God Is Holy

Good morning. Morning, man. It is so good to see you. If you're relatively new around Beltway, it's so good to have you. We are actually a church that has multiple locations. One church, but we in Abalene have a south campus location. Good to see you guys. We have a north campus location. We love seeing. We're actually online, which is an awesome opportunity because we know there's a lot of sickness going around. People can be online. There's times that you can't make it for various reasons. And man, it is just a joy that we have all these opportunities to be together to really do one thing. We exist to help each other take a first step and a next step with Jesus. Life is found as we stay in step with Jesus. Amen. As we're a part of what he's doing, we find abundance.

But as we do this, I'm just going to tell you, sometimes you'll feel a little bit like an outsider. Let me explain. It was about 30, 35 years ago. I can't remember. I'm old enough that everything's starting to run together. You know what I'm saying? And I made my first visit to Roswell, New Mexico. Now, I wasn't going to Roswell. I was going through Roswell to Ruidoso. We had some little kids at the time, and we had made a plan that we would run off some preschool energy from a long road trip. We actually lived in Leech at the time. And when we did, we knew there was a McDonald's there. McDonald's were the forerunners of playgrounds. We were going to go to that McDonald's. We pulled into the McDonald's and man, I noticed it was like different than any McDonald's I'd ever seen. Anybody ever been to the Roswell McDonald's? It's shaped like a spaceship. You know what I'm saying? Like what we think a spaceship looks like. It looks like, like I grew up watching Lost in Space. Anybody old enough to remember that or new stuff? Danger, Will Robinson. I, I, that's what I grew up. And I look, yeah, you young ones are going, you just, you'll go look it up sometime. Anyway, I looked and it had the spaceship. Look, it's still there. And on the outside, they have a statue of a creature that looks something like this, which would be a common depiction of what we call an alien.

Now, at this juncture of my being, I had no idea about the Roswell incident and I didn't have a way to find out. Listen, 30, 35 years ago, we were just beginning to have cell phones that made phone calls. We didn't have a smartphone. Smartphones, iPhones didn't come out till 2007. We are in the early '90s when this happened. I couldn't pull out my smartphone and go, "Hey Siri," and ask a question or whoever your AI buddy is that you created. I couldn't ask him anything like that. I had none of that. I had to wait till I got back to love and I went to this place, maybe you've heard of it, just kind of in days gone by. I went to this radical place called a library. If you're under 30, a library is just like really slow ChatGPT. I went there and I found out about this 1947 incident where a rancher found strange material that was purported by some to be from an unidentified flying object. Now, the government said it was a high-tech weather balloon that had crashed, but apparently people didn't believe them because people from all over started making this science fiction kind of pilgrimage to Roswell, New Mexico to find out about the UFO to the point that the whole city has an industry built around the idea of unidentified flying objects, aliens, and things like that. They are everywhere in their business.

Now, let's be honest. If I did a word association with you and I said, "What do you think of when you think of the word alien?" You and I would think of this. We would think of Roswell, New Mexico. We have in our mind the image of a being that is not from this world, strange, weird compared to who we are. So, what do we think when the scripture doesn't just suggest something to us, but implores us, gives us an imperative? When it says, "Dear friends, I urge you as aliens and strangers in this world. Abstain from the sinful desires that war against your soul."

So, let this sink in. The Apostle Peter, the same guy we see in the Gospels that was struggling in his maturity, but he matures. He gets full of the spirit. And he's writing to Jesus followers dispersed throughout the Roman Empire. And he says, "Hey, there are going to be times in this world because you are a follower of Jesus that you are going to feel like you are a stranger in the midst of what's going on. You're actually going to feel like an alien." Think about that. Part of our identity as a Jesus follower, in some form, some fashion, is that we are alien to the norm of this world.

Now, as I say this, listen to me. North Campus, South, everybody. When we say alien, we're not talking about this, okay? It's not what this verse and other verses people have cherry-picked are not biblical evidence that extraterrestrials exist. Okay? So, if you've been watching some of the supposed documentaries that have come out, the age of disclosure or alien earth and other things like this, don't write me. Don't direct message me. Don't email me. Don't text me. Nothing like that. Saying, "I want to discuss the biblical evidence for aliens and UFOs and ETs and things like that." We're not going to have the discussion because I don't know. What I do know is that the Bible, when it references alien, it's not talking about this, but it is something. It is talking about something that is outside the norm. The word alien in the text, 1 Timothy, 1 Peter 2:1, is actually referencing somebody from another culture. And when you're from another culture, I don't know if you've ever been that person in another culture, but you know, I've been to a lot of other cultures and there'll be times I'll be with somebody that's like, "We ain't in Kansas anymore, Toto." I mean, it's different, right? Or we get somebody here and we get around them and then they go away and we look at a friend and say, "I don't think he's from around here." That, that kind of alien, right? Things are just different. They're not normal for us.

And with that knowledge, the scripture is clear that in some ways, I'm not saying in every way, but in some ways, as we live life as Jesus followers in this world, we are going to feel alien, strange. If you want what Jesus has for your life, you can't be like everything else in the world. And the reason I contend that compared to the norm of this world, our God is alien. Let me unpack what I mean before you think I've gone a little loco. Okay? If I gave you a quick phrase, and it's real simple, I ask you to fill in the blank. God is blank. What would you put in there? Now, I know you're looking at your notes right now, so you know what the appropriate word is. I know you looked at the front of the park news and all that. But if you could be honest with yourself and say, "Man, if I just got this fresh, didn't know what you were going to talk about." Then what word would you have put in there? A pastor, preacher from a couple generations ago said that what comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. I'm going to tell you from years of following Jesus, I'm almost 46 years now of following Jesus, dealing with a lot of people's life. I do not think that's an overstatement at all. How we fill in the blank. Truly, God is, this is one of the most, if not the most important thing about us. And I would suggest if we were honest with ourselves about God is, most of us would have filled in the blank with the word love. L-O-V-E. God is love. And to some degree, that is true. The scripture says, "And so we know and rely on the love that God has for us because God is love." Absolutely God is love. But do you know that love is nowhere close to the most common word used to describe God? In fact, I'm going to challenge that we often misunderstand the love of God because we do not interpret the word love through the lens of that word that is most commonly used of God. I want you to think about it this way. God actually filled in the blank for us. When that blank was "God is," God says, "I'll tell you what I am." And the word that he filled the blank in, the overriding word for who he is, is the reason why we as followers of Jesus are like aliens in this world.

Earlier in his letter, Peter talked to those Jesus followers, talking to us and says, "As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance." So, very close to what he says in the next chapter, 2:11. "Dear friends, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from the sinful desires that war against your soul." Same idea, but here he gives us the why. "But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all that you do."

Now, stop right there for a second. I think if we were honest, if you've been around the church world at all, most of the time because of the way church world has misused this word, we have a negative associated with holy and we think it's strict, legalistic, angry. And so we see this word, but let me ask you, if that is the word to describe our God, how can it be a bad word? Maybe we have to reclaim it. He says, "Just as the one who called you is holy." Say, "Holy." So, be holy in all you do. "Just as it is written, be holy because I am holy." The most common word by far used to describe the reality of God is the word holy. And we know this by the way is communicated in scripture. When you read the scripture, know that all the scripture was written by first, I mean, not just first century Old Testament, before that, first, uh, New Testament, first century Jewish writers. And the Jewish people had a way of highlighting something and the way they would highlight it is they would double tap the word. So if you've read the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, if you haven't read them, you need to read them. Just start right there. You want to start reading the Bible, read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Then read them about three or four times. You need to get to know Jesus. And you're going to find that Jesus will say, "Truly, truly, I say to you. Truly, truly, I say to you. Truly, truly." Double tap. And the reason he does that is he wants you to really pay attention. Like, he wants you to focus your eyes if you're reading it. He wants you to tune your ears. Like, you really need to hear this reality. But there is one word used to describe the reality of God that's not just said once. It's not just double-tapped, but believe it or not, it's triple-tapped. The scripture says that in heaven there are four living creatures. They had six wings. They're covered with eyes all around, even under his wings. Now, our temptation right here is to get caught up on trying to imagine what the creatures look like. It's like, dude, those are some freaky looking creatures. I, I know, but that's not what's important here. What's important is the next verse. Day and night, they never stop saying, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was, who is, and who is to come." If somehow heaven cracked and we could hear the sounds of heaven right now, among all the sounds, not the only sound, but among the sounds, we would hear the creatures going round the clock. "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was and who is and who is to come. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty." And any Jewish person reading this in the first century and they hear holy, holy, HOLY, they go, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Back the truck up. This is incredible. We have got to pay attention to this." Holy is not just an important word. It is the important word in describing God. Listen to me. God is holy. If you want to know the reality of God, you got to grasp that word. If you don't try to grasp the word holy, we truly have no chance of really knowing who God is. It is a word that's used in its various forms over 900 times from the beginning and the end of the Bible. Almost always it's used to describe God. But when it's not used to describe God, it's used to describe how we as his followers are to live in light of who he is. And it's the only word, listen, that is triple-tapped. Hey, God is love, but the Bible never says God is love, love, love. God is all-powerful, but it never says he is power. "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was, and who is, and who is to come."

You know what the word holy means? It's really simple. Holy means to be set apart or utterly distinct. It means like no other. Listen to me. Similar to this, but not this. Similar to this, it means not of this world. Holy says that God is out of this world. God is like no other. He is like, if I may, he is alien compared to what is often normative in this world. Holy is this overriding attribute of God. You take every other attribute and you've got to put it under the umbrella of the word holy. If you do not understand the other, if you want to understand like what the love of God is, you have to understand holy. If you want to understand what his forgiveness is, you have to understand holy. See, the scripture is shouting to you and I that God is out of this world in everything. Think about it. God is out of this world in his power. When I, when I go to the gym, I often use a thing called a rowing machine. Some of you have seen those. You've seen them advertised. You've thought about using them at various times. Some of you thought about joining a gym this year, right? Hey, it's a good first step for next year where you join and go and stuff like that. And you'll find that exercise machines measure a lot of things. They measure size, they measure distance, they measure time, they measure calories, but they also measure watts. Watts is the amount of power you put out. So, I kind of turned to watts. I don't, I don't use it very much. And I noticed that I was pulling at about 240 watts, which I thought, ah, that's pretty good. And then I thought, ah, a light bulb is about 60 watts. So, I'm pulling enough power right now to power four light bulbs for as long as I'm, or if it's LED, maybe 10. Okay, but really not that significant. Scientists tell us that the power generated by the sun in one second can power all the needs of the United States of America, including all the new AI centers. One second of the sun can power America for 13 billion years. That sun came into being because of one word of our God. And that's not the only star he created. We don't know how many stars he created. We look up there, we can't count them. We can't find them all. But he not only knows how many he made, he knows them all by name. See, God is out of this world when it comes to power. "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty." But at the very same time, God is out of this world in his goodness. One time, Moses was actually meeting with God. And God made this radical statement. He said, "I'm going to cause all my goodness." Say, goodness. "I'm going to cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I'll go proclaim my name, Yahweh, in your presence." But you need to know this. I can't let you see the totality of my goodness because if I do, it'll kill you. I mean, how good is his goodness? If it would so overwhelm us that it would give us a heart attack, an aneurysm, or something, it would kill us in the moment. God is like no other. He is out of this world in goodness. "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord."

But he's also out of this world in his justice. And oh, we begin to struggle here. You see, because what we tend to do if we're not careful is we want to grab on to the adjectives of God that appeal to us. But there are ones that don't appeal to us and we shy away from them, even at times reject them. But when we do that, we miss the reality of God. We got to realize that his holiness includes his justice. Jesus one time said, listen to this. This is Jesus, not some obscure quote from the Old Testament. Not some person in the Bible that maybe you can think and discount. Jesus said, "Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, fear him. Fear God who can destroy both body and soul in hell." Listen to me. I understand that there are many misguided and misplaced fears that cause us to make bad decisions. But not all fear is unhealthy. Right? I'm just going to be honest with you. I stand in the middle of the highway. I'm afraid of the truck coming at me at 75 miles an hour. I don't think that's unhealthy. I think it's pretty wise. There are unhealthy, there are unhealthy fears and there are healthy fears. The healthiest of fears is to fall into the hands of the living God without Jesus. See, the scripture says that every human is destined to die once and then to face judgment. The one single thing that every human will have to go through is judgment. It's not death because there will be a generation that exists that is taken up. They don't actually have to die because Jesus returns. It's not taxes because we know that there's people that are not paying their taxes right now. You may say death and taxes are the only thing, but they're not. The one thing we will all face is judgment. And when we are in Christ, praise God, then we don't face that judgment alone. Jesus stands with us and we're not judged whether we're going to be with God or not be with God. Our lives are going to be judged to determine what kind of reward we get in heaven. But when we're outside of Christ and we stand before a holy, perfectly just God on our own, and we will be cast aside for an eternity of paying the price that our sins deserve. And we struggle with that if we're not careful because we miss the reality that we serve a God who is not just holy, but holy, holy, holy. He is out of this world pure. And that's hard for us to imagine because everybody sins and we think, man, it's hard for us to imagine that there's a God who has nothing to do with sin. But scripture says that this is the message you've heard from the beginning. "God is light. And in him is no darkness at all." God not only has no sin, he hates sin. And sin invokes justice. Sin invokes righteous anger. We actually get that. We taste it. Have a child go through something a child shouldn't have to go through. Molested. Something rises up. What is that that rises up that says this is wrong. This is not the way the world should be. Someone has to pay. That's an inkling of the purity and righteousness of God. God hates sin not because he's a killjoy, not because he wants to keep us from stuff. God hates sin because it wars against our soul, because it destroys people. It harms people. God, his call to purity, to be like him in purity, is his protection of us. "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord." He is out of this world.

He's also out of this world, amazingly, in forgiveness. Have you ever had to forgive something that like really hurt? I mean, like you know what I'm talking about. I mean, we all have the stuff because we deal with humans. Somebody says there's a word here or does this and we can, but there's some things, they're deep. I was 31 years old when through a series of events, a repressed memory came back to my mind of being molested as a kid. I'm a pastor, a leader, and in my head, I know all this stuff, man. I know. I've preached it. Preached some good sermons on it. I knew that unforgiveness is like drinking poison and hoping it kills the other person. That unforgiveness destroys not the other person. All it does is harm yourself. I knew all that in my head. But the forgiveness of that act which had caused so many issues in my life, it was impossible. If it weren't for the grace of God intervening me, intervening in me and empowering me to do something, to this day, I don't think I'd walk in forgiveness. Forgiveness for us seems impossible. Yet for God, the scripture says, "For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him." "As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed your transgressions from us." I mean, God is out of this world in his ability to be just and to be forgiving, to be pure and to be loving. He is amazing. He is great and he is grand and he is good. Come on. Are you hearing this deep within? Is something sinking in a little bit? Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. God is out of this world. He is nothing like us. Sometimes I think we think that God is like us, but just a little bit better. No, he is utterly not of this world. And I'm grateful for it. His love has a depth to it that we have to have a power from on high to be able to even begin to grasp it. For the scripture says that I hope that you have power to understand the height, the width, the breadth, the depth of God's love, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to all the fullness of the measure of Christ. He gives grace in ways that we can't imagine. He heals, he restores, he renews, he sets free, he delivers. On and on and on we could go. Our God, our heavenly Father, is like nothing in this world. "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and who is and who is to come." And if we begin to grasp it, you're never going to totally get it. I am convinced that part of heaven will be us unpacking all the realities of God. It'll never end. For he is infinite, without limit and without end. And so we will see his goodness. We will see his justice. We'll see his love and he'll just keep coming, keep coming, and keep coming. It'll be so great. But we begin to grasp a little bit of his holiness even now.

What do we do? Back to the revelation. You have creatures who do nothing but cry, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty." And the next verse says that whenever the living creatures give this glory, honor, and thanks to him who sits on the throne, the one who lives forever and ever, the 24 elders fall down before him who sits on the throne. They worship him who lives forever and ever. They lay their crowns before the throne and they say, "You are worthy, O Lord our God, to receive all glory, honor, power, and praise, for you created all things and all things exist and have their being through you."

Listen, the only response to a God who is out of this world is worship. But don't make the mistake of thinking that worship is limited to the songs that we sing on Sunday. I'm not talking about just in this room, in our North Campus, online. I'm not talking about just the songs we sing in our cars. Absolutely. When we gather to worship, that is worship. But that's nowhere total, nowhere close to the totality of it. Remember what the elders did? The elders worshiped and then they took their crowns, the sign of the leadership of their life, and they laid them at the feet of him who sits on the throne. The authority of their life, they surrendered and submitted to God's leadership. That's worship. And you know what that means? It means that our God is not of this world. So neither are we. As followers of Jesus, we are on a lifetime journey of becoming like him. Him who is holy, holy, holy. So that means that just as he who called us is holy, so we are to be what? Holy in all that we do. For it is written, "Be holy because I am holy." So, as we become increasingly holy in the way we think, in the way we act, in the way we live our lives, as our lives reflect who he is, then what we're doing is we're worshiping him with our lives.

But we must realize, hear me on this, for us to do this, there are going to be times that as we follow our out-of-this-world God, we're going to feel less and less home here. We're going to feel strange. We're going to feel like we don't belong. We're going to feel, maybe not this kind of alien, but alien, like this isn't our place. You know what I'm talking about, don't you? It's why Peter would dare to say, "Dear friends, I urge you, you're aliens. You're strangers in this world, abstain from sinful desires that war against your soul." Listen, as we follow Jesus, we are going to feel in some ways less and less normal in so many ways. But can we be honest? As I look at the world and all that's going on, if that is normal, I don't want it. I don't want what they say. I see the stress. I see the anxiety. I see the pain. I see the hurt. I see the anger. I see all the stuff. I see the greed. I see the way humans will misuse humans. I don't want normal. I want something beyond normal. I want that which is abnormal. I want that which our society may think is weird. I want Jesus. And Jesus said he died for me to have abundant life. And so if he died for me to have abundant life, then the way I worship him is to live in the reality of that abundant life. I want that which is abundant. And if that means at times people think I'm strange, I'm not trying to be strange. I'm just being who God's called me to be. If people think I'm strange, they think I'm weird. If they look at me like I'm one of these dudes, so be it. I get it. I look at what our society teaches about human sexuality, what it says about human sexuality. I know what the scripture teaches is weird. I know it's weird to believe that God created sex for humans and not humans for sex. That he didn't even create sex as an end of itself. It's not about pleasure. It's got a purpose, a great and beautiful purpose, which is to unite and bring oneness to a man and woman in the covenant of marriage. And it's weird to believe that anything outside of that purpose, unmarried, heterosexual sex, homosexuality, polymorphy, whatever these words are, throupling, pornography, you name it. All these things, they are sinful things and they war against my soul. I want to abstain from those things and live in God's purpose. I get it. I know it's weird to want to be growing in generosity in a culture that says get, get, get. And we grow in our generosity because we know that we're more blessed when we give than when we receive. That when we sow into things of the kingdom, that we're storing up for ourselves treasures in heaven. Shoot, it is even weird to believe truly in the reality of heaven and the reward that he gets there. But so be it. That is who we are in life. I know it's weird in our angry, polarized, yell-at-each-other society, to bless those who curse you. To disagree with someone, but to respect them and make sure they know they're respected. If they shame you, slap you on the cheek. That slap on the cheek, by the way, is not about self-defense. It's about shame. If they slap you on the cheek, you turn to them the other one. It's weird in our society to be angry and not sin. But that's who we are. And we do it as his people. We do it when we're online. The words you type are just as important as the words you say. We do it when we deal with politics. That's a good word for 26, isn't it? You hear what I'm saying? I know it's weird to raise our kids in the ways of the Lord. I know the struggles. I'm just going to tell you, I don't want my kids to be normal. I don't want my grandkids to be normal. I don't want your kids to be normal. If you want your kids to be normal in this world, do not bring them here because we are going for abnormal. We are going for the glory of God and the call of God on our lives. We're going for the abundant life that only comes through Jesus Christ. And we know that in some ways that sometimes it means people are going to look at you different. We're going to hold to a different set of standards. We're going to live a different kind of way. We are going to live not to be accepted by everybody in this world, but we're going to live for the glory of the one who gave himself for us. Right? That's what I hunger for you and I hunger for our kids. Come on. If we want what normal people have, then do what normal people do. They don't do this. They don't sing songs of worship. They don't have their life challenged. But we do this because we want to have what few people have. And if we want to have what few people have, then let's do what few people do by being who few people are. Let's be a people who again and again throw our crowns at the feet of the king. Let's be the ones who can hear the echoes of heaven and hear the creatures saying, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord." Lord. So we lay our crowns down and we bow and we join in and we say, "Holy, holy, holy." But when we get up and we start working on Monday, we still want to be holy. And as we're married, we want to be holy. As we raise our kids, we want to be holy. As we interact with our friends, we want to be holy. Listen to it. "Dear friends, I urge you as aliens and strangers in the world." Got to embrace the reality. Some of us are so torn, like we got one foot in the world and one foot in Jesus, and we feel like we're being torn apart because we are. That's why James said, "Do you not know friendship with the world is enmity towards God?" We don't mean to be. We just get caught in it. Sometimes we just got to recognize. People are going to look at us like we're strange. Got to embrace it. I am going to challenge the world is looking for something different. They're looking for something glorious and something wonderful, and we carry it. Let's just be who God's called us to be, just as he who called you is holy. Be holy in all you do. And as we do that, as we love him radically and we love others radically, people will be drawn to him. People will be given hope and given peace. And I believe we will find abundance.

So, I'm going to ask you to bow your heads. Both campuses right now, online family. We're not going to be done after this prayer. We're going to go into a time of worship in our songs. And I want you to worship. I believe in big worship when we gather together to propel us in our lives of worship. But I just want to dare ask you right now, if you're a follower of Jesus, would you ask him right now, Jesus, help me be holy as you are holy? Would you just do it right now? You can whisper right now, "God, help me be holy as you are holy." We reject the negativity associated with that word. No word that describes you, oh God, is negative. It is the greatest of words. We embrace it again. Make us holy, oh God, as you are holy. Show each of us specifics right now. Maybe there's different areas. Maybe there's some things we need to abstain from. Maybe there's things we need to do. And we're here. We're, we're, we're sensing the nudge of the spirit, not the condemnation. There's no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. You're feeling the nudge of the spirit trying to guide us into that which is life, that which is good. Maybe it has to do with media consumption. Maybe it has to do with some friendships that are core to us. Would you let the spirit just guide you? Say yes to whatever he guides you in. Make us sensitive in the days to come to your spirit about that which is holy, Lord. And let us say yes to it. Not legalistically, not self-righteously, not in anger, not in pride, just to honor you. Let us be holy as you are holy, oh God, and live lives that glorify you. We confess that we have too often been friends of this world, oh God. We all want to belong. I do. And at times, I have compromised you to be a friend of this world. I, I want to love people. I don't want to be strange for the sake of being strange. Lord, I don't want it to be weird, but Lord, I'm tired of straddling the fence. I'm tired of being double-minded, unstable in every way. We embrace the reality that at times we will be alien. We'll be strange. We don't seek just to be strange, but we will be yours. We will follow you. And it may be that you're here and you've never for the first time laid your crowns at the feet of Jesus. You've never surrendered your authority to him. You can do that right now. Like this can be your day. It was 46 years ago, January 13th, that I laid my crown at the feet of Jesus. And we just keep laying them and keep laying them. But you lay them down and I promise you, what he does is he takes you and he makes you new. You just do it right now. You say, "Jesus, I lay my crown at your feet. I become your follower. I give you my life and I receive from you your life. Make me new. Forgive me." And if you do that today, let us know. Come talk to one of our prayer partners after the service here in just a minute or take that QR code inside the Park News that says, "I have decided." Complete that when you use your phone to use that QR code. We're going to help you know what next steps are.

Father, we just pause and for the next minutes, we want to declare your glory, your honor, and your praise. We want to, with the songs that we have, we want them to reflect our hearts and we want to declare that you are holy, holy, holy. You are the one who was and is and is to come. Holy, holy, holy are you, Lord God Almighty. The whole earth is full of your glory. Worthy are you, O Lord, to receive all glory, honor, power, and praise. You created everything and everything exists because you said it can exist. You are like no other, O God. Awaken our hearts to that. We are grateful that you are holy. We are grateful that you are just and that you are pure, but you are forgiving. You are loving. You're gracious. We bow before you at this beginning of 2026. We lay our crowns down again at your feet. And we want not just our songs, but we want our lives to bring more praise to you than ever. We ask in Jesus name. Amen.