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Foreign. Good morning, Sower nation. Happy Sunday. It is Sunday, the Lord's Day, March 22nd in the year of our Lord 2026. If you're watching on YouTube, you can see I'm wearing my Gillette Methodist Church sweatshirt. It's awesome. And that's where I'm going to be today, at the Gillette Methodist Church. And if you don't have a church home in person or online, we'd love for you to join us. Just go to YouTube or Facebook and search Gillette. That's G I L L E T T Methodist Church. And you'll find us and you'll get a classic book, beautiful worship service, Simple Jesus, he's going to be there. And you know what? He's going to be where you go too. So today we're not doing the normal entry. We're just. We read it. We're reading scripture on Sunday. The scriptures that you find in the Jesus asking book, fifth Sunday of Lent, will be on page 127. We're getting down toward the end now. And so we're going to read a scripture. We'll sing a hymn today, too. If you want to get your hymnal out, I can already tell you the number. We're going to sing this hymn in church today. Breathe on Me, Breath of God. It's number 304 if you want to put, put your thumb in that page. But let's begin this Sunday in consecration. Wake up, sleeper. Rise from the dead and Christ will shine on you. Jesus, I belong to you. I lift up my heart to you. I set my mind on you. I fix my eyes on you. I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice. Jesus, we belong to you. And we're praying in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. So our scripture reading for today, Matthew, chapter three, verses one through nine, and then 18 through 23. It's the classic favorite parable of the sower. Imagine that. Hear now the word of the Lord. That same day, Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it while all the people stood on the shore. Then he told them many things in parables, saying, a farmer, a sower, went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were Scorched and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil where it produced a crop a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear. Listen then to what the parable of the sower means. When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the Evil One comes and snatches away what was sown in their heart. This is the seed sown along the path. The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the Word and at once receives it with joy. But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the Word, they quickly fall away. The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the Word. But the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the Word, making it unfruitful. But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the Word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop yielding 160 or 30 times what was sown. The Word of the Lord. And you know, on Sundays, I don't say. Now consider this. At least on this Sunday, these Sundays of Lent, I'm just going to let the Word speak for itself. We'll work with that in church. Some today. Other pastors who are preaching through may work with that. There's several other texts that I'm working with. Pastor Zone. I don't know if you know this, but every Tuesday I have a meeting with pastors who read the Wake up Call and who are preaching in their churches alongside it. And we get together and we pray and we read the scripture for the week together and we encourage one another and we work on sermons. And that happens every Tuesday, one o' clock central. If you're a preacher and you'd like to join us for that, just reply to this email. That'd be a good way to let me know we can get you involved in that. Love to have you. Well, we're going to be going to
