Hello, and
welcome to Heart Lift.
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I'm Jill Morikone,
and I'm so glad that
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you've joined us today.
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We're on a journey
toward hope, toward healing,
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toward the transformation that
the Lord Jesus wants to work
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in your heart and in mine
as women, as daughters of God.
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If you're just joining us, last
program we discussed purity;
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purity from a
woman's perspective,
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from a woman's point of view.
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I shared some of my own personal
battle dealing with purity:
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my addiction to romance
novels I had as a teenager,
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and then in my early twenties
my addiction to soap operas,
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and how I would spin those
romantic fantasies in my mind,
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and how God
wanted to break me free,
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how He worked to break me free.
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This program and the next
one we're going to discuss keys,
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steps that we can take, that
we can walk with to experience
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freedom; freedom
from the addiction of sin,
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freedom from that lust.
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So whether you're
currently physically acting out,
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or if your battle is
only emotional in your heart,
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either way, God
wants to bring deliverance.
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Our Scripture is 2 Corinthians
10, 2 Corinthians 10:5.
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Casting down arguments, and
every high thing that exalts
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itself against the knowledge of
God, and bringing into captivity
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every thought to
the obedience of Christ.
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Let's pray. Father we
come before You right now
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in the name of Jesus.
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We ask for Your deliverance.
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We come as Your
daughters, seeking forgiveness,
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seeking cleansing,
seeking that the blood of
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Jesus would cover us.
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We thank You for that.
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We ask right now that You would
speak from Your Word and that
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we would be able to hear; that
You would give us ears to hear.
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And we thank
You in the precious,
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and the holy
name of Jesus, Amen.
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It was noon, about noon.
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She probably didn't have a
clock, but she could tell by the
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sun that it
stood right overhead.
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Now was a perfect time to go to
the well, because there wouldn't
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be a lot of women there.
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She wouldn't have to
battle questions, or concerns,
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or ugly sneers, or remarks,
or even the rolling of eyes
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that we can be kind
of good at as women.
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She grabbed her water
pot and stepped out the door.
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As she approached the well,
all of a sudden she realized
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there was a man sitting there.
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She had thought she was going
to the well because no one else
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was going to be there.
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She went, and
there was a man there.
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Look at his robe;
definitely Jewish.
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Some sort of Rabbi or something.
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She approached the well and
thought, I just need to get this
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over with, so let me
fill up my water pot,
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and get back to my house.
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As she let down her water
pot the man spoke, and he said,
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Would you give
me a drink of water?
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She was amazed! In their
culture, in their time...
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We're talking about Bible times.
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...they did not,
men and women didn't
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interact like we do today.
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He would not have spoken to her,
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and especially
she was not Jewish.
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She was a Samaritan.
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So there was a double negative,
a double reason for this Rabbi
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not to speak to her.
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But amazingly He did.
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He asked her for
a drink of water.
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She dared to lift up her
eyes when she went to hand Him
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the drink of water.
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And she was amazed because
He didn't look at her with lust
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like all the other
men in her life did.
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There was such purity,
such peace, such power,
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such kind eyes He had.
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The cup trembled...
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This is my imagination.
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The cup trembled in
her hand as she held it out
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to Him, this Rabbi.
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His name, of course, you
know the story, is Jesus.
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They discussed different
things, a few different topics,
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and then the conversation
took an interesting turn.
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Jesus said, Go
call your husband.
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And she said, not wanting
him to know about her past,
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about her impurity,
about her sin, she said,
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I don't have a husband.
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And Jesus said, I know that.
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You're telling the truth.
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You don't have a husband.
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You've had five, and
the man you're with now
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is not your husband.
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She looked up into His eyes
again thinking now that He knew
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the truth about her; he knew
all about her shame, and guilt,
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and condemnation, and
the sin she was covered with,
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that now He would
say, Uh-uh, I don't want
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anything to do with you.
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But amazingly, His
look did not change.
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He still loved her.
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He still saw her
as who she could be
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forgiven and cleansed by grace.
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Knowledge of her
sin made no difference.
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I don't know where you are
today in your journey toward
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purity of heart and life.
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In my own life, my own
battle with my romantic thoughts
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and fantasies, I know
exactly what it's like to say,
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Lord Jesus take my heart.
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I want to walk in purity.
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And the next instant be
bombarded with an impure
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thought from my past.
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For some people, I believe Jesus
gives immediately deliverance.
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Instantly they are set free.
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For other people it's a journey.
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It takes time. And for me,
that's how it worked for me.
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I want to share with you
several steps, several keys.
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We're going to look
at three of them today.
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And the next program
we'll discuss the rest of them.
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But today we're going to look
at three steps, three keys that
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you can use in your own journey
toward purity of heart and life.
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1. Seek forgiveness.
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1 John 1:9. I love this verse.
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If we confess our sins Jesus
is faithful and just to forgive
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us our sins, and to cleanse
us from all unrighteousness.
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You don't have to
waste time doing penance.
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You don't have to
grovel in the dirt and think,
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I'm just covered
in mud and slime.
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You come to Jesus, say I'm
sorry for the junk in my past.
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I'm sorry for the
times I was not pure.
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And do you know
what He's going to say?
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Instantly He will forgive you,
and cleanse you, and you can be
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the purified, dazzling, princess
of the King. Only ask Him.
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First we seek forgiveness.
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Second we surrender our thought
life, or our love life to God.
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What if you're
single and you say,
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I really want to be married.
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God says, Surrender that
desire to Me, and I can pick
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your spouse for you.
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I remember when I was a
teenager, I wanted to give
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my life to God, and I
really desired to follow Him.
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And I remember I
would kneel down by my bed,
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and I would pray, and I would
say, Lord I want to follow You.
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And I'm giving You
everything but one thing.
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There's one thing in
my life that I do not
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want to give to You.
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And do you know
what that one thing was?
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That was my love life.
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I thought, I'm not going
to give God my love life.
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You know, what if I let God
hand pick my husband for me,
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He might pick somebody ugly.
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That seems funny
now, and especially,
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my husband is very handsome.
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But at the time I thought,
He might pick somebody ugly.
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He might pick somebody
that I couldn't get along with,
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somebody that I did not like.
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God says, Surrender that to Me.
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You know the amazing thing
is that in James 1:17 the Bible
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says, Every good gift, every
perfect gift is from above,
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and comes down from the Father
of lights, with whom is no
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variableness,
neither shadow of turning.
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And that's the amazing thing.
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Because I was afraid
to trust God, and He said,
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Jill, I'll bring
you the best gift!
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And that's what He did in
my life with my husband Greg.
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Trust God with
your future spouse.
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But what if you're dealing
with these romantic fantasies?
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What if you were in...
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Maybe you were
sleeping with your neighbor,
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and God convicted you that
was not a good thing to do.
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And so you broke
off that relationship.
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You asked forgiveness from God.
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Instantly you're cleansed.
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But in your heart, in
your mind, you still might
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have those feelings.
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They still might be cropping up.
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In my own experience we
got rid of those romance novels
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that were such a
temptation to me.
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I got rid of that TV that
pulled me with the soap operas.
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But still I had those
thoughts, those romantic
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fantasies in my mind.
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And every time they
would crop up God would say,
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surrender that;
surrender that back to Me.
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We surrender, and I'm
being honest with you,
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ten seconds later
it would come back.
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And I'd say, God I
give it to You again.
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Twenty seconds
later it would come back.
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God I give it to You again.
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But I'm here to tell you
that the battle gets easier.
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Day by day, as you surrender,
pretty soon you might go
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an hour, or a day, or a
week without those old feelings.
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That's an incredible deliverance
that God wants to bring.
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2 Corinthians 10:5. Casting
down imaginations and every
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high thing that exalts itself
against the knowledge of God,
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and bringing into
captivity every thought
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to the obedience of Christ.
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That verse used to terrify me.
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Every thought? Did God truly
mean every thought had to be
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brought into subjection to Him?
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Do you know the beautiful
thing about what God does?
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He never asks us to do
something and says, Well,
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go ahead and do it.
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God knows our hearts.
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God knows of
ourselves we can do nothing.
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The Bible says, Can the
Ethiopian change his skin,
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or the leopard his spots?
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Of course not! We can't do good.
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We can't of our own.
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All we do is say,
God take my heart.
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I can't even give it to You.
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Take my heart. Work
in me Your good pleasure.
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When we surrender, when
we give God our thoughts
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and those feelings, I think
it's important to replace those
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thoughts with something else.
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We might replace it
with a Scripture verse.
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One of my favorites is
Philippians 4, Philippians 4:8.
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The Bible says,
Finally, whatever is true,
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whatever is noble, whatever
is just, whatever is pure,
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whatever is lovely,
whatever is of good report,
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think on these things.
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I love that verse!
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Whatever is pure, just,
honest, noble, think on that,
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think about
that, meditate on that.
00:12:19.33\00:12:22.14
Do you know it's physically
impossible to think about two
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different things
at the same time?
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Now you might say, Jill
I'm the queen of multitasking.
00:12:26.61\00:12:30.95
I can multitask
quite well, and I don't,
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I can really do that.
00:12:33.85\00:12:35.18
But I would
encourage you to try that.
00:12:35.22\00:12:37.95
If I'm thinking a
lustful thought about somebody,
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or someone, or I'm thinking
some sort of romantic fantasy,
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it's pretty hard to
focus on something else.
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But if instead, I focus
my mind on the Word of God,
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if I'm reading this
verse, if I'm focused on it,
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guess what happens?
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I can't be
thinking the other thought.
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Now, I could think
about this and my mind jump
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instantly over here.
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And that happens. And
if that happens, of course,
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you can jump back to that.
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Sometimes you might experience
that in your prayer life.
00:13:08.82\00:13:11.75
I know I do. I'll be
having my morning prayer,
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and my time with God in the
morning, and all of a sudden
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I think, You didn't buy
that at the grocery store.
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Now how does that even intrude
into your prayer time with God?
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Well, of course,
other thoughts come in.
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But I can say, Well,
I'll think about that later.
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Let me go back
to focusing on God.
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If we truly
think about something,
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we can't focus
on something else.
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Another Scripture I like is
Philippians 2, Philippians 2:13.
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It says, God works in
us both to will and to do
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of His good pleasure.
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Now if you study the Greek...
the New Testament was written
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The New Testament
was written in Greek.
00:13:51.83\00:13:54.73
...it says, God
works in us both to will...
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In Greek that means wish.
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What's God saying?
00:14:00.77\00:14:02.24
He's going to
give us the desire.
00:14:02.27\00:14:04.67
God will give you
the desire for purity.
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We can't even conjure up in
ourselves the desire for purity.
00:14:07.14\00:14:11.68
God's going to give it to you.
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But if you look
at the next verb,
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God will give us the desire.
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He'll work in us to
will; that's desire,
00:14:17.49\00:14:20.22
and to do of His good pleasure.
00:14:20.26\00:14:24.19
Do in the Greek is
power, or the word would be aid.
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So I think God gives us both
the desire to break free from
00:14:29.80\00:14:33.94
those bands of impurity,
and in addition He says,
00:14:33.97\00:14:39.61
I can give you
the power to do it.
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First focus your
mind on a Scripture.
00:14:42.28\00:14:44.58
When you work, once
you surrender to God,
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then replace those
thoughts with something else.
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First focus your
mind on Scripture.
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Second, it could be a song.
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I remember a woman called
me once, and we were talking
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and praying on the phone.
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And she said, Jill
I'm really battling.
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I'm really struggling.
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I just can't break free
from this issue which binds me.
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And I encouraged
her, once she surrendered,
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to claim Scripture, to
sing, something like that.
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She called me back and she
said the song she chose is,
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I Surrender All, All
to Jesus I surrender.
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All to Him I freely give.
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I will ever love and trust Him.
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In His presence daily live.
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I surrender
all. I surrender all.
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All to thee my precious
Savior, I surrender all.
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And for her, she said
she would surrender to God,
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and then she
said, I did my duties.
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I went about the
house, and as I did that
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I sang this song, and
I focused on the words.
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That's simply a way
to replace those thoughts
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with something else.
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Our girls in jail, when we
go Monday night to minister to
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them, they especially like the
song, I Need Thee Every Hour.
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I need Thee, Oh, I need Thee.
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Every hour I need Thee.
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Oh bless me now my
Savior, I come to Thee.
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Whatever it is, once you
surrender, choose to replace
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that thought with a Scripture,
or you can replace that thought
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with a song, or you can replace
that thought with prayer.
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You can choose to
pray for the person.
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Pray for the person
that you're struggling with.
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You could choose to pray for
someone else who's in the midst
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of a battle right now.
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Whatever it is,
choose to pray for them.
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1. We seek forgiveness
from the Lord Jesus Christ.
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2. We surrender
those thoughts to Jesus.
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3. We behold Jesus.
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Jump with me to Matthew 12.
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Matthew 12, turn my
page here, Matthew 12:43-45.
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We don't want
to empty the heart,
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and then just sweep it
clean and do nothing else.
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We talked about
replacing it with something,
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and that is vitally important.
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43, Jesus is talking.
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This is actually part of
one of His dissertations here.
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And He says, When an unclean
spirit goes out of a man,
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he goes through dry places,
seeking rest, and he finds none.
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Now He's talking about an
unclean spirit, or a devil.
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Then it says, Then he
says, I'm going to come back.
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I'm going to return.
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And when he finds the
house it's empty, swept,
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and put in order.
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Then he comes and he takes
with him seven other spirits
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who are more
wicked than himself.
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And they enter that man's
dwelling, and they dwell there.
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And the last state of this man
is even worse than the first.
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What is Jesus saying?
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He's saying, We could surrender.
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We could say,
God sweep my heart.
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Clean it out. And then we
don't fill it with anything,
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and guess what happens.
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Satan comes in with a
million other temptations,
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with a million
other lustful thoughts,
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with a million other
issues, and brings them back in.
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So it's important as we
surrender to replace those
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thoughts with something else.
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It's also important to
look to Jesus, behold Him,
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see Him in His purity.
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Study Jesus' life.
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I want to encourage
you to open up your Bible.
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If you're not, if you
don't read the Bible a lot
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start with the Gospels.
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You're going to get a
picture of who God is,
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of His love for you.
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Check out
Matthew, Mark, Luke, John.
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One of my favorites
is the Gospel of John.
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I think it just gives us a
beautiful picture of who God is.
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Whatever it is, that's okay.
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Open up, study the Bible, study,
find out who Jesus really is.
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Spend time in His Word.
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Spend time with other
people who are seeking Him,
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other people who
want to follow Him,
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who want to get to know Him.
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Behold Him as you walk, as you
drive in the car, as you talk,
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and your life will be
transformed into His image.
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Turn with me to
Romans, Romans 12.
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We're going to
look at verse 1 and 2.
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Romans 12 is one of my favorite
Scriptures of all in the Bible.
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I think I have written
in the margin of my Bible,
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It just shows us how to live.
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It's practical
tips, practical steps;
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And Romans 12:1, 2
says, I beseech you therefore,
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brethren, by the mercies of
God, that you present your body
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a living sacrifice,
holy, acceptable to God,
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which is your
reasonable service.
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And we want to
especially look at verse 2.
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The Bible says, Don't
be conformed to this world:
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but be transformed by
the renewing of your mind,
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that you may prove what
is that good and acceptable,
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and perfect, will of God.
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Now if you look in
the Greek at those words,
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we're going to look
at the word transformed.
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What does the
word transformed mean?
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Literally, in the Greek
it means metamorphosed, or a
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metamorphous. So
what's God saying?
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He's going to actually
transform us kind of like
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the caterpillar
to the butterfly.
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He's going to transform us
by the renewing of our mind.
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In Greek the word for
renewing is renovating.
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Renovating! God's
going to transform us,
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and renovate our minds.
00:20:59.05\00:21:01.79
One morning, this was
probably a couple of years ago,
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Greg came up to me and he
said, Jilly, come outside!
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You've got to see this!
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And so I ran out on
the porch and I looked.
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And you know what I saw?
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There was a caterpillar
just forming a cocoon.
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Maybe you have seen
that, or experienced it.
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But that was my first
time to experience that.
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And we saw there was
his little chrysalis.
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And every day we would
go out and check his status.
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Now he was hanging...
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We have our front porch,
and we have the railing there.
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He was underneath the railing.
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He hung underneath the railing.
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And you could go and
peek down and there it is,
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a little green cocoon,
a little green chrysalis.
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Every day we watched.
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What's going to happen?
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Now remember, he started
as one of those old, ugly,
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creepy crawly caterpillars.
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Now he's in his chrysalis.
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And then one morning, and
it happened to be a Sabbath,
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and I think
that's a beautiful thing.
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Because transformation
occurs on the Sabbath as well.
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We walked out on the front
porch and Greg said, Jilly,
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you've got to see this.
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So I stepped out. We sat in
the front chairs on the porch,
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and we looked. And the butterfly
was beginning to break out.
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He was beginning to emerge.
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And we could see pop, pop, pop.
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He's starting to bring a
wing out, and then another one.
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And, you know, when they come
out they look super fragile;
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like they're really
having a tough time.
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But you can't break
it open, because they
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need that extra work.
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It came out. It was
a beautiful butterfly.
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I'm not good
with my butterflies.
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I couldn't tell
you what type it was.
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But it was beautiful.
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And we watched. It
sat on a little leaf.
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I think it was just
stretching its wings,
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and getting itself together.
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And then it lifted
off and it was gone.
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That's what God says He
wants to do with you and I.
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You might feel
like I'm a caterpillar.
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I'm crawling on
the dirt on my belly.
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I'm in a bunch of junk and
sin, a cauldron of impurity.
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And God says, I have a
beautiful plan for your life.
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You're going to be a princess.
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You might be
wallowing in the mud right now,
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but I want to transform
you into a dazzling woman,
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radiant with My
glory, and My purity.
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That's what Jesus can do.
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Just behold Him. Romans 12.
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Be transformed,
be metamorphosed,
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like the caterpillar, from the
caterpillar into the butterfly.
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Be changed. God wants
to do that in your heart.
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God wants to do that in
my heart. Praise His name!
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The three steps, the three
keys that we discussed today:
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1. Go to God and
seek forgiveness.
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2. Surrender those romantic
fantasies, those emotions,
00:24:05.57\00:24:11.55
those issues to God.
00:24:11.58\00:24:12.91
And you might surrender and
then have to re-surrender again.
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And 3. Behold Jesus.
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See Him in His purity.
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And you will be
transformed into His likeness.
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We're going to take a break,
and we'll be right back with our
00:24:26.16\00:24:29.30
application for this week.
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