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Transcend
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Destiny Church
Pastor Womack

1 Peter 1:13
Ready, Set, Live!
Now is the time to live out our faith. First thing to do when living out faith is to manage our mindset. We need to make sure we are not walking around mentally flabby and make sure our mind is set and prepared to live out our spiritual life.
Just as we are coached to do on the basketball court, stay on our toes and be ready for anything that comes our way. Same with spiritually. Stay on our toes mentally and spiritually and be ready for the things the world and satan throw at us. We must not be mentally lazy.
We are called to be learners of Gods Word. If we don’t use it, we will lose it. We have to live and read God’s Word. (Not the daily bread, it is a good tool but not sufficient to the Word of God- it is like trying to live on vitamins without eating, but we still have to eat)
We must make time to meditate on God’s Word. Life gets too busy and stressful and we don’t make time for it.
On game day athletes will show up for a game at 6 am knowing the game starts at 7 pm so that they have time to mentally prepare – get their minds right and stay focused for the task ahead.
Do we have our spiritual game face on?
Are we still learning God’s word? (not do we already know it but are we still learning and seeking it?)
We need to get rid of our stinking thinking. Our thinking should reflect God and not our thoughts. When life doesn’t go our way, our thinking is always impacted. (when we lose our job, family member dies, lose house or car, ect- we turn to human thinking and not God’s way of thinking)
For example:
Last week, a young man went into a bank to rob it and met the woman behind the counter. She started to pray and ask him why he would want to do this when he had so much to live for. They started to talk while he held the gun to her head. He asked her to pray with him and she did and he even gave her the bullet in his gun. He was seen on an interview with Oprah, where he said that he knew that God was talking to him and not the lady behind the counter. She held the money out to him many times and he chose not to take the money and walked out of the bank with his life changed. His mom made him turn himself in later on that evening after seeing his face on the news and he later admitted on Oprah that he had robbed a bank a week earlier. Anyway the woman in the bank had a different way of thinking when the worst came her way and God was able to speak through her and a life was changed in the process.
The robber couldn’t get away from stinking thinking because life didn’t go his way. He knew what he was doing was wrong but he wanted to provide money for his family and celebrate his 2 year old girls bday.
It is tough to think clearly and biblically when life falls apart.
If you are not in God’s Word you cant decipher stinking thinking.
What is the quality of the decisions that you have been making?

Secondly we need to focus on God’s favor and biblical hope.
Not hoping that something will happen but knowing that we will be victorious when trials come our way.
It is one thing to know grace but another to live by grace. When you understand the Word you set your hope on God’s grace. We can hope in Jesus.
WHATEVER WE FOCUS ON WILL DETERMINE OUR EMOTIONS!
If you focus on a dead and scary economy you will be in fear.
If you focus on Christ you will live confidently.
Where do u see the grace of God showing up in your life?
His grace shows up in time to strengthen our hope in Christ in the future.
He also shows up in others lives to be an inspiration and hope to us.

We are called to move forwards in our lives and not backwards
We are obedient to God to possess His favor not to gain His favor.
Now that we are believers we can feel His conviction and that is why he allows us to live however we want and still go to heaven but His conviction causes us to constantly move forward and want to live righteous.
Now that we understand salvation we cannot go back to our former lusts. We are called to move ahead.
Live like you know that God is your father because Satan is no longer your father.
95% of babies walk backwards before they learn to walk forwards and that is how it is in our spiritual lives too. When we are babies in Christ we start out by walking backwards and build our ways to walking forwards.
Are you moving forward or backward in Christ?
Where are u tempted to not grow in Christ?
Are u making spiritual excuses? (by saying I can do whatever I want because I will go to heaven anyway)

Be God’s Next Top Model
God wants us to model after Him.
He wants us to be holy, just as he is holy.
We need to compare ourselves to Christ in whom there is no sin.
Where is God challenging us to look more like Him?
We are to be holy in ALL our behavior. (home, work, kids, spouse, bball court, finances, driving, ect)
We are to represent Christ EVERYWHERE.

If we pray for something and God doesn’t answer the way we were hoping, we are to have confidence in the face that he is still able to answer that request- he just chose not to. Like the 3 men in the fiery furnace, they said that if God does not deliver us we know He is still able to and they had hope and confidence in that fact.
Gods will might not be ours but He is still able to do anything!