Acts 17 - Sermon Notes

Acts 17 – The message comes to all

Summary until now

Acts has been a journey of the early church and the missional journeys of Peter and Paul. We have traveled through 16 chapters of acts to date and are in the middle of Paul’s second missionary trek.

Paul stirs it up in Thessalonica

Paul starts off this chapter in Thessalonica where he encounters heavy resistance to the message he is bringing. He then leave to head for a city called Berea where the group he is reasoning with appear to be receptive to the gospel, but then some of those from Thessalonica show up and start causing trouble. Paul leaves to go to Athens and leaves both Silas and Timothy to deal with the issues in Berea.

While in Athens Paul gets out and tours the city, and starts doing what Paul does best, preaching the gospel. He hits the marketplace and the synagogue, why? This is where the people are, he simply walks around until he finds where the most people are gathered and starts to explain the gospel. The Paul encounters certain stoic and epicurean philosophers in the marketplace where they call him a babbler. They invited him to come to speak at the Areopagus.

Areopagus
This is known as the hill of Ares or Mars Hill. This was the place in the city where many official and unofficial duties took place. This was the cities main court; the groups gathered would hear arguments from people in civil matters and disputes. They would also discuss philosophy and religion on top of this hill. At the time Paul arrived there were two main camps of thought:

Epicureans
Epicureanism is a system of philosophy based upon the teachings of Epicurus (c. 340–c. 270 BC), founded around 307 BC. Epicurus was an atomic materialist, following in the steps of Democritus. His materialism led him to a general attack on superstition and divine intervention.
For Epicurus, the highest pleasure (tranquility and freedom from fear) was obtained by knowledge, friendship, and living a virtuous and temperate life. He lauded the enjoyment of simple pleasures, by which he meant abstaining from bodily desires, such as sex and appetites, verging on asceticism. He argued that when eating, one should not eat too richly, for it could lead to dissatisfaction later, such as the grim realization that one could not afford such delicacies in the future.

Stoics
It teaches that self-control, fortitude and detachment from distracting emotions, sometimes interpreted as an indifference to pleasure or pain, allows one to become a clear thinker, level-headed and unbiased.
A primary aspect of Stoicism would be described as improving the individual’s spiritual well-being. Virtue, reason, and natural law are prime directives. By mastering passions and emotions, Stoics believe it is possible to overcome the discord of the outside world and find peace within oneself. Stoicism holds that passion distorts truth, and that the pursuit of truth is virtuous.

Sermon at Mars Hill

So Paul comes before this group and gives what is one of the most important sermons to those of us who would be included as gentiles. We pick it up in Acts 17:22-31. Paul starts off on a positive note, notice that he hits common ground? He doesn’t jump in and tell them they have everything wrong and that they have no idea of truth? Instead he looks for the common ground with the people there.

22 Then Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are very religious; 23 for as I was passing through and considering the objects of your worship, I even found an altar with this inscription:

TO THE UNKNOWN GOD.

The unknown God is where we now have the term agnostic, Gnostic, knowledge, adding the A in front makes is without. Agnostic, without knowledge, of God.

Therefore, the One whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you: 24 God, who made the world and everything in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands. 25 Nor is He worshiped with men’s hands, as though He needed anything, since He gives to all life, breath, and all things.

Paul establishes who God is in terms that they can relate to and tried to show them that the temples and idols they worship are not the one true God. He is starting down a path to show them that they have broken the second commandment, but in order to do this he must first establish with them who God is and why He created us.

26 And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, 27 so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us;

Paul again was establishing common ground with the gathered crowd, showing them that through creation that we are all related and that God had predestined the times they lived and that if they seek Him, He would meet them halfway.

This raises an interesting question on pre-destination, is God in charge or are you? Why were you born in the place you were and why are you here right now, in this room or listening to this on the internet? Was that God’s will or was that something you did of your own free will? Certainly this is a concept that is not easily answered in the short time we have left, but according to scripture God has decided this, He has pre-appointed the times you live and that means that you are here right now for a reason, the question you have to ask yourself is what that reason is?

28 for in Him we live and move and have our being, as also some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are also His offspring.’ 29 Therefore, since we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, something shaped by art and man’s devising. 30 Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, 31 because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained.

Now Paul moves to tell them that they are the offspring of the created. He also speaks of their idolatry in a manner that some may have found offensive. Basically he makes a case in the beginning then drives it home here by telling them that they ought not to think of the divine nature is something that comes from humans. He tells them that they have formed a god in their own image.

There is a brilliant turn in Acts 17, where Paul tells the Athenians that God had overlooked their past idolatry. As an act of divine patience and forbearance. He winked at these times; he did not restrain them from these idolatries by sending prophets to them, as he did to Israel; he did not punish them in their idolatries, as he did Israel; but gave them the gifts of his providence, and now calls all men everywhere to repentance and faith in Christ who is coming again. So it is a new beginning, a new message for them, and us.

The two Mars Hills

There are two really big churches on either side of the continent called Mars Hill with completely opposite theologies and viewpoints. The one in Michigan is an emerging church which has a view of scripture where they term themselves “red letter Christians” On the other side you have a group putting the fun back in fundamentalism, Mark Driscoll’s church. They are a reformed church with primary focus on the teachings of the reformed church Luther and Calvin guiding their theology. The liberal left view is a humanistic point of view that puts man at the center of attention, not God. It is based on the assumption that Christians have “failed” for the past 2000 years in accomplishing Christ’s purpose and now they are going to get it fixed and put this world in order. They have opened the Bible p to new interpretations focusing only on the gospels, treating all the rest of the Bible as lesser scripture.





Both were asked in the latest issue of Relevant magazine:
"What do you see as the greatest challenge for young Christians in the next ten years?"

Mars Hill, Seattle, pastor, Mark Driscoll comments, "There is a strong drift toward the hard theological left. Some emergent types (want) to recast Jesus as a limp-wrist hippie in a dress with a lot of product in his hair, who drank decaf and made pithy Zen statements while shopping for the perfect pair of shoes. In Revelation, Jesus is a prize fighter with a tattoo down his leg, a sword in his hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is a guy I can worship. I cannot worship the hippie, diaper; halo Christ because I cannot worship a guy I can beat up. I fear some are becoming more cultural than Christian, and without a big Jesus who has authority and hates sin as revealed in the Bible, we will have less and less Christians, and more and more confused, spiritually self-righteous blogger critics of Christianity."

Asked the same question, Mars Hill, Grandville, pastor, Rob Bell comments, "The unbelievable amassing of wealth and consumer goods that we have at out fingertips in American culture. Our greatest challenge will be to learn how to move this into blessings for others, or we will continue to be more selfish and indifferent to the cries of the world. These insane amounts of goods that are at our service are not doing good things to our souls."

So what is the most important thing that faces Christians in the next ten years? Is it feeding the poor? Or contending for the true gospel? Paul’s message to the Athenians was that the unknown god they were worshiping and didn’t understand was the God of Israel and the God of our Bible. They were confused because they didn’t have the scriptures and no one to that point had explained it, but what’s our excuse? In a time where we have free and full access to the Word of God.

Jesus said when asked what is the greatest commandment, that it was to love your God then love your neighbor, not the other way around. It is insulting to think that Christians have failed in the past 2000 years when nearly every single humanitarian organization formed over the past 200 years is Christian based. Some examples, The Red Cross, The Salvation Army, The United Way, and the YMCA just to name a few.

For Christians to come out and say that we are failing because we are not focusing on the “red letters” implies that we have historically been wrong in the interpretation of the Bible. In truth we are now failing because we aren’t focusing on the black letters, the gospels don’t trump the epistles. Opening up the Bible to pick and choose your theology like a menu is a form of idolatry, creating an image of God that you are comfortable with and denying His true nature. This path is one that leads to further destruction and drives us further from God’s word.

Other attacks on the record of Christianity will come from people who are self proclaimed atheists, or from secular humanists. They will often say that Christianity is worth rejecting because of their horrible track record of the past. They will say that the crusades, the inquisition, and the witch trails prove that Christianity has not helped the planet and have harmed society as a whole.

If the measure of harm is the number of people killed as a result of apparent beliefs then atheism and secular humanism win hands down. Lets look at the tally:

Atheism/Secular Humanism:
China – 1949-1965, 21 Million killed
Russia – 1917-1959, 66 Million killed
Germany – 1938-1945, 20 Million killed
Cambodia – 1975-1979, 4 Million killed

Christianity:
Crusades: 40 Thousand killed
Inquisition: 12 Thousand killed
Witch trials: 19 killed

So based upon volume it would appear that Secular Humanism has the edge on volume of death, and this if you notice is just the past 100 years. We also need to look at whether or not the people carrying out these killings were following the ideology they claimed or not? In the case of atheism there can be nothing seen as wrong with killing other human beings, after all if we evolved from monkey’s and before that a random selection of goo, why should it matter if we kill one another? In fact by killing someone else to increase my power and influence and really accelerating the evolutionary process and it fits perfectly with a humanist world view. In fact this is what drove the Nazi regime was the pursuit of the super human, elimination of anything that didn’t fit their ideals. According to this worldview you only get one chance to make an impact on the world, only one time around, you should gain everything you can and enjoy life to it’s fullest.

However from a Christian point of view were these killings justified? Well, for the most part it would appear that those involved in those events were not following the words of our leader, who told us that when we were attacked to present our other cheek to the enemy, rather they were operating in self-interest.

So At the end of the day, God is still in control. Christianity, while social justice and planetary restoration are not the key message has had more of a positive impact than any other group in the history of humans. Bono, Tony Campolo, and George Clooney don’t have the “power” to fix this planet and all its ills. How do we know this? Paul tells us here that God has decided where we were born, where we would live and the extent of our travel. What causes all these problems, why is the world degrading rapidly? The root cause is sin, and the Bible lays out a compelling story of how to eliminate this. We teach this to our children:

A – Admit you’re a sinner

We learn very early in our culture to point out other people’s problems rather than look at our own and we are given a myriad of excuses to reason out why we have the problems we do. These range from a bad childhood to rejection by our father or anything else that Freudian theory can “prove”, excuse or medicate. The true root cause of all of our problems is sin and we need to repent and receive the forgiveness that Christ offers. Jesus taught us to forgive those who sin against us, so all the excuses and reasoning comes from a lack of our own forgiveness and us harboring hatred.

In the case of those present at Mars Hill their sin that Paul addressed was idolatry. What is yours? Do you create images of your god like the Athenians? No you say? What about work, what about money, power? Do these things come before God? How about creating god’s image in one that you’re more comfortable with rather than the God as described in the Bible? I know I have done this, decided I didn’t like God’s rules and decided to create a god of Ryan, built on my principles, do you? Idolatry is not just limited to the physical formation of graven images, but God is always first and foremost interested in the condition of your heart.

This step is often missing today; we like to jump to the good stuff. It fits with our culture better. Why wait to buy the television when you have a credit card? You deserve that spa treatment it will make you feel better. Focus on your happiness not your faults or weaknesses…after all your only human, everyone makes mistakes, we have replaced sin, willful disregard for God’s laws with “I made a mistake”. Similar to the language that insurance companies started using “collision” rather than “accident”, it does mean a world of difference. However now most people think of “sin” as “mistake”

You must tell God your sorry for the sins you have committed and turn from them. Think of it as if you are married and have an adulterous relationship. You come back to your wife and say to her “honey I had an affair, I just wanted you to know that.” And expect everything to be OK? No, you have to be sorry, broken, and on your knees. Same situation you tell your wife you’re sorry and you convince her that you have repented and she accepts you back, then you go out and have another affair, were you really sorry in the first place? Ask yourself the same question about your sin. If you are really sorry for it and want forgiveness for it, why do you keep coming back to it?

B – Believe Christ was who He said He was that he came in the flesh, died and was resurrected. (The resurrection being the proof, but a real sticking point and source of mockery for the Athenians)

He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.” 32 And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked,

This means he can’t be who you want Him to be, but who He was and is. If you create a God you want to worship you create a false God and give yourself false security. This is also the greatest news of all because if you get the first part right you know how much this means. You know that God should punish you for your sins, that He has every right to do so and should. You know that there is nothing you can do to make things “right”, no amount of good works make up for the wrong. Think of a rapist who stands before a judge, he says to the judge, “Judge I know I raped that women, I admit it but I have dated 30 women since and treated them with respect and dignity”. The Bible says if you break one of the commandments you are guilty of breaking the whole of the law. However instead of punishment He instead chooses to take the punishment in the ultimate display of Love and Mercy. Once you grasp this and comprehend how big a deal this is, your life will be different.

If you don’t grasp this my words will seem foolish and confusing. You will mock me and the message I have to bring. Paul later tells us in 1 Corinthians 18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. God purposefully chose a seemingly foolish message, but when it is grasped by those that believe it is amazing. Finally we move onto C.

C – Confess, Choose, and commit to follow Him

This means to put on, not just think about once in a while. Your whole life will be God focused, everything you say, do and think will put God first. The analogy that I think is best is the parachute. You’re on a plane and it is going down, the pilot comes on and says that there is a parachute under your seat. First you must admit that the plane is going down, and then you must believe that there is a parachute under your seat. You do this by reaching down and checking. Once you grab hold of the parachute belief is not enough, you must put on the parachute in order to save yourself from the coming crash. This is the same with Christ, believing isn’t enough. Demons believe and tremble, but they don’t have salvation.

Have you done this? Really put on Christ? Not just in a superficial Sunday I’m all for God but a Monday through Saturday live your own life. Instead you need to wrap your whole life around Christ? The concept of the world is one that is written about often in the scriptures; John tells us in 1 John 15-17 15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world. 17 And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever.

The world is passing away, degrading every day just a little more, accelerating at a pace unseen before. Our footprint and impact is extending to every single nook and cranny of this planet, the whole of creation groans because of our sinful nature. Don’t focus on the world and all your problems, instead focus on God’s purpose, God’s glory and God’s holiness. When you do this all of your problems and concerns are muted, they aren’t fixed, but it puts life into perspective.

Now we come to the conclusion of Paul’s message and after a great delivery with the demonstrated power of God working through him as demonstrated in the previous 6 chapters you would expect everyone to be struck down and worship God right? Well, remember that many mocked the resurrection and

while others said, “We will hear you again on this matter.” 33 So Paul departed from among them. 34 However, some men joined him and believed, among them Dionysius the Areopagite, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.

Was Paul’s message a failure? Here he was among a bunch of unbelievers and he preached a revival message. He was THE apostle, shouldn’t the entire city have been converted immediately with all sorts of signs and wonders occurring? Shouldn’t he have had an alter call where all the people fill in cards saying that they have accepted Jesus Christ and then published their stats on how many conversions he had under his belt? Well, that’s not what happened, instead he was mocked by some, others said they would hear him again, and some believed. Only 2 people are named who become believers as a result of the message he delivered.

So how could this have been measured as a success? It was because Paul preached the Word as it was written and communicated by God, he didn’t tickle the ears of the listeners with words they long to hear, he told them the complete council of God and allowed god to do the work.

Remember earlier when we talked of God’s predestination of people of where they live and the places they go? Well this is in the same category. If you change the message to conform it to what you think the culture and the people are comfortable with you are telling God that you think your smarter than Him and you don’t need His help. In fact you are telling God that he got it wrong and that you know better. God knows what he is doing; don’t for a minute doubt it. All the world is his creation, the salvation of humanity is His plan and He lays out the blueprint in the Bible. There are 66 books in the Bible that contain around 775,000 words, the bulk of the bible deals with God’s plan to restore and save fallen man. Only 3000 words deal with before and after this in the beginning before the fall and the last part of revelations with the restoration of heaven on Earth. The rest 700,000 words in English describe this plan of the messiah to come, the messiah on earth, and finally then the messiah who came. All is the word of God and to be taken at face value.

Finally I want to look back a little in Acts 17, and go to verse 11. These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so. Everything I have talked about is a little controversial and for some difficult to handle. For those that are seeking God, or call themselves Christians, are you reading you Bible every day without fail? If not why not? And please don’t tell yourself you have no time, this is an excuse that is completely untrue no matter who you are. Do you watch TV? Do you drive to work? Can you live with 15 minutes less sleep and spend your first waking minutes of every day with God?
Summary:

God wants all of you, he is calling you to Him now, and how will you respond to this call?

God is in charge of the planet, the people and your life whether you choose to work with Him or against Him is your decision, but make not doubt about it God is in full control.

Today is the day that God now commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained.