Discipline of Integrity

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Have a great day. Yeah, I think I did, but I don't think we actually ever discussed it together. Yeah, I'm sure. You know, in the last like 3000 years since we've gotten together, you've you had a well, you had a boy, but you were elected as an elder. You got out of clinicals. You've been hired as like your life has been crazy busy, man. Just along for the ride. God's just doing.
Doing a lot in our lives, but yeah, yeah, he's been good and you guys have had a lot going on too with About to be a dad for the fifth time. Yeah, I think I'm, not sure we were olivia and I were pregnant. I don't know for the last time we record an episode. Yeah, so there's been a long time since we've been in one of these, uh, one of these recording sessions, so um Yeah, so anyway, there's just a lot going on in life. And so, in both of our lives, which is why we haven't been doing this, but I'm glad to kind of jump back in. And so, we'll do a cursory kind of walkthrough together this, tonight. So, why don't we pray? Why don't we jump in?
Lord, we thank you so much that you are the God of truth. That you do not lie. Lord, you have made us in your image. You have told us to be holy as you are holy. And so, Father, we pray that as we get into this chapter in integrity, Father, we pray that you would make us men of integrity. That we would walk before you in the light. That we would be models of truth bearers as we bear witness to the work your Holy Spirit has done and is doing in us. Lord, we pray that you would sanctify us more and more as this chapter challenges us to walk in your ways. In Jesus' name, amen.
All right. Well, I I don't think it's any surprise where he kind of starts with right it just We live in just moral relativism constantly all the time but the part that shocked me as he goes through is he says After he talks about the american culture is in big trouble. He says. Mm-hmm But for the christian the most chilling fact is this There is little statistical difference between the ethical practices of the religious and the non-religious And then he goes through and talks about statistics.
Yeah Yeah, not a very good testimony, is it yeah yeah, and I You know, we're working off of different editions of this book. Yours is much newer than mine. Does he change any of the examples of the lack of integrity? I've got like falsifying tax returns, committing plagiarism, striving to obtain a building permit, ignoring construction specs, illegally copying a computer program, stealing time, exaggerating a product, telling people what they want to hear, selectively obeying the laws. Um, yeah, maybe. And, uh, well, yeah, I think it's the statistics are similar, I think in the two. Yeah, so I mean, that list doesn't really change that much, right? I'm illegally copying a computer program, right?
That was probably in the age of LimeWire and stuff like that, you know, and then Napster or whatever. I guess people could still deal computer programs now, although I feel like it's more difficult than it was. Yeah, it was a thing in college. I mean, I guess yeah, because I I'm sure there's expensive programs that people try to work their ways around.
So yeah, I guess I guess whether you're Stealing a license code or or whatever. I guess I'm too ignorant to know how you would do that. But When you were in college and I don't know maybe when even PA school I Did you guys have to use like plagiarism software to submit your papers through? We didn't.
I think they were checked by our professors. I know professors do that on a regular basis. They have like the Proctor during the age of COVID and trying to do school and COVID testing got a little bit wild. And some professors were naive enough. They would just say, well, take the test at home on your honor. And you know how that would go, especially in any sizable class. Most most of the professors who actually cared about it would do like some sort of a proctoring software.
OK. And even I mean, you know, you have someone looking at you over a camera and there's ways to circumvent that. Yeah. Yeah. Things got pretty especially in the late age of electronics and everything is done. You know, the missions are electronic, like the loopholes get much more creative. Yeah. At Geneva, we had some type of program. I forget what it was, but some type of program that we, different professors, you had to submit your papers through this, and it had some algorithm to check whether or not this was plagiarized.
And I was watching a video recently, and in the age of AI, it's gotten that much more difficult. And so now they've got, you know, I was just watching this little clip, and it was kind of the chief technology officer for that same company. I forget the name of it now.
But he was just talking about They can't pin it down for certain but they're able kind of like highlight and say this was most likely Written by a chat bot or this this section was most likely And I think man in the age of AI how much more right is especially this idea of plagiarism. Yeah And just outright plagiarism, you know, that's I Something that, you know, I like AI, actually.
Generative AI, I think, is really neat, but where's that boundary line, right? I mean, sermon audio transcribes every single sermon and every devotional I do straight through an AI bot, and then every devotional we do, we pump that through an AI chat bot that gives a description of that devotional, right? And so there's a whole lot that I use on a daily basis that I'm like, man, how much, how, How much more is there kind of these gray areas now in the age of AI with generative stuff?
I think this, for Christians really, if we don't have a kind of a rooted groundedness in what we believe truth is, I think there's also some pretty big problems. So that was just one of those I wrote on the side with the rise of AI now. That cheating is, they can pass the LSAT, which is nuts. And I think he talked about too, the statistics themselves show this, but I think the hardest thing with integrity is the social acceptability of it. It's a weird thing to be a person of integrity in our culture. And part of the pressure against integrity is that, well, everyone does it, right?
Everyone cheated on the test, everyone uses AI, everyone falsifies their tax returns, everyone brings stuff home from work. He talked about how eight billion every year is lost from department stores, which aren't really a thing anymore. 30% to shoplifting and 60% to theft by employees. Why? Well, because every other employee is doing it.
So I think this tide of social acceptability really makes integrity stand out like a lighthouse in our culture. Oh yeah. Oh yeah, absolutely. I mean, uh, you know, speaking of pre-conversion, Brian, I mean this, I, you could justify this stuff all the time, right? I mean, uh, why not take longer on your break? Why not do this? Why not do that? You know, uh, why not? Well, I need that tool. Why wouldn't I just take a home? This is really difficult.
I find even Christians, right, this is going to sound very brutish, right, but even things like speed limits, right, like, well, and I'm not saying there's There are times where going to the speed limit is actually going to violate the commandment not to kill.
That was actually when I first became a Christian and was convicted about walking in integrity and keeping laws. I was like, okay, I'm always going to drive the speed limit. And then we moved to Chicago. I was like, if I drive the speed limit here, I'm going to kill my wife and son, right? Like, there are people flying past me 30 miles per hour faster than I am. Man, I've got to figure out what to do here. How do I balance these commandments?
But yeah, this is just the quandary we find ourselves in. And he points out in Romans 3 verse 13, right? Their throats are open graves, their tongues practice deceit. says, even once we were regenerated, if we do not discipline ourselves under the lordship of Christ, we return to deceit like duck, like a duck to water. I thought, that's true. It's baked into our human nature.
So, interestingly, how does he show God's, I loved some of the different examples and Bible passages he uses here. What does he talk about as far as God's word goes for examples and instructions on integrity? Yeah, well he opens up to Act 5 passage recounting Ananias and Sapphira who donate some money and he's like let's put ourselves in their shoes, you know, here you are like God look at me I'm donating money and it's great and you hear the condemnation of Peter, you know, why is it that you've contrived this deed in your heart you have not lied to man but to God and You know, I think our gut reaction is like, Whoa, what's going on here?
Like, isn't this a little harsh? Didn't they do something right? Good. You know, aren't they to be commended and not condemned and it, God strikes them dead. And so it kind of is a jarring introduction to, okay, what's God's definition of integrity. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean that's that's kind of running right out the gates, right? Yeah, somebody dies cuz they don't have integrity, but the point is Why have you lied to the Holy Spirit? Mm-hmm like God knows Mm-hmm who we are behind the scenes.
Yeah, and I think that's one of the things that's I You know, really interesting, in that he points out, right after the whole conclusion of Ananias and Sapphira, where he says, the answer is the church cannot prosper with deception among its members. And God wanted to make this clear for all time. Deception wounds the body of Christ, makes it dysfunctional, and is a sin against God. This is why Peter cried out to Ananias and Sapphira at the moment of their deaths. You have not lied to men, but to God." And I think that really gets to the heart of it, right?
No culture can stand too long if the culture broadly doesn't have integrity, at least some sense of integrity. And definitely no church is going to stand or prosper without integrity. And so, this is one of those just, especially in a day and age where political discourse is just filled with all sorts of false promises and outright lies, it's just one of those things that I, you know, how do we walk as Christians, like you said, in that odd way above the fold? And so, the shape of integrity.
Let's go ahead and go there. This is that second section. I got all sorts of notes here. Yeah. I love that he went here, you know, cause I feel like the Psalm just is, it goes to Psalm 15 to kind of show us what integrity looks like. Cause it's one thing. Okay. Integrity, everyone's going to get a different version of it.
Um, you know, what is it? Um, and the song was asked that, you know, Lord, who shall sojourn in your tent? Who should do on your Holy hill? You know, if God's perfect, if God's Holy, then the truly, the person who has true integrity, true wholeness, true perfection in every area of life can stand here. And so he's like, okay, what would that look like?
And just kind of walks us through each one of these and it's like, okay, fail, fail, fail. I flunked this question, this test. Yeah, and notice some of them are really outright and some of them are are just so easy, right? And has no slander on his tongue.
I mean, especially we live in a small rural type area, right? It happens in the church and it happens in the workplace. It happens in the communities and it happens with our neighbors, right? Just tearing other people down with our words, right? We're not around them and so we're gonna talk bad behind their backs.
And just even simple things like that. The man of integrity doesn't slur his fellow man. But he despises a vile man, but honors those who fear the Lord. Now this is one, again, just in our moral relativism, when it seems like wedding vows don't mean much, who keeps his oath even when it hurts. That's a that's a huge call.
Mm-hmm. That's that I think what Jesus is talking about you to let truly yes be yes in your no be no. Mm-hmm. I don't try to find Skirting ways around but you made an oath. Mm-hmm. Keep your oaths. Mm-hmm You don't want to keep your us better just not to take the oath. Right, right No And so, yeah, you're right, Psalm 15 is a really hard one to kind of really wrestle with.
But then he kind of talks about different examples of ways that people lose their integrity as he goes through this. You want to just kind of line some of those out? Yeah. Talks about like lying, um, either for the sake of peace or just to protect your own name, you know, cover up, cover up, you know, someone else did this, not me. Um, you want to keep peace, not to, you know, present the truth to someone if it would be offensive. Um, talks about, um, cheating and defrauding other people. Um, you know, He talks about the problem about being, having unequal weights, unequal balances. Um, whether that's on, you know, stealing time from our employer, stealing supplies from our employers, dealing on tax returns, those sorts of things.
Um, keeping your word like you talked about, um, not going back on that. Um, and being a man of principle. I'm not just having principles, but I mean the courage to stand up for your convictions when it costs you. So and I think that's where it's helpful to put nuts and bolts on this because like, OK, yes, I think every man wants to be a man of integrity in theory.
It's a lot harder to do that in practice. Yeah, I mean and that's that's the discipline part that he's getting at right but it's it's kind of that uh that building of that courage muscle right that You practice this in the little ways that nobody sees That way when the big ways come Well, you've been acting like this without people noticing. So, where are you going to act differently? That's one of the things that I think is so helpful here by just pointing out the normal ordinary ways in which we fail in integrity and culture all around us fails this way. How do we as Christian men just, okay, you know what?
Nobody other than, you know, if the IRS doesn't audit me, this is just between me and TurboTax, right? But how do I make sure I'm not lying on my deductions? How do I, you know, Well, yeah, I got I got 5 000 miles per To deduct this time when in reality, you didn't keep track of your mileage at all And you know, you maybe only had one or two thousand. I don't know. There's all sorts of examples or I mean, I know I I have Friends who run their business as much as they can on a cash basis Because they don't want to report to the irs at all. Yeah, you know what their actual income is Uh, and so, you know somebody pays them with cash That's off the books, so they don't have to pay for it. That's essentially keeping it a double ledger. And so, nobody else is going to know that. Nobody at work is going to know the small things that you might take from the office. the Lord does.
And so, I think to Archon, his point is the more we practice integrity in the little things, the more, like he says, that when we're men of that type of principle, then when the big things come up, hopefully we won't fail and we'll have the courage, because we've been practicing that behind the scenes. And I think that's just talking about what is integrity, who you are when no one else is looking.
And you think about what Inanias and Zephariah did. Peter says, you've lied against the Holy Spirit. No one else was looking, the Holy Spirit was looking. Psalm 139 talks about how the Spirit knows us better than we know ourselves. And so it's easy to rationalize in our own mind. Well, it's just to myself. This is, you know, it doesn't impact anybody. No one saw it. No one heard about it. Just me. And you kind of have to convince yourself that because in your heart of hearts, you know, it's not just you, right?
Like we have this God consciousness, whether we suppress it in unbelief or not, but the Lord's looks on right. And the Lord, there is always, you're never really making a decision alone that only you see. Yeah. And, and usually that those gray areas are that, Oh, what did I do? Usually it's a lot of self-talk like, Oh, I got to convince myself that this was right. Or I got to convince myself that this isn't a big deal. But the Lord sees, and that's, that's where this psalm talks about, you know, before God's holiness, no, there is not even one iota can stand before him. I think about, even with our kids, when they're doing something wrong and they try to hide it, I'll have to tell them, hey guys, if you feel in your heart that you have to hide this from us, it probably means that you're doing something you know you shouldn't do.
And so, would you take that in front of your boss? If there was an IRS tax man standing behind you, would you just pocket that money? Would you? Would you just spend extra time on a break or leave work early or whatever if you knew your boss was watching?
And so, if you feel yourself that you have to kind of hide this or keep it from people, Probably a good indication that you're not walking in integrity. Right? And that's, I guess that's where I'm saying is like, yeah, the boss is watching, or yeah, what if Iris was watching, but like, so often we put God lower than that. And we, you know, like, well, what if the king of all the earth is watching, which he is, right? Like we should fear trouble that more than the boss walking in the room. And I think that's where integrity really is just, you know, kind of putting God out of that picture. The struggle with integrity. Yeah Well, he kind of moves from there into the the benefits, right? So I like this part What is what are some of the examples he gives of the benefits of integrity and he's right here.
I mean I He's spot-on I mean the the change emotionally spiritually psychologically for me, you know becoming a Christian and I mean there's a lot of this lack of integrity I had as a non-Christian, that I almost immediately experienced these things once, you know, the Holy Spirit convicted me of sin and realizing, oh, oh man, this is bad. Oh man, this is bad. Oh man, this is bad.
And so, you know, repenting of my thieving, repenting of lying, repenting of hiding things, the Lord really gave me a lot of these benefits pretty quickly. And so, yeah, I wanted to just kind of start there. Yeah, yeah, integrity yields character about having a benefit of a clear conscience. The intimacy of being with God like we talked about not not holding anything back, but having that truth in the inward part. about elevating our lives as believers, as a testimony to the watching world, and evangelism.
This is something that the world takes notice of. Something's different about this person. Kind of brings up this story, which kind of reminded me of Zacchaeus. Yeah, really this guy in Nairobi Kenya who I have any debts like I return them all like let me know no no dispute will be No amount will be disputed. No, you know, he has had that turnaround of like, okay. He didn't just Talk the talk, you know this had nitty-gritty like okay now that God's got a hold of my heart Yeah, he's gonna do some hard things.
I Yeah, this was actually, again, just thinking about my previous life, right? There was a guy I was on the ship with, and digital cameras are a pretty new thing when I was on the ship, and this is my thieving heart, right? He left a memory stick, and I mean that memory stick, like half a gigabyte or something like that, right?
But back then, yeah, it was like 150 bucks, and I swiped it. It added pictures from when we were on port. And those pictures I put on my computer and I don't know what happened to the memory stick, I have no clue. But I was so ashamed of that, that I had stolen this guy's memory card and kept his pictures. And it was years later, after I became a Christian, that I realized I still had contact with that guy. And I had to email him, and be like, hey man, I did this despicable thing years and years ago when we were on the ship. These are all the pictures that were on that memory card.
I should never have done this, I'm so sorry. And if you want me to pay you whatever amount, just let me know." And it opened up conversations for evangelism with him, like, why the heck would you do this? I mean, I feel ashamed now, right, talking about that story.
Because I mean, it's a real sin. But it did open up that door. And I still feel bad though, because I mean, and then for years, I'm sure he was like, yeah, I knew I took pictures when we were in Hong Kong. Why don't I have those pictures? because they're sitting on my hard drive for years. And it's like, oh man, that's, but it wasn't the sense of relief that it gave and the opportunity it gave to just confess, speak the truth.
You know, hey Earl, I did this. It was sinful. How can I make it right? And he received it well, thankfully, right? He was like, there you go. Oh, no big deal. Don't worry about it. Thanks for telling me, blah, blah, blah. And it did, you know, water under the bridge type thing.
But for me, it was just kind of like, Lord, why have I been holding onto this for so long? And so, yeah, I mean, just this sense of, But now, right, my conscience is clear before him, before God. Now there's an opportunity between him and myself that if we can talk about these things, and we have had some different conversations now. I'm not saying he's a Christian, right? He's in a weird place in his life, but he's an interesting dude. But the point being is that Now that door is actually open where before I was always hesitant even to talk to the guy because I'm like, oh man Because I knew that there was this thing hanging over my head like I don't like it just that guilt that way there.
So um Yeah, so, and he talks, kind of closing up that section, he says, "...the world is dying for us to have integrity. Its enviable benefits of character, a clear conscience, deep intimacy with God, the elevation of others, and the winning of the lost all powerfully argue its importance." I think this is A difficult one, but it's so true.
So true. So then he gets on into the discipline of integrity in this last section. What do you got down for that last section? Yeah. I think when first time I read this chapter, I remember I was like, man, I've heard this line somewhere before. It was really good. Then I remember, oh yeah, it was in this chapter when I read it a couple months ago. He talks about, uh, He quotes this guy, Wesley Pippert, says, one of the most effective disciplines I know is not to do something for the first time. A repetition will come far easier. It's easy to tell a lie, but hard to tell only one.
And that really just hit hard, just thinking about those, all the times you're wondering, should I be doing this? You know, should I do this? That question for the first time that you do. It's hard to do that once. We're creatures of habit, right? Our brains primed to do repetitive things and to build pathways and to just ingrain, these things get ingrained in us, in our heart. And we go down these roads and it's like, yeah, it's easy to tell a lie, hard to tell one. And that's where this discipline comes in.
And I took that principle of thinking about, okay, doing this for the first time. Is this something I want to keep doing? Or am I making an exception here? Putting God on a corner over here and pretending he's not looking but I want him to be looking the rest of the times Like yeah, you know, yeah. No, I mean this is right just bring it real clear into how how Applicable this is right?
We've been talking about a lot out there. I mean, we know people whose marriages have been Harmed and even ruined Because they looked at pornography the first the first time right talk themselves into oh, it's not that bad I'll just hide it from my wife one time. Yeah And then this long-term repetitive hiding habit that ends up harming or destroying their marriages. It's the same thing with how many guys and ladies talk themselves, essentially, through themselves into affairs.
And just, no, hold on. Stop it. Micah, my old pastor, Micah Ramsey would tell me, Brian, you need to stop the sin, not by trying to damn the stream. That just makes a big old lake of messes. You need to go to the spring, and you need to stop the spring. And so just dealing with all the after effects, you're just always going to be constantly fighting, but you gotta go at the root heart problem. And the root heart problem for a lot of us is this lack of integrity.
And so, yeah, I mean, I would hear him say that, not just to me, but I was in an accountability group with Micah and a bunch of other guys. And these were guys who were single, but wanting to get married and they were struggling. Some of them were struggling with pornography and stuff.
And Micah was just like, guys, You gotta deal with this now. Like right now. It's not gonna get easier later. You need to deal with it. And so, yeah, just not letting these, as he says, it's easy to tell a lie, but hard to tell only one. And then I loved what he said after that.
Discipline will help us avoid the guilt that we often experience by dabbling in things we shouldn't. An important fruit of discipline is integrity. Few things are more important than whether one has a good reputation, a good name. Not all people are gregarious or outgoing Not all people have sought after or are sought after or lovable But everyone can have integrity integrity flows more out of a disciplined character than a daring personality Like again just that in the little things in the little things in the little things in the little things, right You know, you know that I struggle with with routine and one of my routines that I have to fight for is going to the gym. It takes a lot of discipline to go and to be humiliated again and again and again.
And sometimes I get disappointed, right, because I have these weightlifting goals I want to be at. I just look at him, I'm like, am I ever going to get there? And in the moment, it's like, I'm never going to get there. And then sometimes I'll look back.
Actually, it was the other day, I looked back and the front page is where I first started keeping track of my lifting scores. And you know what, over three years, it has gotten a lot heavier. I'm like, oh, that's kind of cool, right? It's literally a three times increase. It took me three years to get there, but hey, I'm not where I want to be yet. But the point is, it's all the little times of showing up and the little times of, this is hard. It's going to be hard. Hard things aren't bad things. Right, yeah.
And that's how the Bible talks about it, right? No one who competes for the prize doesn't discipline himself and train, right? You get to lifting the goal that you want without going. And it talks about how our faith is a marathon, right? You gotta put your head down one step at a time. And sometimes we want it to be a spring be like, oh, I did this amazing thing. I won the battle in this really hard time and then crash, right? But I think we need the marathon mentality of integrity. It's all the little times of showing up. It's a long term. The sad thing with integrity, right?
One big blunder. can undercut all of it. I mean, look at King David. Actually, King David's a perfect example of integrity gone awry. He even has Psalms, you know, God, judge me in my integrity. Now that's, I think, situational integrity, right? Judge me according to my righteousness. I think that's in those situations.
But David, at one point in his life, could say, no, Lord, I know that I'm walking in your ways. And you see the blow to David's family and to his reputation and to the kingdom as soon as he compromises on his integrity. As soon as he tells that first lie. You see the snowball. I mean, thankfully, graciously, the Lord forgives after Jonathan, sorry, after Nathan, very pointedly, you are the man. But the consequences that David still feels in his life as you track through the rest of 2 Samuel, it's just like, man, this is, It did not go so well.
I think integrity is just one of those things where it's almost like being just careful. A silly illustration would be something like you're walking around with an egg in your pocket. Once it cracks, You can bump into it a few times maybe, but if you break it, it's going to make a mess. I was just thinking of integrity and how, at least for me internally, there's always the struggle of like, okay, I've got this option, which I think is right, and this is this option, which is more convenient. And situationally, what am I gonna do, right? And it's kind of like, you know, doing this more convenient, maybe less upright option for the first time that kind of builds this pattern.
And it really comes from this war within our heart, right? Like, who am I gonna be and what am I gonna do? You know, am I gonna be one person fearing the Lord, living before God? It just made me think of Psalm 86 verse 11. Teach me your way, O Lord, I will walk in your truth. Unite my heart to fear your name. We need oneness of purpose before God. We need oneness of desire.
We don't need to put to death these desires that war against serving the Lord and walking before him. There's freedom in that in the gospel. Instead of having this divided heart of serving sin any longer. Paul says, no, that's dead, right? With one heart, you get to serve the Lord. And that's what God's done for us through the work of Jesus Christ. And it's just this grace of stepping forward in that each day and saying, who am I in Christ? And can I be that one redeemed person for the glory of God in every situation?
Yeah, and when the old man rears his head, and we fail, right? Because Romans 7 comes after Romans 6, right? Where do we go? Well, thanks be to God, right? For the Lord Jesus Christ. And so we know the Holy Spirit is still in our hearts, and nothing can separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus.
But then, you know, by the time you get to chapter 12 of Romans, there's righteousness to be had, right? You're going to struggle with sin, but you walk according to the Spirit. You walk knowing that your identity, your salvation, your justification is true. But now we walk in the spirit, we walk in integrity, even though we know that we're gonna fail. And that's one of the just dangers, we wrap up this section, is we shoot for integrity. We try to be there. In a sense, we're shooting for righteousness. But we're gonna fall short in this life.
There's gonna be times when, I mean, I just had to repent to the whole presbytery for giving, it was unintentional, but yet I had to repent to the whole presbytery for an unintentional violation of the ninth commandment. I said something that wasn't accurate. It's not fun eating crow. Not fun repenting.
But I'll tell you what, I was so thankful for so many of the messages I received back from the guys, from these elders all throughout the presbytery saying, I know this sin was casted to all the elders. Brother to brother, I forgive you. And thank you for being honest. I just thought. Thank you, Lord, because I was in here weeping over this.
Here, I mean, in my office, it's like two o'clock in the morning when I'm writing this and realize, oh my goodness, I can't believe I did this. And I didn't know what was gonna come about from it. If I needed to, if the presbytery said, okay, you can't be a pastor anymore, okay, that would, okay.
And the men who kind of came around, they're just like, no, Brian, No. A man of integrity is also one who's honest about his own faults and sins. There's actually this temptation, if you want to be a man of integrity, that you actually put on false integrity. And you act like you're perfectly righteous. This whole idea of false integrity was like, huh. Man, our hearts are deceitfully wicked.
Well, hey, you want to wrap us up with a little bit of prayer? Sure. Lord, we thank you for who you are, that you do not change. You don't have any division in your being, that you are good and true and perfect and eternal. And we thank you for that.
And we confess you, Lord, war within our members each and every day of flesh war against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh. Help us to go back to the gospel and remember who we are in Christ. It's redeemed in heart and mind and body and that you would redeem our desires, Lord, to love what you love and to hate what you hate and do it consistently, Lord. We always want to make excuses. for our own sin and for making righteousness look weird. Lord, I pray that you would help us to behold more and more of who you are and that we would become more and more like you as your spirit puts to death our flesh and gives us grace to walk after Christ. Help us to do it faithfully, one step of the way with our eyes set on Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.
We just thank you for him and the work he's done. We give you praise in Jesus' name, amen. Amen, amen. All right, thanks, man. Thanks so much for listening to this episode of The Student Podcast. Feel free to go over to the website, sharonharpc.org backslash student and find more information and other shows. Also, don't forget to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. We appreciate it. Have a great day.