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up there in the cockpit, the pilot happens to be also an acrobatic stunt pilot.

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He decides that even though this is a jetliner, he's going to go through some of his maneuvers.

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Now never mind the fact that this is a 747, not a stunt plane, he begins to put this plane

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through the acrobatic maneuvers that he's used to.

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He ignores the reality of the plane that he's in.

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What's going to happen?

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The plane is going to come apart because you see a 747 is not constructed the same way

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a stunt plane is.

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That's the reality.

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You begin turning a 747 upside down and doing loops, etc., etc.

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It's going to come apart at the seams.

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When we ignore reality, we invite destruction into our lives.

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I fear that our nation is doing that right now.

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In Washington, we have leaders who refuse to recognize and to deal with reality on lots

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of different levels.

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Talk about social security and the crisis that is involved, the real nature of Islam,

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illegal immigration, cultural and moral decay, the failure of the government education system,

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the ballooning cost of government.

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When we ignore the reality of these things and pretend that they're not really happening,

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the result will eventually be catastrophic to our nation because no nation can survive

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when its leaders and those who elect them as well prefer to live in fantasy land over

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reality.

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The same is true in every human association.

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It is true in a family.

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A marriage cannot be survived unless it is built on the truth upon reality.

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A business, a union, a club, a church, at the heart of survival is the ability to face the

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truth and to manage reality to a preferred outcome.

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If we simply ignore reality, then we will inherit destruction.

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Seeing what is real is vital for the survival of Los Gatos Christian Church.

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And so with absolute dependence upon the Lord, let me assure you, I undertake this brief

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series of messages that might be called a state of the church kind of a series.

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I referred last week and I refer us again this morning to the Lord Jesus Christ and

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the dictation of seven letters in Revelation chapters two and three.

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Letters written to seven literal local churches like ours in the first century.

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In each of those situations, Jesus saw reality.

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Often they did not.

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And so He says to them ten times over the seven letters, I know, I know, I know the

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truth and here's what it is.

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The sad fact is that none of those churches survived, not one of them, survived their

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culture and the changes that took place in history.

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They did not take seriously the words of Jesus.

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We can mistakenly assume that because our church is here today, it will always be here.

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There's a basic fact to life and that is life has a cycle to it.

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We are born as we've been well reminded this morning.

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We live and then we die.

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The Bible compares us in that regard to the grass, which in the morning is green and flourishing,

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but by the end of the hot day is wilting.

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Or we are like flowers that bloom and then fade.

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How many of you have had at least one pet in your life?

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Would you lift your hand?

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Well, that's most of us.

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Pets are wonderful companions.

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But there's a season to pets and they die too.

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You have a season to your life.

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You may be in the spring of your life or you may be in the heat of summer or like some

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of us you may be in the fall approaching the winter of your life.

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Cultures.

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Is somebody shivering out there from winter?

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She's there.

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Okay, I got it.

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She's there.

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Nations and cultures likewise have cycles to them and the very same thing is true of

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a church.

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No church, no church is guaranteed its future.

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Well, Scatis Christian Church has been in this community since 1884.

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Think of that.

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Most of us were not alive then.

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In 1884 there were 12 staunch churchmen, so the record says, who formed a congregation

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to counteract the evil of the wet days.

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They weren't talking about the rainy season.

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They were talking about drink.

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And so they founded a church in the middle, literally in the middle of seven saloons in

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Las Gatos.

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We've been in this community now for 122 years.

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But what assurance do we have that we will be here 20 years from now?

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Because we have been here 122 years doesn't guarantee that we will be here for 150 years.

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A church, I think, needs to be re-envisioned about every 20 years.

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Those who study the cycles of churches say that there are critical points in the cycle

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of a church when it can be re-envisioned with the greatest prospect of result.

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But there is a part of the cycle in which that re-envisioning needs to take place, and

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if you get beyond that, it becomes increasingly more difficult for it to happen at all.

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And if it doesn't happen, the church cycle will eventually take it out of existence.

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The future of Las Gatos Christian Church, I believe, is clouded by the presence of cultural

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toxins, I am calling them, in its people, in you and in me.

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Before I could preach this message this morning, I was up early repenting before God, yet again

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of the toxins in my own life.

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And what I call all of us to is a repentance of the cultural toxins that are clouding our

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future.

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This is not unique to our church.

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In fact, what I am preaching to our church could be preached in most of the churches

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in America today, because most of the churches in America are either stagnant or declining.

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The contemporary western church of Jesus Christ is polluted and defiled by a deadly

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mixture of toxic values and ideas that have been embraced.

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Local churches face the same threats to their existence in the first century.

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This is not unique to us in our time.

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For example, in Colossians 2 and 8, I remind you of this verse, C2, that no one takes you

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captive, writes the apostle, takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, ideas,

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views, which depend upon human tradition and the basic principles, the basic thinking,

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the natural ideation of this world, rather than on Christ.

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Whatever we may think of ourselves, we need to get a perspective of reality from Jesus.

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He sees the wonderful strengths of this congregation.

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He sees also our weaknesses and our opportunities.

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He knows better than we do our threats.

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I am especially focusing on the threats in this message.

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I believe that we have adapted to the diseased values and ideas of our culture, and because

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of that, the future of our church is in question.

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God will not be mocked.

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What we sow, we will also reap.

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He tells us, do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your

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minds.

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You see, the battle is in the mind, the way we think, the way we think.

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And he says that we will be transformed by the renewing of our minds.

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And on the other hand, we must be careful not to allow the world to squeeze us into its

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mold, as the Phillips translation puts it.

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What are the toxic cultural toxins, rather, that are present in us?

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Well, as I list them, I want to say, first of all, that I'm not saying that these toxins

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are equally present in all of us.

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That would not necessarily be true.

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I'm not saying either that these are the only toxins that we need to be aware of.

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But these are four that God has laid upon my heart for my sake and for your sake.

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The first toxin is the poison of thinking about church like a consumer.

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Thinking about church like a consumer, the phrase that really identifies this is, I

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want my needs met.

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Would you say that with me?

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I want my needs met.

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American capitalism has made us a nation enjoying the highest standard of living of any nation

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in the history of the world.

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We have so much in this land that we must make choices about things that many people

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in the world don't even have.

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We can go to a store and pick from hundreds of styles of shoes.

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We can go to the grocery store and buy all kinds of bread, or on the other hand, all

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kinds of candy bars.

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We have selection.

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We can go to the mall and see little booze representing a variety of cell phone companies.

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We can choose the one we want.

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Walk into Target or walk into Best Buy.

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And there against the wall is this blanket of television sets.

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You can choose whichever one you want in the size and its features.

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Computers.

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Think about the many choices of computers that you can make.

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I usually make the wrong one.

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And advertising redefines for me and for you as well, it redefines our wants and makes

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them needs.

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Do you know what I'm saying here?

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I would like to have that.

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Advertising says you really need it.

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I want that over there.

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Advertising says you deserve that.

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And so we have created this consumer culture.

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We bring that same mindset into the church.

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We are church consumers.

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We are going in churches for what pleases us.

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And as we shop, we consider the style of worship or of preaching or of outreach or what Bible

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version the church uses or how easy it is to park there or any number of variables.

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But the basic question is this.

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And we're looking at a church, what are you going to do to serve me?

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It's sort of like buying a car.

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What are the options that this church has to offer me and to my family?

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And so we shop around until we find the best deal.

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When the church had better meets at a convenient time or preferably times, it should have convenient

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options for my family.

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It should be available 24-7 to meet our needs.

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And what is the result of this consumer mentality?

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Well there are many.

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One of them is that we no longer think of ourselves as stakeholders in a church.

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We are the customers of the church.

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And we insist on the church providing services that meet our needs.

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Oh, no please, don't ask me to be involved.

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But I want my needs met.

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No, I don't have time to lead that.

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I can't be a part of that solution because I'm too busy you see, but you the church need

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to meet my needs.

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Why you the church should be glad that I come at all.

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After all, I could go somewhere else where they will meet my needs.

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Either you fix this church or I'm out of here.

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Oh, no, don't you ask me to help.

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I've my money, are you joking?

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I don't have enough money for myself to meet my needs.

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Why should I give anything to the church?

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Now I could go on and on with this, but I think you see the point.

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This kind of self-absorption suffocates spiritual maturity in a believer.

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And not only does it suffocate us personally in our maturity, it threatens the life of

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a church community, which is by its very nature, biblically, others oriented.

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Others oriented.

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A church values everyone.

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Not just a few serving the many.

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I believe that one of the poisons that is at work in churches today, including our own,

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is this subtle idea, I want my needs met.

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And it's up to you, the church, to do it because I'm your customer.

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The mindset of a consumer.

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Secondly, I believe that a cultural toxin that is at work in the church of Jesus Christ

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is the noxious waste of expecting to be entertained.

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The great God, entertainment.

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If there is any primary God in the pantheon of secular America, it is entertainment.

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Entertainment is primarily responsible for the cultural decay in America.

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Now I know that people in the business say, oh, we're just reflecting the culture.

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The loaning, they are leading the culture.

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I want to have fun.

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Would you say that with me?

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I want to have fun.

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We in this culture are amusing ourselves to death.

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We expect to have the good life, and we confuse that with a life that is well lived.

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We play more than any culture in history because we have more leisure time.

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There is this insatiable desire that we have to entertain ourselves.

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The sales of computer games and toys, of handheld devices, options on cell phones, bigger and

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better entertainment systems, Tivo iPods, going down the list.

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One of the major reasons I've read in the newspaper for the recovery in the tech industry

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is because of the creation of more ways for Americans and people in the world to have

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fun.

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The creation of entertainment.

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We want new places to play and new ways to spend our money and our leisure time.

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And I truly believe that at the core of this is the fact that we are desperately bored

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with the emptiness of our hearts.

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The expectation of entertainment is carried over into the church.

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Ministry must be fun.

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And don't just think that that's the students and the children of the church.

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It is true there.

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Our student pastors tell me that when there is an opportunity to go out into the community

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and serve, we'll have maybe 15 or 20 kids show up.

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Not when you have an extreme night or something that is a lot of fun, you will have 80 or

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maybe 90 kids.

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What are they doing?

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They're reflecting the culture, the great desire for entertainment.

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And we adults are not much better.

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Worship had better be enjoyable.

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Preaching needs to keep me awake with lots of stories and jokes.

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Church needs to be fun.

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Oh, come on, tickle my ears.

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I want to have a party this Sunday morning.

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If it's boring, I'm not going back.

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It's lust for entertainment, the worship of the Oscar, the idol.

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Now let me hasten to say, I don't think church ought to be boring.

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And I think there's a wonderful place for fun in the church.

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In fact, last night we had a ball here in the volunteer appreciation event.

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It was so much fun.

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We had a great evening together.

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There is a place for having fun.

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But when we set entertainment as a high value in what we want from church, we have begun

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to worship a false God.

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And it is a toxic poison.

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It is a noxious waste from our culture that leaks into the work of Jesus Christ.

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And we all need to be careful of it.

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The more we are like Disneyland, the less we are like the kingdom of God.

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There is a third toxic poison that I want to talk about that I believe is present in

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the church.

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And that is the contamination of seeing life in separate cubicles or separated cubicles.

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Some people would call this compartmentalization.

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I do what I want to do.

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Would you say that with me?

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I do what I want to do.

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Our culture is sold out to the idea of relativism, that there are no absolutes.

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So what is right for one person may not be what is right for another person.

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And you must be very tolerant when there are these differences.

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No one should make any judgments for who is anyone to force their values on another.

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Good choices that people make, well, they are all equal.

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They may be contradictory, but everything is right.

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And that idea of relativism has crept into our lives personally.

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In order to accommodate what pleases us, we divide our lives into compartments.

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Instead of our lives being seen as a consistent whole, we see them in cubicles that are separated.

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And in each of these cubicles, we have different values for how we act, how we live.

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I have a cubicle over here for my job, and when I go to my job, I am this person.

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And I talk this way.

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And I value these things.

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And then I come home, and my family is another cubicle in my life.

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And there I have these values, and I talk this way, and I am interested in these things.

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And then over here is another cubicle for the church.

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And when I go to church, I get cleaned up, and I look decent, and I put a smile on my

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face, and these are my values, and I put a mask on, and that is how I live there.

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That's how we create these cubicles.

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We compartmentalize.

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And we view the church as just one more compartment in our lives.

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A compartment like a hobby, or an activity that we're involved in.

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You know, Tuesday night I go to piano lessons, Wednesday night I go to youth group, and Thursday

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night I'm in some sports activity.

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And I allow the person to live in each compartment without feeling guilty, even though there

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may be competing or opposite values in these compartments.

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And so when I get online in my space, or in some other part of the internet, I'm this

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way.

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And I present this persona.

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And we don't think that that's inconsistent at all with what we're like around our family

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in this compartment, or our church over here, or our friends over here in this compartment.

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This is a worldly way of thinking.

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It says, I go to church, and I have my God spaced in my life.

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So it doesn't matter what I do over here in this space or in that space.

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Somehow we think that we can isolate parts of our lives into rooms that are separated.

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But the fact is that life doesn't work that way.

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God has not created us that way.

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Our total lives will sink to the lowest common denominator in whatever room is in worst shape.

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The Bible says, love the Lord your God with all your heart.

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God calls us to be people of integrity.

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A word that means whole, an integer, the whole.

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God calls us to be people who live life as a whole, holistically, not dividing our lives

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up into compartments and being different things to different people.

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Jesus called that hypocrisy and warned that the fires of hell await hypocrites.

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God calls us to be consistently who we are in Jesus Christ.

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And not to see the church as just a piece of my life.

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I'll make a little time for God over here, a little time for this, a little time for

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that.

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I want to see all of my life as lived under God, under the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

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There is a fourth toxin that I want to get to, and that is the deadly virus of loving

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things more than God.

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I love my stuff.

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Would you say that with me?

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I love my stuff.

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God calls this affluenza, affluenza.

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It is a virus that affects our souls because we have so much stuff and so many possessions.

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The prosperity of our country woos us to ever increasing expectations.

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The pressure then is to do whatever is necessary to increase our stuff because we love our

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stuff and we want our standard of living to rise and we want to accumulate possessions

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and have bigger homes and nicer cars and more toys.

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And the result of this is that it produces complex lives and busy weekends and fewer

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openings in our lives for spiritual connections that we truly need.

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We are exhausted and that exhaustion precludes involvement in spiritual connections which

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need to be at the core of who we are.

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And so the love of things and the stress that that brings to our lives lobs us of the love

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of God and His church.

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And it displaces the spiritual commitments that we once made.

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The love of things becomes our God and a form of idolatry.

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Jesus said life does not consist in the abundance of the things that we possess.

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He also said you cannot serve God and things and money at the same time.

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I have quickly gone through these cultural toxins that work in us.

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The question is can the church survive this lethal dump of toxins into its system?

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There are other toxins that we can talk about but can the church survive this legal dump

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of toxins?

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And the answer to that is no.

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There is no survival apart from repentance and a change of heart that reverses the toxins

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that are at work.

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The last word of Jesus Christ to His church was not go into all the world and preach the

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gospel.

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That is an important commission that Jesus gave us before He ascended back to heaven

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but that is not the last word of Christ to the church.

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The last word of Christ to the church comes at the end of that first century and it can

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be encapsulated in one word, repent.

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And that was 19 centuries ago.

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Repent.

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Change your mind or else I will come, He says, and remove your lampspans.

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That is your witness will be gone from epists, from pergamum, from phyatira, from laodicea,

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from Los Gatos.

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To be free from toxins and to have a healthy heart means that you, number one, think of

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the church as a place to serve others and to give of yourself rather than a service center

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to get what you want.

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And the amazing thing about this is when you focus on meeting the needs of others, what

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happens?

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That is right.

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You get your own needs met.

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And when we focus on ourselves, our own needs, they don't get met.

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To have a healthy heart, to have a repented heart means to expect to experience God through

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personal commitment and to be challenged to grow.

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Whether you have fun in doing it is not paramount.

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It means to experience God and to make commitments to God, to be challenged to grow.

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And sometimes those challenges are not fun.

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Number three, to have a healthy heart means to see your life as an integrated whole and

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Christ as the Lord over it all.

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And you choose no longer to live with this cubical concept, but you see your whole house,

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your whole life filled, every room of it filled with Jesus Christ and his Lordship.

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To have a healthy heart means to love God supremely and to use the things that he's

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given you as a means to advance his kingdom, not to play with.

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And you refuse to submit to the cultures allure to surround yourself with more things and

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ever increasing ways to entertain yourself.

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Is there hope for the church?

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There is no hope apart from repentance.

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But there is hope because God is here and he offers us that one way to escape but otherwise

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is inevitable.

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It's not a sure thing.

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It depends in this case not upon God but upon us and our attitude whether we will repent

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or whether we will allow our minds to be changed and renewed so that we are transformed.

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What we need to do today is to let God do a toxic clean up in our hearts.

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He's told us what is necessary to do that.

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We have to look at reality.

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We have to face what's really going on and repent of it.

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And then, and then he will provide the clean up that is necessary.

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He's already paid for that massive clean up that is acquired through the blood of his

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son.

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What I call you to do is to determine not just to survive but choose to thrive.

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To live by guarding your heart against the poisons of our world and the culture in which

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we live.

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Would you play with me?