay, again on the outside, I'm like, okay. On the inside, it's a little bit different story. They bring the twins, Charlotte, or Courtney brings the twins out and puts them in the little car seats in the back, in the back seat. And then said, oh dad, when you get there, you're going to want to use a stroller. Because, you know, walking around the mall with eight-month-old grandchildren is not the easiest thing to do without a stroller. So I said, OK. And she says, do you want me to show you how it works? And I said, baby, no. I mean, I'm a guy. I can figure that out. I mean, like when you were a little boy, I mean, we had these umbrella strollers, and I figured that out. And she says, are you dead? And I said, no, I got it, honey. So anyway, it's in this Mini Cooper. In the way back is a stroller, and it's all compacted up into this almost like a suitcase, you know? And then the children in the? Next seat in the car seats facing backwards and then I'm in the driver's seat. And feeling my blue jeans rub against my chin since it's a standard. But we got there. Got there parked by wildflower there and. that part of the car seats actually come out and move into the stroller. Okay, so, okay, this is going to be interesting. So I pulled the stroller out and literally, the center of the handle, I just moved it forward and this thing just popped open. I mean, it was amazing. And then the car seats themselves, you hit these little buttons and it actually comes out and it slips into these, you know, this double stadium seating thing for them in this car. It was like 30 seconds. And so Charlotte and I are just strutting around. It's like, yeah, they're us. We're grandparents. We just had a blast. So anyway, kind of changing in my mind is, you know, this is better than Cabela's actually today. Showing off my grandkids. So anyway, oh, we got to go. Time to go because we got to pick up some other grandkids. We got to go take these twins back and then get our car so we can go pick up. So great, I'll go get the car. So I get the car, pull it up there by Wallflower in Charlotte, brings the twins out. And of course, their little car seats are part of the thing, the stroller. So we pull that out, put that in, put them in there, only now something's not happening. I'm trying to fold this thing up like doing the reverse of what I did, and it isn't folding. And so I'm pulling, I'm pushing, I'm doing everything that I can do to make this stroller get to where it's going to go back into that mini cooper so we can go. And it's in the summer so it's like 312 degrees outside and, you know, sweats just rolling down. And I'm working on this and they're in the car seat, car running, they're doing OK. And I'm just, I'm about to, well, drop kick this thing across the parking lot. We call my daughter and she says, oh dad, on YouTube is this little, and I'm like, I don't even know how to go to YouTube, okay? So that is no help. And so literally I'm here and I see young people and it's like, hey, hey, hey, do you have one of these? Just as they're walking by and they're like. But I'm getting desperate. It's getting late. And I am frustrated. And this thing won't work. And I'm a guy. And I know how to do stuff. And I can't get that. I'm pulling, pushing, doing everything I know to do. So I'm about to throw it on the top of the car and just lash it down and charge. No, you can't. It'll fall off on the freeway. So anyway, she's sitting there. And then comes out this dear lady. She must have been. She must have been close to 90, came out with an umbrella, walked up to me, and she says, here's Sonny, gave me the umbrella, and then pushed me out of the way. She said, let me. So I'm holding this umbrella, and here's this elderly lady working on my stroller, And I just felt like, OK, here. Here's my man card. Just throw it on the ground. Just stomp it around. But I didn't know. And then all of a sudden, something comes loose. And it takes part of the fold in. I mean, it started to work. Now, not all the way, but enough to where I said, ma'am, thank you so much. Here's your umbrella. Thank you so much for helping me. And then I took what she had done, and then I put the rest of it in the car, and then I found some baling wire, and I tied that trunk down as far as it would go, and we got in the car to leave. And so Charlotte's like, that's my wife, she's like, this thing's gonna fall out, it's gonna be on the free, it's gonna, no honey, we're, you know, I wasn't talking a lot at that particular moment other than, it'll be fine, it'll be fine. Sure enough, it was fine, we got to my daughter's, and opened up the trunk and my daughter came out and I said it there. I said, Courtney, I don't, and I didn't even get the sentence out. And she says, Dad, I forgot to pull that out. And it goes. So then again, I just feel, okay, great. Twins were great. Get in our car, leave her car. I'm not wanting to talk. I am not wanting to hear what Charlotte has to say. So in the car, she began to say, What is wrong with you? Why are you acting this way? What way? Okay? So let's pause it there. Now, let's say that your friend calls you up and says, let me tell you about my day. And relates something, how do you help him? More importantly, what was going on in me? So I want to take this illustration, get your help, and let's see how we think about and where we see the need for biblical change. I guess we see the need for biblical change. That's not a hard one, right? Okay, so first of all, in this particular model, how to think about that, you start with this. This is called the sun, and this is the event, the situation. This is just life happening. Right? Now, as you listen to someone, there's always kind of a couple of pieces here. One is life happening. This is what situation, this is what is going on as I relate to you. But the next step then is to discover, how did I respond to that? OK? Observable behavior. So this is the audience participation part. OK? You all ready? You awake? You awake enough to do that? OK. So, what would be some of the ways I responded to this event, this situation? Yes, in the back. Thank you, sir. Okay. Bass Pro Shop, right? You and me. Yes, sir. Frustrated. Another hand over here. Yes. Isn't that a good question? That would be a no. Yes, ma'am. A little resentful. Yes sir. You guys are, this is a little too easy. I thought it was going to be a little harder for you. Proud. Yes sir. A little selfish. Yes. Double check on proud. Yes, ma'am. A non-teachable spirit. That's almost too long for me to get up here. We'll put another check on proud. Not teachable. Yes, ma'am. Embarrassed. Yes, it was. It is. Someone didn't raise their hand. If you don't raise your hand, you're not getting it. Okay. Impatient. Good, bro. We can help one another in this. Yes, sir. Anchor. Yep. Maybe you didn't see it on the outside. Necessarily, Charlotte did. Anger represent, or you know, you see it in a lot of different ways, right? Being quiet can be angry. Yes, ma'am. Feeling stupid. All right, that wasn't hard to come up with that list, was it, unfortunately? Because what we see, this behavior, what we see, how we respond to a situation is just right there before our eyes, right? But being aware, if I'm only aware, like I'm aware that that's true, but if I'm only aware of it, do I change? No, I mean, we're aware of our stuff, aren't we? Yeah, yeah, that's, yeah, I can, yeah, that's. Aware, just solely being aware, doesn't engage in biblical change. It's a necessary first step, but we don't stop there. Now, in this particular model, take the arrow this way, this is called, a thorny, that's a thorn tree. It's bad fruit. We'd all agree that that's bad fruit, right? It's definitely not fruit of the spirit. We'd agree with that, right? Because that's kind of on this other side over here. And that's what we want is good fruit. So that the same event, there's no reason that I can't have a different response, right? But I didn't. That's a response I had. So then what do we do? Jesus said, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks, right? So the heart really is the source that drives my behavior, isn't it? So when we get to the heart, and that's our next step, because this behavior is always reflected, a reflection of my heart. So as we look at what we see, we want to then ask the next question that would see, well, what was motivating that behavior? What were you desiring? What were you craving? Yes, question in the back. You know, I think our time is up today. Appreciate everyone coming. What? Well, let's use biblical terminology, right? What was in my heart, what was motivating my heart was different than my behavior, right? Because if I take, what's your name, sir? Darryl, if I take Darryl's point a little bit further, I could say, I know what's wrong. Let me just make a decision to do what's right. Don't we do that in life? Does that change us? Where we're aware of what's wrong, and we know what we should say. We know what we should do. We know what it should look like. We know. And just make a decision to do that. Being aware. deciding to change. It's just more of my modifying my behavior, isn't it? It's not getting to what's motivated that behavior. It's not getting to my heart. Again, as Christ said, of the abundance of the heart. So this is always showing what's in my heart. Our behavior always displays what's in our heart. So again, as we're caring for our own souls, as we're helping one another, we're trying to help someone with the mirror of God's Word, see how their behavior is different from what God's Word would say. Now, why is that? See, you ask those questions because no one can see someone else's heart. We can't. We can't judge someone's motive, even. But we can ask questions. Kind of like what Darrell was saying. What was going on inside? Yes, ma'am. Yeah, you might not have heard the comment that it was, but the Holy Spirit sees your heart. Absolutely. God sees it all, right? And so there's no one that we're fooling in the Trinity in our lives at all. What we're trying to do is bring what is functioning in our lives in line with what God's Word would say. We're wanting to participate as God changes us. being transformed into the same image, his image, from one degree of glory to another. And this is the Lord, who is a spirit. His power is bringing change. So how do I participate with that? Do I participate with that by just acknowledging, you're right, you're right, I don't want to be that way. And next time the phone call comes in, I'm going to be patient. I'm going to be... Or does change involve the heart? In other words, if we look at this, what would that reveal that is motivating my heart? I think we would see that it was in the category of a sinful motivation, wouldn't we? So, if we looked at this, and maybe looked at those two, pride. And that's such a big word. I think what might be more descriptive is a selfish approach to my day. Selfish approach, putting what I wanted, not Philippians 2.3, putting the attitude of Christ, putting the interests of others above our own. That was not in the same zip code. in my thinking. I was putting my desires first. It's not a bad desire to have kind of a day the way you want. That's not a bad desire. But yet, James talks about it in James 1.13. Let me read this for you. If you have your Bibles open to that, James 1, I'm going to begin in verse 13. I guess I need to not say open your Bibles anymore. It's like touch your Bibles. turn to that electronic page. I had one friend, he's old like me, he says, you know what, I'm going to create an app so when you use your phone Bible, it makes the page rustling sound. So you can hear that again. Okay, here we go. James 1. 13, let no one say when he is tempted, I am being tempted by God. For God cannot be tempted with evil and he himself tempts no one. But each person, you and I, each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire, when it is conceived, gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is fully grown, brings forth death. So it's my own desires that get lured away. Not a bad desire to have a day that I would like for it to look a certain way. That's not a bad desire. But when that desire begins to control, when the enemy lure attempts and lures that away to where that is selfish, that desire becomes selfish and begins to dominate my behavior, it begins to betray my heart, doesn't it? It begins to betray a sinful motivation. Right? So we can see how we're taking another step here from awareness, let's say that that's representation of sin, from awareness now to seeking God for conviction. Now this is a hard question. You ready? Christ died for your fill in the blank. Christ died for your, yep. He didn't die for your feelings. He didn't die for your emotions. He didn't die for your situations. He didn't die for your personalities to change. He died for your soul. So as the Holy Spirit brings conviction for my sin, the gospel brings hope. Hope. Because Christ died for my sin. I've never overcome my sin. Christ overcame my sin. I can overcome my sin in Him. I can resist temptation, right? In fact, 1 Corinthians 10.13 says, no temptation has overcome you that is not common to man. Which is a great thought on a Monday when this happens again, right? It's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, this isn't unique. No temptation has overcome you that's not common to man. But God is faithful and he will not let you be tempted more than you're able to bear. But will provide a way of escape that you might hold up under it. That's hope that we have. That's a promise that we have as Christians, because Christ is in us the hope of glory. So when we see sin in our lives, and we need to go through this process to be able to see what's motivated, what's generating, what's driving that, what's controlling my heart, my decisions, and my choices there. This brings conviction, in my case, for selfishness, an aspect of pride. That's sin. And let's use biblical language and let's call whatever the Bible calls sin, sin. Let's work to that point. And then when we see it, that's where Christ changes us by His grace because we see in 1 John 1.9. Turn to that too, if you wouldn't mind. 1 John 1.9. Glorious hope is in this verse. Again, Christ died for our sin. He overcame our sin. 1 John 1 night. If we confess our sin, right? You've got to see it. There's got to be conviction to be able to... If we confess our sin, What? He's faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us of all unrighteousness. That's the power of the gospel at work. But I have to first see it. I have to seek the Lord to receive conviction. And when I see that sin, when the Holy Spirit brings conviction, I have such hope, not condemnation. Because we can feel like, I don't want to see my sin, man. I'm tired of seeing my sin. Let me just try not to do that again. That doesn't bring change. When we see our sin, it should bring hope. Because if you look at Romans 6.14, it says, sin no longer has dominion. Because you're not any longer under the law of the Spirit. See, as much as it feels like on that day, it felt like sin had dominion. But the truth of God's Word is it does not. Christ has dominion. And when I see my sin, I can confess it, be forgiven and freed. because of the power of the gospel. So what I'm explaining to you is as I see my sin, what do I want to do? I want to transact with the Savior. I want to go to the Lord. I want to confess my sin. As I do that sin, remember, if we confess our sin, He's faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us of all unrighteousness. So that sin is not influencing my heart at that moment any longer. It cannot remain. Now that's great news. That's hard work, though, isn't it? To not just distract ourselves. I hate it when I do this, so let me go to my video game. I hate it when I do this, so I'm just going to spend some time in Facebook and just try to... Whatever we do. But when we find our refuge in God, Lord, help me. Why? And we do the hard work of seeking Him and looking at His Word. And God reveals sin in our life. Why does He reveal it? So we can be freed of its influence. And when it no longer influences our lives, the fruit of the Spirit is what comes out. See, the fruit of the Spirit is in every Christian's life. it's singular, the fruit of the Spirit. It's the character of Christ in you. It's sin that keeps that from naturally coming out. So you remove the sin and that is there. You don't have to work at it. It's not like a grapevine Pop out that grape. No, it's the natural result. The fruit is the result of the vine. As Christians, the fruit of the Spirit is way more available, active, visible in your lives. So as we see what sin influences us, that can direct our choices and our decisions. Even good desires lured away, as we saw in James 1.13. When we see it, to confess our sin, to transact with the Savior freezes from the influence of our sin. And we're changing. We're participating in the work of Christ. But you can see it's His power over sin. He overcame sin and the punishment of it in my life. So the result is good for... And the hope is, the next Monday when we get the call, if this selfishness is not driving my heart, then there's even a more immediate, a genuine response that can be unselfish, that can allow the fruit of the Spirit to show. Yes, Pam? Oh, it's a great, yeah. Yeah, if we turn the, we talked to Charlotte about the big screen, you know, our lives are displayed in it. Anyway, if you saw the big screen when we're in the car, she began to ask me, and I had a choice there. I had a choice to either, with my tone and anger, which I've done before, I know how to make her stop asking me questions, right? Honey, let's just not talk about it now. I just don't feel like this. It's not a big deal. Let's talk about something else. I'm tired of it. Whatever. But fortunately, I made a choice to draw her out. So she began to just ask, Trey, what was going on? Why are you so frustrated? Why are you so upset? I made a choice. that this was a moment that God was interested in my change. That God was wanting to help me. Hadn't planned it that way. And I began to say, okay, well, let's talk about it. Honey, what did you see? And actually, I went through this in my mind. Okay. That's the behavior you saw, honey. Okay. And I would feel that this area of selfishness, and we see it in a lot of different ways, is just kind of showing up here. And felt conviction for that, and I asked her to forgive me for that. And to Pam's point, I think when our sin affects others, it's always step two. Step one is, Lord, I've sinned against you and you alone. That's what David said, right? and confessing our sin to Him, but confessing it to who it's hurt. And that's a humility step, right? It's hard, but God says He resists the proud, right? Also in James, I think it's 4.8, God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. We all want to change, it's just hard. It's not complicated, it's just hard. It wars against our flesh. But can you see how this isn't hard. This is simple. What's going on in my heart and your heart really is simple. We try to make it complicated. Man, I don't know what's going on. It feels complicated. It just feels like, well, I don't know. I don't know what happened. I don't know who was in a tree suit that day. It wasn't me. I don't know what was going on. No, it's not complicated. My behavior displays what's in my heart. I'm being tempted. What does my behavior show? How is that motivated out of my heart? What sin would be influencing me? As the Holy Spirit brings conviction, that's what I take to the cross, because Christ died for my... And as I confess my sin, I'm freed. So as we do that, and actually help one another do that, Can you see that's how we change? It's Christ that's transforming us from one degree of glory to the other. This is the Lord who is the Spirit. It's the Holy Spirit at work in us. So you see, it's not some mystery. It's not complicated. It's not something we can't understand or you have to have a degree in biblical counseling to understand. Absolutely not. These are the concepts of the hope we have as Christians communicated in the Bible that help us to see how to become more like Christ. Joe, and then behind you. Yeah, and those closest to us can help us to see what that looks like. Because often, again, events happen. Our responses happen. And then all of a sudden, it's like, what's that? You see, it's people close to us caring for each other that can help us slow it down and say, well, ask questions. What was that? Were you loving Christ? Were you loving yourself? Yes, behind there. Okay, and your name? Jim? If I'm understanding your question right, it's like, when do I ask for someone to help me and when do I press into God to try to figure out what's going on? Is it? Oh. Gotcha. where serving may not be the right thing to do. Yeah, that's a good point. Yeah, there absolutely does. And I would just say, if Udaif is on Monday, it's gotta be time with God on Monday. That's all I can say. Not really. Yeah, it's a good question. And the way I would try to answer it is that Psalm 16, that first verse that says, oh God, preserve me. For in you, I find refuge. And what is that balance in your own life? First of all, are you spending time regularly in His Word and prayer? Are you finding that in a regular way? Because if you're not, any opportunity for service is going to feel like it's drawing away. I don't know if I've got anything left in my cup to share. So be having individual devotional time with God. And then I think the Lord will help you to know, you know, what might be, hey, this person called and asked me to help them move and I was going to just do some reading this afternoon. You're going to know that balance. The Holy Spirit will lead you in those individual decisions. But if you're not having that ongoing regular And maybe it's not every day, but that would be the goal every day, right? But a regular devotional time with God, I think it's very difficult to hear and understand what that balance would be as you let the Lord lead you in that. Where do I serve? Where do I pull apart? Okay? Yes, sir? Right? Right? Right, which focuses at kind of this step here, which is repentance. Right? After I confess my sin, I need to turn from it. Right? Repentance is a turning. I'm going this way. I turn from sin and turn to Christ. Well, there are going to be things to do and steps to take here, aren't there? Yes, ma'am? Joe will be glad to answer it for you. It should always be to God first, because like David said, my sin is against you and you alone. I don't know if you heard a question or not, but sin against someone else should you go to them before. And I think to relieve that burden, that conviction that you need to confess your sin to them, which is great, that's the work of the Spirit, but that always follows our interaction with the Lord. We've sinned against the Lord first and foremost. And the word doesn't say, if we confess our sin to one another, Right? It says, if we confess our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sin. So it's to God first. Good question. Okay, so you're starting to see just a little bit of the simplicity, but yet the power that each and every believer has as we trust the work of Christ on our behalf, that everyone in here There's one who has dominion, and that's Jesus Christ. Sin. It doesn't matter if you struggled with a sin, a pattern of sin, for years or decades. It doesn't have dominion. The Bible says so. Now, we have to believe that by faith, right? That's the simple part. The hard part is that means turning from it. And so based on what sin has revealed in your heart, these steps of repentance, what would help you turn from that sin, which will always, excuse me, always involve the Word of God, always involve prayer. There can be some other practical steps, and that's where a trusted friend, a pastor, counselor can help you with what some of those steps might be. But that's what we want to do, right? We want to turn from sin. We want to see God as more powerful than my sin. See the hope that that brings? It doesn't matter what my sin is. Christ is dominion. It doesn't matter what my sin is. If I confess it, He'll forgive me and free me. It doesn't matter. It's an issue of the heart. And Christ died for my sin. Isn't that a glorious thought? That's the gospel of Jesus Christ. Okay, any other thoughts or questions before we jump back into Daryl? Can I tell her you said that? She would say, absolutely, Daryl, it's part of my job description. Well, I would disagree with you, bro. She's none of the above. We've talked about how we as grandparents want to remain open. We want to spend as much time as we can with our grandkids. We love that. We want to be as much of a break for our children as we can be. And we have talked about that as a couple. And we have communicated that to the kids. Please, don't even think twice before calling us. And if we've got something, then we'll tell you. We didn't have anything planned that day. So again, she's on the phone and she's looking at me and she's like, You know, and I'm like, if it was the outside of me going like this, I'd be fine. So, yeah, I did not, I didn't see any, anything that my wife did that would be sinful. Joe? Yes, yeah, Romans 7, 1 through 5, right there. Always first look at our own logs. Could be a speck there. Okay. Any other thoughts before we just have a few minutes to jump back into the outline? So I'm just going to briefly go over that and then just commend it to your own study. But if you'll look at that picture, and I think yours is black and white minus color, but that picture, you see that? That is just what we see here. With the sun at the top is the heat, the trial, the event. And you can see, you can go one of two ways, either to the bad fruit or the good fruit. Go to the bad fruit, you always want to ensure you're understanding what in the heart is motivating that behavior. Where the Holy Spirit brings conviction, you take that to the cross, transact with the Savior. And then steps of repentance. then that same heart, your heart, the fruit of the Spirit, is freed and unencumbered by that particular sin and restricted in influence. A good fruit will be the result. So hopefully the next event, a similar event, will have a different direction in that arrow. So this is just for your you know, to think about it, pull it out. And what I would encourage you to do is begin with your own heart. Are there some things, an area, just pick one area that you feel like God has just kind of put his finger on in your life? Are you applying biblical change? Or are you stopping at the place that you're just aware of it, you want it to change, you hate it, But it's not gone to the place to where you would recognize the sinful motivation, whatever it would be that the Bible calls sin, that you can take it to the Lord, you're confessing it, turning and repenting. Our Monday. Okay. Our Monday experience. Great. Okay. Let's see if I can answer that. Great question, Pete. I'm going to try to answer that in a couple of different ways. First of all, the point is we don't always see it when it's happening. I didn't see this when it was happening. I mean, I felt those emotions. I felt frustrated. I felt anger. I felt that. But I wasn't seeing my heart until later when Charlotte and I were having that conversation. But now, This subject, God used that in my life to say, Trey, this area of selfishness, you know, this isn't the only place that this showed itself. And I began to just see other ways that my own agenda or selfishness is influencing my choices and decisions. So, let's say this is Pete. We'll put him here. with like a policeman hat on. Kind of. Okay. So, anyway, Pete's going through his day. Now, here's the event that we talked about today. And maybe he has one next Monday. And sometime Monday afternoon he sees it. Oh, what does he do at that moment where there's conviction? He takes that conviction for sin to the Lord, confesses his sin, and is freed. But that awareness, I think, grows to where the next situation might not be afterwards. Maybe he's in the middle of it. Or I'm in the middle of it. And then all of a sudden, I'm doing it again. At that moment, see, that's the Holy Spirit bringing awareness, bringing illumination to our heart. We respond to Him. Oh, and over this last 18 months, multiple times where I'll say, honey, I think I'm doing it again. I think, and we'll talk about it. Now, after a while, you're going to see it coming, actually see the temptation. Temptation is not sin, right? Temptation is the draw to sin. Sin is always a choice. So I think as we grow, we begin to see the situation coming. We begin to see it before it's materialized. Oh, Lord, help me. And can make choices that aren't influenced by the sin in our heart or seeing the sin in our heart, but we see it coming. So that'd be one answer to your question. Does that make sense? That's called growing. That's maturing in how we're dealing with an area in our life. Just one second. The second part, Pete, is I think that feeling that you're talking about that's real. We're all that way. When we sense it, let's be committed to respond to it. And a lot of times it is that Psalm 16 response. Oh God, keep me, help me, I don't know what's going on. I find refuge in You. See, it's the Holy Spirit that brings awareness that something's happening. And as we respond to that, I think that we're participating in God's change in our lives. Yes. As long as she's not calling my wife. Yes, ma'am. No. No. How I responded to it. It's always a response, right? Feelings are feelings. I mean, you can have something... Yesterday, preseason football's going on. Cowboys lost to the Vikings. It's preseason, so it's not a big deal, but it was disappointing. Also, they didn't show it on TV, so it's like, oh, I'm disappointed about that. Now, that's just emotion. God's given us our emotion. But it's like, how does that affect me? Does that drive me so much to where it's like, man, my day is not complete until I find a place that's going to show me the game and I can see the game. No, it doesn't matter what you're going to do. You see how that disappointment can then drive my decisions to where sin can be. And we can see that distinction. There's a distinction between temptation and sin. Sin is when we allow that temptation to be our choice. Yes. Right. Yeah, that Colossians 4.2, pray without ceasing. I think that's part of it. It's like always seeing our need. God, we live in a fallen world. We're affected by its fallenness every day. Yes, ma'am. Sure. Yeah, right. Right. Okay, yeah. I think so. And again, we're always looking to the Holy Spirit to bring conviction, right? But the way you describe that, I think, would be operating in my mind, where I begin to defend, excuse, justify what I want, right? So am I genuinely following Philippians 2.3 and putting the interests of others above my own? At that point, I'd be convicted. I'm not really. Okay, we're after 10 o'clock, right? We're over at 10, Joe? Okay. So we got through three quarters of the first page. If I could just, the remainder of this basically explains the model. And again, it's from CCF, not me. I just love it because it's simple. I can understand it. I can have it in my mind as I just view life. It goes through a, 2 Corinthians 1, Paul's experience, where he begins, I don't want you to be unaware, brothers, of the experience that I had in Asia. We're so utterly burned beyond our, it's that section, kind of says, this is how, you know, this is how this model would fit for Paul here. So you can just look at that. There's some, under four, the areas to consider and remember are just like, Listen, our hope is not in a model. People aren't modeled. You know, this is just seeing the work of Christ. Always focus on Christ. And then it concludes with just this concept that, you know what, we're all saints. If you're a Christian, you're a saint, and you have all the promises of God. But we're sinners. And we're sufferers. And all that goes together to show how the gospel connects to each area of our lives. So we're more in common than anything. And then finally, if you'd like to do some additional changes, a personal exercise to just kind of take an area in your life and walk through. The more you understand, The more you apply it in your own life, the more you can really transport what we believe enough to apply it to ourselves. And then there's some additional resources if you'd like to do some additional study. Thank you for being so kind and being with me. Yes, ma'am, one last question. That's great. Yeah, and you can remember. Hymns are easy to remember in that way and can be so helpful. So if I could, let me close this in prayer. Father, we thank You for Your grace and Your mercy, and we ask Your blessing. Lord, and we just declare, what a friend we have in Jesus. What a friend we have in Jesus. Lord, we thank You for the friendship that is made possible through the Gospel of Jesus. and we ask your blessing. We want to live more like Christ. We want to be like David and find our refuge in you. Help us all, and wherever we're needing help, it's in your name we give thanks and pray.