Joe Mueller: Let's take our Bibles and go to Acts 11, if you would. Acts chapter 11.

And we will get there in a few moments. Let's pray and then we will begin here. Lord, we thank you so much for what you're doing in our hearts during this.

These couple of days we have together. Thank you for your word and for your spirit. Lord, I pray that right now you would lead us in this time, and would you use this truth to be a help to these young people.

And Lord, we want to walk with you consistently and live lives in love with you. So would you help us here to understand truth that we need and to see practically where we need to implement that truth into our lives. So help us, I pray in your name.

Amen. On the evening of December 29th of 1972, Eastern Airlines Flight 401 was making its final approach to Miami International Airport. It had been a routine flight.

Everything would appear to be going according to plan. No big deal. Nothing difficult.

And as the crew was preparing to land, they pressed the controls to lower the landing gear. Three green lights were supposed to appear there on the control system to illuminate at that moment, confirming that the wheels were securely in locked position. But only two lights illuminated.

The third remained dark. That third light was supposed to indicate that the nose landing gear had come down and locked, and it wasn't shining. So Captain Robert Loff said we've got to discontinue the approach.

They communicated with the control tower, got permission to climb back up to 2,000 feet and hold there while the crew investigated the problem. And so the pilots then engaged the autopilot system, turned on their attention to that troublesome light. And they tried to first take across some of those controls, take apart some of those controls.

And they had to know, hey, is the landing gear itself malfunctioning or is just the light that isn't illuminating? The light bulb's out or something like that. And so they started to try to take apart some of the system there to be able to get to that bulb, but it wouldn't come out properly.

They got the flight engineer, and so now you've got the pilot and the co-pilot, the flight engineer all working together. And that flight engineer is eventually sent beneath the cockpit some way to try to get a visual check on is the landing gear down or not. And they're working on this for quite a while.

But there was a huge problem. See, in their efforts to investigate that light bulb and try to get it out, they had somehow switched off the autopilot system and its altitude holding mode, and they didn't know it. Flight 401 was descending.

The aircraft dropped below 2,000 feet, slowly, almost imperceptibly. Outside the windows of the cockpit spread the Florida Everglades, dark, No signs of danger. And inside, the crew was preoccupied with that pesky indicator light.

They were now down below 1,500 feet. Then 1,000. A warning sounded, but the crew was, they failed to recognize the danger until finally something caught the attention of First Officer Albert Stockstill.

The exact conversation of the crew was preserved in the cockpit recording. We did something to the altitude. What?

We're still at 2,000, right? Hey, what's happening here? But it was too late.

At 11.42 p.m., Flight 401 crashed into the Everglades, killing 101 of the 176 people on board. Understand, friend, while the crew was distracted by a light that wouldn't illuminate, they failed to notice that the entire airplane was headed for the ground.

They were so occupied with one small problem that they lost sight of their most important responsibility. They were trying to fix a light bulb and forgot to fly the plane.

Distraction. Distraction. I want you to understand this morning, young person, that the danger of distraction isn't necessarily that we give our attention to something bad or wrong, though that certainly could be the case.

But the real danger of distraction is that we give our attention to something less important and neglect what is most important.

I want to think about this here this morning, distractions. According to Merriam-Webster, distraction is defined as something that makes it difficult to think or pay attention, an amusement or entertainment that diverts your mind from worries or work, or a state of extreme mental agitation and confusion.

I was especially intrigued by the root of this word, the Latin root that it comes from, distrahir, meaning to pull apart or to draw a person's mind in contrary directions. Do you see that picture? That's what a distraction is.

It's something that it takes, and here it is. You're supposed to be here, and it's prying and trying to pull you here and pull you here and pull you there. And pull you this way.

You ever feel those pulls? You ever feel those distractions on your life? Trying to grab a hold and pull apart, pull your mind somewhere else.

But understand this, distractions are not just seeking to grab hold of your mind. Distractions are going for your heart.

They're not just vying for your attention. They want your affection. And understand what you give your attention will eventually hold your affection.

Whether you like it or not, young people, you are part of a distracted generation in a distracted world. And I did a little bit of research on this, not huge extensive research, but enough to see and understand that we are literally surrounded, and I think you know this even without research, we're just surrounded by things that are intentionally designed to distract you.

They're intentionally designed to grab your attention and move it to one thing then to this thing, then to this, then to this over here, this over here, this over here. That's what makes social media so incredibly just draws you in,. What's it doing,.

You're bouncing from this to this to this to this. This is the world that we live in. And it's literally affecting the way that our brains work.

And those distractions come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. All sorts looking at Scripture what the Scripture has to say about some of these distractions that come in. I couldn't help but think of mark chapter four.

They're in the parable of the dirt where Jesus teaches about these distractions when he talks about the thorny ground. Do you remember that parable. And there it is.

There's ground that that boy seed goes in that good seed of the word of God and it begins to grow up but there's also thorns growing up that it says a choke that uh that that plant that's growing.

And it keeps that plant from being unfruitful. Mark 4, 19, Jesus is explaining this thorny ground. He says, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the lusts of other things entering in choke the word and it becometh unfruitful.

Well, there's some distractions for us, the cares of this world. There's two different nuances to that phrase that we can think about. The first is this, cares of this world.

We can just think about the challenges of life that you're facing, the difficulties. There's things that you have going on in your life, in your family's life, with responsibilities and pressures that you have as you're just navigating life at the stage that you're in. And those are very real things, and those things can weigh on you and burden you down.

And even though you're supposed to be in this, boy, that's just always on your mind. And this situation here, and what's going on here, and this here. And they're just cares of this life.

They're real things. That's legitimate. There's nothing wrong about those things necessarily.

They're real. But boy, those things, they can easily distract us from that which is most important. There's another side to that phrase, cares of this world, especially when we consider the word world that's used there is the idea of this age.

And so that's getting wrapped up in the things of the here and now, of this moment. And that includes those things, but also this world system and all that the world is screaming at you, saying, hey, this is important. This is what you need to give your life to.

This is what matters. Look at this. Look at this.

Get this. Go here. Do this.

Be this. All those things, you need to be this now. That's all a part of this as well.

These cares of boy, aren't those when we feel those distractions? Screaming at us all the time. So the cares of this world, that's certainly a very real distraction we can face.

But Jesus also said the deceitfulness of riches. This is literally the delusion of wanting to accumulate wealth, money. I know right now there's some of you in the room that think $20 is a lot of money.

But there's others of you that have done enough work now, and you've gotten enough of the taste of what it means to actually put in labor and receive some good money for it, that now you've got your eyes on a bigger prize than a $20 bill.

And it's really easy to want to begin to accumulate, boy, I want to have this money so I can get this and do this. And though maybe it starts with, well, I've got to save money for college and all that. Maybe it starts there and that's good.

It's really easy to get sucked into it. Money, money, more, more, more. Even as young people.

It amazes me sometimes. Boy, there's guys who are just absolutely driven to make that money, to be successful because they want to have this stuff.

Distraction. The deceitfulness of riches. Then he says, then the lust of other things entering in.

And that's a very wide open. Literally anything, anything can become a distraction to us. Any desire for something can be something that keeps us from really focusing on what is most important.

So certainly Jesus gives us a list of some distractions there that we face. I thought as well of Luke chapter 10 where we find the story of Mary and Martha there. Jesus has come to their home and we find Martha is cumbered about, says, with much service.

And she's there, she's trying to make sure the meal's ready and the house is clean and everything's where it needs to be and people are doing what they're supposed to be doing and she gets frustrated and she comes because her sister, who should be there helping her, right? She comes and her sister's just sitting there by Jesus.

And Jesus says, oh, Martha, Martha, you're cumbered about with much service. Okay? One thing is needful.

Mary's chosen that which cannot be taken away. There we find, boy, here we find a woman who's distracted by service, by responsibility.

But you know, those can be distractions for us too. Jesus doesn't rebuke Martha, but she was doing things that needed to be done, but she got so consumed with those that she forgot about why she was doing them, who she was doing them for.

So those are certainly distractions that we see in Scripture. Really, anywhere we turn today, there's distractions, things that are just trying to grab your attention, those billboards as you drive down the road, right? Relationships.

Okay, the boyfriend-girlfriend kind of relationships. Listen, can I just tell you, those are huge distractions, not something you need to be part of right now.

Because it keeps you from what you're supposed to be focusing on. Recreation can be a distraction. Entertainment, television, social media, news feeds, sports going on, podcasts, and all of those things, okay, we can talk about, okay, well, is this right or wrong?

That's actually not the point of this session, to evaluate are these things right or wrong. You need to evaluate those things. But the question is, is it something that's distracting you?

And all of those kind of distractions, boy, they were put on steroids when we got the cell phone and the smartphone now, with notifications and apps and immediate access to whatever, whenever.

Common sense media tracked the actual phones of about 200 young people aged 11 to 17.

The average participant received 237 notifications per day. 23% of those arrived during school. Participants checked their phones more than 100 times per day on average.

Do you believe that? I can believe that. Big time.

And just in another study in 2026 here, revealed that an average student checks their phone 64 times while at school and spends 2.2 hours on their phone during the school day, like school hours.

No wonder people are having a hard time with learning, with education. Why? Because here it is, this phone, though it can be an incredibly useful tool, although it's powerful and boy, there's things that are useful about it, are helpful, Guess what?

It has become a huge distraction generator in your life. So how do we handle it? What do we do?

We're inundated with things that are competing for your attention, and the question is, do we stop to evaluate what actually deserves my attention?

Or do we just give our attention to whatever comes across? Whatever's thrown there in our life? You know, it's easy for us sometimes to think, well, distraction is kind of a neutral thing, And I've heard people say, I just struggle with focus.

I'm just a distracted person. I have a hard time really zoning in. I can't pay attention.

That's just kind of how I am. No, it's not. Distraction is not just a neutral thing.

We're just kind of having to realize this. Distraction, by definition, you are being distracted from something.

Every time. That's what a distraction is. It is something that is less important or perhaps even unimportant that is keeping you from what is most important.

So here's the question this morning. What is most important in your life? If you want to say, hey, I want to rise above the distraction, I don't want to live bound by distraction, okay, then you have to.

If a distraction is something that's less important, then what is it that's most important? If I don't know that, then how can I actually live there? What is it that's most important?

Have you even stopped to ask yourself that question? What is my life really all about? Okay, maybe I should put it this way.

What should my life actually be about? What is the most important thing? What is it that I'm here for?

What is it that I should be spending my life? What am I living it for? Do you have that settled in your heart?

A lot of times we don't. We're so, well, just kind of, I'm here. I'm existing, and boy, I have a heart for this, and a heart for this, and a heart for this, and this, and I enjoy this, and I want to do this, and we have all those things.

Okay, but what are you here for? There's a lot of things that are important in life. If I could ask you, what are important things?

We could probably have different answers, but I'm asking you as a child of God today, what is it that should be most important?

I think we'd probably say, well, God, right?

Yeah God and his will being done in your life here on earth as it is in heaven the will of God okay so well listen how do I know God's will for for my life can I tell you I know what God's will is for your life I don't know all the the nuances and and details but I know this I know for absolute certainty here's what your life needs to be all about knowing God and making him known.

That's what life's about. That's why you're here. That's what your purpose is.

That's the most important thing. I'm not just making this up. Okay?

This isn't just me saying that this is why God has you here on earth. Okay, Luke chapter 10, I just referenced a few moments ago.

Martha, Martha, you're careful and troubled about with many things. That means you're full of care. And Jesus says, but one thing is needful, and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.

What was needful? What was he saying? Mary, she decided what's important right now?

To know me. To be with me. To hear what I had to give to her.

That's what she chose. That's the one needful thing. Can't help but think as well of what Paul says in Philippians chapter number 3.

When he says brethren I count not myself to have apprehended but this one thing I do okay and in the language there his idea is listen he's saying that I I haven't arrived yet but just one thing one thing one thing that I'm living for he says forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth under those things which are before I press toward the mark of the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

And I preached on this text here before at TGYS, but Jesus is the prize.

And Paul makes this clear as just a few verses before this, he says, listen, this is what's on my heart. This is what I'm living for. This is my goal.

This is what I'm trying to lay a hold of. This is the one thing I'm after that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable unto his death.

That I may know him. There it is. To know him.

But not just to know him, but to have a life that embraces, that's wrapped up, that is passionate about the things that he is passionate about. To be consumed with the things that he's consumed about. To experience his power, yes, of his resurrection.

Whoa, that's what we talked about last night, the law of lift.

Then it says the fellowship of his sufferings and now we often and maybe you've heard preaching this we talk about fellowship of his sufferings and we're thinking about okay well that means what we need to realize there's going to be suffering in the Christian life and you know that's true that is a reality we need to understand that but don't lose the point here why did Jesus suffer why did he die we said we got to be conformable unto his death.

Well, why did he die? Redemption. Rescue.

To seek and to save that which was lost. Yes, to know him and to make him known as the redeemer, the rescuer who came for this broken, dying world.

That's what life's all about. That's what's most important for you, even right now, at this point in your life, young person. Knowing him and making him known.

That's why you're here. But we have an enemy who has set up an elaborate system, a culture, a world, a society, to distract us and keep us from living out that purpose.

So if we're going to rise above distraction, you have to make intentional choices to stay focused on what matters most. Can I say that again? If you're going to rise above distractions, then you have to make intentional choices to focus on that which matters most.

Let's look here at Acts chapter 11 in our text. I want to begin reading verse number 19 just for sake of context so we can get the picture of what's happening here in this narrative account.

And then we're going to really focus in on what's said in verse 23. It says, Now they which were scattered abroad upon the persecution that arose about Stephen traveled as far as Phenis in Cyprus and Antioch, preaching the word to none but unto the Jews only. And some of them were men of Cyprus and Cyrene, which, when they were come to Antioch, spake unto the Grecians, preaching the Lord Jesus.

And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number believed and turned unto the Lord. Boy, this is an exciting moment. Verse 22.

Then tidings of these things came into the ears of the church which was in Jerusalem, and they sent forth Barnabas that he should go as far as Antioch, who, when he came and had seen the grace of God, was glad, and exhorted them all that with purpose of heart they would cleave unto the Lord. Did you notice that final statement? Here Barnabas is.

God's moving here in Antioch. And God's doing something amazing. Many people come to Christ now.

Gentiles are getting saved. They're now part of what God is doing. And Jerusalem, boy, they hear what's going on.

They send some folks down. They send Barnabas to come and say, hey, go see what's happening there. And he comes to and he sees what God's doing.

He sees the grace of God. Whoa, this is God at work. And he's glad.

He rejoices. And then he says, I've got some encouragement for you. These young believers, where God was working and God was moving, these believers, now they're responding to God, they're taking steps of faith, and they're seeing God do wonderful things in their life.

He says, listen, you need this encouragement, this simple encouragement, because you're going to face the danger that all of us face, the danger of distraction. He says, here, here's what you need to do, with purpose of heart cleave unto the Lord.

Listen, young person, maybe you're hearing God's working in your heart.

Your eyes have been opened to truth. You've made some important decisions. You're getting a hunger to seek after God to know God to see him work in your life.

You want to do his will. You want to know him and make him known. You want to live by that law of lift we talked about last night.

But there's a constant barrage of things that are seeking to pull your mind in different directions, to draw your heart away from those very things that God is doing in your life, to distract you from the most important things.

If we're going to rise above those distractions, we have to intentionally choose to stay focused on what matters most. I want you to see here, point number one, you must make intentional decisions. You must make intentional decisions.

I want you to notice the statement there. He says, This purpose of heart phrase literally means a setting forth, a planning beforehand. It means to decide beforehand.

To decide before. So it's the idea, it's not like, okay, boy, this thing comes along and then you have to make a decision. No, no, it's saying you make the decision ahead of time before you have to make the decision.

This is something I call intentional decisions. And I believe, I'm more and more convinced, and I feel like the last couple of years, God has been, just keeps on bringing this back in my own life, that the Christian life is all about intentional decisions instead of reactive decisions.

We live reactive most of the time, and that's why we so often stumble in our walk of faith. It's because we're reacting to situations and whatever distractions the life is throwing at us instead of living each moment with purpose and intentionality.

Okay, when you live distracted, when you're not making intentional decisions, you're just reacting to what's happening. You're like a ball in a pinball machine. Do you know what a pinball machine is?

All right, I know those aren't around as much as they were when I was younger. I'm not that old, though, so maybe you know what one is. Yeah, that pinball, boy, you pull that spring back, it comes up, then it comes down, and what do you got?

Then you're hitting those flappers, you're trying to keep that thing, what's the ball doing? You're going ding, boom, ding, boom, ding, boom, ding, boom, boom, boom, boom. You can get it between those two, you know.

Before it finally drops, that's what we do. We live our life, and boom, oh, this happened, whoa, reaction, this, whoa, react, whoa.

And then we wonder, boy, why aren't I walking with God? Why does this Christian life seem so hard? Why is this so difficult?

Oh man, why did I react that way? I didn't want to do that. Because we're reacting.

We're just responding to every distraction instead of living with an intentional, an intentional focus, intentional decisions that we've made. We've decided ahead of time, hey, when this comes into my life, this is how I'm responding. Hey, today, this is where I'm going to go.

Listen, you're surrounded by things that are literally wiring your brain to be reactive. Wiring your brain to have a short attention span and just constantly bounce around. And so if you're going to walk forward in a walk of faith, it's going to take some tough, intentional decisions to keep looking to Jesus.

We all want the easy road. We want the answer that just, boom, fixes our problem.

But that's not how Christian growth works. God has incredible grace for overcoming. He has a wonderful power that he gives us to do what seems impossible.

But we experience that grace as we take intentional steps of faith. And that's what we're talking about here.

Now listen, life's filled with the unexpected. And there's things you can't plan for. Okay, right now, oh boy, our schedule got a little disrupted because a couple of weeks ago something happened that we didn't expect in our family.

My wife broke her ankle and had to have surgery. And guess what? That has filled my life the last couple of weeks with distractions.

Because now I'm having to do a whole lot of things that I never planned to do.

So you can't plan for everything. But can I tell you, there's a whole lot of things you can decide ahead of time. You can plan for.

You do know, oh, this is going to happen. I'm going to be at school and I'm going to face this reality. I'm going to face this distraction.

I'm going to be at work and I'm going to face this distraction. I'm going to be those things. There's plenty of things that we can ahead of time know this is what's coming my way so I can make intentional decisions based on what I do know.

And this is what the Scripture tells us to do. It says, right, make not provision for the flesh to fulfill the lust thereof. What is it saying?

Make decisions ahead of time. So you're not even giving your flesh that opportunity.

A wise man foreseeth the evil and hideth himself. And listen, maybe God's worked in your life here these couple of days. Maybe you've already made just important decisions and boy, you're filled with joy and thankful for what God's doing.

You've experienced the grace of God. Praise God, I'm glad about that. That's awesome.

But you're going to go home and guess what? Normal life's going to hit you. Did you know life at home is not like it is here at TJYS?

Even those of you that you live up here, like this is home for you, Falls Baptist Church. Life's not normally like this. It's a little different.

A normal life is going to hit you and those distractions are just going to come pouring into your life like a flood.

And maybe God has been clarifying in your heart these days, this is what's most important.

Your walk with me. A hunger for God. His plan for your life.

But listen, if you don't make some intentional plans ahead of time to confront those distractions that you know are coming, you're going to find yourself slipping right back into the same old habits, the same old way of distracted living.

Intentional decisions. Well, we've got to have it. I'm just trying to say that you won't walk with God by accident.

You have to be intentional. You won't live by that law of lift we talked about last night automatically. You have to intentionally choose to access that law, to say, hey, this is where I'm going to live.

You'll never have victory unless you start making some intentional daily decisions. Hey, don't just walk out of your wall. I had a good week.

I made a decision at TJS, so now it's going to, boy, everything's going to be different. Not if you don't go home and make some more intentional decisions.

That's the Christian life. Not just reacting. But saying, no, no, I'm going to make, I'm going to intentionally decide with purpose of heart.

And then what does it say? To cleave unto the Lord. So we've seen that you must make intentional decisions.

Now what you notice, number two, you must prioritize your relationship. Want to rise above distraction, make intentional decisions, and decisions to prioritize your relationship. It says here, to cleave unto the Lord.

Now this word cleave could be translated abide with. That's another idea that's maybe a little more colloquial to what we say.

Now this is not the same word that we're familiar with when we talk about abide in Christ and abiding in the vine. It's not the same word. It's that word with another word added on to it.

So it's not just abiding somewhere, it's abiding with. So it's not just staying in a place, it's staying with someone, sticking close in a relationship. It's choosing to be with someone over other things.

This word is only used a couple of other times in the New Testament, and a couple of those times are in the different accounts that we have of the feeding of the 4,000. And there Jesus tells his disciples this. He says, I have compassion on the multitudes because, here's the word, it's translated here, they have now been with me three days and have nothing to eat.

And if I send them away fasting to their own houses, they will faint by the way. And then he goes on and does this amazing miracle, a right to feed the 4,000. But here it is.

There's a group of people. It's saying, listen, these people here, this multitude of people, they have thought that being with me was more important than food.

He says, they've been with me three days. Now, maybe they had a lunch with them that first day, whatever, so maybe they didn't skip all nine meals. But this is saying, listen, they've been with me for three days, nine meals, and they've got nothing to eat.

Okay, they've gone without. Because they decided being with Jesus is more important than having lunch.

They said being close to him and hearing what he has to say and letting him influence and impact my life. Boy, that's more important to me than the steak dinner we had planned.

I just wonder how important is staying close to Jesus to you?

Maybe God's been challenging you to take a step this week that seems kind of radical. Okay you've heard some testimonies of boy some some some really important decisions and some things that boy this seems kind of big. That's getting right with mom and dad or being willing to deal with this bitterness or to get honest about boy the stuff I'm viewing or whatever it is.

Boy those are kind of radical decisions. Okay well how how important is it to you to be close to Jesus to know him and make him known.

Is it worth that to you? That radical step? That step outside the box?

What things are there in your life that would keep you from staying close to Jesus? Brother Bosler was talking about this morning.

Whatever those things in your life that you know, boy, these are the things that will keep me from staying close to Jesus. Those are the distractions, young person, that you need to confront and rise above by the grace of God.

Making intentional decisions to say, hey, I'm going to confront those areas in my life.

Make some intentional choices about those things. What is it that will stop you from pursuing after God? Those are the things you need to deal with.

Maybe they aren't even objectively wrong, but if they're going to hurt your walk with Jesus, boy, you need to deal with those. Those are distractions. If they're going to trip you up in your pursuit of God, you need to say, listen, no, no, I have something that's more important I'm living for.

And sometimes we have to be willing to say no to the less important so we can embrace the most important.

Now listen, there are some distractions that you can control. You can minimize. Maybe you can even eliminate them entirely in your life.

There's also many things that could distract you that you can't control. Most of you are in school. Some of you have a job.

You have responsibilities at home. And you can't necessarily say, well, listen, I'm just not going to go to school because I want to spend 12 hours a day reading my Bible and praying.

You know what? I'm going to quit the job. I know I do need to be saving for college, and so whatever.

I'm going to quit that job because I've got to make sure that I can, boy, I can just have all this. Okay, the responsibility is, listen, Mom, I cannot help clean the house. I'm praying right now.

No, no, those are real things. You're not in control of those. You have to do those things.

But that's exactly what we're talking about is in the midst of those, guess what? You can still walk with Jesus.

Just because they can be distractions doesn't mean they have to be distractions to you. You can rise above those things and still, by walking with Jesus, you can stay close to Him while you're on the job. You can live by the law of lift at school.

You can live with a heart in love with Jesus while you carry out those responsibilities at home. But listen, it will only happen as you intentionally choose to keep the most important thing, your relationship with Him, the most important thing.

I don't know about you, does your mind wander like mine does? It's so easy, you're doing them, for me one of the things, it's so easy when I'm cutting the grass or something like that, and it's loud, so I have nine children, and so there's always lots of noise, but when the lawnmower is on, that noise is louder than the kid noise, so I can think.

And you know what happens? I think about all sorts of stuff. And there's times when my brain is just boy, I'm just distracted.

But there's other times, you know what, I make an intentional decision. And I should do it all the time, but I don't. I'm just trying to be honest with you.

But there's times I make that intentional decision. Lord, and we have a conversation. I talk to the Lord.

Lord, I'm thinking about this. What do I do about this? There's been times that I've been talking to the Lord and I, and I maybe had some tears running down my face, as just the Lord and I are having a conversation with that nice noise of the alarm, and I'm going to drown out everything else.

You can be in the midst of those things, maybe they'd be a distraction, but you can choose intentionally to say, no, I'm going to cleave to the Lord in this moment.

Intentional choices. If you want to rise above distractions, you have to choose intentionally. To keep the most important thing the most important thing.

Let me give you some practical recommendations as we wrap up here. Think, okay, well, how do I actually implement this? What does this actually look like in my life?

And I can't tell you specifically what it looks like in your life, but here's some things I want you to consider.

First of all, intentional evaluation. Intentional evaluation. You need to take some time, actually, and ask yourself some questions.

And don't just ask yourself But ask the Lord Lord would you show me The answer to these questions Here's a few questions That would be good evaluation questions When we think about this distraction issue Lord am I living distracted?

Am I distracted? Okay what things are causing The greatest distraction in my life? And write down just one or two things Listen you could probably spend time And get a whole long list But what are the first couple things?

These are the first big distractions. Okay, just start there. Start there.

And write them down. And then here's another good evaluation question. Why am I drawn to this instead of Jesus?

See, that gets down to the core issue of our affection. Which again, remember, what you give your attention, eventually will have your affection.

So you've got to get down to, why am I drawn to this?

Has this become idolatry in my heart and then what steps can I take to minimize those distractions which gives us kind of the second recommendation first intentional evaluation, take time, actually evaluate don't just think, what am I distracted by, what's grabbing my attention and that answer won't be the same all the time but take time, because if you don't recognize the distraction now you're going to make an intentional decision about that distraction Again, this is intentionally not being reactive.

It's ahead of time. But here's number two, as far as recommendation goes. Intentional limitation.

Intentional limitation. See, as you understand, okay, well, these are distractions that I'm facing. If you can, if it's within your power to do so, maybe you need to minimize the potential for some of those distractions.

Minimize that potential. Maybe you need to take and impose definitive, measurable restrictions on yourself in that area. These could be short-term things, could be long-term things, but let me give you an example.

Several years ago now, I don't know, probably five, six, seven years ago, I don't know. I was at a place just in my journey where I was very distracted by news, political cycle, all of those things that was happening online. And so I would literally, I found myself, I'm just going to check the news, and I would spend hours bouncing from this news thing to this.

And again, it wasn't like I was looking at anything wrong, filter, junk, or anything. It was just all this, and I literally spent hours of time.

And I got burned about it. I said, this isn't right, this isn't good. I'm so distracted by this stuff.

And I tried to rein. And so finally, I actually had a conversation with Dr. Jim, and we sat down and talked, and we decided together, hey, this would be, maybe it would be helpful, and let's just try to do just five minutes a day of anything online that is not required for work purposes, whether that's news or sports or whatever it is, five minutes a day.

And so for 30 days, that was the commitment we made, and we both made it together. And so we would send a text message to each other back and forth, just a little check mark or whatever, say, hey, today, this is what we did. It was an intentional limitation.

It was that I said, okay, you know what? Yeah, I'm going to do this. Can I tell you?

It's not that I now still live by, I don't text him every day, five minutes, no. But it did a reset in my own mind, my own desires, to where, you know what, I don't do that anymore. And it was intentional limitation in my life on purpose to help me get back to, okay, what is really important?

Because you know what? That stuff wasn't really important. Okay, and along with that, if you're going to have those measurable restrictions, okay, definitive, make it clear, make it measurable, put a timetable to it, not just a, I'm going to try not to, okay, for 30 days, this is what I'm doing.

Okay, if there's something that's just been distracting a lot, okay, this is where we're going.

Those limitations. And again, it could be all sorts of things. And then be accountable in it.

And that was what was helpful for me, okay? Me and Dr. Jim, we were accountable to one another on that.

And it wasn't that I was asking him to check up on me. I committed to check in with him. That's a difference in accountability.

Do you understand? And there's something about me knowing I'm going to be communicating with him.

About, hey, did I meet the goal today or not?

Be accountable in that way. That can be incredibly helpful in limiting minimizing some of these distractions. Again if it's just boy overwhelming you feel like I just don't know how to nip.

Okay boy that may be if you're able to that may be where you need to go. Okay so intentional limitation. Um number three another another recommendation your intentional abstinence.

Okay do you understand what the word abstinence means. Yes no means you don't do something at all. Okay so that when I talk about limitation that was okay five only five minutes a day.

Abstinence is where I'm not going to do this at all. Now this could be temporary abstinence or it could be permanent abstinence. Okay temporary abstinence would be something where you're saying listen this app the sports app maybe has become a huge distraction for me.

I'm just sucked into it. My mind just thinking about sports all the time. And the the playoffs are going on now.

And all you milwaukee people the brewers man what's going to happen. And it's so easy to get sucked into those things and just get focused on it.

And you know what, maybe there's, you say, you know what, this is a distraction to me. So for 30 days, I'm not going to use the app at all. Disable the app for 30 days.

I'm not going to use it at all. At the end of 30 days, then you evaluate, Lord, okay, do you want me to, should I go back on this or should I stay with nothing and let the Lord lead you in that? That's, this isn't, again, I'm giving you suggestions.

I'm not the Holy Spirit, like Brother Bosler was saying this morning. Ask the Spirit of God what you should do. But these are things that can be helpful.

And when we've gotten so distracted, so pulled away to help us get back to, okay, no, no, these are intentional decisions we can make. Okay, maybe social media, you just realize, boy, I spend so much time, and boy, it affects the way I think and what I do. Maybe you need to say, listen, I'm not going to do any social media for 60 days.

I'll go dark on social media. If the Spirit of God leads you to do that, okay.

None at all. There's something that can be very helpful about that. Okay, we could talk about other things.

That's temporary abstinence permanent abstinence would be listen don't be afraid to have some things in your life where you say listen this isn't going to be a part of my life at all anymore it's done it's gone I'm not doing that at all anymore and if there's distractions in your life that you're realizing the spirit of God saying you need to let that go and you're struggling and say I'm not going to let that go you can see where your affection is you.

Again, this is something between you and God, but if you're struggling to let something go, it's already stolen your affection if God's telling you to let it go.

Okay, last practical recommendation here as we finish up. Intentional devotion. And this really is the biggest point.

Remember that Jesus is the goal. Okay, we can think, well, I'm just going to try to minimize my distractions and get all this. No, no, no, remember, Jesus is the one we're seeking.

He is the most important to know Him and to make Him known. So you need to have a purposeful plan to pursue God. Some of you think, well, I made a decision here.

I'm going to go and walk with God. Do you have a plan to pursue God away from here?

And yes, that includes spending time with Him in the morning. Maybe [name unclear] mentioned about spending an hour with God a day. Those things, boy, those can be super helpful and super important.

We need that in our personal walk with God. But that's not all there is to a pursuit of God. What about outside of that devotional time?

What's your plan to pursue God? Maybe you need to plan some moments throughout your day. They don't have to be long, don't have to be dramatic, don't have to be huge, but maybe some moments where you reset your heart on Jesus and just take a minute, two minutes.

Lord, I'm just coming. I want to love you with everything I have today. Intentional devotion.

You've probably heard it said, love is a choice, not a feeling. The feeling follows the choice.

You know what that means? If we're going to love someone, We need to make some intentional choices. That applies if in my marriage, boy, you know what, there's intentional choices I make, whether I feel like it or not, because I want to love my wife.

I want to grow in my love for my wife. How much more with the Lord? If we want to grow in our love for him, we have to make some intentional choices.

I'm going to love Jesus today. I'm going to take some time to stop and just reset my heart and say, Jesus, I'm glad I'm yours and I'm glad you're mine.

And today I want to live by the law of your spirit. I'm saying there's not any crisis in front of me right now Lord. But I just want to say right now whatever you want me to do I'm going to do.

I'm saying yes to you. What if you stopped throughout your day three, four times maybe just on purpose. Okay at lunch time I'm going to take just take a couple moments and I'm just going to once again set my heart back surrender to the Lord.

Intentional decisions. Would that affect your distraction level?

Yeah, big time. Big time. Listen, most people don't deliberately choose to waste their lives.

They simply allow their attention to be captured by a thousand things that matter less than the one main thing.

The thing that they were created to do. You cannot give your life to everything else and still give your life to what matters most. If you want to rise above distractions, if you want to live by the law of lift, if you want to live out God's plan and purpose for your life, then you have to make intentional choices to stay focused on that which matters most.

Knowing Jesus and making Him known. Would God help us to do that?