Today I want to talk about Echoes of Eden.
Echoes of Eden, right? Because like I said, not every
attack on your face looks like darkness, not every attack on
your faith is going to look like a massive spiritual battle.
Not every attack on your faith is going to look like a obvious
sin, right? We all know there's things in
the Bible that maybe we've read or that we deal with that we
struggle with that we have to put down that you're like, I
know this is wrong and I'm struggling with that.
I gotta get over whether it's lust or greed or gluttony or
whatever else. We, we oftentimes have things
that were like, I know this needs to, I need to win this
battle, right? And those ones are to an extent
easy to recognize, maybe difficult to overcome, but
always easy to recognize. But what I've learned is that
often times in life, it's not the obvious battles that
actually take us out. The obvious ones you might deal
with and people will struggle with, but more than more than
less, it's the the careful battles.
It's the battles that sound reasonable.
It's the battles that even seem positively spiritual.
Those can be the ones that often take us off the most, right?
Because deception rarely announces itself loudly.
It whispers. It whispers, and in Second
Corinthians, our first verse 1114, it says No wonder, for
even Satan disguises himself as an Angel of light.
No wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an Angel of
light. You have a seat.
The reason I start here in this one saw small simple passage is
because the enemy recognizes how dangerous it is to not appear
bad, but to appear of light. And we need to recognize today
that often times, like I said, it's not the obvious battles
that kick us out, It's the small, subtle ones.
Because the enemy knows if he can influence the way you think,
he can influence the way you live.
If he can influence the way you think, he can influence the way
that you live, right? So we have to be aware then of
these tactics. We have to be aware then of our
own thinking. We have to be aware of every
thought we have, right? Not all thoughts we get should
live in our mind, right? Some have to be held captive,
some have to be thrown out, some have to be put down.
Not every thought we have, good or bad, needs to stay right.
Because if the enemy can appear as an Angel of light, that means
we have to be very attuned to discernment and to scripture and
to our walk to actually reference that not everything
that shines is light. Because if deception was easy to
notice, less people would fall for it, right?
If it was easy to notice, then less people would fall for it.
But the echoes of Eden, the whispers of the serpent, right?
They're whispers that make us question.
They're whispers that distort. They're whispers that slowly
pull you away from what God said.
It's these things that are just subtle shifts, subtle changes
that ultimately affect the entire outcome, right?
Because like we said, not everything that sounds right is
righteous. Not everything that sounds right
is righteous. And so how do we then, as
believers, position ourselves in places that we can discern and
understand correctly what is right, what sounds right, and
what is actually righteous right?
We have to be able to understand if we're going to grow in our
walk with Christ, we have to discern the echoes of Eden.
And there's three things we're going to have to learn to
recognize. Three things we're going to go
over today. What he said, what you heard,
and what God meant. Deception works in these three
layers. What he said, what you heard,
and what God meant, right? The serpent was described as
crafty, and we're going to read Genesis 3 real quick.
Just the one through 6. I'm going to read the whole
passage. I'm going to break some of it
down Now. The serpent was more crafty than
any beasts of the field which the Lord God had made.
And he said to the woman, indeed, has God said to you, you
shall not eat from any tree of the garden?
The woman said to the serpent, From the fruit of the trees of
the garden we may eat, but from the fruit of the tree which is
in the middle of the garden, God has said, you shall not eat from
it or touch it, or you will die. The serpent said to the woman,
You surely will not die, for God knows that in the day you eat
from it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God,
knowing good and evil. When the woman saw that the tree
was good for food and that it was the the light to the eyes
and the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its
fruit and ate it, and she gave also to her husband and he ate
it. I want to break down the tactic
of the enemy right here. The first thing the serpent did
was he did not attack God directly.
He attacked the certainty of the word.
He did not attack God directly. He attacked.
Do you really know what he said? Are you sure that's what he
meant? Are you sure that's what he was
talking about? And the first deception of Eden
did not begin with the rebellion.
It began with a question. It didn't begin just because she
ate. It began the moment she started
to think, well what did he say? What did he mean?
And like it starts by saying, look, the serpent was more
crafty. Why?
Because not only did the enemy knew the Scripture, he knew the
outcome of eating the fruit, which is why it's so important
for you, which we'll get into later, to know the Word, to know
what's being said, because the enemy knows the word, right?
And ultimately the serpent questioned what God spoke.
Then he contradicted what God wanted.
He questioned what was spoke. Then he started to contradict.
God doesn't want you to eat the fruit, but what does he do?
He turns disobedience and starts to flip it to seem like wisdom.
No, no, when you eat of this fruit, you'll be wise.
As if there's more knowledge beyond God.
He reframes disobedience to now look like reasonable.
Well, why wouldn't God want me to know things?
Why? Why would God not withhold
knowledge from me? Well, you know, God probably
does want me to know this. And righteous reasoning, reasons
that sound holy, that seem right.
It was a delight to the eyes and desirable to make one wise
right. This is the craftiness of the
enemy. It's not outright attacking God,
it's making you subtly shift. The more dangerous thing isn't
for me to just tell you what you believe is wrong.
It's for me to start to skew how you perceive what you believe.
This is why movements in in scripture get off.
This is why people get off on scriptural foundations that
started strong but then shift into something that it's never
supposed to be. God does want you blessed, but
that doesn't mean I just name and claim every single thing.
No, scripture is very clear that I have a right to the things in
which God needs me to have for the purpose I've been placed in
my heart. Which means God will provide
based upon the need, calling, and purpose He's given me.
God is obligated to fulfill His word based upon my calling, not
my desires, right? Why?
Because if I'm not careful, I can get off and I can make
something seem, look, feel right that was never intended for me
to have in the first place. So he questions, He makes them
question God. He reframes the disobedience as
wisdom, and he starts to make what they didn't need to have in
their life look beneficial for them.
Not only does he reframe it as wisdom, he starts to tell them,
no, no, this is actually good for you.
This will actually help you do more.
This will actually get you somewhere.
This is what we talked to. I talked about this weeks ago
and in a message called whispers in the wilderness, right, that
the temptations of Christ, which we'll go over just a couple
today. The last one was what it was.
I'll give you the kingdoms of the world, meaning it was Satan
saying, look, you were called to bring these kingdoms back.
I can give them to you and you won't have to die.
Satan has no problem giving you things you think you need, or
even giving you things that might help your purpose that you
feel you have, as long as it's not through God.
Notice the the serpent was not scared of them having the
knowledge, he just needed them off.
He didn't mind that they would gain the knowledge, he didn't
care what they would get from the fruit, just that God told
him not to. So he made independence sound
like enlightenment. He gave them the ability to
think. Oh well, if I do this I will.
I I know more now, right? As like I said, as if there's
knowledge beyond God. He then makes distrust sound
like discernment, right? He starts causing them to
distrust the word, but then convinces them that they're
discerning something wise. This is the slippery slope of
deception. What did he, what did he say?
What did he actually say? Oh no, that's not what he meant.
Because if you if you understand he, he opened the question in
the 1st place. Did he say you shouldn't eat
from the tree? Already knew?
Interesting to think about. He wasn't trying to gain
knowledge of what they knew from them.
He had knowledge of what they should have known.
Which means his very first question was already trying to
see how accurate are you going to be?
How much do you actually remember?
Right, Because we know. We all know someone can tell you
something and if you ain't writing it down, you go back
later and then you're trying to remember what they said and you
don't get all the details like you ain't got it.
You're, I'm, I'm, I'm a live and breathe note taker on my phone.
I will talk to you and you might not see me because when we're
done, I'll turn around and I'll start typing those into my phone
because I don't want to forget. I'm the kind of person that's
like, if I say I'm going to pray for you, 9 times out of 10, I've
prayed for you 15 seconds after I said it 'cause I'm like, I'll
never be the one who says that and then doesn't do it.
Now if the Holy Spirit prompts me to go deeper, then I'll go
back later, but at least that minimum, I'll be like, I did
pray for them because I'm not going to forget what it was or
what the issue was. Because there's nothing worse
than when you have a conversation with someone, then
the next day they're like, did you do this?
And you're like, I forgot that you existed as a whole human
being. Honestly, after the
conversation. But then we sit in services and
don't pull out a notebook to write something down.
And then God gives you unction in your heart goes, Oh, that was
good. And then I think I'll just
remember, no, what are we doing to make sure that the word
spoken sits within our hearts so that when the when right,
because the parable, the soil, what's word is sown on good
soil. Good soil is soil that receives
the word in. Why?
Because if the seed just sits on the top and doesn't get received
into the soil, then anything can come and take it away.
Anything can pick it out. Right now at our house, we got
about like a group of probably like 50 squirrels that come down
from this tree. And every morning I walk out and
they have destroyed this whole section of our grass because
there's all these little acorns sitting on top and they're just
digging them out. And so, you know, I'm a fun guy.
So I like to open the door and just let my dog.
And he's an Australian shepherd. So that's like his thing.
He'll try to like get him in a circle.
He's yet to successfully do it, but he gets close.
But when seed is sown, if it just sits on, if it just sits on
Stony soil, if it just sits on top, if it doesn't get implanted
inside, then it's easy to be pulled away.
I, if I wanted to do Q&A right now, I could probably say what
was my first Scripture? Happy you would be like, oh,
that was 16 minutes ago. What?
It's because am I doing what's necessary for me so that the
word I hear, I know because there is nothing better.
There's just nothing better than when you get called into like a
meeting or back on a conversation and someone's like
they're wrong and you're like, Oh, no, I got all the receipts.
You're like, I can tell you when, where, what color your
shirt was. You had a haircut 30 minutes
before and you just feel like, man, I know every detail.
Bring it on. This is why some of us struggle
with spiritual battles. We had we, we struggle with
surface battles because we only have surface word.
We can defend maybe one attack from the enemy, but that
depletes our word base. And when something digs deeper,
we're like, there's nothing there for me to no, we got to
let the word grow deep roots in our heart.
Therefore it cannot just be pulled out.
We were cleaning out our, our, our garden the last couple weeks
and I got the whole thing like, you know, stripped out and I got
to this one massive plant at the end.
And I started using the shovel because that's all I had is a
thrifted shovel that Pastor Alyssa found.
And I'm like getting around this thing and I stick it in and I go
and it just snaps. Don't use drifted shovels.
So I call in back up and I was like, I call Seth, I call
Duncan. I'm like, hey, I need help.
And I, you know, to my extent, I was like, I just need a
chainsaw. And they're like, we can help,
we'll just take care of it. I was like, great, they show up,
they tie that thing to the back of the truck.
They're pulling that thing on the truck.
Duncan standing on the slack line.
I mean, this thing is rooted in there.
And I'm like, thank God I didn't just try to tackle this with a
chainsaw. But the root structure was so
firm. The amount of effort it took to
pull that thing out was immense. It took backup.
It took a full blown truck. Is our word structure in our
life so deep that when the enemy sends his attack and says what
did he say? Like I know exactly what he
said. I know exactly what was spoken.
See, the enemy did not tempt her with something ugly.
He tempt her with what was desirable.
He tempted her with something that seemed right, that looked
good, that appeared like growth. You will be more wise, you'll
have more knowledge, you will grow if you do this.
How often do we fall for the trap of more perceived as
blessing but is truly deception? More always seems good until
more takes away and is just pulling out your roots all the
time. Because what we didn't realize
was that more was actually going to be pulling and draining us
way more than we had before and we weren't prepared for that
pulling. No, see, he, he, he makes it
seem like growth. And once obedience starts
looking unreasonable, compromise becomes easier to justify.
Once obedience starts looking unreasonable, compromise becomes
easier to justify. They just want too much of me.
They're just asking too much. That's just too much to try to
do that. That's not that's not even
reasonable to ask me. And then it becomes easy.
Just, oh, well, it's alright. Don't worry.
The rest of the sermon starts to pick up.
You'll be happy again. Like I said, the the serpent
never asked Eve to openly hate God, only to question him, only
to question him. What did he say?
What did he say?
He makes them rethink what was meant.
Once again, like we said in the beginning, he appears as an
Angel of light, as if this conversation is fruitful.
No, we're just building each other up.
Why don't you? We're just having a good
conversation. But he's slowly chopping at
roots, softening you up. And the longer we entertain, but
we were never supposed to entertain, the weaker we get for
the final blow that comes. What did he say?
What did he actually say? So I'm saying not everything
that sounds spiritual is holy. Not everything that sounds
spiritual is holy. Not everything that feels
emotional is truth, right? Not everything you hear that
makes you think something is truth.
No, we are to search word ourself because the enemy rarely
attacks truth directly. He just tries to slightly edit
it. He's rarely trying to just make
something up. Now he's trying to alter
slightly enough that it takes root.
Right. This is for all my teenagers in
here. When you go to a place that you
were allowed to be at, but there's people there that
shouldn't be there, then you go back home and your mom's like,
where were you? And you like, oh, I was here.
And then you start listening. All the people that you know are
allowed to be there, but just casually leave out all the
people you know shouldn't be there.
Like I told the truth. No, you deceived.
You reasoned yourself, I didn't lie.
No. And so was here.
You lied. I never said they weren't.
That's what the serpent does. If we're playing games of well,
I mean, yes, I did say that and I did leave that out.
We are deceiving. This isn't just teenagers,
because I know we do it at workplaces when your boss asked
for something and, you know, you forgot and you're like, no,
yeah, it's I have it up in the background right now.
Deception, like Chase. That's harsh.
It's true. Sometimes we casually accept
something that in its depth is a deception.
And the more we make those tiny deceptions OK in our life, the
more we open ourselves up for deception against us.
No, He's altering truth. We saw this in Matthew 4.
I'm going to read it real quick. This is just when Jesus was led
to be tempted. Then Jesus was led up by the
Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
And after he had fasted 40 days and 40 nights, he then became
hungry. And the tempter came and said to
him, If you are the Son of God, command that these stones become
bread. But he answered and said, It is
written, Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word
that proceeds from the mouth of God.
Then the devil took him up to the holy city, and had him stand
on the pinnacle of the temple. And he said to him, If you are
the Son of God, throw yourself down, For it is written, He will
command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they
will bury you up, so that you will not strike your foot
against a stone. And Jesus said to him, On the
other hand, it is written, You shall not put the Lord your God
to test again. The devil took him to a very
high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world, and
all their glory. And he said to them, All these
things I will give you, if you fall down and worship me.
Then Jesus said to him, Go Satan, for it is written, You
shall not worship, or you shall worship the Lord your God and
serve him only. Then the devil left him, and
behold, angels came and began to minister to him.
The devil knows Scripture. He quotes Scripture.
What he hates is when you are surrendered to scripture.
What he hates is when you actually know it yourself.
What was the second temptation? It was.
This is what the Bible says. But Jesus responds with no, that
it says it doesn't mean that that's not the context there.
But why can Jesus respond with that?
Because he knows the context. He understands the scripture
enough to then refute what's being said.
Like I said, the enemy isn't just fighting with full lies.
Most of the time it's pretty easy.
If someone comes to you and, and just completely said, Oh, well,
the Bible says like, it doesn't actually say that anywhere.
No, it's when that half truth comes in where it's like, well,
the Bible says you're like, well, yeah.
And then I don't know if that's what it means or not.
That's when I find myself in a dangerous position.
Why? Because if I don't know truth,
how can I stand for truth? And twisted truth still poisons.
It's still poisons. Many believers never fall
through open rebellion. They drift through subtle
agreement with distorted truth. Many believers don't just wake
up 1 morning and give up the faith.
No, they've accepted subtle, distorted echoes of Eden that
slowly eat at them and eat at the words sewn inside of them.
But the If the enemy can't twist what he said, then he starts to
challenge what you've heard. If he can't twist what he said,
then he'll start to challenge what you've heard.
He'll shift from questioning God to weaponizing your human
reasoning, right? Well, it would be wiser for me
to do this. Or, or, or I'm just protecting
my peace. I'm just, I'm just protecting my
peace. Sure, God will understand, man,
that that's too extreme. They want too much.
I'll, I'll, I'll catch up later. I'll listen to it later.
How often do we listen to those little shifts?
We got our daily Bible reading. We're tired at the end of the
day and we're like, I'll just catch up later.
And then we never catch up. We miss a sermon.
Oh, I'll listen later. Then we never listen.
Or we listen while we're doing something else with half an ear,
expecting a full truth. I want to give him part effort,
but expect full revelation. No, see, he'll start to get in
your mind to reason what was said.
Proverbs 1412 says there is a way which seems right to man,
but in its end is the way of death.
See, we can have thoughts that seem wise.
We can have thoughts that are perceived as wise, but in the
end they are still the way of death.
There's still the way of death, and what seems wise can still be
wrong. And here's the thing, I want to
be very clear, just very clear for everyone.
I'm not saying that you shouldn't question what's being
preached from this platform. And if you come to Anchor Faith
Church, you know, we say this all the time.
You should not believe anything I say just because I say it.
You as a listener are obligated to study the scripture for
yourself and let it bear witness with you as truth.
Reasoning in itself is not the problem.
It's not a problem for you to sit there and hear me say
something. Hmm.
The problem is, do I let my reasons keep me from scripture
or bring me to scripture? Do I reason myself out of
studying deeper? Oh well, that's just baloney.
I don't even need to look deeper to know that, no?
Or am I confirming thoughts? There's nothing wrong with you
having thoughts. There's nothing wrong with you
having wisdom. God's not afraid of wisdom, But
what he doesn't like is when you try to take your wisdom and
place it above the Word. When you try to take your reason
and act like this means more than scripture.
When I place my reasons above the scriptures.
So what I'm saying today isn't that reasoning in and of itself
is inherently bad. But what I'm saying is when we
let our reasoning push us away from scripture, pull us out of
the building of church, pull us away from places God's called
us, we should be asking the question, was that my mental
reasoning or was that actually God?
Because God will always pull you closer to Himself and truth
always pulls you higher. Growth will always demand more
responsibility. You ain't finding growth by
leaving things behind to do less.
We at Anchor Faith Church have heard the message on capacity.
I don't increase capacity by letting go of things.
I increase the capacity of how much more I can hold.
I love going to the gym. I love squatting.
We put on. I love benching is really my
favorite and I got a goal this year to get 405.
So we've been benching. I'm putting on plates.
I'm building strength. I have to have a higher
capacity. I don't tell people I bench 3
plates because I can bench 145 LB plate three times.
We don't say, oh, I've gotten more capacity, I'm stronger now
I can bench 3/15, 1:35 at a time.
No, it comes by putting more plates on, more weight on more
than I had before. More pressure, more intensity,
more soreness, more need for someone else to be with me, to
spot me through what's happening.
I'm not tackling more alone. I've never gotten under the
Bishop like I've never done this weight before.
Today's the day I'm either lifting this weight or seeing
the Lord. No, I get more people around me
to make sure that I'm prepared for this weight I'm trying to
hold. I surround myself.
The flesh always wants explanations, but faith just
requires obedience. Your God will speak.
Your flesh will always want the game plan.
And there's nothing wrong with asking God.
OK, what does this look like? But he's not obligated to supply
that. Sometimes he might, sometimes he
might tell you this is what it looks like.
Other times he might just say, I've given you enough.
Go ahead and go. I've given you enough word.
Go ahead and move, right? We saw this with Noah, who built
an ark when rain didn't exist. I guarantee he was like, what am
I doing? And God's just like just build,
just trust me, Just trust me. Doesn't matter.
Abraham left when he had no details, no details on what to
go, just go. Peter stepped out on the water
without it forming into solid ground before him.
He didn't wait to see, oh, this can hold.
He didn't go. Oh my, now he stepped.
Sometimes the word alone is all we need.
Why? Because Isaiah 55, eight through
9 says, For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are my ways
your ways, or your ways my ways, declares the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways
higher than your ways, and my thoughts higher than your
thoughts. Your human logic will always
ask, Does this make sense? But faith never needs a full
explanation, it just needs your full obedience.
If the enemy can't get you off by twisting what was said, he
starts to make you reason. God's asking.
No, surely God did not ask you to do that.
Quit your job that. Come on, you're already so busy,
why are you going to start serving somewhere else?
You heard wrong. Now we start to get in the way
of what God wants for us. But I've personally just found
in my life, I've never stepped out into what God's called me to
do and been left wanting. I never stepped out into what
God's called me to do and been lacking.
I've never stepped out into what God's called me to do and looked
back and be like man, I wish I would have done that different.
When I've stepped into what God's called me to do, all I've
seen is blessing, abundance and fullness.
But it takes the moments of not knowing where that blessing,
abundance and fullness is coming from when it doesn't make sense.
And that's why most compromise begins with a conversation that
sounds reasonable. Most compromise begins with that
conversation that sounds reasonable.
Yeah, No, that makes sense. You bring that buddy in.
I mean look at the story of Job had the worst buddies in the
world and they all had a reasonable arguments they tried
to present. But what did God say?
What did he say? The end of the day I'm going to
fall back on what he said. Seek counsel, ask people you
know are godly, surround yourself.
But at the end of the day, they are not God to you.
You got to sit back on. What did he say?
I know what he said, right? And so we can't let compromise
and conversation then make us, you know, feel like something
sounds reasonable. We start to compromise.
We've all heard this illustration before, but it
bears witness here, right? When airplanes take off, if
they're just 1° off, they end up in a totally different
destination. But while they're flying for the
first, however, depend on how long they're going, the first,
however long they're up there, everything can seem right.
You you look down, you see the right landmarks, air's fine,
nothing's off. But over time, that course
adjustment leads us to a completely different destination
than where we were supposed to be.
That's how deception works. While you're walking in it, you
can seem fine, Life can seem good, you can feel blessed.
You can put on appearances of everything's great, but at the
end of the day, you'll wind up at a destination God never
called you to. And what I've come to find in my
own personal experiences, God is so good at putting someone in
front of you. Most times that will give you
something that you'll realize later.
That man, that was where my course could have been corrected
and I could have finished where I was supposed to, but I stayed
the wrong course. And drift goes further away and
drift happens in ways you don't see it, right?
We all have kids. We've been to the beach.
I know when I was a kid, we would go to the beach and my dad
was one of those dads that would they like to lay out and they
would set up something and then they would give us that same
speech. You see me, you see these
towels. When you're in the water, you
stay where these towels are between this towel and that
tent. That's where you stay.
Then you get out in the water and you're playing and like 20
minutes later you jump up and you're like, I don't see a tent,
I don't see a towel, I don't see a human being.
And all the while you have no idea I'm a mile and a half away
from where I started. That drift occurs and you just
are going. No, we have to make sure we're
keeping ourselves on track. We have to make sure that we're
glancing. It did.
What did his words say? Why is this looking different?
Why do I feel like I used to love doing this?
Now all of a sudden I get I'm begrudging every time I show up.
How's my heart? Has my heart shifted?
Has my heart drifted right? Those are checks coming.
I mean, I used to love doing this thing.
All of a sudden now I feel like it's over here.
I feel like I've. I feel like something's off.
What's off? Because word doesn't change.
Word doesn't move. That tent planted in where my
dad was laying out never changed.
But I slowly drifted away. No see over distance.
It happens. 1 compromise, 1 reinterpretation, 1
rationalization at a time. They all start to add up.
So I'm saying when we when we allow place in our life for
little deception to be OK, it allows for the next one and the
next one and the next one. And then we start wedging
further and further away from the lion.
And course, God wanted us. Right.
The tactic of the enemy is not to destroy you instantly.
It's to slowly redirect you and long before compromise becomes
visible. It begins as an echo of Eden in
the mind. It starts with that subtle
twisting, that subtle deception, that subtle echo that we have to
cake captive and throw down. Colossians 28 says see it, see
to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and
empty deception according to the tradition of man, according to
the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to
truth. Like we said, some thoughts are
not meant to be entertained. Some thoughts are meant to be
taken captive. Not everything.
I, I, I allow myself to. Not every preacher on YouTube do
I listen to, not every book about God that's written do I
read. Not every book about the Bible,
Not every historical text is something you need to partake
in. Like we've said before, the
illusion of will, now I know more is now.
Also, just things I have to cast down is now questions I should
have never had to ask had I just not gone there, right?
Parents, we know this. Parents, we know this.
We set up instructions for our kids.
We set up boundaries for our kids.
And they're like, come on, these boundaries are the worst.
Just slur and shackled. He's got me in a straight
jacket. And you're like, those
boundaries are freedom because outside those boundaries that
you perceive, knowledge that you perceive freedom is just death.
What you're longing for that you think is so glorious is just
death. It's just more questions you're
going to have to deal with. It's just more problems you're
going to have to put down. It's just more mistakes you'll
have to answer to later. You're like, trust me, God's
doing the same thing is like, look, trust me, that fruit does
not bring the knowledge you need.
And if you continue to seek me, you will find me and I will
provide all the knowledge you need for your purpose.
I will reveal myself in every aspect of life in times and in
places that you can understand and receive it and hold on to it
and actually grow from it because there is no growth
spiritually outside of God. There is no true spiritual
growth. I will find exploring the
mountains of Tibet. You can have an emotional tie,
but the word is what brings us knowledge.
The word is where we're going to find truth.
The word is where we're going to grow in.
The word is what we're going to do.
And that's why as as believers, we have to understand we were
never meant to put our mind above the word.
We were meant to renew our mind to the word.
There is no thought you've had that you can't find in Scripture
that you're going to be like, God gave this to me.
God is not revealing special knowledge to you outside of the
Bible, and if you can't anchor it in Word, then it ain't from
Him. And if you got questions about
the Bible and someone starts bringing Scripture and you're
one of those people who don't bring the Bible into this, I got
nothing for you. I look, I'm a Christian creative
director and there's nothing more annoying to me than when I
post an Instagram post and someone wants to question my
theology. Question it all you want, but
then they're like, oh, well, don't well, don't bring
scripture. We're talking about this.
I'm like, I'm not talking about anything else.
The minute you say, oh, we don't need scripture, we don't have
conversation anymore. I'm not going to beat my head
against the wall trying to philosophize with you.
I'm like, no, what does the word say?
Give me word chapter verse. I want chapter verse and then
I'll grow. I want chapter verse.
Then we can believe we can have conversation.
Bring chapter verse. Don't bring feelings, don't
bring thoughts, don't bring Magellan.
I don't care who else this comes from.
That's right. What's the Bible say?
What's the word say? What he said, what you heard,
what God meant. Revelation.
Silence is reasoning. If you notice, Jesus never
debated Satan. He answered him.
Oh, that's good. He never debated Satan, he
answered him. Some of us are spending too much
time debating people. I'm not debating with my
enemies. This is what the word says.
This is what the word says, he said.
It is written. It is written every time.
He just answered with what does the word say?
See where? Where Adam listened to the
whisper, Jesus stood on the word.
Where Adam was listening to the words being said, rather than
just answering with what the word said, rather than giving,
this was the word. He listened.
He entertained. While one listened to the
serpent's questions, the other answered with divine authority.
And This is why the wilderness was the reversal of Eden.
He's the second Adam. You're going through the same
thing at the tree. Temptation, hesitation.
Listening in the wilderness. Temptation.
What? Why?
Listen? Oh, man.
Jesus was sent to the wilderness to be tempted.
Why? Because God said, yeah, you
might have beat Adam. You're not beating this one.
So Jesus, go, let him question. This is where your faith walk
should be. I'm not scared of temptation
because I know Word. I'm not scared that a challenge
might come because I have victory.
I'm not scared when something arises that I didn't see coming
because I can stand on the Word and believe.
Temptation only messes with you when you're not rooted enough to
respond correctly. And drift comes through the
through the the the letting something sink in and meditating
on what isn't of God. And here's the thing, why do we
meditate on things sometimes? Because you don't know the
scripture enough to answer it quicker.
So then it gnaws at you because you don't have the confident
answer. No, I get into the word.
I study it to show myself approved so that when situations
arise, I'm ready. This is why it says to take on
the helmet of salvation, the sword of the Spirit, which is
the Word of God. You're going into battle
swordless, you're running around throwing punches in a sword
fight. You ain't got word, you ain't
got weapon. And guys like, look, you are to
be equipped with this because Psalms 119105 lets us know your
word is a lamp to my feet and a light unto my path.
Meaning, when I know His Word and I study His scripture, it
will light the way in front of me, it will show me where to
step, and it will keep me from drifting onto a course that's
not lit by His Word. Because not all that shines is
light. I need the lamp of the Word in
front of my feet to catch the drift.
I'm not just walking down any lit path, I'm walking down the
path the Word lights in front of me and the word in your mouth
will silence the echo in your mind.
When you speak the word, it silences those thoughts.
Joshua 18 says The book of the law shall not depart from your
mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you
may be careful to do according to all that is written in it,
and for then you will make your way prosperous, and then you
will have success. Look at this, You are to
meditate on it. Day and night should not depart
from your mouth. Victory is not tied to the
reading of the word. It was tied to the meditating on
of the word. It was tied to keeping it on
your mouth. It's tied to completely
confessing it. It was tied to not just reading
something, but sinking it into your heart and then keeping it
on your lips. Right, because meditate means to
murmur, to refrain, to rehearse, to speak repeatedly, to keep it
on your lips, to have the word come forth.
You should challenge yourself to respond with word first.
When a situation comes, do I instantly go to OK, well, I can
move, you know, I need money. I can move money from this
account to this account, to this account.
Or do I seek God and say, OK, you're my provider, I've got a
need. Now where's this going to come
from? What am I going to do here?
And then you follow whatever natural step he gives you.
I'm not telling you to wake up in the morning and pray over
your closet to decide what clothes you're going to wear.
But maybe you should wake up in the morning, have a confession
on your mirror that you say before you walk out the house.
Put a little bit more word in your life.
Put a little bit more word on your lips, get into the habit.
Like I said during worship, some of us came, we go to a moment of
just sing a praise from your heart.
And some of you were like, I don't have a praise for my
heart. Do I not have word in my heart
because I should have word in my heart that's ready to come out.
Didn't have to be a beautiful melody, didn't have to be on key
with what was going on. It just need to be from your
heart. But you can't pull something
that's not there. No.
Am I meditating on it day and night?
Am I keeping it before me? Because when you know the word,
you cannot be reasoned out of obedience.
When you know the word, you won't be reasoned out of
obedience. You'll be able to sit back like,
no, this is what it says. This is what I heard.
This is what he meant, this is what he said, this is what I
heard, this is what God meant. And when I lock in those three
things, I'm setting myself up to not fall prey to minor
deception. I'm not setting myself to fall
prey to minor deviation in my life because information without
obedience can create the illusion of maturity.
But until it's applied and walked on correctly and obeyed,
that's where true maturity comes from.
This is why the Pharisees were the way they were.
They knew word, they knew laws, they knew scripture, but they
didn't keep it on their lips. They didn't actually live it out
and obey it. So they had an illusion of
maturity, but they had no follow through with it.
I want more than illusion of maturity.
I want to know what it means. I want true revelation on it.
Because you can quote scripture, you can quote verses, but then
ultimately not actually follow the convictions.
And it's not enough to just know something.
It's do I live it? Do I walk it?
Is it something that rests in my heart throughout my day?
John 539 says you search the scriptures because you think
that in them you have internal life.
It is these that testify about me, and you are unwilling to
come to me so that you may have life, right?
You search the Scriptures because you think that in them
you'll have eternal life. But what?
We have to go to Him. We have to go to Him.
It's not just about having had knowledge of Scripture.
This is where the deception of Adam and Eve set in.
They thought by having knowledge they would also have growth.
But knowledge without obedience does not equal growth, and
knowledge outside of obedience cannot produce growth.
This is why the Bible says there's many more things I'd
like to say to you, but you're not yet ready to bear them.
Meaning me trying to collect knowledge can also cause me to
be in positions that I can't bear.
It can cause me to be in places that maybe you can't handle
what's being said because you don't have enough scripture in
in you to know exactly what's being said.
Therefore, when you hear stuff, you're like, I'm not and we get
confused and God's like, well, I never intended you to hear those
words. I never intended you to go down
this path of study. I never intended you to be in
this conversation. I told you to be here so that
you could grow and develop and then one day handle what's to
come. But if we try to seek knowledge
outside of obedience, we fall for deception.
The answer to the echoes of Eden is in the Word of God.
Rightly held. Rightly held.
How do we overcome those nagging thoughts?
How do we overcome those little whispers?
How do we overcome slight deviations?
We study the word so that we can have it rightly approved.
I'm telling you guys, in these day and age, it's not enough to
listen to this stuff once. It's not enough to just sit in
this service on Sunday and Wednesday night.
You're spending every we what? Anchor faith church.
We maybe do 3-4 hours on a Sunday.
Maybe we get 3 hours on a Wednesday night.
You're getting 7-8 hours a week in the word here.
And you're spending the rest of those hours being attacked,
having to deal with thoughts, having to deal with what's going
on. No, it's not enough to just
think that I can sit here once and I'm going to get everything
I need. No.
Do I go back over? Do I study?
Do I re listen when I'm going through something?
Do I get back in Just so everyone's clear that I love
this on our YouTube, if you go to anchor face YouTube, you can
go. We have playlists based upon
subjects. If you're dealing with
something, whether it's like, I mean, I want to strengthen my
faith or baby man, I need to know more about finances or man,
maybe I'm dealing with depression or man, I'm dealing
with anxiety. They're all sorted so that you
can sit into them and start going through every message that
we have on there that's listed in those topics.
Why? So that you can grow yourself,
so you can surround yourself with word, so that you can stand
firm when battle come, So that you can stand firm to
temptation, so that you don't fall prey to something.
So like I said, some of us are not under attack from obvious
sin. We're under attack from just
reasonable compromise. We're under attack because we've
started to allow some compromise to sound OK.
We've allowed a drift to feel like it's not a big deal.
I'm floating in the ocean and I've lost my line and I'm like,
oh, I'll course correct in a little bit.
But the drift don't stop. It doesn't stop.
No, it only stops when we get our word and our heart and our
spirit in alignment to what the God says.
And then we start moving back and putting ourselves in
position. This is why it's not enough to
just hear the word. We hold it, we murmur on it, we
speak it, we confess it, we study it, we let it take root.
We don't just quote it. We live it.
We know it for ourselves. We know it for ourselves Because
I'm telling you, if the enemy can twist your reasoning, he'll
twist your direction. If he can start to just make,
It's always the things that sound good.
It's always the things that sound right.
I've seen it time and time again.
Oh well, I'll get more money. I'll just be at church less, but
I'll be able to sow more. Oh man, I'll step out and I'll
do this and more people will get born again.
And maybe people do, but the enemy don't care what you do for
God outside of what God's called you to do.
And sometimes we do more harm trying to do things for God
outside of what God actually called us to do.
And we reason, well, look how many people got born again at a
place you were never supposed to be.
Are we doing good or are we just seeing something that seems
good? No, God's mercy shows up in
places that we act like. God moves in spite of you, not
because of you. And we start to confuse
blessing. Or we start to confuse abundance
for blessing. We think because we have more of
something now. God's blessing my disobedience.
But how dare we profess Christ's name and not walk in his nature?
We do more harm confessing His name, but not living according
to His Word. No, I don't just want God on my
on by appearance. I want to be saturated with His
Word. I want to be standing exactly
where He called me to be, and I can only do that by anchoring
myself in Scripture, by knowing man.
This is what He said, this is what I heard, this is what God
meant. And I'm not letting anyone
change any of those things. I'm not letting any reason twist
me off of this. I don't care if I see the
solution. I don't care if it makes sense
in my human mind. I don't care if someone can make
an argument against what I'm saying that sounds good.
Do I know what God said? Some of us just need to get off
the course we're on now and go back to the last word we knew
God said because some of us are standing outside of the path
because we've reasoned, but we knew we had a word and we just
need to get back to the last one we heard and start resetting our
trajectory. I got to kill the drift, which
means I'm going back to the last place I know I heard God to.
The last word I know came from God.
If you got any confusion today, you got to go back to the last
place you know you heard God and hold to that word.
Hold to it.