CrossWay Church Sermon Podcast

In Matthew 6:16–18, Jesus assumes His followers will fast ("When you fast..."), but He radically redefines why and how we do it. Fasting isn't about impressing others, proving how spiritual we are, or earning God's favor. It is "full-body worship"—a voluntary act of setting aside a physical appetite to acknowledge our deep dependence on God.

In this message, Pastor Brad walks through Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount to explore:

• Why Jesus expects His disciples to fast without legalism

• How spiritual disciplines can be warped into performative religion or manipulation

• The gospel rewards of fasting: exposing our hearts, quieting worldly noise, and feasting on God’s Word

Have you ever wondered if you're praying "the right way"? Many of us picked up a prayer style somewhere along the way: a special prayer voice, the same familiar phrases, or the fear of sounding foolish when we pray out loud. In this message from the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus shows us that prayer isn't a performance. It's a conversation with our Father.

In this sermon on Matthew 6:5–15, we look at:

Two traps that turn prayer into a show: praying to impress people, and piling up words to get God's attention

How the Lord's Prayer reorients our hearts, starting with God's name, kingdom and will before our own needs

Why we can bring God everything, from our daily bread to our struggles with temptation

What Jesus means when he says, "If you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins"

Whether you've prayed the Lord's Prayer your whole life or you're not sure how to pray at all, this message is an invitation to come to a Father who already sees you, knows what you need, and freely forgives.

We all perform for somebody. A boss, a friend, a crowd, even ourselves — and once we know who's watching, we start adjusting. In this message from Matthew 6:1-4, we ask the question Jesus asks: who's the audience we're actually living for? Along the way, we find out why chasing human applause is a leaky bucket that never fills — and why, in Christ, we're already free to stop performing and give, serve, and live for an audience of One.

We're all experts at spotting someone else's faults — and strangely blind to our own. In this message from Psalm 51, we watch King David do the exact same thing... until the prophet Nathan turns the mirror around.

Psalm 51 is David's raw, honest prayer after his sin with Bathsheba was finally exposed — and it shows us that real confession isn't about managing guilt or performing religion. It's about asking God to do what only he can do: wash us clean and give us a new heart. And in Jesus, that's exactly what he's already done.

In this message, we'll walk through:

Why real confession goes deeper than "I made a mistake"

What it means to ask God not just to forgive us, but to remake us

How Jesus fulfills every single thing David could only ask for

What a truly restored heart naturally produces in how we live

What happens when God calls us into court—not to gather evidence, but to hand down a verdict? In Psalm 50, God confronts his people with a sobering truth: he isn't fooled by transactional religious performance, empty routines, or hollow words. In this message, Pastor Brad Vos walks through Psalm 50 to expose how our subtle self-reliance and practical neglect keep us from true worship. Discover how God dismantles our religious resumes to lead us into a life of genuine reliance, deep gratitude, and the blameless standing given to us freely in Jesus Christ.

When crisis hits—whether a sudden wildfire evacuation, an unexpected medical report, or economic uncertainty—we are confronted with a truth we usually try to ignore: our bank accounts, achievements, and self-reliance cannot buy us out of the grave.

In this expositional sermon on Psalm 49, we explore the universal human struggle with mortality, wealth, and fear. While no human fortune can pay the ransom for a soul, God provided the ultimate ransom through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Discover how resting in Christ’s completed work frees us from envy, fear, and misplaced trust in a fragile world.

Most of us have heard about God for years — sermons, Sunday school, a parent's example, a friend's testimony. But hearing about God's faithfulness and actually trusting him yourself are not the same thing. In this message from Psalm 48, we look at how a whole community moved from "we have heard" to "we have seen" — and what it looks like for that same move to happen in us, whether our lives have come through untouched or carrying real scars.

Psalm 47 calls us to that unrestrained joy — for a King whose throne isn't up for grabs.

In this expository sermon on Psalm 47, Pastor Brad walks through the psalm's two matching calls to praise and the single verse at the center that everything turns on: God has ascended. We look at what it meant for Israel, what it means now that Jesus has taken that throne, and why the nations who were once under Israel's feet end up standing beside them, singing the same song.

Along the way: what "inheritance" actually meant, why Joshua isn't the subject of verse 3, and how God's promise to Abraham finally came true.

Passage: Psalm 47 (NIV)

Series: The Psalms

Commission: Colossians 3:15–17

📖 Message outline:

I. All Peoples Are Called to Praise the Great King (vv. 1–4)

II. God Has Ascended to His Throne (v. 5)

III. Sing Praises to the King of All the Earth (vv. 6–9)

IV. Sing Praises to Jesus, Our Ascended King

Because King Jesus reigns over all, our lives sing.

In 1703, dozens of ships anchored in the safest harbor on the English coast. By morning, many of them were gone. Their anchors had been dragging all night — and nobody on deck could feel it.

We do the same thing. We drop the anchors of our hearts into good things: work, health, family, a plan that's finally coming together. And in fair weather, we cannot tell the difference between an anchor that's holding and an anchor that's sliding.

Psalm 46 is written for the moment we find out. It watches the mountains fall into the sea, the nations rage, and kingdoms collapse — and it says something startling: God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.

In this message we walk through all four movements of Psalm 46 and ask what it actually means to "be still and know that I am God" — a verse almost everyone knows and almost everyone misreads. It isn't a call to quiet your feelings. It's a command to stand down. And we'll see why we can: the LORD Almighty of Psalm 46 has a name, and he has already won.

In this message:

I) When our physical world shatters, God is our stronghold (vv. 1–3)

II) When our world is in uproar, God is present (vv. 4–7)

III) Seeing what God has done stills our striving (vv. 8–11)

IV) Christ fulfills what this psalm promises

Why do millions of us wake up in the middle of the night to watch a royal wedding we weren't even invited to? In this exposition of Psalm 45, we discover that our deep fascination with royal glory isn't an accident—we were made for a wedding. Join us as we walk step-by-step through Psalm 45, an ancient Hebrew wedding song that contains a astonishing theological mystery: an Israelite poet addresses an earthly groom as God and promises that the nations will worship Him forever. Discover how Jesus Christ fulfills every detail of this psalm, how He paid the ultimate bride-price for us on the cross, and what it practically means for us to leave behind old securities and live into the white robes of His righteousness today.