Divine Order

Happy New Year, everybody. Can anybody excited to be in church today? I'm so excited to be standing here right now in a brand new year. You guys look amazing. You look smarter this year. I don't know if something's different. The wisdom in the room, the passion in the room. You look amazing. And I know through that camera, getting to say hello for the first time this year to all of our locations in Alabama. in Georgia, the Alabama correctional facilities, also now, into the state of Georgia and correctional facilities, online and on demand. And the entire Highlands family come one more time. Let's put our hands together. It is such an honor to be with everybody today.

And I really, truthfully, I am so excited to be here with you today on this first Sunday of the year. I've been looking forward to it and just since in my heart. Honestly, this is the best way I can say it, that the revival sparked that 2025 was. is going to turn into a raging fire in 2026, that God is up to something big. I am so full of faith for this year. And so thankful that you're already a part of it, this very first Sunday of 2026. It is kind of crazy, by the way, it's 2026. Well, look at your neighbor and say, we made it. Look at your other neighbor and say, you made it too.

We are all here. I can even feel it in the room right now. I love the energy of the new year. It's an interesting mix of emotions. Because on one hand, there is so much excitement. I mean, come on somebody, the holidays are over. No more turkey and dressing. And we can also amen to this this year. No more bowl gangs matter.

So it's like, let's roll up our sleeves and let's get to work. And I love it because change is in the air. I mean, there's this sense of energy that it's a fresh start, 2026. You know, it is a blank slate right now. We're only four days in the 2026 and change is possible. I mean, I put it on the screen here as a question, but I'd love us even to raise our hands. Is there any area of your life at all locations that you would like to see change in 2026? Well, raise your hand. If that's you, raise your hand. I mean, that's almost all of us here at Grant's Mill. And what's exciting is we have that opportunity.

And I want us to lean into that today here in church really all month long as we have that opportunity. It's exciting that a new year gives us that opportunity for a fresh start, which is why Janie Wearer at Highlands is one of my favorite months of the year, because we get that fresh start in every area of our life, including spiritually. And I just got to start by saying this. You are in church on the first Sunday of 2026, which means you're taking advantage of this fresh start spiritually. And by the way, you have perfect church attendance this year. Go and give yourselves a round of applause. Hey, I grew up in a badger shoes group.

We'd be handing out badges right now. You get a badge at the end of the service. Keep coming back. You are your perfect church attendance. And really, as you've already seen and heard here at Highlands, today is a big moment as we step into this month. A lot of amazing things happening. I want to share. These are not announcements. Really, I'm praying that these would be communicated as convictions or really passions of our church January. It's a very passionate month for us because there's so much opportunity. Today we are starting a brand new series. I'll talk more about that here in a moment. It's going to be an exciting time really partnering with our 21 Days of Prayer.

It's going to be a powerful series and a powerful time for us as a church. I do want to highlight this next one is so important and that is that today is also step one of the growth track. And I want to share this really to everyone. The heart of the growth track, and especially step one, comes from Psalm 92, which is a beautiful Psalm. I love this text. Verse 12 says that we can be planted. Everybody say planted. Planted in the house of God. And that when we're planted in God's house, there are some promises for all of us that we can take advantage of. The Bible says we will grow healthy, we will grow strong, and that we'll have impact both in our home and in the world around us, all from being planted in God's house.

And getting planted is what step one is all about. It's your chance to learn more about Highlands and really to make Highlands home. If you are with us, if you're new here at Highlands, it's a perfect place. We're here if you've been around for a while, but you've never taken this step, it gives you a chance to meet your campus faster, to meet each campus team at every location, to meet other people from your campus, and again to make Highlands your home. So every location, 6 p.m., dinner is provided, and come on somebody. Childcare is also provided. We do everything we can to make it easy. And all I got to say is this, you know this is, if this is you, the time is now to get planted.

Again, if you've been around for a while or if you're brand new, and we, I know we have a lot of new people here. This season's been amazing, really, from At The Movies to Christmas, which by the way, do you want a Christmas report? We had over 117,000 people come to our Christmas services. The God be the glory.

We saw 563 first time decisions for Jesus, which is a maya praise God. And so really with that week, and then also at the movies, there are hundreds of new families in the sound of voice right now, and we would love the opportunity. to meet you to get to know you. And again, to call Highlands Home will be amazing. Step one tonight at 6 p.m. And then as you've all already heard from your campus pastor in the video, today is day one of 21 Days of Prayer. And so I'm going to talk about it a little bit more because it is such an important part of our church. You saw in the video earlier, which by the way, February 1st, we're going to celebrate 25 years as a church.

And so every week this month, there's going to be a video moment where we celebrate kind of the last 25 years But we had to start with prayer because the foundation of this church is prayer. We are a pray first church. And I want to take a moment and turn to my pastor and our founding pastor, Pastor Chris, thank you for building this house on prayer. Can y'all honor, PC, Ms. Henry, we love you.

And I want to say this to him, but also to all of you, we will continue to build on that foundation. We are a pray first church. Prayer changed my life. 21 days of prayer. in 2008 truly changed, my life changed, Jill's life has changed the trajectory of our family. So maybe you've been a part of it. Don't take it for granted. Don't just say it's another January. Let's lock in. Let's be there tomorrow morning. If you've never been a part of it, you gotta come and see this. Tomorrow morning, 6 a.m. at all of our central time zone locations, 7 a.m. over in Georgia. It's a one hour prayer meeting. We'll have you out on time.

You have my word. Come and pray. Come and learn how to pray. And honestly, just come and see it. It will build your faith. Can I get amen for anybody who's been there? I mean, it is so encouraging. Of course, it's streamed online as well. And during the month of January, we also add fasting. And so you can get all the resources for prayer and even more about fasting on our website, but also want to highlight one more thing. It's this first Wednesday, first Wednesday is this week. Pastor Chris, I've actually asked him to speak this first Wednesday on fasting. And so he's going to spend that entire time teaching us from God's word all about fasting.

Sound good, everybody? All right, so for all these reasons, and so many more, the new year is exciting. You know, look at me today. Change is possible. I need you to get this in your heart today. I need all of us to have this in our heart today. Change is possible. But on the other hand, part of the energy of the new year is also interesting because there's also a tension. So I've been studying for a couple of months getting ready for today. And it was interesting for me. I'd never read a stat like this before, but it's backed up in many different places that the new year season, January specifically, is also a peak stress time of the year.

And part of that is just like the post-holiday blues and finances for sure maybe we made some bad decisions in the Christmas season specifically. But it's interesting as excited as we are about change, the biggest stressor in the month of January is the pressure to change. Y'all do know we are all crazy people.

It's interesting, but really it makes total sense because I know I felt that before and this is kind of the tension question is what if all the change we're hoping for in 2026 doesn't happen? And we feel that way, and I know I feel that way when I was thinking about it, praying about it, we feel that way because we've all been there before. Y'all know we have all started a year with so much excitement, come on. And we end up in November, December, so discouraged. And a few years back, I've actually shown this video once before, but this is the perfect way to demonstrate this. A few years back, we love amusement parks. I love amusement parks, six flags, Disneyland, Disney World, Dollywood, anywhere out there.

Cinnamon bread at Dollywood? You know what I'm talking about. So we love amusement parks, but the rule in our family is, if we're going, you're riding every ride. There are no passes. We're not going to be afraid of a roller coaster. And so we're getting ready to go a few years back, and we were taking our three-year-old for the first time ever to the theme park. We're telling Knox, Knox, you're gonna ride every ride. He has no idea what a ride is. We're building his fate. We're building his confidence all the way to the day we get to his first roller coaster. And this is actually the video, because I'm a good dad. I just videoed him as it was happening.

We're going up the first hill. Y'all look at that excitement. He is so, he's excited. We've been building up to this moment, and we're getting to the top of the first hill. This is the

Moment and... That video! is New Year's resolutions in a nutshell. Gonna put the pictures up there. We start the year out full of faith. And we end the year so discouraged. Can I get a witness out there in church? Oh, come on somebody. Don't leave me up here by myself.

It's so true. It's like 23% of us who make New Year's resolutions break them in the first week. 80% are finished by the month of February, and less than 9% percent see real change. So again, the last couple of months I've been praying and wrestling with just some questions on really these questions. How can 2026 be different? How can this be the year we see real change in our lives? And then ultimately, what are we missing? So if you have your app today, I'd love you to grab it and kind of fall along. We're going to take notes today. And then in the weeks to come, you have my word on this, we are going to get into the weeds practically, both on Sundays and 21 days.

Our Sunday series and 21 days are going to partner together in a huge way this year. We're going to get into the weeds practically. But before that today, I really felt it was very important for us to lay a foundation for us to build on, not just on the same January, but for the rest of the year. And here's the good news, is that today's gonna be full of some really good news. Not hype, not wishful thinking, a settled biblical truth. Everyone look at me. Yes, this year can be different. Can I get an amen? And the reason will not be a better strategy, it will not be resolutions on the, there's nothing wrong with them in the cells, but it won't be depending on the resolution.

And for goodness sake, it won't be something that we buy off an Instagram ad. Because I'm getting hit like crazy. Everything on Instagram right now is how you can change your life forever. The answer is in a God has given me, and I can't wait to share with you today, is in a single verse of why 2026 can be different. This is the theme of the series, the theme of 21 Days in Church. This is our rally cry for the entire year. If you have your app open it up, it'll be on the screen or if you have your Bible, Matthew 633,

But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. And we are going to dig into this verse today as a foundation for our year. This verse, Matthew 6, is found in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount, which is a sermon that Jesus preaches from Matthew 5 to Matthew 7. It is the longest recorded sermon of Jesus. Now y'all have to forgive me. I'm a little bit of a Bible nerd, which hopefully you're okay with that as your pastor. I love the Bible. And all the Bible is amazing, but the Sermon on the Mount is one of my favorite parts of the Bible. It is brilliant.

Jesus is brilliant. There's never been another speech. Sermon like it. Everything he shares is earth-shaking. It comes out of heaven, literally wisdom from heaven. It is a divine reordering of the world. I mean, Christians, of course, admire it, but non-Christians, even atheists, I've read a few quotes of atheists saying it is the greatest moral teaching in history. Y'all just gotta know that the thermal amount is the basis of the moral code of Western civilization, like the Magna Carta, the Constitution, all based off, I told you, I'm a Bible nerd, okay, forgive me. But it is way more than a moral teaching. Jesus is giving us a new way of living. This is what NT Wright says.

The terminal amount is not an impossible ideal. Oh, this is so good church. It is Jesus' vision of what human life looks like when God is in charge. And in the middle of this beautiful sermon is Matthew 633. And theologians catch this, call it the key to unlock the abundant life of God. I actually almost had the team bring a door frame out on stage. Just imagine with me there's a door right here and this is the world we live in and even the areas of change that we're looking for. How do we get to all of that? You know, what's missing? All those questions that we have. And on the other side of this door is the abundant life of God.

All the promises of God's Word. How do we get from where we are to where it is? Matthew 633 gives us the key. Because in Matthew 6.33 Jesus is teaching us, real change will not come to our lives by trying harder, by doing good, by rule keeping or willpower. We have tried all of that and it doesn't work. Real change comes from living a re-ordered life. And Dallas Willard who writes much on this in renovation of the heart and divine conspiracy says this and this is just a powerful way to frame it up. He says, the kingdom must be sought first, not as an added concern, like not as something else on our list, but as the controlling priority that orders all of our life.

And again, we're going to get very practical with this. We're going to get into relationships. We're going to get into finances this month. We're going to get into personal growth. Probably everything that's on your New Year's list, we're going to get into it practically. But if 2026 is going to be different, if we're not going to end up on that roller coaster, then we've got to get this revelation church in our hearts.

Because Matthew 633, and this is a title of message today, is teaching us the divine order of life. So here's what we're going to do today. We're actually going to take these next few moments, 20 minutes, and we're going to look at this verse exegetically. Now, that is just a fancy, seminary way of saying, we are going to slow down. And we're going to look at all 19 words of this verse. And I've been praying that from my own life and all of us that we would get this in our heart. And again, this is the foundation where we're going all year long. So team, put the verse back on the screen. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.

We're going to start if you're getting, if you're taking notes with that first word, write down the word but. Now listen, there are a lot of great buts in the Bible. A lot of great buts. This is a beautiful but. I've been waiting so long. It's like the worst dad, preacher, joke, and history. But it's true. This is a

Beautiful but. because I gotta move on, because Jesus has been addressing, go read Matthew 6, Jesus has been addressing in this scripture, he had just finished addressing the anxieties of life. Talking about how life is full of worry, and in the original language Greek that's written in, worry and anxiety are the same word. So Jesus, I love that our Lord and Savior put Himself into our seat. He's recognizing that our life can be filled with worry and anxiety. And it's interesting because these are categories. He goes into specific examples. He talks about how we can worry about our provision, our possessions, and we can worry about the future. Isn't it interesting that 2,000 years later, the specific examples have changed, but the categories are simpler?

I mean, think about the things right now you walked into church with. I want to lean in a little bit here. I know it's exciting, it's a brand new year, but I also feel the weight. That's that tension of energy right now. I feel the way that we've come in with some worry about some situations. I would love you to take a moment. I'm sure it's from top of your mind. What is your worry list right now? It'll be the same categories. For me, I'm a dad of three teenagers, help me Jesus. I'm thinking a lot about my kids right now. Anybody else out there? Think about your kids? Raising kids in 2026. Are you kidding me?

Maybe for you, it's health. or finances. And what Jesus is saying is this, I recognize, this is what this bud is really all about, I recognize that all that worry is leaving you tired and worn out. And Jesus, he's our loving Savior. But you're right here, y'all, he gives us a little bit of a rebuke. This is a spiritual spanking from your loving Lord and Savior already for this. He says, listen. pagans try to run after possessions and provision and the future in their own striving and their own strength. And Jesus is saying, but you are not like the pagans. You're not like the world. So stop acting like it.

I have a better way. So, but this is what the bus all about. You've been looking out here, but if you will just turn to me, you've been trying to fix it in your all strength, but if you'll just look my way, not this way, this way, can I get an eight minute chance today? There's a better way, not the way of worry and effort, the way of grace, the way of mercy, the way of the love of a perfect heavenly Father. And y'all he is a good, good Father. If you came in today to church, worn out and exhausted, overwhelmed, I mean, maybe for you, and this is so deep in my heart, I've been praying for this person, maybe it's one person or many of us,

Even the thought of going through another year around the sun is overwhelming you. Can you just open your heart up today to not to answer me, but to Jesus? He is speaking to you today, there's a better way. There's a better way. And that way starts when we, what's the next word, when we seek, write it down, when we seek. Now this word seek is a

Present, active, imperative. I'm laughing because your boy had to Google that. English, this is true. English was my worst subject in school. I made better grades in Spanish and I can't speak a word in Spanish than I did English. Anybody else out there that just struggled with English? I really don't believe. I think my English teacher actually was a strong believer, but if she wasn't, she would get saved seeing what I do today. She's like, I don't think you can even speak English. But seek is a present, active imperative, which just means this. Seek is meant, catch this, seek here. When Jesus says it, it is meant to be an ongoing action. Seeking God is not just a one-time occurrence.

We don't just, for instance, we don't just seek God when we get saved. It's actually very interesting. The Bible talks about salvation in three different ways. There is that kind of past version of, I got saved. I saw it after God. I raised my hand. For me, I was 17 years old, and I was coming home actually from church. I had felt the conviction of the Lord in church, but I had not responded to it. And I didn't even make it home. I pulled over on the side of the road and on the side of the road. I prayed the salvation prayer in my truck at 17 years old and come on somebody, it changed my life forever.

Can we just thank God for the moment we got saved? With the moment, God changed everything. He paid for my sins, past, present, and future. But the Bible also uses the word salvation presently. I am being saved. This is all about sanctification. Philippians chapter two talks about how we continue to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. We never stop seeking God. And even this is a beautiful text, but Philippians too, because it's the image of a gold mine. You don't need to hear this today. We got to get this in our heart. Salvation is a gold mine. Y'all, there is always more gold. It gets better. The more we seek God, the more we find.

The better it gets. So we were saved. We're being saved. There's even a future tense of the word salvation. I will be saved. And this is all about glorification. We're almost chapter 13. Our salvation. Praise God is nearer now than it was we first believed. Jesus is coming back. You all hear me? There is a day where Jesus is returning. And we will spend eternity with him. The big idea is this in the Bible, and Jesus is saying here in Matthew 6, look at me today, never stop seeking. You won't walk on the other side of the door. We want that abundant life. We got to not look to the way of the world, look to his way, and begin to seek him.

If you want his life, pursue me, Jesus says, aim at me, abide in me, and not randomly. What's the next word? Seek first. Let's try that again. Seek what? seek first. Very important word in this text. Jesus does not just want to be on our list. Jesus demands first place.

Jesus demands to be our priority. I was studying that word priority. It entered English in the 1400s, and yes, I had to Google this as well. Very interesting. When the word entered our language, it meant the most important thing in our life. There was no plural form. There was no priorities. There was only our priority. This is a beautiful picture of what Jesus is calling us to do. If you want the abundant life God has for you, if we want us on the other side of that door, then we are to seek Him first. And a lot of us have God on our list. But here's a question we need to wrestle with. Is God our priority?

And Jesus, you just got to hear this today, church. This is the foundation. He just doesn't leave any wiggle room here. He's either Lord of all or not Lord at all. which is, again, one of the reasons we do 21 days of prayer to start the year, we are saying to God, God, you are our priority. You come first. Can I get an amen today? But seek first. Now the next few words of this verse are huge because maybe you're here today and you're like, okay, I get it. Seek God first. But what exactly am I seeking when I seek God to things? The first is we are seeking His kingdom, right? That now we're seeking His kingdom.

Now we could, honestly, we probably should at some point be a lot of fun, do a whole series on the kingdom of God, because the kingdom of God, that phrase can honestly be a little confusing for us. And so I'm going to hit it short version here, but there's a much bigger teaching. But when we think about kingdom, we often think about geography, like land, border, territories. And I do want to just declare right here. We know this, right? God already owns it all.

Psalm 24 says the earth is the Lord's and everything in it, the world and all who live in it. Hey, everybody, our God is sovereign over over it all. That deserves a little bit more of an amen right there. I guess we really got nothing to worry about. Our God is king over it all. But when it comes to our life, God is sovereign over all creation, but that's not what it's talking about in Matthew 6 specifically. The kingdom Jesus is talking about here is not geography, it's about governance. The kingdom of God is God's rule, His reign, and His authority in our lives.

So God's kingdom is active wherever He is trusted and obeyed. So when Jesus tells us to seek His kingdom first, He's asking for complete surrender to His governance. And I wrote down a few things because I want to lead in right here. This is God speaking to me even in my study time. It's easy in my life, and I'm sure this could be true for a lot of us. It's easy in my life for God to be more of a guest than a governor.

We welcome Him, we enjoy Him, we love the benefits, but we aren't allowing Him to set policy. When we seek the king of verse, Jesus is telling us that he gets to define truth. He gets to establish what matters most, that Jesus gets to call the shots in my relationships, in my finances, in our decisions, in our future, in our identity, in our sexuality, in our desires, and the list goes on and on and on and on. To seek first his kingdom is to ask God church to reign as king over every area of our life. This is what Jesus is calling us to.

And listen, he is not an ego maniac. He knows this, that only under his rule can we live that abundant life that God has called us to live. God's called us to live. He's encouraged us. He's invited us to seek His kingdom so that we can experience what life is like under His rule and reigns. We seek His kingdom, and here, secondly, the verse goes on to say, we also seek what? His righteousness. We seek His kingdom and we seek first His righteousness. Now the good news is this, nothing I'm talking about today is based on our own righteousness. Can I get an A.M.? ? That was called the law, and that did not work.

The Bible actually says, and we could have found 20 more verses for this. None of us is righteous on our own, Romans 3, 10. We all sinned and fallen short of God's glory, Romans 3, 23. The wages of our sin is death. That's what we all deserve because of our sin, Romans 6, 23. But because of the death and resurrection of Jesus, the miracle of Jesus, we now have access, even though we deserve death We now have access to the righteousness of God.

And I know that's a huge concept, but we gotta get in our hearts today, church. Second Corinthians 5.21 says, God made him who had no sin to be sin for us so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. Anybody grateful for Jesus going to that cross and paying a price I could never pay. Now because of that, I can experience the righteous, since God I can become that in Christ Jesus. The next verse Romans 8.4 says, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, so we don't have to earn it on our own according to the flesh, but now we've been empowered with the miracle of the Holy Spirit.

And we get to live. This is really what Jesus is telling us to seek right here, a Romans 8.11 life. And if the spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead lives living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his spirit who lives inside of you. We don't have to achieve righteousness on our own, but we get to receive it through the power of the Holy Spirit at work in us. which means when we seek His kingdom, we're saying, God, I'm coming to you. I'm not going to the world. I'm actually coming to you. And in this area of my life, what do you have to say about this area of my life?

I'm looking for your role, your reign, and your authority. And when I find it, it's going to be intimidating because I can't live that on my own, but I don't have to because now I'm empowered by the Holy Spirit to be transformed into the standard God that you have. This is Matthew 6.33. If you'll seek me first, my kingdom and my righteousness, it will change everything about change. There is no more trying in our own strength to seek first is righteousness is to invite God's spirit to shape and transform every area of my life. Can I get an amen today?

Now, let me bring this into a very practical way. What is Jesus really telling us here? I'll just take an example from my life of being a husband. So I grew up with having an amazing dad. He's here in the service. I'm grateful for how other men around me were a great standard. But as many of those great standards I've had around me, as much as I learned from them, I had never been a husband myself. So many times I have felt overwhelmed. This idea of worry or anxiety has definitely been attached to this area of my life. And in the middle of that worry and anxiety, it's easy to grab something off a shelf or from a self-help book or just a practice of the world.

And I'm looking at all these different ways to become a great husband. And it's really not helping me change into the husband I really want to be that God's standard sets. But I don't have to live that way anymore, church. I can actually turn the other way, and I can begin to seek him. I can begin to open up his word and say, God, I'm going to seek you first. What do you have to say about what it means to be a husband, a godly husband? And when I read his word, I begin to read and seeking his kingdom. Oh, God, you have rule and reign and authority here. You have a vision and a version of this that is different than the world.

And it's exactly the way you made me to live as a husband. Can I get an amen? But I'm kind of intimidated by that, but I don't have to be because now I just say Holy Spirit, transform me into what I'm reading here. and I begin to live out what I was always meant to be as a husband. Take that as a dad. Take that in the area of finances. That's what we're going to do for the rest of the month is allow his standard to be transformed through the power of the Holy Spirit into a reality and our life. When we seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, the promise of 2026 is our life can be different.

How do we know it? It's the very end of this verse. Come on church and all these things will be given to you as well. C.S. Lewis says it so well, put first things first, and we get second things thrown in. Put second things first, and we lose both first and second things.

The key to change is a reordered life. The divine order of God changes everything. So earlier I had you raise your hands, you know, there's an area of your life that you would like to see change in 2026. And honestly, I obviously have no idea what that area or areas for your life might be.

But I want to just lean in for a moment there because I can guarantee whatever you're looking to change in your future, that for many, if not most of us, who, especially if you've been walking with Lord for any amount of time, in your past, you've experienced Matthew 633 in action. I'm willing to bet that for many of us, and if this isn't you yet, this will just be a testimony of the power of God, that for many of us we can look back on our past and say there are areas in our life where we weren't, we weren't for living in the chaos of the world, but we allowed by seeking God first His kingdom and His righteousness, we allowed that area to be transformed, and now we're no longer who we once were, can I get a witness in church today?

I have many areas, but for me, the one I just have to celebrate because it's been a bedrock of my testimony. I got saved when I was 17 years old. And within a few months, it was just complete. I mean, instantly transformed was felt called the ministry. It was just, there was so much vision that getting saved changed everything for me. But I was living with a crippling spirit of fear. I don't know where that spirit of fear came from. I've shared this before. It wasn't just being afraid. I was living with a spirit of fear. It was usually attached to death either in myself or people that I love were going to die. And it was a crippling fear.

Here's what I know now looking back. That was a crippling fear. And this is what fear and many other strongholds in our life are. The devil's just trying to keep us from our future. He wanted to cripple me with fear so I would never become who God had called me to be. And I'm six months in. Barely a Christian. Hadn't really seen God do anything. And I opened up my Bible and my quiet time. Because I don't want to live in this fear to fear. I don't even know what to call at that point.

And I read in God's Word that I no longer have to live with a spirit of fear. But I've not given you a spirit of fear. And the reason I quote Romans 8, 11, that same power that raised Christ from the dead lives in us is because it was right after I read that I don't want to live with a spirit of fear that I read Romans 8, 11 and I asked the Holy Spirit In the most innocent, six months save way. God, can you set me free from this spirit of fear? And here I am two decades later. I'm telling you in that room, that spirit of fear lifted. And for two decades, it's never touched my life.

Come on, church. If he can do it in one area, he can do it in any area. If he's done it in our past, he can do it in our future. The key is living an ordered life. So what do we do, Highlands? This is our rally, Crawford 2026. What do we do? We seek God first

His kingdom, His rule and reign over every part of our life. And we seek His righteousness. Come on, we are spirit-filled. The power of God at work in us and all these things will be given us as well. If you believe it, can you put your hands together? Let's celebrate all the God has for us.

If you were in every location, just bow your heads, close your eyes. I want us to take these next few moments to respond. The message is over, but the moment isn't. And this is an important time for us to allow the Holy Spirit. You know, seed is from God's Word has been thrown out. Let's allow it to take root in our life.

And I really felt led just to take a moment and pray, as I even described earlier, for anyone who has come into 2026 with a spirit of warrior anxiety. And I'm so grateful that in this context, we're reading today Jesus speaks directly to it. He actually uses two examples. He uses flowers and birds to talk about how we don't have to live that way. Look at these things. They just trust that God's God. They trust that God's gonna take care of them. And I want to take a moment to allow this moment to be a moment for us, to take whatever it is that's worried us, that's given us anxiety, whatever it is that's strongly trying to cripple us,

That we would allow that area to leave our hands and to be put into God's hands. Every head is bowed, every eye is closed. I felt directly from heaven to say these next words over whatever that area is. God has guided. God's guided. Psalm 27, some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God.

Isaiah 49, 23, And those who hope, who hope in me will not be disappointed God right now. And the authority of those verses in whom, just who you are, God, we come to you with our worry and our anxiety.

God, we've been holding on to ourselves. In fact, if you would just, even there in your lap, would you just open your hands up? We've been holding on to it, trying to fix it in our own strength. But our first move in 2026 is to open our hands to release these situations and to trust in your name and to put our hope in you. It can't be our problem, and your problem at the same time, God. So we let go, but it's in your hands, and we trust you with it that you got it. God, I pray that you administer, lift the weight, lift the cloud. God, I pray for a spirit of joy, and even in this moment, for the spirit of peace in our hearts and our minds to flood wherever there has been worry and anxiety.

Right now in Jesus' name, we receive peace, and we receive joy. Just continue to allow the Holy Spirit to minister to you. Maybe you're here today. And you don't have that real relationship with Jesus. I know at 17, I talked about how it changed everything. And that's honestly, I don't want to finish this service out this first Sunday of 2026 without giving anyone who's here who doesn't have that relationship, who's never had that experience, a chance to respond. If you're here today and you don't know him personally, if you've never been saved or even if you have and you've walked away in today's a day of rededication, don't miss this moment. If that is you, I believe with all of my heart, you already know it.

So this is a moment of salvation for you. We're not gonna embarrass you or call you to the front. In fact, I just wanna lead you to all locations in a prayer with a chance for you to respond to what God is doing in your life right now. Just say these words to Him, Jesus today I give you my life.

I repent of my sins and I receive you today as my Lord and as my Savior. I belong to you. Come live in my heart and fill me with your Holy Spirit. So I can live the rest of my life for you. God, thank you for those who just prayed that prayer. But the old is gone, the new is gone, they're a new creation. You and God, I thank you for all of us who've experienced this moment of release and trusting you. God, we say, 2026 is the year we're gonna seek you first. And we give you all the glory in Jesus' name. Everybody said, amen. Can you put your hands together and help me celebrate those who just prayed that amazing prayer.