All right. What is up, young adults? It is good to see you. My name is Jason. I got some people that I just love in this room, and I'm so glad to be with you guys, uh, today. Man, I just want to start by saying this. Jesus is here. There are people for you here, and I believe that God's going to move here today. So I'm really excited to be with you. I'm really excited to just get to share my heart with you and just what I believe God is doing and speaking and wants to speak to each of us today. And as we get started, I just have a word before we begin, and it's for you guys for future young adult gatherings, it's just this. When you come, come ready to spend what you have. Now, you think to yourself, I thought the food was free. You are correct. Here's what I mean. If you got a little extra inside of you, come ready to spend it on somebody else. You got a little extra joy inside of you, come ready to spend that joy, with a smile, in worship, as you engage people. You got a little extra hope inside of you, come ready to spend that hope. Prophesy to somebody. Speak life into them. Declare the truth into them. You got a little extra faith inside of you, come ready to spend that faith. What do I mean? I mean, raise your voice when the word is spoken. Say amen, say yes, say I agree. You're not just agreeing with just whoever's speaking here. You're agreeing with the goodness of God. And you're spending your faith, and you're building it in this space and in this room. And every time you come, there is somebody in here that's like, "Is any of this real? What am I doing here?" And I'm not even sure. But when they hear you respond by faith, you can change and help change the atmosphere of the room. It says in Corinthians 8. "At the present time, your plenty will supply what they need. So that in turn, their plenty will supply what you need." Come ready to say, I got a little bit extra inside of me. I'm going to spend it on the people in this place. 

All right, so here's the deal. We're in a brand new series. The first one ever in the history of young adults, which I'm so excited about. And we have been learning about life in the kingdom, a series called Learn From Me: Life in the Kingdom. We've been asking the question, what does it actually look like to live like Jesus lived? We've been looking at Matthew 11, at this verse, it says, “Come to me, all you are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me." There's only one place you can get it. There's only one person you can get it from. That is Jesus. Because He's "gentle and He's humble in heart. And you will find rest for your souls." We've been learning what it looks like to live life in the kingdom. And as we've gone through the series so far, we've taken a look at these symbols up here, which is really just a grouping of things that we all want in life. Like if you're just going to look at that list, you'd be like, man, who doesn't want peace in chaos, and joy in every circumstance, and purpose in the mundane, and all the other things that Jesus offers us. This is what His life in the kingdom looks like. And so we've been going through these, kind of, piece by piece. We talked about connection with God and freedom from the world. And so I'm so excited to spend time with you today talking about self-control in the face of temptation. Self-control in the face of temptation, because Jesus had a whole bunch of self-control in the face of any and every temptation that He faced. So as we get started, I want to share with you a little thing called the parable of the tricycle. Yes, indeed. The story has to do with a boy who may or may not be named... Hason, who grew up in Fremont, Ohio in the 1980s. And he had a tricycle that he loved. And he was the man on that tricycle because he could go where he wanted, when he wanted, and do what he wanted on that tricycle. It was freedom. In fact, you may be looking at it and think, that is quite the tricycle, here was the only problem. He had one major temptation. There was a huge hill right outside of his house on North Street. And this hill was a temptation because Hason felt the need. He felt the need, the need for speed. And one day he thought to himself, “What if I just took my tricycle straight down this hill at high speeds?” Now, contrary to the picture, contrary to the picture, um, I know it looks like it, but that parking brake doesn't do as much good as you would think it would. You see the parking brake right there? And so what happens is on a tricycle, once you get going at high speeds, the pedals, you can't actually slow down because the pedals are going at such velocity that they're like just, they're smacking your feet, right? So eventually your feet are just out to the sides, like full on, like I’m just, I'm going, man, I'm going, I'm going all the way, going down for real. So all the way down the hill, all the way down the hill until he started to get towards the bottom and realized this parking brake is not everything that it looks like it is. So he had a great thought. He was just going to use his feet to stop at the bottom of the hill. The only problem is he was wearing flip-flops. And so as he took the, as he put his feet down, the flip-flops bent over and he basically stopped himself at high speed with his toes. Okay, the moral of the story. If you are tempted to go down the hill at high speeds, it's probably going to rip off your toes. 

Okay, we laugh about that. Here's the thing. Temptations in our life, they probably will not rip off your toes. There is a really good chance, there's a real, real possibility it's going to rip a little piece of your heart out. There's also a possibility it's going to rip your relationships. And so Jesus offers us his self-control in the face of temptation. He faced all kinds of temptation, probably nothing more or nothing bigger than in Matthew Chapter 4 when he faced the temptation in the wilderness for 40 days. Now, before we jump into that story, you got to go all the way back to Genesis chapter 3 to see how we got here. Check this out. “Eve faced a temptation also. It says, when the woman saw the fruit of the tree was good for food, pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and she ate it. And right then, we see the pattern for every temptation we'll ever face. If it is good for my body, it's pleasing to the eye, and it's good for gaining.” So that is, if my body desires it, if it's something I see, or if it's something I want to gain, that's the framework for every temptation in our life. And actually, 1 John 2 calls this "the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life." It's the basis for any and every temptation we face. And Jesus Himself faced all three of those during His 40 days in the wilderness when Satan came to stop Him, tempt him. Just as a reminder, when Satan came to Jesus, He had fasted 40 days. He was hungry. And so he looked at Him, he said, “Tell this stone to become bread, good for the body.” He took Him to a high place, and he showed Him where He could jump down and angels would take care of Him, what His eyes could see. And then he showed Him all the kingdoms of the world. He's like, "I'll give these to You if You'll just bow down to me." What he thought He could gain. So the same pattern that we see Eve walk through is the same pattern that Jesus walked through, in Matthew chapter 4, but He broke right through, how? Well, when you hear the story, you think, well, Jesus must have been like, super self-controlled. Like 40 days of fasting, He could do all the stuff that I wouldn't like, how could I ever do that? But what I want you to catch is it wasn't so much that Jesus was super self-controlled, more that He was super Spirit-controlled. And it wasn't that He was super strong willed, it's that Jesus was super Spirit-filled. Check this out in Matthew chapter 4. Then Jesus was, say it with me, "Led by the spirit." Let's try it one more time, say it with me. "Jesus was led by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil." Oftentimes we think about self-control in terms of how much control we have. In fact, actually on some level, the word self-control really actually shouldn't even be self-control, it should be Spirit-control. So we think about the control that we have, what we can bring to the table. Now, I want you to think about His temptation for a second. So He's led by the Spirit, He goes 40 days of fasting, then He's hungry and Satan comes to Him. When we read that story, we think, oh, He was really hungry because of the 40 days of fasting. But in reality, the 40 days of fasting emptied Himself of Himself, leaving all kinds of room for the spirits. And the spirit is what helped Him break through the temptation. And so we're invited to live that same kind of life to live this self-controlled life, which is really God-controlled life, this spirit-controlled life, which is really the thing that leads me to be self-controlled. And Galatians 5 says, "Let the Holy Spirit guide your lives, then you won't be doing what your sinful nature craves. The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants." There it is. Any time in all my life that I'm struggling to do the things that my flesh craves, that my sinful nature wants, there's a really clear way out to let the Holy Spirit guide my life. I don't know if you've ever experienced that before, something like this, that you feel this, you feel like you're getting pulled two different directions.

Well, my flesh wants what the Spirit wants, well, my flesh wants what the Spirit wants. And I'm telling you, there is a way through that because there's a way forward in Jesus' name. Jesus wants to offer so much more of this kingdom life. So in order to understand how it means to have the Holy Spirit guide your life, you have to understand that it's not really just a self-control or a strong will problem. It actually has to do with the lack of a vision of the Spirit leading our life. You see, what you think of as a lot of the sin patterns that you might be stuck in for years and years, has less to do with just that specific sin and more to do with the fact that we don't have a vision for a Holy Spirit-led life. You don't have a vision for a Spirit-filled life. You see, if you want to have a vision for a self-controlled life, you need to have a vision for a Spirit-filled life. So here's my question for you. Do you have a vision for a Spirit-filled life? I bet you might have a vision for like a married life or a vision for a spend my own time the way I want to life or a vision for I just want to be happy life or a vision for I want to be financially free life, but do you have a vision for a Spirit-filled, a Spirit-controlled life? Because my question for you is, what if you got everything you ever wanted or at least everything you ever thought you wanted? Basically, what if all your vision came true? What if you got the things that you've always thought that you wanted, but then once you had them, you'd realize you didn't actually want them? And when it comes to temptations in our life, we often find ourselves in that exact quandary. We finally get the thing that our body desires, our eyes can see, and what we wanted to gain. And then once we get it, we're filled with a lot of that regret, a lot of that disappointment, a lot of that shame. Well, here's why? When it comes to you, if you don't have a Spirit-filled life, first of all, you won't know what to do with any of the things that you think that you want, and a lot of times the things that we want that are not part of our decision-making from a Spirit-filled life are so damaging to us. And they're so painful after the fact that some of our sins damage us quickly, but a lot more are more subtle and insidious and more long-term, these long-term patterns of sin. And so we say to ourselves, “Oh, I'm just not going to do that anymore. I'm just going to like, stop doing that.” But you have to understand, it's not going to be enough to say, I don't want to do that anymore, because it's not going to be enough to say I don't want to be like my parents, and it's not going to be enough to say I don't want to envy their life anymore, and it's not going to be enough to say I don't want to look at that thing again, why? Because you can't just have a vision for what you don't want to do. You have to have a vision for who you want to become in Jesus' name. It's not enough to just have a vision for all the things I don't want to do. That won't get you there. You have to have a vision for who you want to be. It's not enough to be like, don't lust, don't gossip, don't envy, don't be bitter, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, because you just can't have a vision for who you don't want to be or what you don't want to do. You must have a vision for this kingdom life, who I want to become in Jesus' name.

And that's why so many of us have not broken out of our loops, our patterns, because so many of us have been living our life like a version of the show The Floor is Lava. Oh, no, don't look at that, and don't get mad when they do that, and don't spend too much over it. And so suddenly, your entire life is built around all the things you're trying not to do, and inevitably, just like in that show, when you're trying not to do those things and you lose your balance, you will fall into the lava. But it's the people that are like, I'm going to win. I'm going to make it all the way across the obstacle course. I'm not even going to really think that much about what I'm jumping onto. I'm just going to go. Those are the awesome people in that show. And that's kinda like it is to live life with Jesus, to be like, actually, we could spend a lot of time talking about sin, but in reality, I'm already forgiven for my sin, and sin is not my master anymore, it doesn't control me. So what I'd rather do is I'd rather look to Jesus and His move in my life, and I'd rather try to just live like He lived, and then suddenly, everything else in my life makes a lot more sense, and I suddenly have this vision for a Spirit-filled life, and I'm breaking through all the sin patterns that I used to fall into. Usually, when we hear self-control, we think of subtraction versus addition, what I'm losing versus what I'm gaining. But in reality, self-control is everything to gain and nothing to lose. Because self-control is a Fruit of the Spirit, so when I live my life self-controlled, I'm gaining everything in Jesus, I'm not losing anything. I'm not losing any of the things that actually were damaging to me and were causing me to fall into the lava in the first place. I'm actually gaining everything that Jesus has for me, a vision for my better life. And you can actually get to the point, when it comes to self-control, that you actually start to change, um, you change your desires and you change your tastes, so much so that those things that used to be really tempting are not as tempting anymore. Like, it is possible to break through, because that's what we see in the life of Jesus.

And I'll even give you an example. I bet you there's not many people in this room right now that are thinking, you know what would be awesome? Is right after the young adult gathering, if we went over and robbed Hobby Lobby, because I've really been longing for one of those to, longing for this too blessed to be stressed signs to put up in my room. So maybe just after this, we can take a rock, bust through the window, and see if we can grab one of those signs for ourselves, right? There's not a whole lot of people here thinking that right now, why? Well, let's see, your vision for your life is so clarified that you don't really want to spend the week in Denton County Jail, you don't really see any value in even being tempted by that, and it would mean nothing to you, okay? Well, that's probably like, yeah, of course, that makes sense. Okay, well, who's to say your whole life couldn't be like that? Who's to say your whole life couldn't be so clarified with such a clarified vision to live Spirit-filled like Jesus did, that every temptation that you ever faced would start to just be like, yes, I’m worth it. Like what, why would I even do that? That doesn't make any sense. So for example, you could have a vision for budgeting Jesus' way. You could be so self-controlled, you wouldn't even have a temptation to like get Uber Eats five nights this week, right? Because you're like, that's not my budget. I'm doing my budgeting in Jesus’ way. You could be so clarified in your vision for stuff like peaceful relationships that you weren't even going to get suckered into the chaotic conversations because you're a person of peace. And so that doesn't match a clarified vision that Jesus has given you. You could be so clarified in a vision for what your eyes are going to look at that you know your eyes are the lamp to your body, and so you're not going to look at things that are going to damage you. But your vision would be so clarified, like it wouldn't have control over you anymore. Who's to say your whole life couldn't be like that? That's a different kind of life. That's a Spirit-filled life. When you have a vision for who you want to become, not just what you don't want to do, that's self-control at a whole different level. 

Many of us have visions for what we don't want to do, and that's why it's not working. Because when your life is thinking, it's who I want to become in Jesus' name, I want to live His kingdom life, that's self-control at a whole different level. That's when the temptation actually starts to flip, and that's when the things that used to have control over you become easier not to do than to do. And that's how Jesus lived His life. So one of the things that blows my mind about the end of Jesus, is that He does things when it comes to like, He is like, holding of His tongue that I can't even dream of. So it's easier for Jesus not to try to defend Himself when the Pharisees are mocking Him publicly and making fun of Him, than it would be to go toe-to-toe with them and just start like, blasting them with His wisdom. It was actually easier for Him to just be like, "I'm good," and say nothing. It was easier for Jesus to look at Judas when Judas was turning Him over to the authorities and be like, “Do what you came here for, friend.” With no sarcasm in His voice, with no bitterness, than it would have been for Him to say, "I hate you for what you're doing right now." Are you serious? It was way easier for Jesus to set His face like flint, uh, and go to the cross and finish the work that He came here for, than it would have been to call 10,000 angels to come and get Him off the cross. Way easier, because He'd built Himself, and He'd lived with such a fullness of the Spirit, that there wasn't any room for self. And there wasn't any room for what He wanted to do. Jesus was so self-controlled, because He was so Spirit-controlled, because He was so spirit filled. So you can only be controlled by whatever you're filled with. Your actions portray your heart. Your actions portray your heart. The outside of you always reflects the inside of you. The mouth speaks what the heart is full of and it's not what goes into a body that defiles it. It's what's already in there. And so that's, I said this before, that's why if your eyes are full of light, your whole body will be full of light. And so some of you honestly are so filled with bitterness that bitterness just has control over you. Some of you are so filled with lust that constantly your eyes are filled with lust and you see people as a possession, not as God's special creation. Some of you are so filled with self that self has control over you. But in Jesus' name, there is a better way. There is a kingdom way. And as we learn from Him, and we live life in the kingdom, He gives us a different kind of way. What if you were so filled with the Spirit that the Spirit had control of you? So filled with peace that a peace that passes understanding had control of you? So filled with wisdom that the spirit of wisdom would lead you into wisdom in every decision because the spirit of wisdom had control of you? So filled with the God of comfort that you just lived a life of not trying to seek comfort, but the God of all comfort comforts you? And so you can comfort other people, that kind of life. And the spirit had control over you. You see, a vision for a spirit-filled life is a vision for a self-controlled life. Now, the last time we were together, we had a whole conversation about freedom from the world. And so maybe you're hearing me say that, you're like, "That all sounds great. You have absolutely no clue how long I've been stuck with that addiction, that thing, this way that I am, how I interact with people, this anger, a comfort, idolatry in my life. You don't know how it's been for me." And I just want to say to you first and foremost, I don't, I don't. The fishbowl of the world, that thing is real. We get stuck there very much in our life. But Jesus knows exactly how you're feeling and exactly what you've been through because He's the one that knows it this way. Check out this verse. "So we don't have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses. We have one that's been tempted in every way just as we are, yet he did not sin." Why? Because hHe was so Spirit-filled, there wasn't any room for it. That's why He's able to empathize with exactly what you're going through because He knows how difficult it is. He's faced every temptation we've ever faced. And so, no temptation has taken a hold of you that He won't provide a way out for. You know what the way out is? The way out is to let Him in. The way out is let the Spirit in. That’s the way out of the temptation. A lot of times we get so confused. We'll hear verses like, "Don't get drunk on wine, but be filled with the Holy Spirit." We think the verse is totally focused on not getting drunk. It's actually totally focused on being filled with the Spirit, so you won't want to. You'll be so filled, there's no room for anything else to take over your life. And that's the way that Jesus lived. 

You want to know why some of us can't stop sinning? You know why you can't stop sinning? Ready? Because you can't stop sinning, that's why? Because I can't stop sinning, but the Holy Spirit inside of me, that changes the game. Because His supernatural, His divine power gives me everything I need for my life and my godliness to the measure of Him who's called me to my life. So here's my question. What's inside of you? If you just, if somebody were to just look at the totality of your actions and your thoughts and your interactions, what's inside of you? Because we often hear a thought like that and be like, oh man, I'd be ashamed, that'd be horrible. Okay. I get it. There's a lot of stuff that we're working through, the human condition is very real. But can I just say that for those that are in Christ, you know what you have? You got the Spirit of the living God inside of you. That's what you have. You got the Holy Spirit inside of you, leading you, guiding you, showing you, revealing Himself to you. And that's what was inside of Jesus, the Holy Spirit. And because He had the Holy Spirit and because He was continually filled with the Holy Spirit, He was able to live a self-controlled life. Check out this verse out of Acts 10. "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power." And you know what the next part of the verse doesn't say? "And He just barely stopped sinning all the time from the stuff that He always struggled with and were always the temptations and He could never get past." It doesn't say that. You know what it does say? He went around doing good and He healed all those that were under the power of the devil because God was with Him. He lived a completely different kingdom life. He wasn't just barely scraping by. He was anointed with the Holy Spirit. And so here's how this works. If you have Jesus, you have 100% of all of the Holy Spirit you'll ever need. Quite frankly, if you don't have Jesus, you don't have that. So you can't even move into the next phase of what we're talking about because you would need to say, I need Jesus. I can't do it on my own and I don't want to anymore. When you say that, you get the Holy Spirit, 100%, all you will ever need. And here's the crazy part. There's still more Holy Spirit to receive. And how do I know that? Well, because Jesus, who was God and was literally connected to the Holy Spirit, was anointed with the Holy Spirit and with power.

So that is Jesus who was born with connection and relationship with the Holy Spirit was anointed especially for His life, especially to live with power and to do good and to heal all those that are under the power of the devil because God was with Him. What does that mean? It means that the very best way to think about a kingdom life of self-control has so little to do with me trying to control it, it's almost hilarious. And everything to do with being filled to all the measure of the fullness of God. And when I'm Spirit-filled and then when I'm refilled and then after that when I'm filled again and then tomorrow morning when I wake up, when I choose to be filled again and I say, Holy Spirit, fill me to overflowing. Suddenly then I'm filled for the life that Jesus has called me to. And my life is not just about trying not to mess up all the time. It's about living in the power and the fullness of what I have in Jesus. So as the band comes back out, I got a special invitation for you tonight. The invitation is that anybody who would want to have a fresh filling of the Holy Spirit and when I start praying in just a moment, I want to invite you to stand up and somehow either open your hands or raise your hands like this as a sign of surrender and I'm going to pray that you are filled fresh with the power of the Holy Spirit. I'm going to pray that you're Spirit-filled because the best way to help you live self-controlled has so little to do with yourself and everything to do with being controlled by the Spirit. For everybody else who's like, I'm not sure if I want that, man, I would actually encourage you to stay seated and actually not do it because a bunch of people in the room are going to do it. Anybody that says, I need a fresh filling of the Holy Spirit, I believe He wants to move right now in power over your life. I believe by faith that God wants to anoint you with the Holy Spirit in power. So in just a second when I start praying, if you want to stand up by faith to receive this. Um, everybody else, I just encourage you, close your eyes. And so Jesus, I pray for every person in this room that's standing up right now to receive this by faith. Um, no hype, all heart. And so I pray for each one of you that right now you'd be filled with the of the Holy Spirit, that even as I pray for you, you would have literally like electricity through your fingers. You'd feel God moving through you tangibly. He'd begin to move through your hands, to the top of your head, down through your chest and your shoulders down your torso, into your legs, down to your feet, that you would be filled so, you'd be filled up so much right now that you'd be able to not just hear me say these words, you feel the power of the Holy Spirit. I pray that you, in this moment, would be filled and anointed so that you'll live your life going around and doing good, and you'll heal people with the words of God, and you'll know that God is with you, and you'll have a sense that there's so much more than the life you've been living. You'll have this sense that you're not just trying to barely scrape by, trying to get past your sin, the sin that's damaged you for generations, like literally the long, devastated places in your family. You're not just trying to repeat that. You're not trying to, uh, you're not trying to get rid of it of your own effort. You're living in the reality of this kingdom that will never end, and the Holy Spirit that's available to you every moment of every day and every time that you're tempted. And so the best way out is to let Him in. And the best way forward is to know that Jesus is guiding you. And the best way to work through whatever you're facing right now is to know that you don't do it in your own power. You do it in the power that only He provides, Holy Spirit, blow. Come like a rushing wind. I break off any sin and brokenness in the name of Jesus. I replace it with the fullness of the kingdom of God. I break off anything you've tried to do in your self-effort, and I replace it with the goodness of the Holy Spirit in you right now. I break off those places in your mind that you think you're an enemy of God, you're not. In Jesus' name, you once were enemies. Now you've been brought near by the power of Jesus. And so may you be filled to all the fullness of God right now. Thank You, Holy Spirit, for a fresh filling. Thank You for anointing us. Thanks for moving in us. And thank You that You are the one that gives us all the self-control for the life You've called us to. I bless this room, I call out the power of the Holy Spirit, and we walk it, and we choose to walk forward in Jesus' name.