we're thinking about evangelism. We're thinking about, specifically, what we've called bringing people to Jesus, which is a really simple way of describing what we're talking about when we talk about something like evangelism. It's a big word, but it refers to a simple concept. We realize that there are lots of people whose greatest need and greatest desire, if they really understand themselves and Christ correctly, is to have Jesus. And so we're thinking about that together, and this morning we're going to come to John chapter 10. So if you would turn in your Bible with me, we're going to go to John chapter 10 together this morning. John chapter 10. We're going to look at pieces all throughout this text of verses 1 through 18. John chapter 10 verses 1 through 18. I do feel the need to say from the outset that there is a lot more that I could say from this text than I'm going to attempt to say this morning. There's actually probably a main point that I'm going to kind of gloss over as we go through this text together because we're trying to focus our attention on what Jesus has to say about the way that we begin to see people come into his kingdom, join the midst of his people. And so as we look at John 10 verses 1 through 18 this morning, I want to focus our attention there. Now before we go to the specific passage in front of us I do want to remind you that I've suggested a definition for evangelism that I hope will help to shape all of our conversation over the next weeks and months and even into the rest of this year. This is the big question we've been asking in the series, what is evangelism? It's a big word, it's a good church word, but what does it actually mean in practice? And this is the definition that I've offered. Evangelism is our happy, loving effort to bring people into the presence of the living Jesus so that they can recognize and receive Him as their long-awaited, all-satisfying Savior and Lord. This is the definition that I've offered to kind of help frame our discussion that's rooted in the things that we've seen in previous weeks. Last week we thought about not just the what of evangelism, but the why. Why is this something that we should be devoted to? Why is this something that's important for every Christ follower to be committed to? And why is this important to shape the life of our church together? This morning I want to get a little bit more practical than even the what and the why. One of the things that at least comes up in my mind is, okay, so I'm supposed to bring people into the presence of the living Jesus. What am I supposed to say? What am I supposed to say as I'm trying to take people who don't know Jesus and draw them into the presence of Jesus so that they can meet him and see him work as only he can? Do you ever think about that? You get in these conversations and you're talking to somebody and you want to see them come to Christ, and then there are these moments where as the conversation is developing and progressing, you're just wondering, okay, well how do I get from here to Jesus? What do I say in this particular moment? We're thinking about this in a much greater degree on Sunday nights, but I want to give a little bit of thought to it this morning, because it's really important. What we say when we tell people about Jesus matters. A few years ago, a controversy broke out around a large megachurch in North Carolina. I think they may have some campuses in South Carolina as well. There were reports out of this church that they had had an emphasis on evangelism one particular Sunday, and that as part of that, they were offering spontaneous baptisms. This is not something we practice. I have some real questions and concerns about it, but it is increasingly common for churches to just say, hey, if you've trusted Christ and you want to be baptized, come on down and we'll do this. That would have been controversial in some ways in and of itself, but that's not the reason for the controversy. In this particular church, it was discovered that in addition to offering spontaneous baptisms, in and amongst the congregation, they had placed actors and actresses. And the reason they had placed these actors and actresses there was because they felt like if they just asked people to come forward and be baptized, they would all look around and they'd be embarrassed and they wouldn't want to do it, so they would need to kind of break the dam to bring people forward. So they put all these actors and actresses, these people that were willing to kind of make a show of things, out in the midst of the church so that when the invitation for baptisms came, these people jumped up and they were excited and they were genuine and they came forward to be baptized with the hope that this would make other people interested in coming forward. Now, why would that be controversial? Because it's a lie. Because it's manipulation, it's deception. Now, if you were a part of this church's leadership team, I'm sure your justification for having people lie about being saved to convince other people to actually be saved is, well, look at the results. What's wrong with a little bit of pretending if that results in people coming to Jesus? And the answer to that question is, Jesus doesn't just care about the end, he cares about the means. Jesus isn't just concerned that we bring people in by any means necessary, by anything that we could say or would say. Jesus cares that we bring people in in a way that conforms to his word. And ultimately, we have to understand that what saves people is not something that we say, it's not something that we're producing in people, it's not something that we're engineering. What actually saves people, what we need to actually say in evangelism, is we need to ensure that people hear the voice of the living Jesus. Our goal is to make sure that people stop hearing us and start hearing Jesus as we speak, because what saves people is Christ. Now, maybe you've never thought about some of this stuff before, because I think the mindset of whatever works has crept into so much of the life of the church. As long as we can produce the desired result, as long as we're growing, as long as people are coming in, then everything's okay. But what I want to suggest to you is that what really transforms lives is not the sort of bombastic approach to ministry that some churches and some individuals take, where they're willing to go to any means possible to bring people in, even if that means deceiving them, and we'll see that in another text later this morning. What I want to suggest to you is that what changes people is Jesus. What changes people is the word of Christ. What I'm saying is, if we're going to be faithful in evangelism, we don't get to check our Bibles at the door. The goal of evangelism is to make sure that the voice of Christ is clearly heard. Now, this raises a question for us as well. If we talk about the voice of Christ, and we're going to see this really clearly in our text this morning, how do people hear the voice of Christ today? Christ is in heaven, right? He's seated at the right hand of God. We don't see him. We trust him, we believe him, we know he's there, but how do we in 2025 as a group of Christians hear the voice of Christ? Well, the answer comes from Jesus himself. Jesus is abundantly clear how we hear his own voice because Jesus promised that there was something coming after his ministry, after his ascension into heaven that was actually better for his disciples than he himself could be. Consider what Jesus said about the work of the Holy Spirit in John chapter 15, just a few verses after, a few chapters after what we're considering this morning. Jesus promised his disciples that he was not going to leave them. John 14 rather, verse 26, we read, but the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name. He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you." So Jesus is telling his disciples, these apostles who are going to become the foundation for the church, that as he departs, they don't need to worry. He's going to send the Spirit. And the Spirit is going to ensure that they remember what Jesus has said and faithfully communicate that to the rest of the church. This comes up later in John chapter 15 verses 26 and 27. He says, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me. And you also will bear witness because you have been with me from the beginning." Jesus is saying when the Spirit comes, he bears witness to the truth concerning himself so that people can, through the work of the Spirit, hear the voice of Jesus. But that specifically finds its expression for us, not just an abstraction as the Spirit works on individuals, but where did the Spirit work to ensure that we would have the words of Jesus? Where are the words of Jesus? In the Bible. That's the living word of Christ. Christ's words are represented for us and recorded for us throughout the entirety of the Holy Scriptures. This is where we hear the voice of Jesus. And as the Holy Spirit works, what the Spirit does is He comes and He inspires the biblical authors so that what they say is what Christ has said. Peter can say of the work of the Holy Spirit that prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. So the Holy Spirit works to ensure that Scripture draws our attention to Christ and clarifies who He is through inspiration. Paul says all Scripture is breathed out by God, and it's profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness. When he says that all Scripture is breathed out by God, what he's saying is that the entire Bible is God speaking. And because it comes from God, it's true and it's trustworthy. And we can build all of our lives as individual Christians and our church's life on the firm foundation that is God's word. Now, I want to press even deeper. I just want to see a survey. How many of you have a red letter Bible? the words of Jesus are in red. All right, red letter Bibles are really common. And it's a really helpful tool for study, right? Because you can really quickly see in a given passage when Jesus is speaking versus when someone else is speaking. So I'm not trying to denigrate your red letter Bible. But if we were to be entirely accurate with the way that the Bible itself describes inspiration, every word in your Bible would be red. Because every word ultimately comes from God, and Christ is God. All of Scripture is the Word of Christ. All of Scripture bears witness to Him and His divine glory and His purpose in redemption. All of Scripture is the means by which Christ speaks. And now, if you're in Christ, not only has the Spirit inspired the words of Scripture, but the Spirit is given to you so that He can open up our minds through the process that we call illumination to understand the Scriptures. The Spirit enables us to understand what the Spirit has said through the human authors that have written the scriptures, so that your mind can perceive the truth as it's represented in the Word of Christ, and you yourself can hear Christ. Now I'm saying all of this to say that if we're going to be a faithful church, as we're going to see in a few moments, we've got to be a Bible people. And that's not just restricted to what happens in the pulpit or in a Sunday school class. That means that that's what shapes our identity on the evangelistic field. As we're seeking to bring people to Jesus, they need to hear the voice of the living Jesus. Where do they hear the voice of Christ? In scripture. We'll talk about this more in a few moments, but let's turn our attention to our text this morning, John chapter 10, verses 1 through 18. This is what Jesus says as John records it, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, so that these are God's own words to us. Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber. But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers. This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. So Jesus again said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees. And the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the father knows me and I know the father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father. The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of our God stands forever. So we come to our text this morning and we're asking this question, what are we supposed to say? And our big answer is in evangelism we work to ensure that people hear the voice of the living Jesus. I want you to see from this passage three particular ways that the voice of Jesus works in the midst of the life of his people. We'll think about it, about ourselves at first, and then we're going to work our way to evangelism in our final observation. So three things I want you to see this morning. Number one, the voice of Christ governs the people of Christ. The voice of Christ governs the people of Christ. Throughout John 10, 1 through 18, Jesus is using a variety of metaphors to explain who he is. He describes himself with respect to a sheep flock, the church he represents here as a flock of sheep. And he himself has a particular role in their life. He uses two particular expressions to explain his own ministry. He says that he is the door to the sheep and that he is the good shepherd. But all throughout this passage, I hope you noticed, Jesus is really determined to distinguish the way that his voice works in the midst of his flock. And the reason was that in the ancient world, shepherds didn't lead their flocks by driving them from behind, often with animals like we do in our own sort of context. But shepherds would lead by knowing their sheep, they would give them names, and then they would lead them by going out ahead of them and speaking, calling them with their voices to follow. We have evidence that back in this particular time, many times families would share a courtyard where in the midst of the winter season, when they needed to put their sheep away, they would push all of their sheep together in this courtyard. Now, what would happen if several families with their own distinct flocks put all their sheep together in one place? They get mixed up. How would they then separate them from each other? Well, each family's shepherd, whether he was a member of the family or a hired hand, would stand in the midst of the sheep. and he would call out to the ones that belonged to him. And those sheep would hear his voice, and they would go where he was, and then he would lead them out to find pasture. This is exactly the idea that Jesus is communicating about the church. Verse 1, truly, truly I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the doors, but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber. that he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his, the shepherd's voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice." Do you see what's happening here as Jesus is describing this? There are all kinds of voices vying for the attention of Christ's church. Many of them are just pretenders, but nevertheless they're speaking to us and trying to lead us and direct us in particular ways. But what Jesus makes abundantly clear here is that what distinguishes a real sheep from a false sheep and what distinguishes him from a thief or a robber is that Jesus' sheep know his voice and submit to it. The thing that governs and shapes the life of the people of Christ is the word of Christ. The voice of Christ governs the people of Christ. All true Christians recognize that Jesus's word has distinctive authority and they submit themselves to it. So what happens when Jesus speaks is he begins to shape all of our life. He defines our identity by his voice. If I want to know that you're a true Christian, Jesus says that I can see that by how you respond to his word. If I want to know who really belongs to the sheepfold of Jesus, I can see that by how eager you are to come and put yourself under the authority of God's word as it's preached and taught. You can see that in me by how I'm faithful to communicate the scripture's truthfulness and to put it before the people of Christ rather than what I have to say. Jesus is saying that that's what sort of defines the identity of his people. But not only that, it's what controls what we do. Jesus's word shapes the fullness of our ministry. Why don't we put actors and actresses in the midst of the congregation to try to convince people to come forward at the end of the service, thinking that there's a revival breaking out? Well, Jesus hasn't told us to do that. And we want to submit ourselves to what Jesus has said. In fact, Jesus tells us not to do that. through the other writers of Scripture. So our perspective is shaped by Scripture. Why do we do what we do in worship? You ever think about that? Why do we do the things that we do when we come together? Why do we sing and pray and read Scripture and preach Scripture and, when appropriate, baptize and observe the Lord's Supper? Why are those the things that we do? Why don't we stick a bounce castle up the Baptist tree and all jump down and scream, Jesus is King? Because what shapes our corporate identity is not what we think is going to be entertaining or interesting or work. What shapes us is what Jesus has said. And what controls us is what Jesus has said. Show me someone who loves their Bible, and I'll see someone who knows Jesus. Show me a church that submits everything that they do to the Bible, and I'll see a church that's submitted to and loves Jesus. So what about us? is what shapes and governs us the Word of Christ. When the Word of Christ is spoken, taught, or read, do we bow ourselves to it? When I was in high school, I took a lot of math. My senior year I was in AP Calculus. And our teacher in AP Calculus loves technology. Now, this was before the days of rampant iPads and things like that. Our teachers had desktop computers that they could work from to enter grades, but he was always looking for another way to incorporate technology into his classroom. And so he purchased this thing where he could sit in the front of the room, and we had a projector, and he could write on a screen, and everybody would see what was happening on the screen, and we would track with him and take notes and all this stuff. That's all we thought that thing could do. Until one day we had a substitute teacher. And substitute teachers were not particularly authoritative, at least in our school. The one that he often asked to come didn't care what we did. And so every time we had a substitute teacher it was chaos in his classroom. I don't know if he got wind of that or if he just realized some cool stuff his little thing could do. But one day we were in there with a substitute teacher and we were planning to kind of goof our way through that 50 minute period. And then all of a sudden the substitute teacher stands up and she walks to the front of the room She turns on the projector, and then she starts something on our teacher's screen. And lo and behold, the teacher's talking to us. And all of a sudden, writing starts appearing on the screen. He had pre-recorded his lecture about calculus. And you know what happened to the entire classroom? We got real quiet, and we started getting our stuff out to take notes. Why? Because the word of our teacher was authoritative, and we knew that he was gonna hold us accountable for listening to it. The substitute teacher was authoritative insofar as she could be, but we knew we weren't going to see her very often and we didn't really care what she thought. But when the teacher spoke, we listened. How do we feel about the voice of Jesus when he speaks? How do we respond to that? Are we similarly willing to submit ourselves to what Jesus has said and not just in terms of hearing it? Just hearing what Jesus has said, James tells us is not enough. We're not supposed to just be hearers of the word, but we're supposed to be doers. You show your faith in Jesus by the way that you live for Jesus. You're not saved by your works, but your works are evidence that the faith in you is genuine. So if you say that you believe in Christ, if you say you believe in the word of Christ, what does your life actually say? Churches like ours are rightfully committed to the authority of scripture. We teach the doctrine of inerrancy, that everything that the Bible says is true and trustworthy. We teach the doctrine of infallibility, that God will accomplish everything he purposes through his word. We teach the authority of scripture as the word of God. Do we actually live and order our lives as individual Christians and as a church like those doctrines are true? Or do we treat the Bible like something that we can pick up and put down on a whim? As long as we're just holding on to what we think is important from our own perspective. The voice of Christ ought to govern the people of Christ. Secondly, the voice of Christ guards the people of Christ. The voice of Christ guards the people of Christ. I'll be quicker here, but notice with me in verse 5. A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers. This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. So Jesus said to them again, Truly, truly, I say to you, I am the door to the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep do not listen to them. I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture. What Jesus is saying here in part is what ultimately protects the sheep is that they know his word. How do people know when a dollar bill is counterfeit? You've probably heard this illustration before, but it's helpful. How do people know that a dollar bill is counterfeit? Do they study every possible counterfeit dollar bill in the world? No, they couldn't do that. It'd take too much time. So what do they study in order to recognize the fake? The real thing. That's why they keep getting more complicated. They study the real things so that they can distinguish what's true and what's false. What Jesus says here is that we as his sheep, we know his voice, we know what he said, so if we want to be protected against the false stuff, what guards us against that? Knowing what Jesus has said. That's what protects us against going the wrong direction, against being misled. We realize that the Word of Jesus protects us from destructive influences, from wandering into error regarding our doctrine or practice. If we are going to be faithful, we need to know the truth. Consider what Paul says in 2 Timothy 4. Right after he says that really familiar, those really familiar words about what Scripture is, that all Scripture is breathed out by God, he applies that To Timothy's ministry, verse 1 of chapter 4, I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing in his kingdom, preach the word. Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Reprove, rebuke, and exhort with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. What is the remedy to false teaching? The real thing. If somebody starts a rumor about you, how do you clarify that the rumor isn't true? You tell them what did happen. You tell them the truth. And if you have evidence, you provide it. Listen, we need to recognize that what protects and guards us as a church is knowing the word of Christ. That's what's going to make sure that we're doing this evangelism thing the way that Jesus wants us to. Because there are all kinds of different methods out there that may seem effective, but what pleases Jesus is what Jesus has commanded. So we need to love the Word of Christ so that we will do the will of Christ. Last thing I want you to see, the voice of Christ guards the people of Christ, the voice of Christ gathers the people of Christ. The voice of Christ gathers the people of Christ. As Jesus continues, he begins to describe that his purpose for his sheep goes beyond the people that are listening to him, his disciples, or even the house of Israel. As he continues teaching, he comes to verse 14. I am the good shepherd, I know my own, and my own know me, just as the Father knows me, and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. Verse 16, notice this, this is our verse here. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock and one shepherd. What Jesus is acknowledging here is that ultimately his purpose for his flock is bigger than the people that are right in front of him. He is building one flock with one shepherd that covers the entirety of the earth. He's calling people from every tribe and nation and tongue. These are his sheep. But how is he going to summon them? Is he going to do something different for them than what he's doing for those that are right in front of them? No, no, what does Jesus say? He says that he has other sheep who are not of this fold. He's got to bring them in also. And then he says, how? And they will listen to my voice. What ultimately brings people in is the word of Christ. What ultimately saves people is the word of God. So we don't have to be ashamed then when we go to share the gospel with people about the word of God. We don't have to make excuses for what God has said. Because what God has said is truth. And let everybody else be a liar. The voice of Christ is what gathers people into the life of the church. The voice of Christ is what saves people from their sins. As Paul tells Timothy in 2 Timothy 3, it's the scriptures that make us wise for salvation. People call on the Lord, Paul says in Romans chapter 10, because we sent preachers, and those preachers have brought a message. What is that message? The word of Christ. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the what? The word of Christ. What is it that we go out to share with people? What we think? What we've come up with? What do we share with people? The Word of Christ. And what begins to happen as the Word of Christ goes out is that Jesus himself begins to speak. Listen, evangelism is not about creativity. It's not about coming up with the next best thing. I mean, goodness gracious, how many evangelistic methods have you seen in your life that have come and gone? The goal is not creativity, because our creativity isn't saving anybody. Consider what the Apostle Paul says of his ministry. We've looked at this passage before and we're going to hit it again. As Paul is describing his ministry at Corinth, he says, For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling. And my speech and my message were not in plausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. As Paul begins to describe his ministry yet again in 2 Corinthians 4, he says, therefore having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart, but we have renounced disgraceful underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word, but by the open statement of the truth, we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. Paul says, listen, the focus of faithful evangelism is ensuring that people hear the Word of Christ. Because the Word of Christ is what saves people. Consider how fruitful Paul's ministry was. How many churches were planted as a consequence of his ministry. Consider how the apostles saw thousands of people at different points saved by the preaching of what? The Word of Christ. Go read some of the sermons from the book of Acts. What does Peter stand up and say in Acts chapter 2? Does he make stuff up? No, he goes to the Old Testament, he preaches the Old Testament, and then he shows them how all of these things have reference to Jesus. He preaches the Word of Christ. Go follow all the way through the entirety of the New Testament. What is it that people are sharing? They're sharing the word of Christ. If you're going to be faithful in evangelism, if you're going to bring people to Jesus, you need to bring people to Jesus by the word. And people need to hear the voice of Jesus in it. Now, here's where the rubber meets the road for so many of us. We can't speak the word of Christ because we don't know the word of Christ. Because we don't read our Bibles. the most interaction that I think a lot of people in churches have with the Bible is coming to church and hearing either a Sunday school teacher or a preacher talk about a passage. And so then we go out into the field and we have this obligation to share what Jesus has said, and we don't know what to say. Or if we do, we know such a limited amount that we live in fear that somebody's gonna ask us a question that we can't answer. They're going to levy a charge that we don't know a response to because we don't know the Word of Christ well enough to share the Word of Christ. But if the Bible is what we say it is, and if it's what God has appointed as the effective means through which people are brought into the sheepfold of Christ, then what's the solution to that problem? Learn the Word of Christ. And I've got a way for you to do that. Out in the foyer you're going to find, I don't even know how many because the printer messed up, there's more than I originally planned. There's at least 50 but there's probably 75 Bible reading plans. Maybe you're already reading a Bible reading plan this year. That's awesome. Stick with it. Keep working. But if you're not, these are really simple. They're just of the New Testament. Next year, we're going to go through the whole thing. And it's going to be something we're all going to do together. And I'm excited about it. But this year, I'm just asking you to read the New Testament. It's called the 5x5x5 Plan. It's from the Navigators Ministry. It divides up the New Testament into five readings per week that should take you five minutes or less. And then it gives you five ways that you can respond to that given passage. If you've never read the New Testament, then I want you to read the New Testament so that we can begin sharing the word of Christ and be confident that when we share that word, people are going to hear the real Jesus speaking into their lives. So as you're leaving today, those who are there, grab one and just try it. Read the scriptures and let the scriptures change your perspective on your life and on the way in which we engage evangelism. Maybe one of the reasons that our evangelism isn't fruitful is because we're not speaking Jesus's words. Now, I also want to speak to you this morning if you've never trusted Jesus. The thing about the way that Jesus is appointed for this world to work in between his first and second comings is that we live in dependence on his word and his spirit. That's who we are as Christians. We're waiting for the day when we see Christ face to face. But now in this period, we recognize that we live in dependence on Jesus's word and his spirit. And what's amazing is that Jesus promises to work through his word to meet with you. And this Jesus, this shepherd who calls his own by his voice, did you notice all the times that he said what he came to do for them? He came to lay down his life for those sheep. The Jesus who gives you his word so that you can hear his voice is the same one who saw your need because of your sin and died so that you could be brought into his fold. And this morning, if you find yourself in a place where you go, I don't know the shepherd of the sheep, I don't know his voice, I don't really wanna hear his voice, I never have before. Maybe today your heart is beginning to open up and your eyes are beginning to see that you need this word. I want to tell you that when you go to the scriptures, you're going to hear the voice of the shepherd. And if you would respond to him in faith, you can belong to his flock and he will keep you forever. So if you would, as we come to that time of response, don't run away. Come and be reconciled to God through faith in Jesus Christ if you never have. And for the rest of us, this is our opportunity to respond according to what we've heard, if the word of Christ is what we said it is. If it's the instrument through which God saves people and sanctifies people and governs His church and makes us who we want to be, are we actually living like it's that? So maybe as we sing a song of response, your response needs to be repentance. Because you say, I have not valued the word of God. I have not recognized it for what it is. I have ignored it. I have made it secondary to some other things in my life. And maybe you need to repent this morning. Or maybe you just need to give thanks that God has spoken. Because that word changes everything. In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. God spoke in the beginning by his son. Long ago and many times and many ways God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his son. And that son changes us.