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Amos 5 This chapter confronts one of the most uncomfortable possibilities in the Christian life: we can be deeply involved in religious activity while our hearts and lives remain far from God.We can sing the right songs, preach sound doctrine, attend services faithfully, take communion, and still neglect the justice, mercy, repentance, and obedience God requires. Amos doesn't allow us to measure faithfulness by how religious we appear. He forces us to ask whether our worship is reflected in the way we actually live. This is not a sermon against worship. It is a sermon about the kind of worship God desires—worship that flows from a life surrendered to Him.

For two Sundays we have followed the blood through the story of Scripture. In Egypt we saw a whole nation covered on Passover night. Not because they were better people, but because God said, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you.” Last week we went deeper. The blood of Jesus does more than shelter us from judgement. It reaches the one place nothing else can reach: our conscience. Paid once for all. No top-ups. God chooses to remember our sins no more.  Today we come to the end of the journey: Conquering.  Many of us know a voice that keeps reopening the case against us. It reminds us of what we did and tells us what it supposedly means. Scripture calls him the accuser. Today we will see from Revelation 12 that he has been hurled down, and that God’s people overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony.  Come expecting freedom. Bring the thing you have never said out loud. This is a morning to stop listening to the accuser and start agreeing with God’s verdict.

Last Sunday we began our new series, The Blood: Covered, Cleansed, Conquering. We stood with Israel in Egypt on Passover night and saw three pictures: blood in the river, where God judges what we trust for life; blood on the door, where God provides the substitute; and blood that sets free, where God pays the price and leads us out. Every house had a death that night, a son or a lamb. The difference was never goodness. It was the blood. Today we continue our journey with Better Blood. God didn't rescue his people just to get them out of Egypt. He rescued them to bring them near. From Hebrews 9 and 10, we will see that Jesus' blood was shed once for all, that it seals a new covenant in which God remembers our sins no more, and that it reaches the one place nothing else can: our conscience. Abel's blood cried out, "Guilty." Jesus' blood speaks a better word: "Forgiven. Come near." If an old memory keeps reopening the case against you, come and hear that better word today.

The Blood. Over the next few weeks, we're setting out on a journey, and I believe it will open up a fresh spiritual walk for every one of us. I'm really looking forward to it.  Blood may seem like an unusual subject, but it runs through the whole Bible, from the Passover lamb in Egypt to the cross of Jesus and the victory song in Revelation. In Scripture, blood means a life given up for others. And that is the heart of the gospel: Jesus gave his life so that we could be rescued, made clean, and brought near to God.  Like Israel, we'll walk this road in stages. We start in Egypt, where God rescues and sets his people free. From there we'll move into God's presence, cleansed and welcomed, and we'll finish standing in victory over guilt and the accuser. The series will then lead us to the Lord's Table, where we'll share communion together.

Eph 3-4

For five weeks we’ve built toward this moment. We established that God never stopped speaking. We named what drowns Him out. We learned to tune in — to be still, to let R.E.A.D. become a daily rhythm. We discovered the difference between the logos God has always spoken and the rhēma — the specific word with your name on it, waiting on a page for the exact day you’d need it. And last week we learned to know His voice with confidence, the way sheep know their Shepherd’s.  But hearing was never the finish line. This week we ask the question underneath everything: now that you’ve heard Him — will you actually do what He said?  Reception isn’t just about picking up a signal. It’s about what you do the moment it comes through. A word without obedience is just information. A word obeyed becomes transformation.  This is where the series has been leading all along — not toward six more things you know, but toward a life that actually moves when He speaks.

We began this series in John 10, where Jesus makes a simple but staggering claim: His sheep know His voice, and they won't follow a stranger. That's not a throwaway line — it's the whole reason discernment is even possible. God's voice isn't unfamiliar static you have to decode from scratch. It has a consistent tone, a consistent character, a consistent content. This week we'll look at John 16, where Jesus tells us exactly what the Holy Spirit's voice sounds like — what He consistently speaks about, and just as importantly, what He never sounds like. Because here's the danger: not every voice claiming to be God actually is. Some voices flatter. Some voices condemn. Only one voice does both truth and love at the same time. If you've ever wondered, "How do I know if that was God, my own thoughts, or something else entirely?" — this is the message for you. Come ready to know His voice with confidence. CLEAR THE STATIC. HEAR HIS VOICE.

We've spent three weeks establishing that God speaks, naming what drowns Him out, and learning to show up and listen. Now comes the question every one of us actually wants answered: when I open my Bible, how do I know it's Him? Here's the truth that changed how I hear God — Scripture isn't a book about Him. It's a book in which He speaks. Hebrews 4:12 says the word of God is living. Not was. Is. Right now, in the Bible on your nightstand. I'll share how this played out in one of the most significant decisions of my life — a moment where I waited on the Lord, and He confirmed His answer through His Word with a specificity I could never have planned myself. You'll also walk away with R.E.A.D. — a simple, permanent way to open Scripture expecting to be met, not just informed. Come ready. He's not finished speaking.

God has never stopped speaking. The problem was never His silence — it’s our static. He speaks continuously, ordinarily, through Scripture and by His Spirit — most often as something as unremarkable as a thought, a conviction, a nudge, a verse that suddenly has your name on it. We continue STATIC with Week 3: FREQUENCY — Tuning Your Heart to Hear. Jesus said His sheep know His voice (John 10:4, 27) — and here’s the good news: that’s not a gift given to a spiritually gifted few. Sheep don’t recognize the shepherd’s voice by nature. They recognize it because they’ve spent time close enough, long enough, for it to become familiar. Frequency is learned in proximity. If your prayer life feels flat, if Scripture feels distant, if you can’t remember the last time you sensed God speak — He hasn’t gone quiet. You’ve likely just drifted out of range. This week we’ll look honestly at what pulls us there, and practically at how to close the distance again. Come ready to get close. He’s already speaking — and He’s been speaking all along. CLEAR THE STATIC. HEAR HIS VOICE.