You know, I hope you understand how unique uh mission Grove is um with your involvement in, in the grafted church. Uh It is not many churches that take their resources and uh take their senior pastor and say, we want you to help another young guy uh get churches going. But the reality is that it is one of the most effective ways of fulfilling what Jesus asked his disciples to do in, in Matthew chapter 28. Um Jesus says, he gathers his disciples together. He has gone to the cross. He is laid in the tomb, he's risen from the dead and now he's spent 50 days with his disciples and he gathers them all together on this mountain just before he leaves. And he says to them says all authority in heaven and on earth that covers just about how much authority that that would be just about all of it. So it's all authority I have. And here is what I'm telling you now, what he tells them has one verb in it. So I want you to think about it and find out what is that verb? He says, go into all nations and make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the father, son and Holy Spirit and teaching them to obey all that I commanded you. So what's, what's the verb is the rumor? One more time. Loud. Go. OK. Everybody go. Trick question. Nope, it's not go. It, it's actually the word go is as you are going because the reality is that we're not gonna have to send Kurt in here at about quarter to 12 and say, hey, everybody, you have to go. Are we, you're gonna go. That's what, that's what we do. We naturally go. You're gonna go back into your, to your neighborhood. You're gonna go back to your work, you're gonna go back to your schools. And Jesus says, as you're going make disciples. Uh And actually, that's one Greek word make disciples. That's what we're called to do. The last words that Jesus had for his disciples was here's what I want you to do make disciples. And every study indicates that more disciples are made by disciples. Because if you're a follower of Christ, you're a disciple, more disciples are made by disciples in church plants than in any other way. Did you know that? So when Mission Grove takes the time and the energy and the commitment to go plant another church, you are effectively fulfilling what Jesus called us to do is to make disciples. And so you have now planted Mission Grove has planted grafted church and graf the church is gonna begin to look to see how can they start a church. But because you've planted a church, you don't go uh we did our job. No, when John comes back next week, boy, for about to have about 50 of you go up to him and says, John, that was so great that grafted church. When are we gonna do it again? That would be a thrill for him because he is convinced that's what mission Grove has been called to do. And another thing that you are blessed with is Dave Reno is a part of your church. You, you've heard him speak up here. Dave is a part of a, a ministry called the Timothy Initiative where it's disciples making disciples. If you consider yourself a disciple of Christ, a person who is a follower of Christ and you're going, I just wish I had better training on how to make disciples. Um He is gonna have a class on September 22nd and I would encourage you to go and say, how do I want? I wanna get better at that. If that's what Jesus called us to do, I wanna get better at that. And so I encourage you to uh uh watch for it. And, and when you have a chance to sign up for the disciples, making disciples class, now we're going to uh continue with John's study called Centered. It was in the midst of all of the chaos. Does anybody feel like life has a little bit of chaos going on. Yeah. Yeah. I, I'm a news junkie. Um, it's a crazy world out there. It's not. So, uh, and for most of us there's a sense of anxiety that comes with it. Oh, no. What if the other side wins the election? Oh, no. If they win every, and there's a level of anxiety. But some of you have a level of anxiety. Maybe because of some health issues. M maybe for you, the, the anxiety comes from your, your marriage. There's a struggle there and you just confused and it's a tough time for you. Well, the question that we're gonna ask today is, could you be blind to the negative power of your emotion? Your emotions are having to your life and on your relationships, is there any possibility that you might be blind to just how, what your emotions are doing? I, when I was 19, my father bought his first little tiny grocery store in, in Minneapolis and he looked, and he said, well, I've got three boys and I got myself, uh I bet I could own a store and work them to death and, and he pulled it off and we had one customer that was an amazing customer. He would come in every week and he would go get a grocery cart and he would stop and just stand there at the cart holding his cart and he would stand there and when you spotted him, somebody needed to quickly go over there and grab his cart, ask him how he was doing and take him around the store because he was totally 100% blind. And so we would take, you'd say, let's go get some eggs and we'd go get some eggs. He says, I need some Cheerios and we'd go get some Cheerios. But the one that got me is, he'd say, now let's go to the produce department and we go into the produce department. He says, let me see some of those tomatoes. Oh, what? And he'd go over there and he peel the tomatoes and he'd say, OK, I'll take this one and he'd say, let's go see the lettuce. And I'm sitting there thinking with everything that is in me. I would love to help you see the lettuce, but I can't because you're blind. Jesus asked the question when he was teaching one day, he says, can the blind, can a blind man lead a blind man? Will they not both fall into a pit? And the same is true for us that if emotionally we are blind, we're, we're gonna struggle in our life and we may not be even aware of emotionally what we're doing to other people. And so really, the, the big idea for today is emotional blindness blocks our ability to see God's plan and participate in healthy relationships. And so we're gonna be asking the question are you blind. Is that an area for you? And, and I know some of us are sitting here and go, wow, man, how did I get stuck with this one? I'm not emotionally blind, but a lot of times that's arrogance. Listen to what Paul writes to the Corinthian Church in First Corinthians 10 verses 12 and 13. So if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall. Do you get it? If you think you're standing firm, if you go on, when it comes to life, I have life altogether. He says, be careful. And then the verse continues with something that I think is, is really misunderstood. It said no temptation has overtaken you, which is common, which is not common to man and God is faithful. He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will provide a way out so that you can endure it. You know, most often when people hear that verse, they, they'll come to me and they'll say, you know what? I just don't believe that verse uh uh what I'm going through, my husband's had three brain surgeries and I've had to watch him deteriorate and this is way more than I can bear. So some of you have lost a spouse and you're going, I have no idea what God's talking about that. He wouldn't let me have more than I can endure. I cannot imagine it. But there's some of you here. I know have lost a child and you are torn up and you are going, God had no idea what he said because it was way beyond what I could endure. Some of you are going through health things or financial things or marital and you're going, I, I'm at the edge. The verse does not say God will not allow you to go through anything that you cannot bear. Doesn't say that I promise you each and every one of us goes through things that are way too much for us to bear way over the top. And in fact, that's why he knew we needed a church. We needed a community of brothers and sisters who in those moments when it's just too tough, we have other people who surround us. It's why he sent us the Holy Spirit and called the Holy Spirit, the comforter because he knew there would be times in life when we go way beyond what we can handle what the passage says is. There's no temptation that you'll ever have to face that isn't common to man. And with the temptation, I'll provide a way of escape. I've heard people explain how they've gotten caught up in sin and they go, well, it really wasn't my fault. I had one lady come to me one time. I, I thought she was kidding me. But the tears were a dead giveaway that she wasn't. And she said that. My husband is a successful international salesman. He travels literally around the world. And when he goes to other countries and other places, you almost always ends up having sex with other women. And when I've confronted him on it, he said I can't help it. It's how God made me. You know what? That's exactly the reason why God has given us the back of a hand. Do you get what I mean? It means don't tolerate that. That's the, that's the most bizarre thing. Boom. No, not a chance in the world. You know what? Every time you're tempted, God provides a way of escape. He says to you in your head don't do it, so don't do it. You go, oh, I don't have a choice. The, the verse does not talk about that. It's talking about arrogance that we don't make excuses. And for, for many of us we have there's a level of arrogance that we have and, and I'm convinced that arrogance. There's two causes for arrogance. Number one is, are the two causes for the lack of humility. One of them is arrogance. I think I'm pretty cotton picking good. You know, I sort of sense. I have a feeling that when I get to heaven, God's gonna go, I'm so glad you're here. It's such a mess up here now that you're here, you can get everything straightened out. There are some of you who think that there are some of you who believe that? Yeah, I can take care of it. But you know what the other reason for the lack of humility or what is perceived as a lack of humility. It's a low self esteem. You absolutely don't feel like you're terrific. But instead you feel like I, I have to always look like I have it together because I feel like a failure because when I was little, I was told I was a failure. And I have to let people think I always have it together. And that creates an emotional blindness that we fail to see what's going on in our life and what God wants to accomplish in her life. So here's some questions I'd like you to ask yourself. Are you filled with anxiety? There's some of you who are here, who would go right off the bat? Yeah, that's where I'm at right now. II I feel anxious all the time. Another question is, do you have to be right all the time? Are you defensive? That's sort of your nature. Are you defensive when, when, when people come to you and they, they point out an area of weakness? Do you create an environment in which it's difficult for people to be honest with you? Do you create that Patrick Lencioni is a consultant for businesses and he goes in and he tries to deal with and help companies get healthy and, and he tells the story about going to one company that he had been hired to help. And he had um the, the people take a survey uh about their CEO and they asked him to describe him and they described him as the CEO was angry all the time. The CEO didn't take any ideas from other people. The CEO had to be the smartest guy in the room and, and so Lynn Chion sat down and he shared this with the CEO and with the team and the CEO turned to the team and said to them, I don't think I'm an angry person. Do you guys think I'm an angry person? What do you think? They said no, not me. Next guy, not me. I, I would have never said that. No, you, you think I'm a no way. It, it says you think that I shut people down? I just think I'm really good at drawing out of people who, who thinks I shut somebody down? No, not me. No, no. You are always open to my ideas and Lynch only came back up and he said, he said, guys, I didn't write those answers. You wrote those answers and they go, oh no, it wasn't me. Whose fault was that, that they wouldn't be honest. It's the fault of the CEO, right? You know, I, I always say if, if you want people to be honest, who decides whether you're going to be honest with me, do you decide it or do I, we oftentimes think that, well, you, you decide whether you're going to be honest with me, but that's not true. Basically, people have good hearts and, and, and after the, the message I may go around and I may ask people, what do you think of the message? You go. Well, don't be too hard on me now. Just, just be kind. What are you gonna say? I thought it was about the most boring thing I ever sat through. Probably not. You're probably gonna go oh I don't think this guy could handle the truth. And so we have to ask ourselves, do we create an environment in our families at work with our friends where they can really be honest with us or if we created a situation where if they were honest, we would be defensive and explain to them why they're wrong. So as we look at those questions, they are, do we always have to be right? Are we frequently angry? Do you often feel out of control? And so I believe that if we're going to be centered, Pastor John is kinda encouraging us. Let's be centered in the midst of this chaos, let's be centered. The first thing we have to do is we have to be healed of our emotional blindness so that we cannot see how we really are. And if we're gonna see how we really are, we need God's help and we need Christian brothers and sisters help. So we're gonna turn to Psalm 139 and I believe in Psalm 139 there is instructions on how to discover if you're emotionally blind and how to be healed. Here's what it says in Psalm 139 and then in, in uh verse 23 search me oh God and know my heart. Search me. Oh God. And know my heart interestingly. Look at, look at verse one of Psalm 139. 0 Lord, you have searched me and you know me. Does that make any sense at all? Search me and know my heart? But you already said he has searched you and he knows what, what does that mean? But does God know everything? Yeah, God knows everything. That's a pretty casual thing to say. God knows everything. Why would God then search my heart? It would be to help me see what's there. He already knows it. God search my heart. I want you to do a deep dive in my heart and see what's there. See what's going on in my heart right now so that so that I can be a different person, but I need to see it first. Some of, you know, your weaknesses. Yeah. I, I remember a guy that I supervised um, in one of my jobs and, and as I sat with him, I said, you realize you're angry all the time. E everybody's afraid to come to you because you, you just shut them down. You're just so angry all the time. He looked at me and he said, Dan, do you really think you're the first person who told me that I'm going? Probably not. Um, but you haven't made any changes. It's just who I am. You know, some of you are sitting here and you've put up these barriers and you're doing it intentionally, you, you, you feel like you need to be in control and you're doing it intentionally. What you're doing with this passage, God, the, the psalmist is saying, I want you to go deep into my heart. And I, why am I angry? Why am I anxious? I want you to dig down Lord in me and to open it up in such a way that I can see what's going on and for each of us, are we willing to do that? Are we willing to let God go deep into our heart to open us up so that, that we know why our hearts are the way they are. He says to me and know my anxious thoughts test me. The word thought is also found at the beginning of psalm 139. It says, you know, when I sit and when I rise, you perceive my thoughts from afar. He says, God, you know, you know from heaven. What I'm thinking am I, am I able to think something that God goes? Didn't see that. No, he, he says that. But now he says, what I'd like you to do is I'd like you to test my thoughts and the word thoughts is a different word. It, it's the, the anxious, the, the upset thoughts, what's going on in our head that's controlling us. If you're here today, what, what is in your mind? That even now as you're sitting there is really controlling your thinking, maybe it's your business. Maybe you're going, I got this big deal coming up this week and I don't know if I'm going to be able to make that sale. Maybe it's your health. You're sitting there going Monday morning, I've got a doctor's appointment. I'm really terrified of what he's gonna say. So there's all this anxiety. Maybe there's some of you who are sitting here who are in a marriage relationship where you're going, just not positive that this is gonna work out and I'm worried they're gonna leave me and right now in the midst of it, your, your thoughts are always there, Jesus in the sermon on the mount, he said to his disciples. He said, don't worry about what you're gonna eat or drink or what you're gonna wear. And, and I'm, I'm a little different than most of you. You guys are way more respectful than I am when I, when I think about some of the things that Jesus said. So I gotta be honest. The first time I read that Jesus telling his disciples, you know, stop worrying about what you're gonna wear. I'm sitting there going, you know, Jesus, I think that's sort of a dumb thing to say to your disciples. I mean, it's not like Peter got up in the morning and he went over to a big stamp, a night luggage thing and opened it up and, oh my gosh, what am I gonna wear today? So, if it doesn't mean that, why tell the disciples that what's, what's the point? Well, I think the disciples were worried about what they were going to eat or what they were, they had become followers of Jesus. And they said, you know, how are we gonna get taken care of tomorrow? You know, I sat with Jesus yesterday and today, I wasn't sure how we were gonna eat and yet Jesus fed the 5000. But how are we gonna do it tomorrow? And so their mind was on, how are we going to get taken care of? And Jesus said, stop worrying about that, but seek first the kingdom of God and all these things will be added unto you. The testing of our thoughts is really the idea of, have we placed anything in front of God? Is there anything that consumes our mind more than God's will in our life? And so the psalmist says, search me, test me and know my anxious thought, see if there is any offensive way in me. And the idea of offensive is that false God, Lord I want you to open up my heart and see if there's a false God in there that I've, I've made something more important than you. Do. We ever have those kinds of prayer times, those kinds of reflection times. And then it says, this lead me in the way everlasting. Literally, it says, lead me in the way that I started. I if you took, take just a moment and say, what was it like at the beginning of your walk with Christ? Some of you are here and you might go II, I never started that journey. I've, I've gone to church for a long time, but I've, I've never come to the place where I've said, Jesus, you take control. There's others of you here who can remember that like that. It was such a sweet time in your life where you said, Lord, I'm gonna let you be in control. And then as the years have gone by, you've been caught up in other things and caught up in life and all of a sudden, it's less and less that you sense God is in control and more and more that you're in control. And the writer of the Psalms is saying, Lord, I wanna be back there in the beginning where we were and I want that to go on in my life. I had a friend come to me one time and he says, Dan, my, my wife and I after listening to your sermon have decided to stop drinking. And I said, when, when did I ever talk about drinking? And he said, oh, you never did. And I said, I, I don't get it then. How, how did you make that connection? And he goes, oh, you told us to just ask God if there was anything in our life that was interfering with our relationships and, and my wife and I prayed about it and we came to realize that drinking was getting in the way of our relationships. And so we've just decided not to see what they were doing is they were praying and saying God, show me if there is anything there, I don't know what it would be. There's some of you who the Lord may bring to your head right away that, that you're spending a life in pornography that is just interfering with your relationship with God and your relationship with others. Some of you, it's finances and that they're just all consuming and, and it's just wrecking your relationship with others for others. The anxiety may be even political today that it's having a controlling influence in your life. I don't know what it is. But what I would like us to do right now is I'd like us to just bow our heads and, and close our eyes. This is, this is a time not for you and your spouse or you and your friend or, or anybody else, just you and that you're there and you're coming to God. And you're saying, God search me, search my heart right now. Is God able to do that? Take the time to search my heart? Lord test my thoughts right now is with Josh here together, ask God to test your thoughts. Are there, are there thoughts that are consuming you that are not healthy? They interfere with your understanding. God. There, there are a problem in your relationships. And if you're a person who's been a follower of Christ, ask God to just take you back to that moment that you made that commitment and say, Lord II, I want to be back there. I want you to take all this old junk that I've collected over the years and I want you to get rid of it and in place of it, I want that close enduring relationship that I had just stop for a moment and reflect and listen for the voice of God. Is he talking to you and telling you something even this morning?