The Healing Word

Guest (Male): The healing word ministry on one place is brought to you by the generous donations of people like you. At any time during today's message, feel free to send a prayer request or make a donation using the links provided. Now I pray you will be blessed as Pastor Jack Morris delivers a message from the word of God that will encourage and strengthen your faith in him.

Pastor Jack Morris: The peace of God. God not only will put peace in your heart and bring rest to your life. When you take these truths fully take them and you take all of them and receive them, not only will God impart his peace to you, the God who is imparting the peace, the God himself will come and enter into you.

Guest (Male): Welcome to the healing word, a ministry dedicated to offering strength and encouragement through God's word for anyone facing life's challenges. As believers, we want to serve God and walk in his will. Though the path isn't always easy, today's message is here to meet you at your point of need, bringing hope and renewing your faith. Now here's Pastor Jack Morris.

Pastor Jack Morris: Philippians chapter four verse eight, the very first word, finally. You see that word? Oh, Paul is not concluding the letter yet. He has a little bit more yet to say, but he's making a transition here. He's going to give us the final imperative. He started this whole chapter giving us imperatives, not suggestions, but commands on how to live a wonderful Christian life. He tells us that we need in the beginning of the chapter, we need unity in the church. We need unity between brothers and brothers and sisters and sisters and brothers and sisters in Christ.

There must be unity. Without unity, we're not Christ-like. He goes on to tell us that we need to pray, petition, give thanks, and we'll have peace. He tells us to rejoice in the Lord. He gives us a whole list of imperatives, and it would behoove all of us to go back and read this chapter again if we haven't read it yet, at least well yes, the whole chapter of Philippians chapter four. But now he's going to give us the last imperative, the the final imperative. He's going to make a transition and he breaks down the final imperatives into several component parts.

He tells us that God would have us to have an excellent character and praiseworthy behavior. And he tells us exactly how to have an excellent character and praiseworthy behavior. He tells us this in verse nine. If we have an excellent character, if we have praiseworthy behavior, we will most certainly get the father's well-done benediction when this life is over. Excellent character and praiseworthy behavior. This is a testimony to the world that Christ is in us and he's telling his congregation in Philippi to witness to the people around you, have a good character. Let the people look at you and say that's a wonderful man.

That's a wonderful woman. And they will look at the life that you live and wonder and then you will have the testimony to say it's a result of the grace of God. Let your life be your testimony, not just your words, but live the Christian abundant life and people will see your character. They will see your lifestyle. They will admire you. They will open their hearts and now they will listen to the words that you have to say. Now to become such a person of excellent character and praiseworthy behavior, to become such a person, the the motivation, the action, the strength begins in the mind.

Now what I'm saying today, dear friends, listen to me closely, this is not mind over matter and this is not new agism. I'm not preaching new agism. I'm preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ as Paul outlines it, as the Holy Spirit moves upon him and motivates him. Paul is saying, you can't become a person of excellent character and praiseworthy behavior until you get your thought life right. Get your thought life right. Get your head right and your heart will follow and your life will follow. Now we have invisible thoughts. All of us do. I can't see what you're thinking.

You can't see what I'm thinking. It's our thoughts are somewhere hidden in our skull, in our head. But Paul is telling us if we think it long enough, what is hidden and invisible will begin to manifest itself in behavior and in character and everybody will know what you've been thinking. Your life and your behavior will begin to reveal the thoughts that you have you have had. Now the scripture says so many many years ago, so long ago in Proverbs chapter 23 verse seven, as a man or a woman thinketh in their heart, so is he or she.

Long before psychiatry, the word of God told us so that as we think, we will become and we will behave. Our thinking will reveal itself. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, a man's life is what his thoughts make it. A man's life is what his thoughts make it. Marcus Aurelius said, a man's life is what his thoughts make it. Waldo Emerson said, a man becomes what he thinks about all day long. You become what you think. The imaginations of the heart of the mind begin to reveal itself in how we act and how we live. There's a word called psychiatry.

You've heard that word before. It comes from two Greek words, psyche which means person or soul and itary which means treatment, healing and restoration. You put the two words together. They now are made into one word which means healing and restoration of the soul or the mind. Long before psychiatry, long before the word was ever invented, the scripture tells us God knew that and he tells us what he knew and that is what we think, that's what we become. That's exactly what we are. Now participating in psychiatry are physicians, physicians who will administer psychotropic drugs and medication for those who have a chemical imbalance in the brain.

School teachers will participate in psychiatry even though they don't say that they're part of the psychiatry science or system, yet they're participating because they are training the mind with truth and imparting knowledge. Ministers are involved in psychiatry because ministers bring the spiritual walls of the word of God. Now when a life violates the word of God, when that is violated, the word of God is violated, that is certainly an indication that before it was ever violated, that life, that that behavior, that character, that individual was violating the word of God in his or her thinking in their minds.

This is what we're told in the scripture. Under point A, write down the word right, the necessity of thinking right. It is necessary to get our thinking corrected and to get it right because if it is wrong, wrong thinking produces wrong behavior. Nothing right ever came out of wrong. You're still with me? Saint Augustine said, my soul is restless until it finds rest in thee, oh God, meaning my soul, my psyche, my mind. People are agitated today. Their their mind, their whole physical, spiritual, emotional system is agitated today because they have violated the laws of God and they're not living right.

Now they might be have the appearance of a good citizen, a good neighbor, even a good church goer. But there is a restlessness, an uneasiness. Something isn't right. I look at the marriages of so many people and I know there's something wrong. Their the restlessness has not been satisfied. They they they marry and divorce. They marry and divorce. They marry and divorce. They do it two, three, four times. They can't quite get it right. There's a restlessness. They're searching. They're they're they they don't know really what they want. They only know when they get something they don't want that they don't want it, but they the restlessness causes them not to know exactly what's going to make a good marriage.

What's going to make me a good husband? What's going to make me a good wife? The restlessness is there. I see it in marriages. I see it in young people. I see it in people going from job to job. They work a little while, six, eight months, they quit, they go somewhere else. The restlessness is there. People looking for thrills and excitement, searching, ever searching. Saint Augustine says, my soul is restless. Friend, you you may be a good person, even a Christian person, but there's a restlessness. There there there's there's something wrong with there there is something not not quite together, not connecting.

And the scripture is telling us, Paul is telling us, I'm so glad you're here today to hear what Paul is telling us, how we can find peace and rest in our soul, get our homes right, our marriages right, our jobs right, our careers right. People, I know people and you do too. They can't stay at one church too long. Only a few months, a few years, they're gone. They go from church to church. They've had their membership all over the place. There's a restlessness. And today the Holy Spirit comes to help us to know how to to make our life conform in harmony with God that the restlessness might be gone and that we might be at peace.

The necessity of thinking right. The psalmist says in Psalm 23, he restoreth my soul, meaning he takes care of my psychiatry. He takes care of my thinking. He heals me of this restlessness. I obey the great physician, the great doctor that comes to me with healing rest, healing rest to my marriage, healing healing rest to my church attendance, healing rest to my career, healing rest to my relationships. There's a healing rest. But friend, you need to look at yourself transparently and all honestly and say, somewhere I must be violating something that God wants me to conform to.

Now become honest and you will receive the healing touch of the master and there will come a rest to your soul. Otherwise you will go and go and go and never find rest to your soul. The psalmist says, he restoreth my soul. Say those words with me. He restoreth my soul. Now put on point B, write down the way we should think. Write down the word think. Now you have a a lot of lines, one, two, three, four, five, six uh with quotes around them. For the moment, maybe you don't need to be writing all these words down.

I'd rather maybe you take your Bible to verse eight. Philippians chapter four verse eight and let's look at these words. You can write them down. You certainly may do that, but I want you to look at them in the word. He says, finally my brothers, whatsoever is what?

Guest (Male): True.

Pastor Jack Morris: Now we're this is how we're to start thinking. We're to start thinking true. Now by that it simply means let your thinking be consistent with the word of God. Now so many Christ most Christians today they're they're biblically illiterate. They don't know what the word says so they can't conform their thinking to the word of God. And and this is this is this is bad. This is where part of the problem is. But our thinking needs to be true. God's word is true. Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. So we need to conform to him and his word.

And and this is the way to think uh consistently. Now if we think true, we will have true behavior. Okay, secondly, look at the second word. Brothers, whatsoever is true, whatsoever is what?

Guest (Male): Noble.

Pastor Jack Morris: Noble. Now that's respect. That's reverence. We need listen to me now very closely. We need to respect and reverence one another. Whether we agree with one another, that's that's not what it's saying. It's saying we need to respect and reverence even another person's opinion. Not that we're going to condone it, but respect. Now the word of God is so practical. It's it's a manual to live by. It really is. This book is for you, friend, and for me. And when we think right, we're going to behave right. But when we have wrong thoughts about God, about other people and we don't reverence and we disrespect and we have these feelings, we don't show it immediately.

We we cover it with a facade of a smile, but it's in your brain, it's in your mind and sure enough you're going to act it out sooner or later. It's going to behave itself through you. Your thoughts will. Now let's go on. Whatsoever is right, whatsoever is what?

Guest (Male): Pure.

Pastor Jack Morris: Pure. These are clean thoughts. Clean thoughts. We we hear of dirty thinking and dirty thoughts. People who think dirty talk dirty. Sure enough sooner or later you're going to hear that dirty word or that unclean story or that that joke that is has a innuendo in it. If it's in your mind and you keep thinking it all day long, you're soon going to be saying it and you're soon going to be giving your body to it. That's what it means. It means this. It means that we are to take our thoughts. The word of God is like a great filter like it filters water and it comes in unclean and it comes out clean.

Our thoughts are to be filtered through the word of God. Our thoughts were just look at the word of God and anything there that that teaches otherwise were to say my thoughts are wrong. This is the word of God. You cannot fill your mind with the word of God and think dirty at the same time and think unclean. You you fill your life, your thoughts with his words. You read the word, they will say no. No wonder you're such a mess. No wonder the unhappiness and the ill will and the restlessness uh the the broken relationships and and fellowship is is lacking there.

Uh let's go on. He says what what is the next word? And whatsoever is pure, whatsoever is lovely. Is is that the next word? Yes, lovely. This this is the think of God's love to reflect on God's love and to allow that reflection to bring love back into my life again. Pure love, the right kind of love, love that will last. People I marry so many people and they say they're in love, but listen. Love never faileth. People don't know what they're saying because if it were true love, they'd be married for a hundred years.

Stop talking it, begin thinking it, start living it. But you need to know and I need to know in order for that to happen, I need to know pure loveliness, the pure loveliness that God puts into my heart and puts into my soul. I need to think about that. You know there's never a time that I can think of and I'm trying to be as honest as I know how that I read the story of the cross and I read Gethsemane and and the the passion of our Lord that I don't sense a emotion of awe that comes over me.

It's not a time I take communion but that doesn't happen to me. And I want it to happen. And I know the story and I preach the story and I teach the story and I've been doing it for 40 years and it's ever new. When I read the story of the cross where Jesus takes my sin and his own body on the tree, I'm I'm overwhelmed. I'm overcome. I know that story. But it ever washes and refreshes my heart. It's the most lovely thing that happens to me. I I hope you do learn some new things when you come to church on Sunday morning.

I hope I don't preach stale sermons or give out truths that are are redundant and and so ordinary. I hope you go and say, man I never thought of it quite like that. I did learn something. But if you don't learn a thing, tell me the old old story for the old old story is ever new, bringing refreshment and blessing and revival to my soul. That's the loveliest story that I've ever heard that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. Isn't that the most lovely story? I know that story, but it ever blesses and refreshes me.

I can hear it every Sunday morning. I never tire weary of hearing the message of the cross. Paul said the same thing. He said, God forbid that I should glory or boast or celebrate anything but the cross. Tell me about the cross. I've heard it before, but tell it again. It's the most lovely thing in all the world. That's what he's saying about. Come on think about lovely things. That's the loveliest of all. And then and then the last one. What is the last one? Whatsoever is admirable. I want to do things that God admires.

That's what he's saying. What does God admire? That's what I want to think about. What does God admire? I want to go out and do it. I want God's well done. I want God's smile upon me. I want God to find pleasure in what I do and I want to do those things that bring pleasure to him. Now point C, look at point C. The way we should act. Point A, the necessity of right thinking. Point B, the way we should think. Point C, the way we should act. Verse nine gives us the information. Verse nine simply says, whatever you have learned or received or heard from me or seen now think of it this way, learned to receive, heard or seen, learned or received what I've taught you.

That's what Paul is saying. I have taught you the truths of almighty God, the very truths of heaven. I have taught you. You have learned it. You have learned that that will alter your life or change your life or bring joy into your life. You have learned it. Now receive it in to your life. You learned it. Now receive it. It's like something that I I put in your hand. I hand you something and you take it. You receive it with the thought of of passing it on to another, to your own to your own children.

Paul is saying what you've heard these all these imperatives at the beginning of this chapter, unity, rejoicing, prayer, a petition, thanksgiving and then the last imperative, how we should think. All these imperatives, receive them, receive them. Don't go out of here just learning them that you're smarter than when you came in, but go out of here because you have received them. You have received that that will alter your life, alter your marriage. Take the restlessness out and bring peace to your heart, that which you have learned and received. Look at verse nine again and he said heard and seen.

Paul said, I didn't only teach it to you. You didn't just hear it, but you saw these imperatives put in action through me. The God that that gives you peace, he will come and take up his abode in you. You will tabernacle God. You will have the very generator of peace, meaning you'll never run out because God will keep generating peace all the time. This is the way of peace. Now there are countless and con countless concerns and worries that come to God's people, come to everybody. Countless concerns. We're just being bombarded all the time with ideas, ideas, ideas, suggestions, suggestions, suggestions.

Your mind is filled with ideas and suggestions from newspaper to radio to television to the family to friends to the things you read, suggestions, suggestions, thoughts, thoughts, thoughts. Paul is saying there's some things you need to start thinking about. The world will pass away and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God will abide forever. And this is the will of God, these imperatives. Come, learn to live in peace, abundant peace, not only having the wonderful peace of God within, but the very God of peace himself will come and enter into you.

You have heard, you have learned. I pray now that you will have also received and that your life and your family and your marriage and your lifestyle will become altered not by television, not by commercials, not by magazines that are putting pictures in your head that you walk away and drive to work and they flash back or you see people at work that bring a reminder. Let the word of God dwell in you richly and you will know God's abundant peace. Now we're going to pray and I'm going to pray because this is a supernatural thing that's going on today.

I truly believe this. I don't believe that this is just something that we can just do mind over matter. The scripture tells us in second Corinthians 10:5, we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. We take captive those thoughts. Those thoughts now have to come down, those strong holds that have altered your behavior and turned you into the thinking, feeling, emotional person that you don't want to be. Those thoughts have to come down. We're going to take control over them in Jesus's name by the power of the word. Today you're going to think differently and as you begin thinking differently, you'll begin living and acting differently and experiencing a different lifestyle altogether.

Guest (Male): Every day the healing word reaches people with a life-changing truth of God's word, bringing hope to the hurting, peace to the anxious, and salvation to the lost. But we can't do it alone. If this ministry has blessed you, would you consider standing with us in prayer and financial support? Your faithful partnership helps us stay on the air, expand our outreach, and continue proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ to a world in need. Please take a moment today to pray for the healing word for Pastor Jack Morris and for all those listening, many of whom are facing incredible challenges.

And if you're able, make a financial gift of any size. Every donation makes a difference. Visit thehealingword.com to give today. Together let's share the healing hope of Christ with more people than ever before. We love to hear from you. Your thoughts, questions, and testimonies are so important to us. They truly bless Pastor Morris and the entire healing word ministry team. Please email us at contactus at thehealingword.com. Again that address is contactus at thehealingword.com. Join us tomorrow for another healing word message. Until then, blessings on you.