In Scott Brown's sermon titled 'To Be Unaffected by God's Sovereign Rights In Your Life,' he emphasizes the biblical perspective that God has complete authority over our lives, including our bodies. The sermon references Isaiah 1:3 to illustrate how the people of Israel failed to recognize God's ownership, contrasting it with the innate recognition seen in oxen and donkeys. The message underscores that God created us and has sovereign rights over every part of our being. Brown discusses various scriptures, including Matthew 22:36-37, which highlights loving God with all our heart, soul, and mind as the ultimate priority. He stresses that God should not just be our first priority, but our only priority, influencing all aspects of life. In 1 Corinthians 6:19-20, believers are reminded that their bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit and should be used to glorify God. The sermon encourages Christians to present their bodies as living sacrifices (Romans 12:1-2) and to do everything, even mundane acts like eating and drinking, to God's glory (1 Corinthians 10:31). Brown also touches on the importance of physical health and the responsibility to care for our bodies in a way that honors God, referencing Daniel 1:8 and 1 Thessalonians 4:4. He concludes by urging believers to abandon anything that detracts from God's sovereign rights over their bodies and to recognize their bodies as instruments for glorifying God.

This is Isaiah 1 3. The ox knows its owner and the donkey its master's crib, but Israel does not know. My people do not consider. Isaiah is saying that even oxen and donkeys know who their masters are but the people of Israel don't know who their master is they don't know who owns them they they don't they don't understand that God created them and has a claim on their life. Now if you look at the title of my message here this evening it is to be unaffected by God's sovereign rights in your life or in the world.

In other words not to be affected by the fact that God made you and God owns you. He owns every part of you, your body, your soul, your spirit, everything about you He owns. He has sovereign rights over your body and over everything in your life and that really is a mark of the beast if you don't believe that God has sovereign rights over every part of you then this is a mark of the world you're thinking like the world You're thinking like the people who actually go to hell, frankly. But for those who delight in God's sovereign rights in their life, it's a telling thing and a blessed thing. So I want to talk about Christ's authority over your body.

And the focus of everything that I want to say here is that God has authority over your body. Every part of your body, your eyes, your feet, your hands, your mind, every single part of your body. And why would that be so? Because God created you, because God knit you together in your mother's womb Because God designed you every every cell in your body was according to God's sovereign design and so Christ has authority over our bodies and that's really the most important principle that I want to try to just illustrate by several scriptures And the first is in Isaiah 43, 1 and 2, which reads like this, but now thus says the Lord who created you, O Jacob, and he who formed you, O Israel, fear not, for I have redeemed you, for I have called you by your name you are mine you are mine The reason that God has absolute right over everything that you do in your body is that He created you and you belong to Him. These are the words of the God who creates.

The second text is Matthew 22, 36, and 37 where someone came to the Lord Jesus and said, Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law and Jesus said to him you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart with all your soul and with all your mind So the question that this should cause all of us to ask and that is do I love my creator with all my heart, with all my soul, with all my mind. Is this my desire in this life? Is to love him and to follow him. And it's a very startling principle to declare that because we were created now, we owe him our heart, our soul, and our mind as it says here. Now this passage of scripture is not telling us that God is your first priority your family is your second priority and your work is your third priority That's not what this passage teaches It teaches that there is only one priority There's only one and that is the priority that governs all the others and that is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind.

Now when you do that all the other things fall into place. Your family falls into place, your work falls into place, but none of those things can fall into place without love for God first. So God is not your first priority. He's your only priority and that's what that commandment means and it's of course the first commandment in the Bible And then the next Text is first Corinthians 6 19 and 20 which reads like this or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you whom you have from God and you are not your own for you were bought for a price at a price therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit which are God's God owns your body and he identifies the matter of your spirit and the fact that you are not your own. You're not an autonomous being.

God made you and he has sovereign rights over you. Your body is not your own. You're not free to do anything with your body that doesn't please God, nothing. We should do nothing with our bodies that does not please God. You should always ask yourself, does this please God?

And thankfully we've been given so many commands of things to do in our body. There's a lot to do in order to please God. But this has to do with everything that composes our life. And the next passage of scripture is Romans 12, 1 and 2. And Romans 12, 1 and 2 makes it very clear that a Christian has a duty to render his body a living sacrifice to God.

You're again, It's the idea that you're not your own. You belong to Him. You were created by Him. And therefore, everything in your life is designed by God to be a sacrifice to God. And that's why the Apostle Paul tells this church in Rome, he says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable to God which is your reasonable service and what what we're being told here is that what you do with your body is an act of worship.

Everything you do with your body is an act of worship. It's either an act of worship toward yourself, worship of yourself and your pleasures, or the worship of God. Or it might be the worship of other people as well. But no matter what you do with your body, It's always an act of worship. Then the next passage is 1st Corinthians 10.31.

Therefore, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. Here he's talking about what you eat and what you drink. Do all for the glory of God. It matters what you eat, it matters what you drink, and you're either eating or drinking for the glory of God or for your own glory. And then the next passage is 3 John 2.

Beloved, I pray that you may prosper in all things and be in health just as your soul prospers. What this means is that the well-being of our bodies is important to God. The way that we treat our bodies is very important to God. You know, that's become very prominent in my mind lately as we've seen this matter of COVID-19 and the reality that the people who are dying are people who either have difficult you have have real problems in their bodies or they haven't taken care of their bodies very well. And I've been thankful for our church.

We have a relatively fit church. We don't have much obesity and things like that in our church. But it matters. And John speaks of it, that you may prosper in all things and be in health. It matters what you do with your body.

God has sovereign rights over your body, and one of those rights is that you take good care of your body and you make it healthy. And the next passage is Daniel chapter 1 verse 8, and this has to do with Daniel believing that eating the King's food would be harmful to him And so we read this in Daniel 1 8, but Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king's delicacies, nor with the wine which he drank. Therefore he requested of the chief of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself. Daniel did not believe that Nebuchadnezzar had jurisdiction to demand what he would eat. We live in a time right now where the governments of the world are demanding that you inject something into your body.

They have no right or jurisdiction to do such a thing. God has given you that authority personally to decide what is good for your body and what is not good for your body. And then the next passage is 1 Thessalonians 4.4. And again, this is another passage that declares God's sovereign rights over your body in this sense that he has given you responsibility to take care of your body. First Thessalonians 4-4.

That each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor. What does all this mean? It means that your body is an instrument of God. It means that your body has been given to you by God so that you would glorify God in your body. It means that you can't do anything you want to do with your body.

It means that only God and pleasing God should guide us in what we do with our bodies. The world thinks they can do whatever they want with their bodies. The world thinks that they can follow their own truth. The world thinks that they're free to act in any way that they want, to think anything they think, to ingest anything they want to ingest. But that's not the way of God.

Because God has given you a body So that you might glorify God in your body And I'm I'm here tonight just to encourage you to think of anything that you're doing in the body Anything that needs to be abandoned anything that you need to stop doing and even stop doing it tonight and to stop doing it forever and to turn away from anything that that takes away God's sovereign rights over your body. God has given you a body. It's so complex. It's just, it's an astounding instrument. And the truth is, it's the only instrument God has given you to relate to the world.

And you should take good care of it. And you should recognize that God and God alone has sovereign authority over your body. A mark of the world, a mark of death, is if you don't believe that and you don't live that way. That's the mark of the beast. But the mark of Jesus Christ is that you say, Oh Lord, here I am.

I give my life to you. I am yours have sovereign control over my body would you pray with me father you've been so clear in your Word of your ownership of us we thank you that you not only own us you take care of us and you teach us the ways in which we should go Lord you're so kind you're so good why would we want to relinquish our body into anyone else's care but yours because you're such a good caretaker. You're the only caretaker we want because you are wise, because you are loving, because you are good. Oh Lord help us to continue to relinquish every area of our hearts, our eyes, our feet, our minds, everything to you. Amen.