Here's Pastor Alan Wright with today's blessing, a biblical faith-filled vision for your life. Receive today's blessing from Luke. Chapter 7 Like the woman who anointed Jesus' feet, it's a new day for you. You're free. You are forgiven.
and you are moving on.
So in Christ, Go ahead. Let down your hair. It means in Christ it's time to receive the bliss of unfettered gratitude and love for God. to receive freedom from the tyranny of keeping up appearances. to receive a light heart so you can relax.
Legalistic living is over and peace you can move into your destiny without anxiety. Your heart will overflow with gratitude when you think of Jesus' love and sacrifice. Gratitude is always the surest path to joy, and that's the gospel. Pastor, author, and Bible teacher Alan Wright. He said when he announced that the kingdom is at hand and he told his disciples this is the message to go tell people, he said, tell them repent.
And the word repent in Greek is repentant. to change your mind. Change your mind. God's glory and goodness and grace. is here.
That's Pastor Alan Wright. Welcome to another message of good news that will help you see your life in a whole new light. I'm Daniel Britt. Excited for you to hear the teaching today in the series, No Worries, as presented at Ronalda Church in North Carolina. If you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program, I want to make sure you know how to get our special resource right now.
It can be yours for your donation this month to Allen Wright Ministries. As you listen to today's message, go deeper as we send you today's special offer. You can learn more about it. Contact us at pastorallen.org. That's pastorallen.org.
Or call 877-544-4860. That's 877-544-446. 4860. More on all of this later in the program. But now.
Let's get started with today's teaching. Here is Alan Wright. There's a connection between giving thanks to God and a peace that passes understanding. I tend to always have thought in my Christian life that. You Get the joy of the Holy Spirit, and then your mind can start thinking about peaceful things.
And that happens. But what Paul is saying here is that you can choose to set your mind on the things that you're thankful for. and it will welcome in The peace of the Lord. That something you can think about will lead to something you can't think about. that something that you can think about will lead to that which surpasses understanding.
We're talking about heart and mind and spirit and soul in the mysteries of God's grace. Mm-hmm. Lost in reading some this week about what scientists call neuroplasticity. That the brain is not so hardwired after all that it changes. Used to be scientists thought the brain kind of was hardwired after a few years of life, and that's kind of what you got, and you could stuff some more information in there, but what we're realizing.
is that the brain can adapt. The Sea Gypsies or the Mokan people are a seafaring people Who spend a great deal of their time in boats underwater off the coast of Thailand? And they have, scientists have found, exceptional underwater vision. Twice is good as normal people. And so they're able to gather shellfish at great depths without the aid of scuba gear.
How do the Moken do this? It's because they constrict their pupils 22%. Which They say how can they do that and the science has confirmed their brains have changed. It's interesting.
Some years ago, a famous study about London taxi drivers. who through images of their brains were compared to bus drivers. in London. And I suppose before they had the GPS and all that, this was a little bit older study, maybe, but they required the taxi drivers to memorize the street maps of London. And they would constantly, every day, having to be thinking about how they get to this place, this play, and the best route, whereas bus drivers just drive the same route.
And what they found was that A cab driver's hippocampus, the part of the brain that Deals, I think, with spatial representation is measurably larger. in the taxi driver's brain than it is in the bus driver's brain. Your brain gets better at what it does a lot. If you seek to play a musical instrument. Mm.
And you wonder, well, how is it you get better at it? Your brain's getting better at it. The studies show if you would take up a musical instrument, then your brain's going to grow. It means that, in a very real sense, you're Brain doesn't have to stay the way it is. it can get better at something.
And so this means that if you are one who worries a lot. your brain will become very good at worrying. But if you're someone who gives thanks a lot, Your brain will get good at giving thanks. The thing that's so diabolical is that to him who has much, more is given. And this is God's principle, but it's used diabolically when we are in the negative because.
When you have negative thoughts, you just get more negative thoughts. And it's why it discouraged people and depressed people. often do what psychologists call dampening of positive experiences. I used to do some of this.
Something positive has happened, but if you're really discouraged, your mind starts going, Well, I'm sure this won't last very long. The other shoe is going to drop. My good fortune is going to change. But the people who regularly are thinking about what they're grateful for and looking in that direction. Don't dampen the positive thing, but it gets magnified.
It's very fascinating, this brain science. Dr. Dennis Charney, who's the dean of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, studied brain changes in. POWs who had experienced solitary confinement. It's hard to imagine being confined for a long period of time alone.
where all they could do is think. But the ones who survived emotionally and mentally, he discovered, were ones who actively used their brains all day. throughout maybe even years of solitary confinement. Reference, for example, one man who was a builder, and what he did was every day in his mind he built a house. Room by room, stick by stick, brick by brick.
And when he came home, He built that house without any drawings. Another person that he had interviewed discovered that. This man had just started multiplying numbers in his mind all the time, and he developed the capacity. to multiply Triple digit numbers by triple digit numbers. Another man started accessing parts of his memory that he'd long forgotten.
And so, for example, began remembering and have the capacity to remember all of the names of the people in his kindergarten class. The brain We're realizing is able to be rewired. And it adapts. And not just that, but it grows.
So back to my juggling. I read an ABC News article that referenced a study. That said that they took two groups of people and one group they gave us some instructions on learning to juggle and gave him three months to learn how to juggle. And the other group didn't learn to juggle. And what they discovered at the end of it was that those who learned to juggle over a three-month period.
demonstrated, I'm reading the quote from the study, an increase in gray matter in two areas of the brain involved in visual and motor activity, the midtemporal area and the posterior intraparietal sulcus. I didn't even know I had an intraparietal sulcus. But when I juggle, it's getting bigger. Right now, my brain is growing right now. Mm-hmm.
Mm. That's Alan Wright, and we'll have more teaching in a moment from today's important series. The life-changing message of good news has been taught over radio from Allen Wright Ministries for quite some time now, and God has used every one of those messages. But some broadcasts have really hit home in special ways. In gratitude of more than a decade of radio, we have assembled the most powerful, best-loved messages from each year of the first 10 and put them together in one special album.
When you make a gift to Allen Wright Ministries this month, we want to give you Alan Wright's top 10 CD album or digital download. Are you ready for some good news? Make your gift today and discover God's grace afresh with Alan Wright's top 10 of the first decade. The gospel is shared when you give to Allen Wright Ministries. This broadcast is only possible because of listener financial support.
When you give today, we will send you today's special offer. We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Allan Wright Ministries. Call us at eight seven seven five four four forty eight sixty. That's eight seven seven five four four forty eight sixty. Or come to our website, pastorallen.
org Today's teaching now continues. Here once again. is Alan Wright. It might be. That prophetically Paul saw into things that Science hadn't discovered yet, of course.
But maybe Romans 12, 1 and 2 is more literal than we realize. I appeal to you, therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God. To present your bodies as living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. To say, God, I I'm so grateful to you. My whole life is shaped by an awareness of your benevolence.
And so I surrender every part of my being to you. This is my worship. I give thanks to you. I praise you. I worship you.
And this is linked to verse 2, where Paul says, Do not be conformed to this world. But be transformed by the renewal of your mind. That your mind is being changed. He might be saying, without realizing how prophetic it is, that when you give God thanks, your brain is changing. That by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
He is saying. That the more you worship and you give God thanks, the more your mind takes on the capacity to see everything else that is good and lovely and wonderful. That if you think on what's true and noble and right and pure and lovely and admirable and excellent and praiseworthy, that your brain's going to get better and better at thinking on those things. That you're not stuck with where you are now and the way you think. In fact, isn't this what Jesus said?
He said when he announced that the kingdom is at hand, and he told his disciples, this is the message to go tell people. He said, tell them repent. And the word repent in Greek. is to change your mind. Change your mind.
God's glory and goodness and grace. is here. Our flesh Struggles with this because we'd like to have a peace with understanding. We all know what that means. I'd like to get all of my life circumstances set just right so I don't have to worry about anything.
And you get little moments like this. You know, everybody you love is healthy. You got enough money in the bank account, got food on the table, job is secure, life seems good, weather's doing well. It it just that's not much of life though, is it? No, if you love a lot of people, somebody's in trouble.
If you're a human being, you're going to walk through some storms. And it's just, we're not going to have much peace if we're looking for peace with understanding. And the fact of the matter is, even when you have that, I'm talking about circumstantial peace. You're also worried about when is that going to change.
So, the story of the scriptures about people that God wants to have peace with. It surpasses understanding, but they struggle. Abraham and Sarah, they struggle. They were promised a son, the son didn't come, so they got Hagar to come in and be a surrogate, a maidservant to come be a surrogate. And they went out with Ishmael, and it messed up their lives.
We're trying to help things along. The spies that go into Canaan and they spy out the land, 10 of them come back with a negative report because they say, We have no peace about this by our own understanding when we look at the giants in the land. And all along through the scripture, God's like, I want you to have a peace that transcends what you can see with your eyes. And Jesus came and he said directly in John 14, peace. I leave with you, my peace I give to you.
Not as the world gives, do I give to you. He's talking about something that transcends. The world wants to give peace with understanding. He says, I'm giving you a peace that surpasses. your understanding.
Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. The way that you use your understanding to give thanks. can lead you into a peace That is beyond your understanding. Wow. And what this means is not just for the believer's life that there is no worry.
But where there is no worry You know what is close at hand? Joy. Joy. Brene Brown, who's done such excellent research on shame and vulnerability, and she's also, this Houston researcher, has researched gratitude. She writes, the relationship between joy and gratitude It's one of the most important things I found in my research.
I wasn't expecting it. In my 12 years of research on 11,000 pieces of data, I did not interview, listen to this, I did not interview one person who described themselves as joyful, who also did not actively practice gratitude. actively practice gratitude. For me, she writes, it was very counterintuitive because I went into the research thinking that the relationship between joy and gratitude was: if you're joyful, then you should be grateful. But she said, that's not what I found at all.
Instead, Practicing gratitude invites joy. Into Our lives. See The most beautiful word, I think, maybe in the New Testament. is Karis. Karas Aims.
Grace It means literally gift. Kharis is the unmerited favor of God. Karis is the notion that Though we deserve nothing but God's displeasure that we deserve nothing. But banishment for our sin Though we deserve nothing but punishment, instead God has come benevolently to us. in the person of Jesus Christ.
So that The Gospel says clearly That when you accept By simple childlike faith, that Jesus died for you. That what you're saying is that all the punishment that was due to me has been taken by Jesus. And you're saying that God Loves you so much. that he has Defined justice and executed justice through the cross. and therefore lest himself propitious towards you, wherein he gives to you the reward that only Jesus should have merited.
That's grace. Amazing grace. How sweet the sound. It saved a wretch like me. Caris.
And what I want you to see is that the Greek word for give thanks that Paul uses in Philippians 4 and that we see throughout the New Testament is a word that has grace in the middle of it. Kairos is in the middle of the word for giving thanks. You caris. Day of. Karis Is Essential if you're going to be thankful.
It As I've been saying, if if you are Entitled to something, you may be gratified or satisfied if you get it, but you're not thankful. Only if you get grace Will you ever be thankful?
So the way to be thankful is to think much of the grace of God. And you give him thanks for his grace. for all the things that you could have never done for yourself. including giving birth to your own life. or your spiritual births.
And the word for joy is a derivative from the same root of charis. The word is kara. And Kara, the joy of the Lord, comes. When you are grateful.
So, grace and gratitude and joy are inextricably. Linked. All this is to say You know who the happiest people are in the world? The most grateful. And you know who the most grateful people in the world are?
The ones who understand grace. That's it. It's that simple. Years ago, My brother and I were playing a round of golf and we linked up with a third. who was a stranger to us, a man who was playing around with us.
And we just met him. And he was maybe the happiest person I'd ever seen. Which was very interesting because he was at the same time. maybe the worst golfer I'd ever played with. I had a few struggles on the golf course that day, hit a few bad shots, and it felt frustrating to me.
But y'all He was shanking it into every forest you could find. If there was even a small creek, he topped the ball into the water. He hid in every lake, every creek, past every out-of-bounds stake. He looked for balls, lost balls, quit looking for them. We're tired of looking for his golf balls.
And the whole time he's whistling and happy. You'd have thought the man was shooting 500 par It was terrible. And my brother. Finally, found a way to discreetly say to him, You know You sure are happy. And I imagine this might not be your best round of golf, you know, or something tactful like that.
I don't Think he said, How can you be happy as horrible a golfer as you are? But It was the intent of the question. And the man said, oh yeah, I'm happy. He said, you see, I just came from the doctor's office. Is that they thought it was malignant and maybe even late stage, but the biopsy came back and it's all benign.
He said, I don't even need any treatment. And he just shanked another ball in the woods and whistled. Yeah. Because the happiest people in the world are not the ones that are hitting the best shots. They're the ones that are the most grateful.
And the most grateful people are the ones that know That I was dead, but now I've been made alive. When you think much. of the goodness of God. and give him thanks. You will change your mind.
and become really good at gratitude. And the people that are really good at gratitude. Have no worries. And that's the gospel. Alan Wright.
And we're placing the conclusion here to our series, No Worries, in the final moments here of this teaching: How Gratitude Conquers Worry. Alan is back for one final thought in this here in the studio. Joining us in just a moment. Stick with us. The life-changing message of good news has been taught over radio from Allen Wright Ministries for quite some time now, and God has used every one of those messages.
But some broadcasts have really hit home in special ways. In gratitude of more than a decade of radio, we have assembled the most powerful, best-love messages from each year of the first 10 and put them together in one special album. When you make a gift to Alan Wright Ministries this month, we want to give you Alan Wright's top 10 CD album or digital download. Are you ready for some good news? Make your gift today and discover God's grace afresh with Alan Wright's top 10 of the first decade.
We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Allan Wright Ministries. Call us at eight seven seven five four four forty eight sixty. That's eight seven seven five four four forty eight sixty. Or come to our website, pastorallen.org.
Well, Alan, earlier in this series, we talked about how it's probably the most simplistic message, but yet the most comprehensive thing to try to understand is: hey, just don't worry. Just don't worry. And Scripture's pretty clear on that, but a lot of practicality throughout this series. What's your closing thought as we finalize this?
Well, It's so difficult to come to the end of a series like this, Daniel, and not want to just keep going and going because it's so important. Our culture. is an anxious culture. and it seems that our lives are more and more anxious, and we've learned so many things. We've learned uh that Shame is at the heart of a lot of our anxiety.
We have. Learned that we can have our imagination sanctified by God so that instead of Saying what if and fill it in with negative things. We can say what if and fill it in with positive possibilities. We have Discovered that the world is not getting worse, as people always say.
So many things are actually getting better, and God's on his throne. We have seen over and over great hope. But there's no more fitting way to end than this. The joy of the Lord. Mm-hmm.
And the word for gratitude in Greek is directly related to the word for grace. And that word is directly related to joy, grace, what God's done for us. Is the root of our gratitude, and that gratitude causes us joy.
So, maybe we just leave the listener with this thought. Celebrate the gospel. Think much of what Jesus has done for you. Give him thanks and worship him. And as you do, let the joy come in your heart that displaces The worry that would want to choke us out.
You can live a life. of no worries. Today's good news message is a listener-supported production of Alan Wright Ministries.
