GYC 2025: Seeing the Invisible

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Generation. Youth. Christ. (GYC)

Addiction in the Last Days: Breaking the Invisible Chains on the Mind

Eric Walsh

01 A Generation Addicted: Drugs, Demons, and a Rising Death Toll

02 The Brain on Drugs: How the Devil Chains the Mind

03 The New Drug: Pornography and Sex Addiction

04 Healing the Brain After Addiction: The Power of Our Health Message

05 Sobriety and the End of Time: The Need of a Clear Mind to Avoid Deception

Our scripture for this session is found in Romans chapter 7 and verse twenty-four.

The Bible says, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

And it's the brain on drugs, How the devil changed the mind.

We thank you for this opportunity to study a word and lord as we get into this topic now, lord, we're asking for holy spirit presence again.

Lord work on our hearts work on our minds and make us instruments to help free others through your power.

So 1 of my my favorite verses when I'm when you're thinking about addiction is actually found in Romans chapter 7 Romans chapter 7 and if you start at verse 14, it says for we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal sold under the sin and this is Paul talking about the flesh and he says for that which I do.

I allow not For what I would that do I not, but what I hate that do I.

Paul here is basically describing addiction.

We're just talking about it on the break, right?

Person doesn't really want to do it but they're stuck doing it.

The thing I actually hate doing that's what I'm doing.

He says verse 16 of Romans 7, if then I do that which I would not I consent unto the law that it is good.

Now then it is no more I that do it but sin that dwells in me.

Paul says For I know that in me that is in my flesh dwells no good thing.

For to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not.

Then he says, For the good that I would I do not, but the evil which I would not that's what I do now if I do that I would not it is no more either do it but sin that dwells in me and Paul says I find that a law that when I would do good evil is present with me when I would do good evil is present with me and so yes even in addiction people begin to have that desire to escape addiction.

But because of the way addiction is set up, you wanna do right, but evil keeps pulling you in.

Now what I want to clarify statements when I asked me about this I am NOT saying that in you know when someone is addicted they can't be justified.

Justification says you confess your sin God forgives you.

You may stumble around addiction for a while as God leads you out.

What I am saying is, when you stay in a state of intoxication, it is impossible to reason.

This is why we are admonished in Scripture to be sober so many times.

So we're going to look at how these how this whole thing really works.

LY says through his specious temptation, Satan leads men to worse and worse evils till utter depravity and ruin are the result The only safeguard against his power is found in the presence of Jesus His spirit will develop in man all that will ennoble the character and dignify the nature It will build man up for the glory of God in body and soul and spirit.

He has called for us to the obtaining of the glory character of our Lord Jesus Christ He has called us to be conformed to the image of his son.

We are called to be like Christ and that's difficult to do when we have addiction, right?

Let's so let's step back from I talked about the United States and the drug runners and you know and I grew up when I moved when we moved from Connecticut to Miami in 10th grade, the realtor took us back ways into a neighborhood every time the realtor showed my mother the house.

And we didn't know, we wound up buying a house just a couple blocks from 1 of the major crack neighborhoods in Miami.

So helicopters, gunshots, some of y'all know what I'm talking about, right?

And what I learned is the addiction is powerful.

It doesn't just take down a person, it takes down whole families.

There is a spiritual war going on for your soul.

And a lot of times we think of the great controversy We think about angels and demons fighting out there.

We think about the war in heaven Let me tell you the greatest battleground in the great controversy is your mind That's what a real fight is going on it's in you that's the real big fight So let's look at addiction.

Ella White, Council for the Church, she says, Satan gathered the fallen angels together to devise some way of doing the most possible evil to the human family.

1 proposition after another was made till finally Satan himself thought of a plan.

He would take the fruit of the vine, also wheat, and other things given by God as food, and would convert them into poisons, which would ruin man's physical, mental, and moral powers, and so overcome the senses that Satan should have full control.

Well, when man fell, decay became possible.

With decay, the creation of toxins, poisons became possible.

In the perfect world before Adam and Eve sinned, that was probably not possible.

Well, you can argue that theologically, but whatever, either man wouldn't have been affected by it or it wouldn't have been produced.

We know that this is the case because even righteous Noah, after he comes off of the ark, makes a vineyard, the atmosphere had changed.

Some argue maybe he didn't realize the wine would, the grape juice would ferment.

I don't know maybe give him old Noah a pass.

Satan understood that he could take what was designed to nourish man and use it to poison man.

That's literally what he figured out and he understood how the brain worked and he started to hijack our reward system.

Under the influence of liquor, men would be led to commit crimes of all kinds.

Through perverted appetite, the world would be made corrupt.

By leading men to drink alcohol, Satan would cause them to descend lower and lower in the scale.

Satan is taking the world captive through the use of liquor and tobacco, tea and mercy.

Boy sometimes feel coming like some adventist gonna jump me now Dave when you talk about coffee.

The God-given mind which should be kept clear is perverted by the use of narcotics.

The brain is no longer able to distinguish correctly.

Man has sold his reason for that which makes him mad.

You sell your reason, and remember, God says, come let us reason together.

Why is this constant state of intoxication incompatible with salvation?

You gotta, God has to work you out of this state so that you can be in a place where you can make the decision.

Like the prodigal son in the pig pen, you can come to yourself.

So 1 of the my favorite equations I created stress equals demands minus resources right.

So what does the devil do he gives you demands puts pressure on you.

You're in school and you gotta do well in school and so you study real hard all week.

Man, it feels good to go partying on the weekend with your friends.

The stress, the demand is put on you, right?

But what the devil does is he creates false resources.

The devil will produce and give you false resources.

In other words, what the devil does is, he gives you things that make you feel like the demand is less.

He gives you things that make you feel like the demand is less.

He gives you things that make you feel like the stress is better.

But I've taken care of a lot of people, alcoholics and stuff, I'm telling you, no 1 ever drank a whole bottle of 50 whiskey or something and woke up the next morning and all their problems went away.

What happened the next morning when you wake up?

You wake up with all your problems and a hangover.

The devil tricks you into false resources and again a major object lesson you have got to trust the resources of God not the resources of the world when you learn to do that something special something powerful begins to happen so let's look at this there's 6 triggers of substance abuse I want to really talk about why people get into this.

Right, people are stressed out, they need to relax.

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Series

Addiction in the Last Days: Breaking the Invisible Chains on the Mind

02 The Brain on Drugs: How the Devil Chains the Mind

Transcript

Parent Series

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

Parts

01 A Generation Addicted: Drugs, Demons, and a Rising Death Toll

55m

02 The Brain on Drugs: How the Devil Chains the Mind

59m

03 The New Drug: Pornography and Sex Addiction

59m

04 Healing the Brain After Addiction: The Power of Our Health Message

59m

05 Sobriety and the End of Time: The Need of a Clear Mind to Avoid Deception

1h 8m

Sound Doctrine