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Praise the Lord Church, today's Church Service is all about staying focused on Jesus.

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Our first scripture is James chapter 1 verses 2 through 4 in the ERV version.

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It says, My brothers and sisters, you will have many kinds of trouble.

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But this gives you a reason to be very happy.

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You know that when your faith is tested, you will learn to be patient in suffering.

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If you let that patience work in you, the end result will be good.

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You will be mature and complete.

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You will be all that God wants you to be.

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Distractions are inevitable, but we can choose to stay focused on Jesus.

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When we let distractions interfere with our relationship with God, we are stagnating our

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faith.

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We stop prioritizing Jesus and find other stuff to fill our time.

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Also, distractions can come in ways we don't expect.

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Sometimes we can be so busy, even doing good stuff or doing the Lord's work even, that

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we forget to spend time with God.

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When we are weak, we will give in to distraction, but when we are strong, we will do what is

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right.

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Our second scripture is 1 Peter 5 verse 8 in the NLT version.

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It says, Stay alert, watch out for your great enemy, the devil.

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He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour.

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Wow.

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Now, when we first read the scripture, it might sound a little bit scary, but wait, remember

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that God is all powerful.

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And when we choose to activate our faith, we can stand firm in Jesus and we don't yield

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to the distractions.

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But remember this, the enemy can use other people as a less suspecting hindrance.

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If our inner circle of friends isn't leading us to Christ, then they aren't from Christ.

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And our thoughts will reveal who or what we prioritize and give our full attention to.

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If we are staying focused on God, we will become more like Him.

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But if we are fixing our focus on people, we will want to become more like them.

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And that's one way we can slowly start to drift away from Jesus is when we start looking

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to others as our example, rather than looking to Jesus as our example.

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Our last scripture today is Hebrews chapter 4 verse 12 in the ESV version.

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It says, For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword,

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piercing to the division of the soul and of the spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning

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the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

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God knows our deepest intentions.

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Yes, He knows us better than we know ourselves.

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And sometimes our deepest thoughts can be, we are more eager to do other things than

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to spend time with Jesus.

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For example, a hobby.

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On the outside, it looks fine, but when our first thought when we get up in the morning

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is to spend time playing an instrument or doing a sport or spending time with our friends,

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then we quickly have an idol.

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And idols can come out of nowhere.

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They are our biggest distractions when something takes the place of God in our lives.

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When this happens though, we should fast from distractions to seek God in prayer and through

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His word.

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And what is a fast?

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You may ask, well, firstly, a fast is when we give up something to focus on something

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else.

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In this case, we will give up our distraction in order to focus on Jesus.

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You don't always have to fast from food, but we can fast from social media, we can fast

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from something that distracts us, we can fast from gains.

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And when we do this, we will recenter our minds and our lives back on Jesus.

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Also, when we spend time with God, He will show us the things that have been distracting

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us.

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Remember how I just talked about fasting?

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Well, when you fast, you'll spend more time with Jesus in prayer, spend more time reading

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His word and getting Christian influences.

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And when we spend more time with Him in prayer for Him to talk to us, He will show us the

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things that we need to give to Him and the things that have been distracting us.

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He knows us better than we know ourselves and He has infinite wisdom, not us, because

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we only have human brains, but He knows everything about everything.

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Our points today are one.

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Staying focused on Jesus comes down to a choice.

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We can choose whether we'll yield to the temptation and the distraction or we will

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stand strong in our faith, keeping our focus on Jesus.

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Should not be let astray.

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Two.

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Be watchful because the devil will try to distract us in unsuspecting ways.

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Even though it might seem innocent or like it's not bad at all, the devil will use that

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once he sees that he can get a foothold in our lives.

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And three, fasting from distractions is a great way to recenter ourselves back to Jesus.

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So if you have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, then this message will help

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you.

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But if you don't have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, then I invite you to give

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your heart to the Lord today.

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To receive Him into your heart, go to Romans 10, 9 through 10.

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It says that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that

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God has erased him from the dead, you will be saved.

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For with the heart one believes unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto

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salvation.

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If you set this prayer with sincerity, you are saved and now have eternal life with Jesus.

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You are saved from all your sins, past, present, and future sins you may commit.

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This truth is not of repastice in any time.

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Instead, Jesus gives you power over all wrong choices and empowers you to spread the gospel

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to others.

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You are saved forever and your name is written in the book of life.