Join Cherri Campbell in a powerful discussion about the importance of controlling your thoughts to cultivate a life of peace and vitality. Building on Romans 8, this episode reveals how battling through negative, anxious thoughts can lead to a spiritually enriched life. Cherri shares encouraging stories of transformation and offers scriptural guidance on replacing worry with faith, guaranteeing a renewed mind, body, and spirit.
Good morning. Welcome to Victorious Faith. I’m Cherri Campbell. This morning, I’m going to continue sharing with you the message that I’ve been sharing with you in the last several broadcasts that I preached in one of our Victorious Faith services called Living in Perfect Peace. And I do believe this message is blessing you. So join me now in our live service for part seven of this message, Living in Perfect Peace. In Romans chapter 8, I don’t have it here, but I need to bring it up. It’s important. Romans 8, 6. The mind of the sinful man, or you can say the carnal mind, is death. Romans 8, 6. These are the thoughts of the devil. Carnal thoughts, fearful thoughts, anxious thoughts, negative thoughts. The mind of sinful man, also in other places here, sinful nature. You can also relate that to the carnal nature and the carnal man. The mind of the carnal man is death, but the mind controlled by the spirit, that means you yield to the control of the spirit or you think the thoughts of the spirit that he gives you is life and peace. Life and peace. You can have your mind filled with life and peace if you yield to the Holy Spirit instead of yielding to the devil. Most people are so used to yielding to the devil because it’s easy. It’s easy to let fear take over. It’s easy to let worry take over. You’ve got to fight a battle to cast down the fear and the worry and the anxiety and the negative thoughts. You have to fight a battle. But the Holy Spirit is in you to do that. He brings up to your mind thoughts of his word, his promises, his scriptures. And if you will think those, the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace. You will have life and peace if you think his thoughts. But if you think the devil’s thoughts, you get death. The ultimate end, because what you think is what you say. Proverbs says the power of life and death is in the tongue. So if you think it, you’re going to say it. And when you say it, you create it. Life and death is in the power of the tongue, but it starts in the thought. And the thoughts of fear are death. You’ve got to cast them down. The negative thoughts are death. You’ve got to cast them down. You’ve got to replace them by yielding to the Holy Spirit. Think the thoughts of the Holy Spirit, which he gives you the word of God. He gives you scriptures. You think on those. You meditate on those. Those can make your mind whole. And give you life and peace. They can heal your physical body. Yes. Definitely. They will drive sickness and disease out of you. The word of God will drive sickness out of your body. It will cure every disease. And guess what? It can even make you smarter. Meditating on promises. I remember Kenneth Hagin. I think it was, and he testified of other people, but I believe it happened to him. I think also brother Copeland that they weren’t so smart in school until they started meditating God’s word. They started meditating on it and confessing it and believing it. And brother Hagen went back to high school for a short time. He was smarter than getting better grades in school after he started meditating on God’s word. Brother Copeland, he was going back to college and boy was he struggling until he meditated on God’s word and it brought a sharpness to his mind. So it can even increase your intelligence. Meditating on the scriptures can increase your natural intelligence because it sharpens your mind. It gives life, life and peace. to your mind. So if you’re having a problem with your mind, you know, you have no reason to lose your mind, lose your memory, become dull or get dementia or Alzheimer’s as you age. If you will cast down fear, worry, anxiety, and negative thoughts. Those bring death. That’s what brings death. You don’t have to lose your memory. You don’t have to get dementia. If you will cast down thoughts of fear, worry, anxiety, and just negative thoughts of all kinds, you cast them down and you pull in and replace them with the scripture promises of for yourself that you need in every area that will be life and peace to your body and your mind and give longevity to your mind and your body. Praise the Lord. So meditate on the word. Do not let the Joshua one eight. Do not let this book of the law depart from your mouth. Meditate on it day and night. How do you do that? Same way you worry day and night, but you just challenge and cast down every thought of worry and replace it with scripture. Replace it with scripture. You get a worried thought. You say, no, I’m not going to think on that. I’m going to think this and replace it with scripture. That’s what Jesus did in the wilderness of temptation. When Satan said, are you the son of God? Command these stones to become bread. And Jesus answered, it is written. It is written. It is written. It is written. It is written. You know, I do not believe that. And I don’t have this written in scripture, but it’s what I believe. According to Hebrews says that Jesus was tempted in every way we are. How are you tempted? In your thoughts. Does the devil come stand in front of you in a visible form and say, hi, I’m the devil. I want you to sin. No, he doesn’t come and appear before you visibly. He comes deceptively in your mind with thoughts. That’s how you’re tempted with fear, doubt, and sin. In thoughts. Jesus was tempted every way we are. So how was he tempted? In thoughts. So I think he was hungry. He’d been fasting for 40 days and he’s hungry. He gets a thought. Not the devil appearing in front of him. Talking face to face. He got a thought. Why don’t you just turn these stones into bread? You’re the son of God. That was probably just a thought crossing his mind. You’re the son of God. You could turn the stone into bread. Feed yourself. But he recognized the source. It was not from God. It was from the devil. And he, he came against it. He said, it is also written. Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. So he answered every temptation, which was a thought was saying the word. He answered every negative thought or tempting thought with the word. And he spoke the word. He spoke it out loud. So you meditate on the word by keeping his promises in your mind and answering every negative thought or every worried thought. You worry day and night, then replace those worries with the scripture promises every time they come up in your mind. And then by abiding in his presence, as I said before, worship him, love on him, talk to him consistently, continually through the day. And then by faith, you believe it. By faith, 1 Peter 5, 7, cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. And then Hebrews 4, 1 through 3, 9 and 11. Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. You see, entering rest is a promise that stands. You could say stands firm forever. You could enter his rest. I remember as a youth, our family was going through some struggles and the thought came to me. It was so pronounced. I never, I still remember the thought. If only we could just get in a place of peace and just live there, dwell there in heart and mind. Well, we can through the word. We’ll have the storms raging around, but we can live in the eye of the storm and a place of quietness. The promise of entering his rest still stands, but you could fall short of it. Let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. For we also have had the gospel preached to us just as they did, the Israelites. But the message they heard was of no value to them because those who heard did not what? Combine it with faith. You’ve got to combine the promises with faith. Everything that I’ve been reading to you, all the promises about God, what he’ll do for you, deliver you, heal you, save you, protect, preserve, provide. He’ll be your fortress, defender, shield. You could look at that and say, oh, I don’t believe that. and then it won’t happen for you and a lot of Christians do that I don’t believe God heals everybody I don’t believe God protects everybody I don’t believe God delivers everybody I don’t believe God meets every need a lot of Christians say that well then they’re not going to receive it It was of no value to them because they did not combine it with faith. You must combine the promises of God with faith. You must believe them. Now we have what? Believed. If you believe, that’s how you enter into rest. You can enter into rest by believing. by believing what God said, by believing God’s promises, that’s how you enter into rest. You believe him. You believe he’s your safety, your protection, your deliverance, your helper, your shield, your victory, your healer, your provider. You believe it. And when you believe it, you enter into rest. Just as God has said, so I declared on oath in my anger, they shall never enter my rest. And yet his work has been finished since the creation of the world. Verse nine, there remains then a Sabbath rest for the people of God. And for I put in brackets there for us, it is 24 seven. It’s not just the seventh day rest for us. It’s seven days a week, 24 seven, seven days a week. We can live in the Sabbath rest of God because every day to us is a Sabbath. For us to be in his presence. To honor him. And to receive his rest. Verse 11. Let us therefore make every effort. This again is the battle of the mind. It’s the warfare. You’ve got to make every effort to enter that rest. Casting down imaginations. And taking up the shield of faith. We’re going to get to that. Verse 11. Make every effort to enter that rest. So that none of you. No one will fall by following their example of disobedience. Their example was unbelief. We believe God. Faith is rest. If you’re not at peace and in rest, if you’re anxious or worried or fearful, you’re not in faith. Those are the opposite of faith. Faith is rest. And I’ve said before, peace and joy are two gauges of your faith level. Just like your gasoline gauge is. your fuel gauge in your car, the needle goes up and the needle goes down. And when the needle goes down, your car can run out and die and just stall and won’t be able to go any farther. Well, your joy and your peace are two gauges on your faith mobile, your faith mobile, your faith energy. How long is your faith? Can you, can you tell if your faith is still working strong? Check your peace. Check your joy. If you’ve lost your peace, your faith has gone down. I don’t know. What is it called? Electricity gauge. No power is weaker. The gauge, the needle goes down. If the amps, I’m thinking of an amp gauge, even amp gauge, and the meter goes up when it’s strong and goes down when it’s weak. Check your peace and joy gauges to see how strong your faith is. Your faith, energy, power, strength can be measured by your peace and your joy. What you just heard was part seven of a message that I preached in one of our victorious faith services called Living in Perfect Peace. And we will continue this message again tomorrow. So join me again tomorrow. And remember, God loves you. You are blessed and highly favored by the Lord.
