Nothing Will Change Your Life More Than This | Boot Camp | Pastor Josh Howerton

Hey guys, thanks for checking out this Bible teaching. Every week, release a podcast that corresponds to the sermon. It's like a little bit of a deeper dive where we hit some things that didn't make it into the sermon, some theological concepts. We talk about things that are going on in our culture and how to think about them from a biblical perspective. We call that podcast Live Free, an episode releases every Monday that corresponds to the sermon. If you would like to check out Live Free, just go to the Lake Point YouTube channel and look for the Podcast tab there. We'll see you at Live Free. Now enjoy this Bible teaching. All right, man. Come on, man. Good morning, Lake Point family. If you guys got your Bibles, let's get into the Word, man. Luke chapter four. Luke four is going to be today. I do want to do something real quick. So we're in a series right now that we're calling Boot Camp, Training for Team Jesus. And you'll hear more about what it is. What we're doing during this series is we are raising a bar of what it means in the Scriptures to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. And here's what I'm asking you to do. I'm asking you to do what I'm doing. The Lord showed me something this week. I'm asking you to go, okay, Jesus, what's the one thing that you are asking me to do to walk more closely with you as a disciple? One thing. And then during the series, whenever he tells you what it is, just do it. Okay. So I want to celebrate somebody do that last week. So last week we talked about being baptized in water and filled with the Spirit. So right after, and I think she, I've been told she might be at this service. Right after this service, there was a young lady named Akila who came under conviction, ran right out there a little next step spot. And then she serrated her life to the Lord of Jesus right there in the lobby. Well then right there, hang on just a second, just a second, it gets a little better. So then right there, our team members, Johnny on the spot, they were like, okay Akila, right now we need a, let's sign you up for baptism, let's get scheduled. And her response was, nope, baptized today, that's what I need. So she literally, she's like grabbing our team members, like walking them down to the baptism room. So this is right here, this is Akila getting baptized. After everybody else had left, hang on, hang on, after her bells had left, I know it's really fun. Had left last week and the building was empty except for her getting done. Lake Point runs on Duncan. And then this right here, so this is, let me show this one, this is Akila. And I think, again, she might be in this service. So here's what I do, she didn't get to celebrate with her church family last week. So let's do it right now, show her how proud we are of her. Come on man, let's go Akila. Well done. Good job girl, good job. All right man, let's get into the word, I'm excited about it. We are in week, whatever of a series we're calling a boot camp trainer for Team Jesus. On your way in, we made this little dude, it's called Field Guide. You'll see why that is. The entire purpose of this is to help you figure out, like with a Bible in your lap, a hard open and prayer for you to be pranked through what's on the inside of this sucker, to figure out, okay, Jesus, what is the one thing that you're asking me to do to follow you more closely as a disciple? There's all the QR codes in there that will help you facilitate those things, ask your grandkids how to use them, it's going to be awesome. If you turn to the middle of that thing, here's the diagram that's on the inside. You're going to be hearing a lot of this in the next few years. This guy right here, this is how we make disciples at Lake Point. This guy right here, go back and go back down and you can see it. What we say at Lake Point is we are a movement for all people to know Christ, live free, and change the world for God's glory. No Christ, live free, and change the world for God's glory, okay. Let me remind you where we started this series was up here in Belief, and you must get this down deep in your soul. What we said is that becoming this type of Jesus does not begin with trying really hard to do a bunch of really good works. Being a disciple of Jesus is trusting in the finished work of Jesus Christ that when he hung on nail pierced hands and nail pierced feet and he pushed up choking to death on his own blood and cried out to tell us that it is finished, what he was saying was finished was every work necessary to put you back into a right relationship with God. That work is finished and now there is therefore now no condemnation for those who were in Christ Jesus who have placed their faith in Him. There is only love left for you because the imputed righteousness of Jesus now covers you and when God sees you he doesn't see jacked up you, he sees perfect Jesus. Amen church. So it begins right there with believing. Now what we said last week is there is no such thing in the New Testament as a disciple that chooses not to be baptized. So last week we talked about being baptized and being filled with the Spirit. We are going to get more into that this week and at prayer and worship night. Today we are going to talk about these are kind of like one step, someone do this one, I am going to cheat and do this one first and next week. This week we are talking about a disciple is a man or a woman of prayer in the word like Jesus. We are going to talk about this book man and we are going to get all up in this book and I am going to pour out every ounce of energy I got and scream and yell and it is going to be awesome. We are going to talk about this book. So let's get at it right here in Luke chapter 4, pick up will be in verse 1. This is immediately after last week when Jesus was baptized in water and the Spirit descended on him. This is the very next verse that is important and it says this. Now Jesus full of the Holy Spirit and if Jesus Christ needed to be full of the Holy Spirit, you need to be full of the Holy Spirit. Jesus full of the Holy Spirit. He left the Jordan and he was led by the Spirit in the wilderness where for 40 days he was tempted by the devil. Now side note, I have never noticed this in the Bible before. It is really awesome. Let me get it out. So later in the gospels, when Jesus goes to the Lord's prayer, that is that little prayer you prayed in your football locker room. When Jesus does that prayer, if you remember one of the things he instructs us to pray, is to lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one. It just dawned on me this week. I think Jesus probably did that because way back here in Luke chapter 4, that happened to him where the Spirit led him into temptation. I think Jesus was like, well that one is real awesome. So why don't you all start praying and he doesn't do that to you because that was not awesome. So Jesus does this, this is what happens. The Spirit leads him to be tempted in the wilderness by the devil. He ate nothing during those days so he is fasting. I need to do a whole message on fasting at some point. And at the end of not eating for 40 days, most obvious statement in the whole Bible, he was hungry. Okay. Now let me explain what is going on right here because if you don't understand, you have an adversary, you are not going to understand why you need a weapon. And this is going to be really important. So check this out. Let me just get a caveat here. I have not been in a fight in a really long time. I am a pastor. I try to generally avoid that. So there has been a minute. I haven't had one while I have been a pastor but in high school middle school, we have gotten a few fights. There are too many but a few. And here is what you never want to have happen in a fight which you don't want as a sucker punch. Now if you never had this happen, it happened to me once. It is not very awesome. What a sucker punch is, they call it a sucker punch, it is a sucker punch because the other guy knew that you were in a fight and you didn't know you were in a fight. So he throws a sucker punch and they call it a sucker punch because you are the sucker. He knew that you were in a fight and you didn't know where you were in a fight. Now check this out. What happens right here is Jesus is led into the wilderness and he engages in war and a battle with an actual enemy that you actually have. And listen, if you do not live your life and if you do not lead your family in a way, understanding the reality that you are in a war, that this is a battle, that the birth mark of a believer is a bullseye and there is a real enemy who wants to steal, kill, destroy everything you got. Here is what is going to happen to you. You are going to get sucker punched because he knows that you are in a battle and you are acting like you are not in a battle and that is not going to go awesome. So it starts right here. There is a two point sermon. Point number one, what we get from this is number one, you have an enemy. In the words of my friend, Pastor Jonathan Pecluta, you are in a story and your story has a villain. It has a villain. Let me talk about this. We have so many people who are new to the faith, brand new Christians. Let me talk about this for a second. So you got an enemy. He goes by many names in the Bible. If you go back to the book of Ezekiel, here is a quick theology of Satan. God originally created all the angelic beings, all the angels with the Bible calls the host of heaven and they all worshiped and served him. Now Bible scholars generally think, and I think this, that Satan, who was originally called Lucifer, was one of the three commanding angels of that army. Here is what happened, is that the most deadly sin that can get into your heart is the sin of pride. And this is what happened to him. Book of Ezekiel describes this. So he did not want to worship God. He wanted to be worshipped as God. He didn't want to obey orders. He wanted to give orders. He didn't want to stand around the throne of the Lamb. He wanted to sit on the throne of the Lamb. And so he rebelled against God in hatred of God. And in the book of Revelation says that a third of the angelic army rebelled with him in defiance of living God. And that fight lasted all of about 0.01 milliseconds. That's all I asked. Now, if you've ever asked the question, okay, man, so who are Satan and demons? Here's who they are. They're fallen angels. They started it out as angels. And then they're fallen angels that now walk and live in condemnation and rebellion against the living God. Now Satan goes by, by the way, people make fun of me. I've always said Satan with a D. Satan. Satan is what it is. Satan. Satan. Satan. He goes by many names in the Bible. One of them is Satan. It comes from the Hebrew word satan. It means adversary or opponent. The word that's used right here in Luke chapter 4, it calls him the devil. The English word devil comes from the Greek word deobalos from which we get the English word diabolical. It means slander or accuser. Here's what that is, okay? You ever get to whispers? Little whispers in the back, I get them all the time. Who do you think you are? Who do you think you're such a screw up? You're not going to mountain. You've ruined everything. Nobody loves you. God hates you. He's disgusted with you. How do you think you're going to come up in church and raise your hands and worship? Who do you think you are? What you've been doing this week? The whispers? That's him. He's a slander or an accuser. Try to get all up on your head. Matthew chapter 4 calls him the Timter. A bunch of different things. Here's the big idea. The gospel of John says there's only three things that he wants to do and watch this. In your life, your family's life, your lineage and your legacy, three things. He wants to steal, kill and destroy. Steal. He wants to take away every ounce of glory and everything good that's in your life. He wants to steal it all. Kill. Listen, this is not an analogy. He wants to kill you. He wants to kill your children. He wants you dead. There was one Bible commentator who read this week that said, Satan wants to saw your children's heads off, stick them on a silver platter and laugh at you all you weep. It's not a joke, man. It's stuff's for real. All throughout the Bible, the blood shed, every ounce of blood shed, violence, violence towards children, Satan, all of them. So he steals, he kills and he wants to destroy. He wants to destroy your life, your family, your lineage. And above all else, the thing he most wants to destroy is your faith. He's coming after your faith. Okay. Now, some of you have thousands of people, your brand new Christian. Some of you, here's a spot you're in. You're too close, some of you are too closed off to this. So right now you say things like, man, I just, I don't know if I believe in all this though. Okay, well here's a deal, man. If you don't believe in gravity, you're still going to splat if you jump off the top of the building. Okay, it doesn't matter if you believe in him. He believes in you. And if you don't own up to the reality of him, again, you're the sucker and if you're going to get sucker punched, some of you are too close off to this. But then watch this. On the other hand, listen, let me plead with you if you're in my generation and down. Some of you, you're way too open to, to, to spirits. You say things like, like in my generation and down, one of the fastest growing things, witchcraft, the occult, spiritism, hashtag witch talk has like two billion impressions on TikTok right now. It's growing in a meteoric way. And here's the thing that you said with a little crystal on you on all the thing. By the way, just hang with me. I'm, we're all learning together. So, but here's the thing you say, what you say is, oh, I'm a spiritual person. I'm a spiritual person. I'll check this out, man. Satan would love for you to be a spiritual person. Because if you're just generically a spiritual person, you're not just open to the Holy Spirit, you're open to unholy spirits, the Bible called Satan and demons. So if you've ever asked a question about all this stuff that's like gaining popularity right now, things like spiritism, the occult witchcraft, all the crystals, all the things, and you're asking, man, is that stuff real? Yep, it's really demonic. And if you've ever asked a question like, okay, yeah, but stuff like tarot cards, weegee boards, fortune tellers, horoscopes, all that stuff, man, don't mess with that stuff. You don't need that stuff to know about your future, you don't know your future. That's your future right there. That book, this is going to tell you your future. This is your future. That right there. There's your future, okay? So listen, in the words of first John, first John, it says to us, it's disciples. It says beloved, and when it says beloved, that's not just the title of this command, it's saying beloved. And it's saying beloved, watch this, don't believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether or not they are from God, because you have an enemy. Now, here's what you need to know, okay? Not just who he is, but how he's going to attack you. It's a really big deal. So let me click on this for a second, okay? Satan is beatable because he's predictable. The Bible says he's like a fisherman, I'm a fishing guy, I'm about to use like three fishing analogies just roll with me. The Bible says he's like a fisherman, he's only got three lures. So first John 2, 16, it says this, it says for everything in the world, watch this, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life comes not from the father, but from the world. Lust of flesh, lust of the eyes, pride of life, okay? Now, now check this out, okay? Here's what this is, Satan's fisherman is only got those three lures. Here's what they are. Lust of the flesh, that's a desire to feel something. Some of you hear lust of flesh, and you think it's sex. It is that, but it's way more than that. The English word that gets translated lust comes from the Greek word epithumia. Epa means over, and thumia means to desire. So check this out. In the Bible, lust isn't just sexual desire, it's over desire. It's whenever Satan gets you to take a good thing and over desire it and treat it as a God thing. So when the Bible says lust of the flesh, it's talking about a desire to feel something. Here's what it is, man. It's when you get home every day, and there's that little thing in your head that's like, man, you know what you can really use. You can really use the drink. You can really use the drink. Now, is there anything wrong with having a singular? Is there anything wrong with having a drink? For most people, no. Unless you're a dude and you're drinking a white claw, and then it's a sin. Now, for most people, no, it's in a Bible. It's in a Bible. You get to it later, different sermon. Don't do that. Sin. For most people, no. There's nothing wrong with it, but check this out. Here's what becomes a problem. When there's that voice, it's like, well, about to have fourth one. That'd be real good. There's that thing in you that you're getting towards bed, and you start to think like, man, you're not going to be able to sleep unless you have one or two more. Now, all of a sudden, it's a thing, and your treat is a God thing, and when you start to put your hope in it, or your joy in it, now it's become a sin thing. So, let's just flesh. Now, here's what the other one is. Lust of the eyes. Lust of the eyes is a desire to have a thing. It's whenever you see something, and you just sort of fixate on it, and you're like, dude, I've got to have it. I'm going to be happy unless I have that thing. I've got to have that thing. I've got to have that thing. It's that thing of like, how can you tell if somebody has a Tesla? Don't worry. They'll tell you. That kind of thing is like, when somebody just fixates on it, that's all they can think about. I've got to have the thing. I've got to have the thing. And here's the problem is when you start putting your hope in something, and you start in your heart of hearts, you start thinking, I can't be happy unless I have. And now, all of a sudden, you're taking a good thing, elevating it to a God thing, and now it's become a sin thing, that's a sin. So it's less to flesh, it's a desire to have something. Now, the third one, watch this, pride of life. So that's not a desire to feel a thing, it's not a desire to have a thing. Pride of life is a desire to be a thing. This is stuff like, it's about things like status. This is about blue checks. This is about living for the applause of people instead of the applause of God. Now, let me go back to the fishing analogy. Okay. Check this out. So, fish, I like a bass fish. These are fishermen, this only got three lures. If I'm bass fishing, here's what I do. I start with, I always do the same thing. First thing I'm going to throw is a little Texas rigged soft bait. I'm going to run it through the little debris, and that's my favorite thing. I like fishing a Texas rigged soft bait. Now, if they're not hitting on that, I just clip off that lure, and I just throw something else on there, I'm going to throw a top water frog. I like doing a top water frog. So I'm going to throw a top water frog. If they're not hitting the top water frog, I'm going to clip that off. I'm going to throw a little crankbait. I'm going to throw a little spinner, but watch this. What I'm doing is I'm going to throw something. If they don't hit it, I'm going to try something else. But when I find what they're hitting that day, check this out. All throw the same thing. Over and over and over and over, and I am lethal. Now, listen, your enemy every day is doing that to you. He can't get in your head, but he's got your entire life's game film, and he's reviewed it. And he's doing, he's going to throw something at you, one of those three lures. And if you don't hit that, he's going to try the other one. And if you don't hit that, he's going to try the other one. But when he finds what you hit, he's going to throw it over and over and over and over. So listen, class. Here's your very practical homework. My youth pastor that decided me in high school, he gave me this question, it's a famous question. He gave me this question. I'm asking you to with a pen in your hand this week sit down and answer this question. If you were Satan, how would you take you out? You need to get to answer that question. If you were Satan, how would you take you out? And then you need to get to answer that question and you need to tell the dudes or the ladies in your life group, they need to know about that stuff. You have a real enemy here, here's how he's going to tag. Now here's a question. How do we fight him? How do we fight him? Now check this out. We're going to do a lot of Bible in the next three minutes. So just roll with me. If you're new here, we're all into the Bible. This whole story is Bible. Okay. So what do we do? I'm a cheat. I'm a go over to Ephesians 6. And then I'm going to show you how Jesus Ephesians 6 is Satan in Luke chapter 4. So here's what Ephesians 6 says. Now, super famous passage. This is the full armor of God passage. Now I want you to notice some things about what it says in this passage about how we fight the enemy. It says, finally brother, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on a full armor of God. Listen man, some of you guys you've been around church for the first time. When you got around church, especially the dudes, you get around and it kind of feels a little soft. It kind of feels like what they want you to do is sit around in a circle and look at each other and I and talk about your feelings and sing a song. Okay. Okay. Listen. Are you hearing this? This is warfare language. In the words of my friend, Pastor Joe B. Martin, God wants you saved. He doesn't want you soft. Save not soft. We are in a war and we need this pastor is going to say, we need to stand firm and take our stand against an actual enemy. Watch this. So that you can take your stand against the devil schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood. The greatest enemy in your life is not the great. Now listen, he may use some of these things, work through some of these things, but there's a principality behind the people. The greatest enemy in your life is not a political party, it's not your boss, it's not your ex, it's not your mother-in-law. And it's some of you are like, man, yeah, but she's fire from her eyes and lightning bolts from her. No, no, it's not her. But against, watch this, the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against, watch this, the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore in light of the reality that you are in this war right now, put on the full armor of God so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground. And after you have done everything to stand, stand firm then, listen to the things he tells you to do with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, every one of these things is sermon, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith which with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one, take up the helmet of salvation and watch this. Here we go. And the sword of the spirit which is the Word of God. Okay. Now, check this out. Number two is someone to point sermon. Number two, you fight the enemy with the Word of God. Did you notice in this passage, every single thing in that armor is defensive. Shield, breastplate, helmet, a belt, shoot, all defensive. One thing is an offensive weapon. You have one. It's the Word of God. The sword of the spirit is the only offensive weapon we have against the enemy. Okay. Now, what you're going to see right here, thank you. All right, man, we're awake over here. That's great. Now, what you're going to see right here, watch how Jesus uses the Word of God to fight the enemy when he's under attack in this passage. Now, we're back in Luke 4. So it starts here. The devil said to him, if you are the son of God, he's trying to get him to question the love of the Father for him. Watch this. If he's going to do in your life, more than anything else is trying to get you to question the love of the Father for you as a son or a daughter of the living God. He says, if you are the son of God, tell this stone to become bread, lust of the flesh. Jesus answered, it is written. He goes to the Word. Now, what he's going to do is Jesus is going to deep cut, quote, Deuteronomy 6 and Deuteronomy 8, and it just flows out of him like water. Jesus is written, man should not live by bread alone. So then devil goes to the next one. Then the devil led him up to a high place and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. And he said to him, I will give you all their authority and splendor. This is interesting. It has been given to me and I can give it to anybody I want to. Now, for you, Bible nerds, this is absolutely fascinating. I don't got time to do this, but I'm going to give you a little Easter egg hint. Very interesting that in Luke 4, Satan says to Jesus face, all the kingdoms of the world belong to me and Jesus does not correct him. Jesus is tacitly acknowledging that in some way in Luke 4, the kingdoms of this world quote, belonged to Satan. Why is that? Now, we go into it on the podcast, but that is very interesting. So what he does is he offers, you can have all this stuff, you can have all the kingdoms. I know this is what you want, Jesus, you can have all of them, lust of the eyes. And Jesus answers, it is written, worship the Lord your God and serve him only, verse 9. So the devil goes number 3. Then the devil led him to Jerusalem and he had him stand on the highest point of the temple. If you are the son of God, he said, throw yourself down from here. Now this is interesting. Now the devil is going to quote to Bible. Now watch this. It's really important. Bible sees Jesus twice go, it is written, it is written. And devil goes, oh, I see what game we are playing. I will play your game. I can quote some scripts or two. Watch out for this. Just because somebody has got a verse, doesn't mean they are right. This is really important, man. Just because somebody has got a verse, doesn't mean they are right. It's about rightly dividing the word of God. When I was doing high school ministry, every kid smoked pot within 100 miles. New Genesis 129. Behold, I give you every seed bearing plant on the face of the earth. They all, just because somebody has got a verse, doesn't mean they are right. It's about rightly dividing the word of God. Satan can do Bible too. And this is what he does. So he quotes the scripture to Jesus, he will command his angels concerning you to guard you carefully. They will lift you up in their hands so that you will not strike your foot against the stone. And then Jesus, a third to, by the way, that is pride of life. So he went less the flesh, less the eyes, pride of life. Everybody is going to see you, Jesus. Verse 12. Jesus answered a third time. It is written. Do not put the Lord's your God to the test. Here's a big idea. Three times Jesus is tempted. Three times he responds with the Word of God saying it is written. Big idea. There is power in the Word of the living God. There's power in the Word of the living God now. Okay, now check this out, man. If you're new to the faith, listen, you need to understand this so much. Let me just, God has a plan, this isn't my, in my notes, but I want to get this out. God has a plan to bless your life and Satan has a plan to curse your life and ultimately you get to decide what plan you're on. God's plan to bless your life is in his Word and Satan's plan to curse your life is in the world. And I need to prepare you for something because if you're not prepared, you're going to get sucker punched, not by the devil, but by the world. You need to know this, man. There is the Word and there is the world. And what the Word says is in constant conflict with what the world says. And you are going to have to make a decision as a disciple of Jesus. Does the Word stand in authority over the world or does the world stand in authority over and judge what the Word says? And listen, what you need to understand is that God does not bless, this is a big misunderstanding. God does not bless people. He blesses a place. That place is under the authority of the Word of God. And when you place yourself, watch this and your family, under the authority of the Word of God, you put yourself in the place of blessing. And when you take yourself out of the authority of the Word of God, you take yourself out of the place of blessing. Now this word, this is the most precious thing on earth. This is the only perfect thing on earth. This book you have in your hands is 66 different books organized into 1,189 different chapters, subcategorized into 31,102 different verses, written by 40 different writers, 40 different writers, but how many authors? One, one, every word, breathed out by the living God. That's this book. Now, there's a promise, okay? Come on, man. There's a promise. We've been given a promise. That author is made of promise, Matthew 2435. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. I'll swear Jesus says, I tell you the truth, not one jot nor tidal of the law. When Jesus said that, there's a little Hebrew markings. He's saying like, not the dot of an eye, not the cross of a tea of this entire word will pass away until all is fulfilled. So let me just, I, listen, man, I need you to understand how precious that thing is. So let me just camp out here for a second. The fact that this book is sitting in your lap, in your language in 2026 is a miracle of God that has come to you by the blood of martyrs. That book sitting in your lap is sitting in your lap and my lap because men and women have paid with their blood to get you this book, okay? I'm a church history nerd. Let me church history nerd out for like two minutes here. In the 1500s, I'm actually, my, my, my, my, um, grandma on my dad's side is a direct descendant of these people. In the 1500s, there was a group of very committed French Christians. They were called the Huguenots and the secular French government made a decision to try to persecute them, kill them, stamp them out, and eradicate them. But they stood on their convictions of the Word of God and they did not budge. And eventually, again, heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. That entire French secular government passed away, but the Huguenots and their Bible convictions, they survived and they thrived. And today you can go to the place where they tried to kill them in France. And there is a monument to those French Christians there that today in that place reads, pound away you evil hands, the hammer breaks, the Anvil stands. And for all of church history, for all of church history, the world and the devil have been trying to pound away at that thing. And what has always happened is the hammer has broken and the Anvil has stood. It's firm, y'all, it's firm. So check this out. In the early Roman Empire, there was a Roman Emperor named Diocletian who hated the Christians, and he ordered every Christian in the Roman Empire to be killed, and he ordered every copy of the Bible to be burned. He wanted this book gone. Within 300 years, this is how God works. Within 300 years, the Emperor Constantine bent his knee to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, and he established Christianity as the official religion of the entire Roman Empire, pound away you evil hands, the hammer breaks, the Anvil's gonna stand. Now, fast forward a little farther. In the 16th century, there's a dude named William Tindall in Great Britain. He spent his entire life devoted to the idea of translating the Bible from Greek Hebrew and Latin into what was called plowman's English. That was called blue collar English, normal dudes, the swung hammers and drove plows. And that was his entire life. But the king of England hated what he was doing and decided he was gonna target William Tindall to kill him and persecute him. William Tindall, before his life, and it said this, he said, if God spares my life, he said this too, too the king of England in defiance. He said, if God spares my life, air these many years, I will cause the boy that drives the plow to know more scripture than you do. Said that to the king of England. Eventually, he completed his life's work. He was persecuted and he was burned at the stake. And his very last words as the flames engulfed his throat were, Lord, open the king of England's eyes. If you have ever heard of the king, James version of the Bible, you know that God answered that man's prayer. Why? Pound away you evil hands. The hammer breaks. The anvil's gonna stand. You keep going. I'm just mad. I love this so much. You keep going fast forward to the 18th century. There was a dude you had to read in high school. His name was Voltaire, a French atheist named Voltaire. He hated the Bible. Said it was a laughing stock. He made a prediction that within 100 years of his life, no one on the earth would even remember the Bible. Today, if you travel to his house in France, stands, I kid you not, a Bible printing press in his house. Pound away you evil hands. The hammer breaks. The anvil's gonna stand. Now fast forward to two years ago in Canada, they introduced legislation that would criminalize the clear teaching of parts of the Bible. Now if you don't know this like point church, you have planted churches in Canada. We have together. So as soon as it happened, I called some of our pastors up there, David Podier, who's preached on this stage. I was like, David, is this true? He's like, absolutely true, man. If this passes, it criminalizes up to two years in prison. If a Bible teacher opens that book and clearly teaches some parts of the word of God, I said, David, what's he gonna do? Here was his response. I'm gonna do prison ministry from the inside is what he said. Listen, man, pound away you evil hands. The hammer breaks. The anvil stands. And listen, listen to me. You can lean your life up against the promises of this word because he gave a promise. Heaven and earth will pass away. Not one word of this will pass away. It's true and every promise in it is yes and a man by the blood of Jesus Christ. Every single word of that thing, man. So listen, listen, I don't know how to do this, man. I don't know how to do this. I'm pleading with you. I need the point family. I need you to get into the word of God. Did you notice this? Did you notice with Satan throwing stuff at Jesus? Jesus doesn't say, I ain't on devil. I'm just saying I'm gonna throw it in chat GPT and see if there's a verse about this. No, no. He's got it locked and loaded. Deep cuts. Deuteronomy 6. He's got it locked and loaded. I have hidden your word in my heart that I'm on a sin against you. And listen, I know this. I'm not dumb. You know what some of you say is, yeah, man. But memorizing stuff's hard. Bro, for real. If you are anywhere close to my age, you have every word to the first verse of I-Size Baby of Memorize you've had it for 30 years. And that ain't doing you no good at all. In fact, would you guess, might I just rant it for a second? I'm a rant for a second. You know, it doesn't sound like you want. I'm gonna do it anyway. The same dude that will grab me in the lobby and say memorizing stuff's hard. If I even mention, I can bring up like the 2007 Big Ten championship. And that dude's, yeah dude, last play of the game. You know, third and 13 on a 26. Guy ran a poster out. DB grabbed him by the shoulder pad. Ralph missed the PI call. We lost four seconds. Don't tell me you can't memorize stuff. Memorizing stuff's not hard. Memorizing stuff's a choice. And it's about what we choose. Listen, it's about what we choose tied in our hearts so that we might not sin against him. And we can stand firm in our day. Let me just, I'm a rant one more time. And then I'm gonna move on and we're gonna finish the sermon. Okay. Let me talk to our dudes. I'm just gonna be heads up. Some of the services I can tell they didn't know how to feel about this. I'm gonna be a little aggressive. And the reason I'm doing that, thank you. The reason I'm doing that is I'm talking to our men especially. And I'm talking to men like men. Like I just, if you talk to people like adults, treat people like adults, act like adults. So let me talk to you especially to the men. If there's everybody, but especially to the men, if you're a husband or you're a father. Listen, man. And what I'm about to say is not super popular, it's in the word of God. I don't care, man. God, if you're a husband or you're a father, God has positioned you as the head and leader of your home. And Satan is coming after your family. And right now you have an enemy coming after your family and some of you won't even pick up the sword to defend your family. And he's asking you, man of God, to pick this up and stand firm in your day on behalf of your people. Okay, so check this out, man. This is how we do this. This is how we do this, okay? And this is, let me just, it's got a little heat on it, but just go with me here. You need to grow up and feed yourself. If the only time that you ever get fed the word of God is when you drive up here and you're in one of our services and I like spoon feed you like, oh, open wide. Here comes the plane. If that's the only time you feed on a word of God, I say something man, like I love you, but you're acting like a baby. If the only time that you ever get fed is when somebody else spoon feeds you the word, you're acting like a baby. Hebrews 5.12 says this, he throws shade in Hebrews 5.12. In fact, though by this time you should be teachers, you should be able to turn around and teach your children, teach a rooted group, teach a life group. You want to be teachers. He says with excellent, you still need somebody to teach you the elementary truths of God word, God's word all over again. And then he says this, you still need milk, not solid food. He's literally gone, bro, you're 36 and you're breastfeeding. That's for rest of it. It's what, what it said. He's saying this. So listen, man, I don't know how to put this. I just need to put this like, were you get it? Let me make this visual. Babies are cute. Babies are awesome. Babies are cute. I got a picture on them. That's Hudson when he's, I can't remember a holiday. He went through a Paw Patrol face. That's cute, okay? You know what's not cute? That right there is not cute. That's going to scar you for life. Take that down. That's going to scar me for life. Now here's a big idea. Babies acting like, listen man, I love you, but just listen. Babies acting like babies is cute. Grown men acting like babies, not cute. Not cute. You got to be, we got to grow up as men and women who are real disciples that learn to feed on the Word of God. And if the only time you ever feed on God's Word is when you walk up in here, go on feed me, feed me, feed me. Here's what you're like, man. You're like a big, 50 year old baby sloshing around in your diaper, milk crust, all of your lips, umbilical cord rolling around, feed me, feed me, feed me. My last church didn't feed me. Listen man, I love you. Grow up and feed yourself, you big baby. It's time to grow up, man. Let's learn, feed you, learn, man. Let's get into this thing. My friend Pastor Jobe Martin said that first and it was awesome. Okay. We got to do that, man. Okay, so let me do this. Let me land a sermon. I'm going to get super practical. Okay, here's what I'm doing this. We're finishing super practical. Well, we say at like point, this is a little behind the scenes thing. We're home depot. You can do it. We can help. I cannot listen. I can't get you to get into the Word of God. Listen man, you got to love the Word of God. What I can do is put you in a position to teach you how to feed yourself on the Word of God that changes your life and your family's life. So here's how we do it at like point. This is, we got a ton of people who are new. Here's how we do it. I want to show you how we get you into the Word. Number one, every single week when you walk up in here, man, this ain't a TED talk. This 18 minutes long with two jokes in one verse. We don't do that in here. We do it here. As we open this book, we take every word of this book real serious. We preach through books to the Bible and we actually get into this thing. Some of you guys every now and you're like, man, why your sermon's got to be so long? Okay. First of all, I want to say, I wish my sermon's weren't so long either. I'm tired. I'm sweating. I'm getting old, man. All the things. But listen, here's why my sermons are a little longer than your 18 minute TED talk because I can talk for a long time about the things that I love. Listen, if you grab me into lobby and you ask me about something I love, I'll talk all day. I love football. I was cursed to be born in Cincinnati. I got the curse to be in Cincinnati, Bengals fan. You want to bring it up. I'll talk all day about Joe Burrows. Ankle, I'll talk about how we won't draft a dagum online. We can't keep our, we're going to see if we can keep our receiving core together and we're going to have seen North next year that's what we say every year. I'll talk about it all day long. You want to talk about bass fishing? I love bass fishing. You want to talk about what ponds they're hidden, what things are hidden this time of year. Where are they spawning? I'm like, should I do a little guided tour of? I'll talk about it literally all day long, literally all day long. I love my kids. You ask me about my kids? I'm going to tell you some things because I like talking about them. I'm going to tell you a little Fliessie's a genius, a little straight A student, my little Eliana, cheer captain last year, shout out Providence Lions. I'm all about it. Hudson, y'all listen. Hudson has officially learned to stop peeing in the yard facing the street. In Jesus name, I'll tell you all day long, man. We are progress, bro. We are discipling these kids. I'll talk about it all day long. I can talk for a while about things I love, but listen, when we get in here, we're talking about this. We're talking about this, man. This stuff matters. And here's, listen, here's my assumption. If you got your whole family up early on a Sunday and got all the kids bathed and stuck in their little outfits and you got them all on the dagumini van and drove them up here and you braved the Hunger Games parking lot, I'm assuming you actually wanted to get in the word of God. I'm assuming that's why you came, okay? That's why 30% of you came. That's great, man. We're going to do preaching. We do that. Number two, we got to live free podcasts. I'm going to shoot you really straight. I did not start that podcast because I needed something new on my calendar. I need something new on my calendar like I need a brain aneurysm. The reason I did that, the reason I did that is because I want to teach people the word of God, I'm not too mind-horned. I work hard to get you into the word of God. So every week if you didn't know this, on Monday is a podcast we got called Live Free This about an hour, hour and a half deep dive, deep dive into what was preached on the weekend and we go like six layers deeper than we can get in a sermon. That's why we do that. Now number three, we got this thing, we got rooted. We're my rooted people at. We got rooted people in here. I'll come and I'll see you. Here's a rooted is. Now check this out. Routed is a 10 week discipleship experience. I'm going to shoot you real straight. I need every single person at Lake Point to go through rooted at least once in your life. Here's why I say that when it comes to the word of God. One of the weeks of rooted, it teaches you how to read, study and apply the scriptures. Here's why that's important. What the Bible calls itself, watch this, is the sword of the spirit. A sword was a lethal self-defense weapon. If this book were written today, it would say something like, it's the glock of the spirit, something like that. I mean that for real, for real. Now in the same way, if you get a lethal self-defense weapon, you need to take a gun safety class or you're going to misuse it and hurt yourself or somebody around you, in the same way, you need to take a sword safety class that teaches you how to rightly divide the word of God if not, you're going to misuse it and hurt yourself and somebody else around you. What rooted does is it one of the weeks is it teaches you how to read, study and apply the word of God. There's a single person on each of you go through rooted at least once in your life. Now last one right here, this is new this year. I was very passionate about this. I drove this. Okay. So Bible reading plan. I'm going to say this and then I'm going to finish service. I'm going to be great. Bible reading plan. Here's what this is. This is new this year. Last year I was told a team, I was like, hey guys, we got to get our people into the word of God and we need to do it in a way they can receive it. So in the new Lake Point app, if you text app, I think to 2041. You get a little length of Lake Point app. In the new Lake Point app, there is a daily Bible reading plan Monday through Friday, one chapter per day. That's literally six to 10 minutes of reading. One chapter per day and it sinks with what I was preaching that weekend. So here's how we designed it. You can come here and hear the word. Then you can go deeper with the live free deal. And then every day we can all together be waking up to a big family meal where we feast on a chapter of the word of God together. Now check this out. I want you to see so that you know where this is. I want to help you. If you go in to the Lake Point app, you're going to see this little homepage. Ignore that guy. You can see this little homepage. Now down at the bottom there's a button down here that you can't see without your cheaters. This little button right here, it says daily. You're going to see that icon that says daily. If you click that button that says daily, it's going to take you to this. And you can see up here it says practice your daily habits now. If you click that thing, it's going to take you through a quick guided prayer and then take you to the Bible. But here's the thing. If you just want to get to the Bible, you click this thing at the top that says, read, nope, go back. You click this thing at the top that says, go back. Yep. Thank you. Says, read today's scripture and use the prompts to observe, apply it to your life and pray. If you click this, it's going to take you to the one chapter that day that the Bible teaching team at Lake Point specifically chose because it aligns with what was taught and preached on the weekend. So last weekend I taught on baptism. This is from this last Thursday's Bible reading plan. Roman 6 is about a theology of baptism. Every single week you're going to get that. Why are we doing that? Because your life will change when you develop a habit of feasting on the beloved word of God. That's why. Now, let me finish sermon like this. I want to show you why this is so important. Okay. A few years ago, the largest study that has ever been conducted on the effects of Bible reading in the life of a Christian was completed by an organization called the Institute for Biblical Research. I think they studied some around 200,000 people in this study for a long period of time. And what they found about the effects of Bible reading on somebody's life were pretty shocking. What they found was if somebody reads the Bible one day per week, honestly, it had made hardly any difference in their life at all, hardly any. When they found, if somebody starts reading the Bible either two or three days per week, the difference was negligible. You could see it, but it wasn't significant. But what they found is that when somebody begins to read the Bible four or more times per week, everything begins to change. Most people are 228 percent more likely to share their faith. 407 percent more likely to memorize scripture. 59 percent less likely to view pornography. 30 percent less likely to struggle with loneliness. And 50 percent less likely to experience anxiety. Here's the big idea. When the word and not the world becomes the majority of your week, your life will start. It's a late point family. Stand firm then. Take up the word of God, praying at all times in every way with prayers and supplications, and thank wish the enemy that is seeking to steal, kill, and destroy. That's what we're doing. Prayer and worship by this week. We're going to win the war on the spiritual before we wage it in the physical. We're going to do it. Okay. Now, I want to pray that that would be getting to happen. For everybody, it's amazing. People gather here the word of God. I want to pray for you so that you bow your heads and close your eyes. Father, I pray that tens of thousands of people that they would be able to say with your servant, David, I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. I pray that this week, it would be opening your word and that would be whispering prayers under their breath straight from the Psalms, open my eyes that I might see wondrous things in your law. Father, I pray that they would lean their lives and lean their families' lives and lead their children. I pray that they would lean all those things on the promises of the living God. The Lord, they would know that you are true, that your word holds true, and that every promise is yes and I man in Jesus Christ, and that as Father, as they begin to feast on your word and abide in your word, that you would transform us into the image of your son, Jesus Christ, and that we would be disciples of our Lord and our Savior. We love you. We pray those things in the name of your crucified and risen Son Jesus, amen and amen.