So be it. Yes, God! Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name.

Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us… Jesus is in this place.

Deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom, power, and the glory forever and ever. Not for five minutes…forever and ever. Right here, I want the whole church to say, "Amen.

" Amen means so be it. Amen means I'm coming into agreement with God's plan for my life. Amen means no word from God returns void.

Amen means my Father has the final say. Amen means I read to the back of the book, and I know how this ends: heaven wins. Amen means I'm born again.

Amen means no weapon formed against me will prosper. Amen means I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. You didn't know amen meant all that, did you?

Say it again. "Amen. " If he says I'm blessed, I'm blessed.

Say, "Amen. " If he says my family will be saved, my family will be saved. Say, "Amen.

" If he said I'm more than a conqueror, I'm more than a conqueror. Say, "Amen. " Come on.

Everybody in the comments right now, even watching this on social media, put an "Amen" in the comments. Let the Devil know "I agree with God. I belong to Jesus.

He's the one who never lets go. On every mountain I belong to him. In every valley I belong to him.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. I'm guided; I have a good shepherd. I'm guarded; he's the gate.

He's the Light of the World. He is my risen, resurrected King, and I'm getting up out of this situation. I came to praise the Lord.

I did not come to feel sorry for myself; I came to praise the Lord. I did not come to impress my neighbors with proper church behavior; I came to praise the Lord. If you knew what he brought me through, you wouldn't call me crazy.

You would lift your hands and praise him too. " Say, "Amen. " What are we going to do?

How are we going to get out of this? We can get out with a "Hallelujah! " That's it.

Glory to God. Bless the name of the Lord, for he is worthy to be praised. Every season of my life he has been a friend to me, and he's worthy to be praised.

I don't know what I would do without God. I don't know where I'd be without Jesus. I have a kind of idea, and it doesn't look good.

Look at your neighbor and say, "You already look better this year than you did last year. " Come on. Tell them one more thing.

Look at them and say… Repeat after me. Say, "I can tell you've kept your resolutions. " Tell them, "Your skin is glowing.

Your physique is lean. " Happy New Year, Elevation Church! For the first time that I've been able to say that to you, our eFam around the world.

Let's celebrate our brand-new campus, our twentieth location, which I don't normally do, but before I do, give out about 26 hugs divided by two. Give five hugs and tell somebody, "I'm glad you're here today. " We're sending you a big hug online to our eFam all around the world.

Just remember, God is speaking this message exactly where you need it to be. He's not limited by time or by space or by location. May this message speak to your heart today.

I prayed about what to share with you for my first sermon of the year, and the Lord led and directed me in a powerful way. Let's thank our band, our worship team, I thank you for the privilege of being able to minister God's Word to you another year. What an honor.

I'll be sharing today from the parable of the seed in Matthew 13:24-30. Now, this is not the parable that's normally called the parable of the seeds. The parable of the seeds we hear more about is actually the parable of the soils.

Jesus taught these parables. He would go out and he would give a teaching. On one level, it would sound simple, but you reflect on it, you pray about it, and it really helps you to see what the I love preaching the second Sunday of a new year, because by now your New Year's resolutions have become good intentions, which you have modified to become more realistic.

The New Year's energy has been sufficiently tapered and sufficiently adjusted to match the realities of daily life for most people, and now we can really preach about the way life is. New Year's resolution first Sunday of the year: "I'm not cussing anymore. " Second week of the year: "I'm cutting back on cussing.

I'm only going to say these four words this year, but I've got to have these four, Lord, and you know I do. " "I'm fasting this. I'm going Now, every once in a while, Jesus would explain his parables to his disciples after everybody else was gone, almost like, "Y'all can get it at a deep level," the disciples, but the crowds couldn't consume it.

That's why he taught in parables, so he could have the privilege of pulling aside his disciples and giving them the deeper meaning. We're going to look at the deeper meaning of this parable that Jesus shared a little bit further in Matthew, chapter 13. (Put it on the screen, please.

) "Then he left the crowd and went into But notice in the parable it says that it was his field. I am learning more and more in my life that if it's his field, that means it's his furnace. That means God has to be the one to decide who's right and who's wrong.

God has to be the one to decide who is on his side and who is not. I remember very early in my ministry, there was a pastor I greatly admired, me just land the plane. We've all got weeds.

We've all got weeds. Say it out loud. "I've got weeds.

" Put the S at the end of that. Just making sure. I'm talking about the biblical kind of weeds.

It's called darnel. It's this type of weed. See, the Bible says… Can I preach about this for a moment?

The Bible says that the man planted a good seed in his field. Everybody say, How many of y'all almost have to laugh at how quickly the Devil attacked the very thing you were advancing in this year already? Just wave at me.

It's almost comical. Right? It's almost like too on the nose.

Like, "Really, Devil? You're going to be that obvious? You're just going to do it right in my face like that?

" At least in the parable the man snuck in and did it at night. For some of us, the Devil is just doing it in broad daylight, just attacking things that are advancing. So now you have to decide.

Do you want the attack to stop badly enough to give up the impact that brought it? Because if you weren't baptizing anybody, they wouldn't be making up stories about your baptisms. " But maybe what God was doing in this church was so unbelievable that the Enemy saw it and said, "If they keep baptizing people like this, is that the master didn't panic about the attack.

He was so cool about it. Read it again. "Sir…" Now, the servants are freaking out, like we do.

"Sir, didn't you sow good seed in your field? Where did this come from? Who did this?

What's going on? Is it the Devil? Whose fault is this?

Somebody did this. " The master, because he represents God in the parable… Look at this. He's like, "An enemy did this.

" Because I was reading a passage in 1 Kings or maybe in 2 Samuel last week with Graham. Which Scripture did I give you, Justin, 2 Samuel or 1 Kings? We were reading about David.

Yeah. One time, David was running through his city that he used to rule over from his son Absalom. His son was trying to take his crown from him.

The son's name was Absalom. David actually had to go flee from his own son. you've been under attack and the Enemy is pelting you with rocks and stones… It may even be coming at the expense of your own dignity, and you are asking yourself, "What do I do about this attack?

" David said, "It may be that the Lord will look upon my misery and restore to me his covenant blessing instead of his curse today. " In other words, what David is saying is that he cannot curse what God has already blessed, so let him. He cannot destroy what has God's DNA.

He cannot And the one thing about it, Graham… Check this out, G. The type of weeds that were growing… You couldn't tell that they weren't wheat until they had grown a little bit. They looked exactly the same until the head came up, and then they were like, "Oh no!

This is not wheat; this is a weed. " Sometimes you don't know. Sometimes you don't know.

"I'm never going back to the way I was. Look at what the Lord has done. I'm never going back to But have you come to a point in your life where all you are seeing in this season is the weeds?

Have you got one kid that is in trouble, and you have failed to appreciate the two that are doing good? That means you have become too weed-focused. Have you got nine things in your body that are working well, but the one thing that is not So, all I wanted to tell you today is "Don't let the attack distract you.

" That's what it is. It's a distraction. You have been growing.

You've got what it takes to grow. You've got what it takes to make this decision. You have got what it takes to do the job.

You've got what it takes to learn the skills. You've got what it takes to do the inner work and get some healing. You've got what it takes because you've got God.

Lord, I want to pray today for the person who has never placed their faith in you. Would you just join me in this prayer as a church? I'm going to pray for someone who needs to give their life to Jesus Christ.

Right now, it is very possible that the reason God brought you here today or the reason you joined us online is for this moment. You see, it's not by might nor by power that we become strong in the Lord. No.

The seed was good because of who planted it. Well, campus pastors, you can have it. Grab hands with the person next to you here at Ballantyne.

Look at them and tell them, "Don't pluck it up, because God is not through with you yet. " Another day to be in the presence of God. Come on, Holly.

I ain't got no hand to hold. It's going to be an amazing year in your life, babe.