I’m going to begin a series that I’m calling **Get Ready for Favor**. Get ready. Get ready. Look at your neighbor and say, “Get ready.” Come on, say it again. “Get ready. Get ready.”

Say out loud with me: “My heart’s open. My heart’s open. And my mind’s ready. My mind’s ready. Make me better, God. Make me better by your word. I receive it. I receive it. I believe it. I believe it. I won’t be the same again. I won’t. In Jesus’ name.” Shout a great big amen. You may be seated.

We welcome you to all of our locations. We are right here in Tacoma, but we have locations in Bellevue, we have locations in DuPont, we have locations in Yakima, we have locations online. And so today, wherever you are joining us from, we welcome you. And I just pray that today will inspire you, lift you, and encourage you.

As has already been mentioned, tomorrow we begin as a church 14 days of prayer and fasting. And we held up this book—Pastor Nicole did here at least—and it’s a booklet, but you can also go on, you know, just put your phone up and there’s a QR code that’ll give you all of the same information. And this really is outstanding and lots of good information on not only the prayer guide that we taught on the end of last year, but also on fasting. You’ll learn a lot about everything you really need to know about fasting as we enter into this new year.

And my hope for you individually—hear me out on this—and as a church is that we would prepare ourselves mentally and spiritually for an unusual, uncommon year of God’s favor in our lives. Did you catch that? That’s my hope—that we would just start this year with prayer, fasting, come before God and get ready and be prepared for an unusual, uncommon year of God’s favor.

So the resources and the tools are available to inform you and assist you and support you as you go on this prayer journey with us.

## Isaiah 61: The Year of the Lord’s Favor

If you open up your Bibles today, we’re going to look at Isaiah chapter 61. Isaiah chapter 61. And we’re going to read the first three verses of Isaiah 61. And your Bible probably has a title over the beginning of that chapter that says “The Year of the Lord’s Favor.” In other words, the section is called in the Bible “The Year of the Lord’s Favor.” And here’s what the prophet said. He said:

“The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He sent me to bind up the brokenhearted and to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion—to bestow upon them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor.”

In other words, for his glory.

A little background on this text is that it was first written to God’s people who were captive in Babylon, which when you are in captivity and you’ve become enslaved by another nation, it absolutely means that you have limited resources, you are living in poverty, you are oppressed, you’re not free to live your own life, to serve your own God, religious freedom is restricted, and so forth.

So I want you to capture the writing here and how it brought hope to the people of that day. Not just when you think of that he came to help the poor—and by the way, this is common throughout scripture. We think today whenever there’s a verse that says that he came to help the poor or he came to bring freedom for the captive, we often just think that good news to the poor would mean like the person who is homeless in our culture. And of course it is good news for them. But there’s a different angle on it when you look at it properly and you understand that a lot of the bondage and the poverty was created by enemies and that the promises of God to them was, “You have no opportunity and I’m going to give you opportunity. You have no reward system for your labor and I’m going to open up doors for you and I’m going to create opportunity for you.” And all of this was part of what is called the year of the Lord’s favor. Okay?

So that’s Old Testament. It was called the Year of Jubilee, the year of the Lord’s favor. But then something happened in the New Testament. Jesus came and he said in Luke chapter 4 that he had come to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor to everyone. Somebody say, “Get ready for favor.” Come on, tell somebody around you, “Get ready for favor.”

See, Jesus said this: He said, “The Spirit of the Lord is on me to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” In other words, this is not just going to be about Old Testament situations and Babylon and being subject to the power of your enemies, but I’m going to proclaim it for people and I want to declare it for all in the future in the New Testament days and times and seasons in church.

Now notice how inclusive the writings are of Isaiah so that you can understand the broadness of this year of favor. He says:
– If you’re brokenhearted, there’s healing
– If you’re held captive, if you have addictions in your life, if you have been enslaved by something, he came to proclaim freedom to the captive
– If you’re living in darkness, light is coming. I said light is coming. If you lack direction, if you don’t have clarity, if there’s confusion, light is coming
– If you’re grieving, if you’re mourning, if you’re in despair, he promises and says there’s a crown of beauty, there’s the oil of joy

Some of you are oppressed, you are discouraged, you are in despair, you have feelings of futility about everything in your life, and the year of the Lord’s favor is about proclaiming the joy of the Lord as your strength, declaring that there is a garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness in our life.

Can somebody shout amen? Now this is what a season of favor looks like.

## Appointed Seasons of Favor

And so today I wanted to just announce to you again at the beginning of this new year that God has appointed seasons of uncommon, extraordinary favor.

Watch that closely. God has appointed seasons. See, God—there’s different seasons that accomplish different things in our lives. And even though God’s favor is always with us like in all seasons, situations, and circumstances, what I want you to understand is that there are some seasons that are appointed seasons of uncommon—somebody shout “uncommon,” uncommon—somebody shout “extraordinary,” extraordinary, extraordinary—unusual favor.

We all know what it’s like to go through a season of struggle, a season of setback. Have I got anybody in the room that identifies with me on that today? Like we all know what that’s like, right? A season of hard—hard seasons happen to all of us. Can I get a shout, an amen? Like some days are just hard days, right? And some seasons are just hard seasons. You feel like whatever you try doesn’t work. You feel like it’s one step forward, two steps back. Hard seasons—that happens personally, it happens in relationships, it happens in our businesses, it happens in our church, happens in our nation. Seasons, seasons, seasons, seasons that are difficult or something—all of us will agree with.

What I want to announce to you today is that there’s also seasons of favor that happen to all of us, for all of us personally, in our relationships, in our business, in our church, in our nation.

Daniel 2, verse 20 says, “Seasons are created and directed by God. He changes times and seasons.”

Has anybody ever thought, “I’m just not ready for winter,” but you can’t stop it? Seasons are directed by God. Somebody’s thinking right now, “I can’t wait until this is over and the sun is back in the Northwest,” but you can’t make it happen. You can’t rush the process. In fact, good things are happening right now, but there’s another season coming. Come on, there’s another season on the way.

When you’re going through a season that is challenging and you’re going through a season that is difficult, it’s so important to remember that seasons are just seasons. They’re created for a season, only a season. That same verse that I read to you: “Seasons are created and directed by God. He changes times and seasons. He sets up kings and he deposes them.”

Sounds really natural, organic, because it is. Don’t ever doubt the presence of God. You might think—God, I remember in our Scrooge production there’s this scene where after Scrooge gets saved and his employee who’s been praying for him is like, “God, what took you so long?” You might feel that way about your children. You might feel that way about unsaved friends right now. “Come on, God, feels like you’re not hearing me when I pray.”

What I’m telling you is that there are seasons of opportunity. There are seasons when God steps up—come on—and he moves in a supernatural way. Can you shout amen?

And if you’re—when you’re in a hard season, it doesn’t mean that God’s favor isn’t there. It just means that it’s not as visible. It’s not as obvious and you have to be really looking for it to see it. And when we’re going through a season like that, we got to be careful—hear me on this, church—we got to be careful that we don’t settle in the season of struggle where we lower our expectations and we get stuck in our setback.

And I believe that’s why the Lord has instructed me and directed me to start this year off by saying to everyone: Don’t be stuck. Goodbye yesterday. Let’s move forward right now. Be careful that you don’t allow your standard—come on—to be lowered or your faith to be in just what has happened, because if you do, you’re going to miss out on the next season where God has a season of favor planned for you.

And I want to encourage you to get ready for favor by praying favor, thinking favor, proclaiming favor, expecting favor. Say it again: “Get ready.” Say it again: “Get ready. Get ready.”

Talk to yourself right now. Say, “Self, get yourself ready for favor. Favor.”

## Five Things That Happen in the Year of the Lord’s Favor

There’s five things that happen in the year of the Lord’s favor. Five things that happen.

**Number one: Debt is cancelled.** Can somebody shout hallelujah? Come on, God. Come on, thank you, Jesus. Wouldn’t that be amazing? Debt is paid.

**Second thing is the captives are set free.** Captives are set free. When you make your New Year’s resolution and you say, “I’m done with this lifestyle. I’m done with this thing that has got me all bound up, messed up, enslaved,” I just want to remind you that God’s on your side when you start professing that. God is for you, not against you. And just proclaim God’s favor in that decision. Proclaim God’s favor is helping me right now move towards freedom.

You might call it a diet. You might call it an exercise program. You might call it, “I’m going to get help at a counselor.” Whatever you want to call it, that’s great. Put feet on your dreams. Put effort in the things you’re believing God for. But just remember, you are not alone. God is with you. He came to set captives free. He came to set captives free.

**The third thing about a year of the Lord’s favor is that what’s been lost is recovered.** What you thought is gone forever comes back around again.

**Number four: What’s been broken is restored.**

**Number five: Many who had left return.** Many who had left—and I believe there’s people coming back to the house of God already, coming back right now, coming back. Welcome back. Some who have drifted, some who have gone away. Come on, I’m believing this is a year of return. People who have been confused, disillusioned, got caught up in stuff they shouldn’t have got caught up in—God’s drawing them by his power and by his spirit. And we’re calling them back. We’re declaring a year of the Lord’s favor, a year of return for the people of God, the children of God, the men of God, the women of God, the families who belong to God.

See, the time of God’s favor is a time when things that are upside down are turned right side up. And that’s what we need to pray for in our 14 days of prayer. This is what we’re praying for. This is what we’re fasting for.

## Pray for Our Nation

We need to pray over our nation, our nation’s leaders. We need to pray that our nation’s leaders would be mightily used of God. See, leaders can be evil and leaders can be good and leaders can be a mix of both. But we need to pray for godly policy. We need to pray for the ways of God to become our policies, our laws in our nation.

If they’re not, wrong policy holds back favor. I said wrong policy holds back favor. When people drift away from the ways of God, they choose the ways of man, they get caught up in man’s ideas and man’s philosophies, it limits and hinders the favor of God on people. So we got to pray.

Let me read to you a scripture, remind you. 1 Timothy 2, it says: “First of all, I urge that petitions, specific requests, prayers, intercession, prayers for others, and thanksgiving be offered on behalf of all people—for kings, for presidents, for governors”—I’m just adding, I’m getting it into language here—”for influencers, for all who are in positions of high authority, so that we may live a peaceful and a quiet life in all godliness and all dignity.”

Come on, this is what we’re talking about when we say a year of the Lord’s favor. We’re talking about praying for our leaders. We’re talking about praying for wisdom and protection and divine strength to move God’s plans forward in our nation, in our world.

## National and Global Indicators

Some national and global indicators that we are entering into a season of the Lord’s favor, I want to share with you some of those indicators today because I see something happening. I see something. I’ve been sensing and I’ve been experiencing personally some unusual, uncommon favor in my own life. I’ll talk a little bit about that in the upcoming weeks maybe, but I have been so lifted and encouraged on a personal level, a family level, a church level. I watch and I look around the world and I think and I start observing and I feel like, “Wow, something’s happening. God’s up to something.”

Now I want to name two or three of those.

### Number One: There’s a Huge Transfer of Wealth

**Number one: There’s a huge transfer of wealth that’s happening right now.** We are in what is being called the greatest wealth transfer in history. $84 trillion in assets is set to change hands over the next 20 years. Somebody shout “wow.” Somebody say “get ready.”

New innovative opportunities are on the rise—technology, investment opportunities, service-oriented business. I want to just say to any of you young people, men and women, if you just go the extra mile right now in whatever your role is, you will be doing something uncommon and unusual. I’m talking about at work.

There’s a spirit of the age right now that “I don’t owe nobody nothing”—grumpy, gripy. Good service is rare to find right now. And there’s a transfer of wealth. It’s making it possible for ordinary people to increase in favor.

Bible says that Jesus increased in favor with God and with man. And there are opportunities right now. I promise you, wherever you work, if you will be willing to go God’s way—God’s way is that if they ask you to go one mile, go an extra mile. That’s what Jesus taught. And if you’ll take that on this year, God will open up doors of opportunity for you.

Listen to this: 1,700 people in America are becoming millionaires every day. 1,700 new millionaires. That’s not every month. That’s not every year. Every single day. Another—wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow.

There’s a transfer of wealth. There’s an opportunity season. There’s a time right now. 2025, there are indicators everywhere.

### Number Two: There’s a Major Power Shift Going On

Let me tell you another one that’s happening. **There’s a major power shift going on.** There’s a seismic shift going on in government, media, entertainment—which means the music and the movie industry. There’s a power shift going on in business.

The time of God’s favor is a time when things that are upside down are turned right side up. Is anybody hearing what I’m saying today?

Power shift is happening in the music industry, in the entertainment business, in the media. The media is like—if you haven’t been paying attention, it’s amazing. Journalists who were blacklisted by major networks are now the credible voices to listen to. Some of them individually have greater influence than entire major news networks right now. I’m talking about things upside down turned right side up.

And if you think this is just the way God’s doing something now, you are sadly mistaken. This is how God’s been doing things forever.

There’s a story in the Old Testament about a guy named Joseph who was hated, mistreated, put in prison, but he ended up being promoted from the prison to the palace. A prisoner—he was a prisoner from another nation and he becomes the most influential man in Egypt’s government. Wow, wow, wow.

I should just call this a wow year. Like just a “wow year.” And the same thing’s happening right now. I said the same thing’s happening right now. As leadership is changing in nations around the world, people who were at the bottom are being—people who are at the top are being replaced by people who were at the bottom. People who were kicked to the curb, they’re being brought to the top. Business people, common people coming into places of government.

I think this is a good time to just say to some of you: If your job was taken away because of a COVID mandate, you didn’t deserve that. And while many people have forgotten what happened to you, God hasn’t forgotten what happened to you.

I’m talking about this right here. I’m talking about a year of the Lord’s favor. Some of you were mistreated by strangers, neighbors, friends, church people. And those people still, by the way, haven’t admitted they were wrong and they haven’t apologized for their bad behavior. But God’s got you. God’s got you.

Now I know some of you, you don’t want me to bring any of that up. You don’t want me to talk about—I’m bringing it up anyway because some of you owe apologies to other people. Some of you need to get—come on—you need to get in the year of the Lord’s favor. Come on, start being a believer. Start being a Christian. Start being a man of God, a woman of God. Stop behaving like the world. Start behaving—come on—like a man, woman of the most high God.

Somebody say “get ready.” Come on, get ready.

If people left you, let them go. They are not meant to be in your future. Don’t chase anybody down. I don’t care if it’s a boyfriend, a girlfriend, a husband, a wife. I don’t care if it’s a friend. It doesn’t matter. Don’t chase them. If they left you, they’re not meant to be in your future. God is bringing the right people into your life right now. You will not be at the bottom. Amen. You will experience restorative favor. You will get back everything that the enemy stole from you in the name of the Lord today.

The time of God’s favor—come on—is a time when things that are upside down are turned right side up. Can somebody give the Lord thanks right now?

### Number Three: Government for the People

And the last one—some of you are going to think, “Well, you’re just talking about because you like what happened in the elections.” I don’t really care what you think. You need to get past all of that political divisive nonsense. But the third one is **government for the people.**

Government—this is an indicator—come on—of favor. And you can look at this throughout time. Whenever oppressive kings and government started leaning in and oppressing people, whether it’s Babylon, wherever it is in Old Testament times, in ancient history, favor is limited. But when government begins to serve the people and protect the freedom of its people, it opens up the door for favor.

Evil dictators all around the world right now are being resisted. Some are being overthrown. They’re having to flee their nation. They’re having to flee their palace. Leaders who have caved into special interests, they’ve lost touch with people—they’re being put out of office right now. Places like El Salvador, Argentina—there are new leaders, business leaders who are now stepping in and crime rates are going down. They are stabilizing the economy in their nation. I’m just talking about a year of favor, talking about indicators.

I couldn’t believe it. Like I heard that for the first time in US history, it’s announced that there’s a government efficiency program that’s going to try to be implemented in the United States government and it’s aimed at exposing fraudulent, wasteful spending across federal agencies.

Now you can be skeptical. I’m going to be praying. I’m going to say, “God, let it be. Let accountability come to our government. Let responsibility come to the high places of our nation.” I’m going to be praying—come on—that God will bring honor and integrity.

We’re seeing people come together. It doesn’t matter whether you like them or not or agree with them or not. We need to work right now on our own unity. There’s an alignment of people from all walks of life, different political parties that are laying down their weapons. They’re coming together.

And let me just say this: There’s a phrase right now that we should all be able to say without any sort of negative reaction, and that is “Make America Great Again.” And some of you don’t even like me saying that. You need to check your heart. You need to check your attitude. You can explain away, “Well, I don’t like this person. I don’t like the way it came about.” You can blah, blah, blah. That phrase should be a prayer. That should be a prayer of ours: “God, make our nation great again. God, elevate us above all the evil and the darkness and the sin and the corruption.”

One of our pastors, Pastor John, told me that he was wearing a red cap that kind of looked like the MAGA hat, but it said “Make Prayer Great Again.” And he walked by a guy and the guy’s like, “I disagree,” kind of cussed, you know—that’s how rude people are right now. “I disagree.” And he said, “Well, whatever. To each his own,” and walked away.

He ran into the guy a little bit later, crossed paths again. The guy stopped, looked, smiled a little bit, said, “Sorry about that.” He didn’t see the word “prayer.” He just reacted.

But see, prayer and greatness go together. Come on. I said prayer and greatness go together.

I don’t like everything in government. I don’t appreciate a lot of things that are done by everybody in government. There are people that are doing things I don’t like, I don’t appreciate. But one thing I want is I want the favor and the blessing of God on our nation. I want the favor of God. I want God to open up doors and do great things—come on—in our children, in our children’s children.

I don’t know how some of y’all going to get mad. Hey, listen, let me tell you: If you came to church today, you have a perfect attendance record for this year. So if I’m messing with you a little bit, don’t mess up your attendance record. Come back next week.

Like, I’m just speaking truth. We should all get in alignment with truth that echoes—no matter where it comes—it echoes the will of God, the purpose of God, the plan of God on our lives.

Get ready. I said get ready. Come on. I said get ready. I said get ready.

You remember Balaam in the Old Testament? God used a donkey to talk to Balaam and Balaam was freaked out. And he could have said, “Curse that—coming out of a donkey’s mouth, I don’t receive that.” That’s what a lot of people are doing right now. You don’t like a personality. You don’t like an individual. You don’t like a political party. You don’t like a cause. You don’t like a business leader that’s known around the world, somebody who’s really succeeded. You’re mad at—you got an issue with them. You’re like, “Well, they got it from somebody else. They got lucky.” Come on, stop it.

Be a man of God, a woman of God who is willing to let the ass talk if the ass needs to talk and speak the truth. Like be willing—come on—be willing and open and shout a big amen. Come on, shout a big amen to the favor of God.

## Prayer

Oh, come on, God, we love you today. We are so thankful today for your goodness.

I want to just declare, proclaim favor over your life today. I want to proclaim and declare the favor of God for you. I think if as I do this today, I think if you believe this and receive it, it’ll take root in your soul.

And so, Father, today I just boldly declare and proclaim the favor of God over your people. I proclaim today favor over our family, favor over our finances, favor over our marriage. God, I proclaim favor in our work, that we would have favor, Lord, with our boss, with our colleagues, with our coworkers. I pray, God, that we would have promotions that would come our direction. May the favor of God be upon us.

I proclaim favor upon our health—the health of our body, the health of our spirit. I pray in the name of Jesus that sickness would be healed, that 2025 would be a year where health would return and sickness would be gone. I pray for people today who have battled chronic pain and illness and they are in the house of God. That man of God, that woman of God, I pray and I speak favor in the name of Jesus for healing to come upon them. I pray that physical strength would come. I pray that spiritual strength would come.

I pray, God, that things that have been upside down would be turned right side up. I pray, Lord, that there would be a restoration, that there would be, God, a restorative power that those who have been gone would return. And I pray in the name of Jesus, let it not just be to the house of God. I pray restoration would come in relationship, that it would come in families. I pray that children who are gone would come back. I pray that the prodigal would come home.

I speak and declare in the name of the Lord right now that the blessing and the favor of God would come in 2025. I feel it. I sense it. I know it. And I ask you, God, for your people all over, all over our church and beyond, that your people would experience an abundance of your favor—open doors, opportunities. I pray in Jesus’ name. Let the tide turn. Let the door open up. I pray that favor, God, unexpected, unmerited favor would come into our lives this year. We believe it. We receive it. We thank you, God, for it in the name of the Lord Jesus.

If you believe it today, will you just clap your hands and come on, give thanks? Just give thanks. Come on, church family, give thanks today.

How many are going to take God at his word today? Are you going to take God at his word today?

Will you do this to whatever extent you enter in the next 14 days? I can’t and don’t want to dictate that, control that. I’m just going to ask everybody if you would set your alarm, your clock, your watch, your phone to 7:14 a.m., 7:14 p.m., representing 2 Chronicles 7:14. It says, “If my people which are called by my name will humble themselves, pray and seek my face, then will I hear from heaven and I will heal their land.”

God wants to do some great things in our life this year. If you would set your watch, set your clock, will you do that with us? Will you just say, “I’m going to pause and I’m going to pray wherever I am every day”? And when you do, would you just pray favor? Would you just—how about I say it like this—would you proclaim favor?

There’s a difference. You can pray for favor and that’s okay as a beginning point, but then there’s a point where you need to just move on and start to proclaim favor. There’s a difference in the two. Proclaim favor over your life. Proclaim favor over your family, over your work, over your business, over our church, over the kingdom of God, over our government. Favor, favor, favor.

Will you do that? Will you just say, “Kingdom come, will of God be done”? 7:14 in the morning, 7:14. Wow. Just think about how many of us at the same time we join together and we start calling out and proclaiming favor at the beginning of this new year. Amen.

I’m believing God for great things.

If you’re here today and you say, “I want a new beginning in my life, my relationship with God,” just raise your hand up in the air. I want to pray a prayer of new beginnings with anybody—any man, any woman, any young person who would just say, “I need a fresh start. I need to get right with God. Pastor Kevin, that’s where I need to start. I know my life’s not been right. I haven’t been seeking God’s interest, God’s will.”

And today is an awesome, amazing, incredible opportunity for you. And if that’s you, a young person, a dad, a mom, older, whoever you are, just raise your hand quickly, quietly, right up in the air and I’m going to include you in this prayer today. I’m going to invite you to pray with me. Will you raise your hand? Go ahead, sir. Come on, God’s talking to you. New day, new day, new day. God’s got things for you this year. It starts right here, right now.

While you hold your hand up in the air, say with me:

“Lord Jesus, welcome to my world. Welcome to my world. Forgive me of all my sin. Forgive me. Come into my life and make me a new person. Make me a new person. I receive today. I receive today your plan. Your plan for me. For me. I declare favor. I declare new beginnings, restoration, healing, and salvation. Salvation over my life. Over my life. And I’ll never be the same again. I’ll never. In Jesus’ name.”

God bless you and welcome, welcome, welcome to the kingdom of God. Amen.