WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:16.780 Hi, my name is George Sinclair. I'm the lead pastor of Church of the Messiah. It is wonderful 00:00:16.780 --> 00:00:20.760 that you would like to check out some of the sermons done by Church of the Messiah, either 00:00:20.760 --> 00:00:24.920 by myself or some of the others. Listen, just a couple of things. First of all, would you pray 00:00:24.920 --> 00:00:31.520 for us that we will open God's Word well to His glory and for the good of people like yourself? 00:00:32.079 --> 00:00:37.939 The second thing is, if you aren't connected to a church and if you are a Christian, we really, 00:00:38.179 --> 00:00:42.579 I would really like to encourage you to find a good local church where they believe the Bible, 00:00:43.240 --> 00:00:48.760 they preach the gospel, and if you have some trouble finding that, send us an email. We will 00:00:48.760 --> 00:00:54.560 do what we can to help connect you with a good local church wherever you are. And if you're a 00:00:54.560 --> 00:00:59.340 non-Christian checking us out, we're really, really, really glad you're doing that. Don't 00:00:59.340 --> 00:01:04.219 hesitate to send us questions. It helps me, actually, to know, as I'm preaching, how to 00:01:04.219 --> 00:01:07.760 deal with the types of things that you're really struggling with. So God bless. 00:01:11.980 --> 00:01:18.500 Let's just bow our heads in prayer for a moment. Father, we ask that your Holy Spirit would fall 00:01:18.500 --> 00:01:25.099 with gentle power upon us. Father, it's at moments like this that we can confess to you that we are 00:01:25.099 --> 00:01:31.980 far better at seeing specks in other people's eyes than logs in our own eyes. And we confess before you 00:01:31.980 --> 00:01:39.099 at times like this that we are actually quite skilled at flattering ourselves too much to detect or hate 00:01:39.099 --> 00:01:44.780 our own sin. So Father, we ask for the gentle but powerful work of your Holy Spirit 00:01:44.780 --> 00:01:51.079 to bring your words and the gospel of Jesus Christ deep into our hearts, 00:01:51.739 --> 00:01:59.979 that we might be released from the bands of those sins which cripple us and ruin our lives and the lives 00:01:59.979 --> 00:02:06.500 of others, and that we might walk in the wholeness and freedom that comes from knowing Jesus and becoming 00:02:06.500 --> 00:02:13.479 more like him. And we ask this in the name of Jesus, your Son and our Savior. Amen. Please be seated. 00:02:15.259 --> 00:02:24.539 So two Saturdays ago, I had the great privilege of speaking at the youth retreat. And I think in the 00:02:24.539 --> 00:02:28.639 morning I talked about the Bible, how to read the Bible for yourself, how to develop a Bible reading 00:02:28.639 --> 00:02:36.479 habit. And after lunch, always a great time to speak right after lunch, I spoke on sort of how to 00:02:36.479 --> 00:02:42.259 pray and develop a prayer life or be a more prayerful person. And one of the things I talked 00:02:42.259 --> 00:02:48.359 about during that time was the whole Acts model of prayer. Most of you might remember this, you know, 00:02:48.439 --> 00:02:54.079 adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication. And I talked a little bit about all of them. 00:02:54.560 --> 00:02:59.899 But in particular, when I was talking about confession, I wanted to warn them about something 00:02:59.900 --> 00:03:05.760 that happens. And by the way, I'm sure all of us are vastly too spiritual mature to have anything 00:03:05.760 --> 00:03:10.860 like this ever happen to us. But one of the things that can develop with people is that God can, 00:03:11.240 --> 00:03:17.099 the devil can be very, very happy to make you very convicted about a particular sin. And so when it 00:03:17.099 --> 00:03:21.800 come times to, you know, confess your sin, whoa, right away you go to the really obvious one and you 00:03:21.800 --> 00:03:26.819 pray about it and pray about it and pray about it and anxious about it. And the devil actually is 00:03:26.819 --> 00:03:33.959 quite happy with that because it makes you blind to a whole pile of other sins that if you were to ask 00:03:33.959 --> 00:03:39.579 your best friends or your parents honestly to talk to you about, they'd instantly say, 00:03:40.219 --> 00:03:43.000 oh, they're spending all their time talking about that. Well, yeah, yeah, they should talk about that, 00:03:43.039 --> 00:03:48.099 but they should be also thinking about this, this, this, this, and this. It's just one of those things. 00:03:48.199 --> 00:03:52.819 You know, the example that I gave with them is that, you know, I'm talking to teenagers that 00:03:52.819 --> 00:03:58.099 often a lot of the confessions around the sin of lust. And I don't want you leaving away saying, 00:03:58.159 --> 00:04:02.739 oh, by the way, Reverend George, Pastor George, so we don't have to pray against lust anymore. No, 00:04:02.799 --> 00:04:07.459 I don't want you to say that. But I mean, it's, it may, you might never pray about greed. 00:04:09.039 --> 00:04:15.299 But your whole desire of your heart is to be an Audi driving, fully devoted servant of mammon. 00:04:15.300 --> 00:04:20.720 And you never once pray against her. You have problems with anger or anything else. Anyway, 00:04:21.460 --> 00:04:27.480 the point of this is that the Bible today is going to talk about a sin, which is probably one of the 00:04:27.480 --> 00:04:34.780 most besetting sins of Canadians, including Canadian Christians. But it's something that probably very few 00:04:34.780 --> 00:04:43.420 of us ever confess. And it's going to contrast this sin in an absolutely shocking way with a virtue that 00:04:43.420 --> 00:04:49.319 we wouldn't normally put together with that sin. So let's have a look. We're in Acts chapter 17. 00:04:50.280 --> 00:04:56.280 We're going to be looking at verses 1 to 15. And the way, if you're using this, it's on page 98. 00:04:57.319 --> 00:05:02.840 And the way it's sort of, in sort of the flow of the book, right, the book of Acts is an eyewitness-based 00:05:02.840 --> 00:05:11.240 history of the 30 or so early years of the Jesus movement, and written by a sometimes eyewitness, 00:05:11.240 --> 00:05:16.620 but written when many eyewitnesses were still alive to correct things. And what we've just seen is a 00:05:16.620 --> 00:05:22.540 whole big story. We've looked at that last week of Paul in the city of Philippi, the first encounter 00:05:22.540 --> 00:05:29.620 of Christianity with Europeans. That's what Acts 16 is talking about, the big story in Philippi. 00:05:30.379 --> 00:05:39.139 And we now have these two really short linked stories before we get into a longer section about 00:05:39.139 --> 00:05:46.399 Athens. And so that's where we are. And so let's read. Acts chapter 17, verse 1. And it's really good 00:05:46.399 --> 00:05:54.000 if you bring your own Bibles, by the way. It's just really helpful if you make notes, questions, 00:05:54.159 --> 00:05:58.979 underlying things. Anyway, just want to encourage you to bring your own Bibles. And it goes like this. 00:05:58.980 --> 00:06:04.259 Now, when they had passed through Amphipolis, I'm probably not pronouncing that correctly. 00:06:04.860 --> 00:06:10.100 Now, when they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, 00:06:10.680 --> 00:06:14.780 where there was a synagogue of the Jews. And just sort of want to pause there just for a second. 00:06:16.000 --> 00:06:21.080 One of the things that cracks me up all of the time about action movies, and I'm a sucker for action 00:06:21.080 --> 00:06:28.200 movies, right? But it cracks me up. The action hero falls out of the car that's going at 50 kilometers 00:06:28.199 --> 00:06:33.180 or 50 miles an hour, rolls around a little bit, gets up and jumps up as if nothing's happened to him. 00:06:33.519 --> 00:06:38.519 He doesn't have a concussion. He has no scrapes. He doesn't have any bruised ribs or broken bones. 00:06:38.879 --> 00:06:44.279 Or he falls, you know, like five stories from a building into some boxes and gets up. Or he's 00:06:44.279 --> 00:06:51.139 stabbed or anything like that. And maybe sometimes just for dramatic, they limp a little bit for about 00:06:51.139 --> 00:06:55.579 two minutes. But before you know it, they're right back as if nothing's happened to them. 00:06:55.579 --> 00:07:02.039 I don't know how many of you here have ever had bruised or broken ribs. Let me tell you, 00:07:02.099 --> 00:07:08.439 if you have bruised or broken ribs, my son-in-law has some right now. You can't hardly even breathe 00:07:08.439 --> 00:07:12.939 for five weeks, right? So one of the things we have sometimes, a problem we have when reading the 00:07:12.939 --> 00:07:19.939 Bible, is that we sort of think as if these guys are superheroes or they're action stars. They're not. 00:07:19.939 --> 00:07:24.899 So one of the things in the original language, right? They pass through Amphipolis and Apollonia. 00:07:25.160 --> 00:07:30.680 And it's an important thing to help us. You see, if we think if they're all stars or heroes, 00:07:30.680 --> 00:07:36.180 we can't relate to them. But what has just happened to them immediately before this? The implication is 00:07:36.180 --> 00:07:43.360 that they don't go to share Jesus in either of those cities. They go for a 150-kilometer walk, 00:07:43.360 --> 00:07:48.639 150-kilometer walk before they get to where they're going. But what's just happened before? 00:07:49.319 --> 00:07:58.480 They've been severely beaten with rods. Severely beaten with rods. So bad that amongst other things, 00:07:58.620 --> 00:08:04.759 they have open wounds that have to be treated. And on top of that, after being severely beaten by rods, 00:08:04.860 --> 00:08:09.639 they were thrown into the stalks. And they would have been in the stalks for at least 12 or 13 hours. 00:08:09.639 --> 00:08:15.399 And so that probably means they have raw skin from where the wood was rubbing against their legs. 00:08:15.740 --> 00:08:21.560 And on top of that, they have a shame issue. Because the text says that before they were beaten, 00:08:21.680 --> 00:08:27.000 they were stripped of their clothes and beaten. I mean, just think for a moment. If you were in a 00:08:27.000 --> 00:08:32.199 public place and you were stripped naked, just that, without being beaten, there'd be a shame issue, 00:08:32.659 --> 00:08:35.039 an embarrassment issue that would be with you for a while. 00:08:35.039 --> 00:08:44.179 And that's how they're walking 150 kilometers after all of that. It was probably more of a shuffle 00:08:44.179 --> 00:08:50.639 than a jaunt. And I'm just, you know, they don't tell you why they don't do any ministry in these 00:08:50.639 --> 00:08:57.779 places. I just think they need some time to heal. I think they've just been so badly beaten up. 00:08:58.120 --> 00:09:01.719 Even though they've seen a miracle and God worked in many ways, they just need some time to heal. 00:09:01.720 --> 00:09:10.060 Deal with the shame. Deal with the pain. But they come to Thessalonica and they haven't given up on 00:09:10.060 --> 00:09:14.000 ministry because if you look at the end of verse 1, they went to the synagogue of the Jews and then 00:09:14.000 --> 00:09:22.879 it continues in verse 2. And Paul went in, as was his custom, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with 00:09:22.879 --> 00:09:28.940 them from the scriptures. That would be what our Jewish friends call the Tanakh or the Torah and we 00:09:28.940 --> 00:09:34.740 call the Old Testament. So for three days he reasoned with them from the scriptures explaining 00:09:34.740 --> 00:09:43.000 and proving that it was necessary for the Christ or the Messiah to suffer and to rise from the dead 00:09:43.000 --> 00:09:51.700 and saying, this Jesus whom I proclaim to you is the Christ. And some of them were persuaded and joined 00:09:51.700 --> 00:09:58.740 Paul and Silas, as did a great many of the devout Greeks, they are in a Greek city, and not a few of 00:09:58.740 --> 00:10:07.720 the leading women. Now just pause here. Like any good style writer, he could have said, and a great 00:10:07.720 --> 00:10:12.920 many of the devout Greeks and a great many of the leading women, but it's better if you can just move 00:10:12.920 --> 00:10:17.400 the phrases around a little bit, it creates more interest. So not a few is another way of saying a 00:10:17.399 --> 00:10:25.500 great many. So there's a lot of people like this that become Christians. So what's going on here is 00:10:25.500 --> 00:10:33.179 this. It's what he's done. And so what we here have here is we have a bit of an outline about how Paul 00:10:33.179 --> 00:10:38.740 would have approached speaking to people who had a respect for the Bible. That's what it's talking about 00:10:38.740 --> 00:10:43.579 there. We get a bit of a summary of how he goes about talking to people who have a basic respect for the 00:10:43.580 --> 00:10:50.440 Bible. In our culture, that's fewer and fewer people. Actually, just this week, but it's not 00:10:50.440 --> 00:10:57.480 zero. By the way, just this week, I had two things happen to me in a Starbucks that I visited. Oh, 00:10:57.520 --> 00:11:02.480 I don't normally say the name of the place. But anyway, there you go. I slipped. And in one case, 00:11:02.600 --> 00:11:08.840 I was reading a big, big fat, like I read this big academic commentary that's like this fat, 00:11:08.840 --> 00:11:14.720 hardcover. And because I'm trying to get a handle on the original language and all that type of stuff, 00:11:14.780 --> 00:11:21.600 the cultural background. So I'm reading this big, fat book like this open on my table. And I have a 00:11:21.600 --> 00:11:27.680 Bible beside me. And there's a woman beside me reading. And when she gets up, she says in a very 00:11:27.680 --> 00:11:33.920 friendly way, she says, I bet that what I'm reading is way more interesting than what you're reading. 00:11:33.919 --> 00:11:39.500 And I said, well, just the commentary, right? She doesn't see the Bible, just this huge, big, 00:11:39.599 --> 00:11:45.039 fat book. And I said to her, well, you are absolutely correct. But somebody was praying 00:11:45.039 --> 00:11:51.819 for me at this moment. What I'm reading helps me to understand the most wonderful and wise book 00:11:51.819 --> 00:11:58.000 ever written. And I hold up my Bible. And as soon as she sees the Bible, if it had been videotaped, 00:11:58.000 --> 00:12:07.080 the most sour look imaginable came over her face. And rather than being friendly, she said, well, I 00:12:07.080 --> 00:12:13.220 hope you have a good day. And I said, well, I hope you have a good day too. Actually, just a couple of 00:12:13.220 --> 00:12:20.799 days later, I was in that same place. And a man came up to me because he saw me with my Bible on my 00:12:20.799 --> 00:12:27.639 desk. I was working on the sermon. And he said, anyway, basically, long and the short of it was he had 00:12:27.639 --> 00:12:32.419 a nominal Christian background. He started dating a woman who he said is very religious. And he's 00:12:32.419 --> 00:12:38.899 trying to figure things out. And he wanted to talk to me. We had a talk. Point is, there are fewer and 00:12:38.899 --> 00:12:43.819 fewer people in our culture who have a basic respect for the Bible, some from Christian backgrounds, 00:12:44.039 --> 00:12:48.179 and actually, surprisingly, in our culture, increasingly people who've been influenced 00:12:48.179 --> 00:12:55.220 by Jordan Peterson. I know his name is mud in large circles. But there is no question that many, 00:12:55.220 --> 00:13:00.519 many people have started to have a new interest and fascination with the Bible because of Jordan 00:13:00.519 --> 00:13:07.080 Peterson's talking. So what we have here is a basic structure outline about how Peter went about 00:13:07.080 --> 00:13:11.820 talking to people with a respect for the Bible. The next story, we're going to see how he talks to 00:13:11.820 --> 00:13:17.420 people who are completely and utterly pagan. No Christian memory whatsoever. No Christian knowledge 00:13:17.420 --> 00:13:22.420 or history whatsoever. And what we'd see is he does two very, very interesting things. He basically, 00:13:22.419 --> 00:13:29.240 and he's probably toggling back and forth between them. He helps them to understand the Bible, the 00:13:29.240 --> 00:13:38.219 Tanakh, better. And then he connects it to the conception, birth, life, death, and resurrection of 00:13:38.219 --> 00:13:47.599 Jesus. And he's toggling back and forward to show how this Jesus of history is what explains and 00:13:47.600 --> 00:13:54.620 fulfills what you see when you read the Tanakh, the Old Testament, the Torah, properly or better. 00:13:54.680 --> 00:14:00.100 If you could put up the first point, Claire, that would be helpful. Everything from the big story of 00:14:00.100 --> 00:14:08.659 the Old Testament to its tiniest details are fulfilled in the birth, life, work, and person of Jesus of 00:14:08.659 --> 00:14:24.659 Nazareth. That's what he's doing. Now, some of you might say, well, George, that's, you know, all 00:14:24.659 --> 00:14:29.600 interesting. But, you know, all educated people in Canada know that everything in the New Testament's 00:14:29.600 --> 00:14:35.399 wrong and it's not historical. And that's a very plausible thing for Canadians to say. It's a very 00:14:35.399 --> 00:14:39.879 common thing for Canadians to say. And it's actually just completely and utterly misinformed. 00:14:40.699 --> 00:14:45.860 It's not true. So here's a thing which I haven't talked about very much, but it's, you can go back 00:14:45.860 --> 00:14:51.840 and you can check commentaries on this. So one of the things which is very remarkable about the, 00:14:51.939 --> 00:14:56.720 about the Book of Acts is that not only has he claimed to be writing history, but that when it comes 00:14:56.720 --> 00:15:02.220 to getting minute details correct, he gets them correct all the time. What I mean is this. 00:15:02.220 --> 00:15:08.660 I've, I'm, I like going to the lower mainland of BC. I like going to Vancouver. I know that when I go 00:15:08.660 --> 00:15:13.340 there, I could never buy a house there or live there, but I like going there. But I'm like a lot 00:15:13.340 --> 00:15:19.200 of people from Ottawa. I just talk about Vancouver, okay? Now, people from there say, no, no, that's 00:15:19.200 --> 00:15:23.920 actually not Vancouver. That's Burnaby. Or, no, that's not Vancouver. That's Coquitlam. No, no, that's not 00:15:23.920 --> 00:15:29.180 Vancouver. That's Richmond, right? They, they correct me because I've got the, I've got the city all wrong. 00:15:29.179 --> 00:15:34.559 Same thing when I went to Chicago, you know, and I, I don't realize that Chicago, what I think of as 00:15:34.559 --> 00:15:38.639 Chicago is actually a whole pile of small cities. I know one of the times I was there, I didn't realize 00:15:38.639 --> 00:15:42.859 Wheaton's a tiny city within this. I would have thought it was Chicago. Anyway, you get the point. I 00:15:42.859 --> 00:15:47.779 get, I would get it all wrong. But, and, and, you know, another thing, like if you're reading American 00:15:47.779 --> 00:15:52.739 police detective type novels, I'll often get things wrong. You'll even see people aren't getting 00:15:52.739 --> 00:15:57.879 wrong because there's a difference between the state police, the local police, you know, between sheriffs. 00:15:57.879 --> 00:16:03.840 Like there's a whole pile of different language. Well, here's the thing. In English, you can't get it. 00:16:04.039 --> 00:16:11.580 But at the, the level of the original language, every time Luke talks about a new city, he gets it right. 00:16:12.519 --> 00:16:20.200 The officials in, in, um, the officials in, uh, in this particular city, in Thessalonica, 00:16:20.679 --> 00:16:26.940 aren't called the same as the officials in Philippi because they're different types of cities. And he gets it 00:16:26.940 --> 00:16:33.280 right all the time. All those little tiny details. It's a characteristic of somebody writing careful 00:16:33.280 --> 00:16:37.260 history. And you might say, well, you know, it wouldn't be good if we could check the history 00:16:37.260 --> 00:16:42.280 with letters. Well, actually we have letters. They end up being now in what we call the New Testament. 00:16:42.820 --> 00:16:48.220 A few months after this is all over, Paul writes two letters to Thessalonica. We actually have things to, 00:16:48.220 --> 00:16:49.600 the point is this. 00:16:52.360 --> 00:16:58.100 What Paul does is say, there's these things that really happened in history. I'm going to tell you 00:16:58.100 --> 00:17:05.180 about the real things that happened about Jesus, his conception, his birth, his life, his person, 00:17:05.500 --> 00:17:11.920 what he accomplished on the cross, his final words, his resurrection, his ascension. And as I talk about 00:17:11.920 --> 00:17:15.900 this, I'm also going to open up all these different parts of what you call the Old Testament. 00:17:15.900 --> 00:17:21.400 I'm going to show you that he actually helps you to understand it. You can put the two things 00:17:21.400 --> 00:17:29.840 together. That's what he does. And it's very, very interesting. So it all sounds good. Well, no. 00:17:32.780 --> 00:17:39.880 This being Paul, trouble emerges. You get this constant pattern of people being, 00:17:39.880 --> 00:17:50.000 giving their lives to Christ and people getting furious and irate and violent. Look what happens 00:17:50.000 --> 00:17:51.840 immediately after this in verse 5. 00:17:54.300 --> 00:17:58.680 But the Jews were jealous. And what it means here is obviously some Jews, since some Jews became 00:17:58.680 --> 00:18:04.380 Christians. But the Jews were jealous. And another, you can also translate that word as envious. 00:18:04.380 --> 00:18:11.980 And taking some of the wicked men of the rabble, they formed a mob and set the city in an uproar 00:18:11.980 --> 00:18:18.420 and attacked the house of Jason, seeking to bring them out to the crowd. Jason's probably a man 00:18:18.420 --> 00:18:26.600 who's Greek by his name, become a Christian, and maybe that's where Paul and Silas are staying. 00:18:26.599 --> 00:18:40.959 Now, here's the thing. It's because of jealousy or envy. It can be translated either way. And if you 00:18:40.959 --> 00:18:49.399 did a Venn diagram, there's a big overlap between the two types of things. And it's because of that 00:18:49.400 --> 00:18:56.540 that they go after Paul and Silas. If you could put up the point here, that would be very helpful, 00:18:56.620 --> 00:19:01.600 the second point. Oh, sorry, don't put it up yet. Sorry, don't. That's a different point. I'm going to 00:19:01.600 --> 00:19:14.120 talk about this a little bit more. But envy is sorrow or unhappiness or pain or anger at the good 00:19:14.119 --> 00:19:24.379 that somebody else has. That's what envy is. And the characteristic of envy. So, you know, I could 00:19:24.379 --> 00:19:30.959 see a pastor with a bigger church and I can be filled with envy about it. You could see somebody 00:19:30.959 --> 00:19:37.659 whose marriage seems to be better and you could be filled with envy. You could see somebody who's 00:19:37.659 --> 00:19:41.299 single and you're married and you're filled with envy. And it goes the other way around. 00:19:41.299 --> 00:19:48.139 You can see people who have a job and you wish that you had that job and you're filled with envy. 00:19:48.779 --> 00:19:54.419 In other words, you see the good that you think they have and it fills you with unhappiness. 00:19:55.159 --> 00:20:04.859 It's painful to you. And it's not just that it's painful to you, but at its heart, you want that 00:20:04.859 --> 00:20:12.919 other, you want that person who has that thing that you wish you had, you want it to fail. 00:20:16.579 --> 00:20:21.919 So maybe you're, you know, I'm caught with envy for a pastor in another church, which is bigger, 00:20:21.919 --> 00:20:28.939 and I hear he's having trouble. And rather than saying, oh, that's really too bad. Only the devil's 00:20:28.940 --> 00:20:40.580 happy. I inwardly feel a spark of happiness. You know, maybe you look at that other couple and their 00:20:40.580 --> 00:20:44.620 relationship is really good and then you hear they're having trouble. And rather than feeling 00:20:44.620 --> 00:20:53.120 sad about that, you feel a little bit of happiness about it. A lot of what drives the politics in this 00:20:53.119 --> 00:21:01.679 country are marked by envy. Many people who would have voted for Republican in verse 2020 are filled 00:21:01.679 --> 00:21:09.639 with envy that Biden and Harris won the election. And many people in 2024 who are Democrats are filled 00:21:09.639 --> 00:21:19.199 with envy that Trump and Vance won the election. Many people in Canada are filled with envy because 00:21:19.200 --> 00:21:23.480 it's Trudeau. And it'll all be reversed. It's a human problem. It's not a political problem. 00:21:23.920 --> 00:21:28.960 Don't take anything I say here as having anything to do with portraying a particular political party. 00:21:29.059 --> 00:21:35.580 It's a human problem. You know, one of the things, I was reading some works on the Crusades a few years 00:21:35.580 --> 00:21:43.240 ago, and one of the comments about it was that when we moderns look at the Crusades, we're sort of, 00:21:43.340 --> 00:21:47.200 we have a hard time understanding. I mean, there's lots of stuff about the Crusades that were bad. 00:21:47.200 --> 00:21:51.440 I'm not, but one of the things we have a hard time understanding is how it is that so many of these 00:21:51.440 --> 00:21:58.539 knights could so desperately want to be godly and also be so violent. 00:22:00.720 --> 00:22:05.500 But I suggest to you that if they were to look at us, they'd say, why is it that so many Canadian 00:22:05.500 --> 00:22:10.440 Christians desperately want to be godly and are so filled with envy? 00:22:10.440 --> 00:22:20.360 You see, it's a sin that we see in others, but it's very, very hard to see in ourselves. I mean, 00:22:20.380 --> 00:22:26.539 I would like to suggest to you that maybe nobody in the room in this last week has confessed the sin 00:22:26.539 --> 00:22:32.799 of envy. I'm going to talk about it more in a moment when I look at its contrast. But let's just 00:22:32.799 --> 00:22:41.639 look at, oh yeah, just before we move on. Oh, sorry. What is it that they say about the crowd? 00:22:41.779 --> 00:22:46.940 They brought, I lost my place there for a second. They've gotten Jason. They drag him. They're all 00:22:46.940 --> 00:22:52.000 mad. They want to get at Paul and Silas. And in verse 6, and when they could not find them, 00:22:52.079 --> 00:22:57.159 they dragged Jason down, dragged Jason and some of the brothers before the city authorities, shouting, 00:22:57.160 --> 00:23:02.680 these men who have turned the world upside down have come here also. And Jason has received them, 00:23:02.720 --> 00:23:07.240 and they are all acting against the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus. 00:23:08.060 --> 00:23:12.560 And the people and the city authorities were disturbed when they heard these things. And when 00:23:12.560 --> 00:23:18.080 they had taken money as security from Jason and the rest, they let them go. So there's a riot around 00:23:18.080 --> 00:23:23.240 this particular thing. They've picked on one particular thing that Paul has said about Jesus, 00:23:23.240 --> 00:23:28.440 that he's a king. This is a charge of treason. It's very, very serious. It's a capital offense 00:23:28.440 --> 00:23:33.759 in that part of the world. And some of you might say, well, George, there's some truth to that, 00:23:33.799 --> 00:23:38.279 isn't it? Like, don't Christians say that Jesus is the king? Isn't that a treasonous thing? 00:23:38.940 --> 00:23:42.740 Very short point. If you could put up a second point, that would be helpful. Here's the thing to 00:23:42.740 --> 00:23:48.099 understand about it. And I say this because, of course, many of us serve in government. 00:23:48.099 --> 00:23:57.539 Jesus is the king of kings and lord of lords of every tribe and nation. Charles III is just a king. 00:24:01.179 --> 00:24:08.919 Charles III is just a king. Now, you know, it's interesting. This is sort of lost on people. I 00:24:08.919 --> 00:24:13.259 believe this is still the case, that when you pledge allegiance, if you want, you can pledge the 00:24:13.259 --> 00:24:17.919 allegiance on the Bible. Not required in Canada, but you can do it. And interestingly, 00:24:17.920 --> 00:24:21.680 enough, a lot of people think that you're doing this, and partially it is this, that if you're 00:24:21.680 --> 00:24:26.660 going to pledge allegiance, swear allegiance, you're doing it on the Bible so you'll be telling 00:24:26.660 --> 00:24:31.880 the truth. But it's also doing something very important, is it's actually relativizing 00:24:31.880 --> 00:24:40.880 the oath, because you're acknowledging a higher authority. It's because I follow the king of kings 00:24:40.880 --> 00:24:48.320 and lord of lords of every tribe and nations that I will seek to serve Charles III well. And as long as 00:24:48.320 --> 00:24:54.820 Charles III does not require of me things that only the king of kings can require of me, I will serve 00:24:54.820 --> 00:25:04.020 him well. But if the king of, if the state demands that I kill innocent people, I will defer. I will say no. 00:25:04.019 --> 00:25:12.680 That is against what the king of kings and lord of lords will say. If they command to oppress the poor, 00:25:12.960 --> 00:25:18.839 we have to say no. I could go on and on and on. So it's not that it's treasonous. That's what they 00:25:18.839 --> 00:25:26.519 could say. But the bottom line is, what happened, it caused such a kerfuffle that part of the thing was 00:25:26.519 --> 00:25:31.960 that if Jason wanted to get his money back, Paul and Silas, seen as troublemakers and traitorous, 00:25:31.960 --> 00:25:36.440 they had to flee, and that's what happens next. And it's going to lead us to this contrast to envy, 00:25:36.620 --> 00:25:41.940 which is actually quite a shocking contrast. Let's look what happens in verse 10. The brothers 00:25:41.940 --> 00:25:48.259 immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived, they went into the 00:25:48.259 --> 00:25:57.220 Jewish synagogue. Now, these Jewish people were more noble than those in Thessalonica. They received the 00:25:57.220 --> 00:26:03.579 word with all eagerness, examining the scriptures daily to see if these things were so. Now, just 00:26:03.579 --> 00:26:09.120 pause. Here's a problem sometimes with the English Standard Version, which is what I'm using, is 00:26:09.120 --> 00:26:19.019 sometimes it's too literal. So noble is the right word. But what does noble mean? And in this particular 00:26:19.019 --> 00:26:23.440 case, it's not saying, oh, we have to be like the upper class, you know, like we have to sort of speak 00:26:23.440 --> 00:26:28.539 like Charles or something like that. No, it's not saying that. What it's saying in this particular 00:26:28.539 --> 00:26:35.200 case is that the particular virtue that they're praising here is that they're open-minded. 00:26:37.100 --> 00:26:44.700 So to read the verse again, it would be to make it less literal, but to communicate the truth 00:26:44.700 --> 00:26:53.120 more accurately. Now, these Jews were more open-minded than those in Thessalonica. They received the word 00:26:53.119 --> 00:27:04.559 with all eagerness and examining the scriptures daily to see if these things were so. Many of them, 00:27:04.719 --> 00:27:11.279 therefore, verse 12, believed, with not a few, once again many, Greek women of high standing, as well as 00:27:11.279 --> 00:27:23.519 men. So here's the odd contrast between envy and open-mindedness. In fact, you don't have to put it 00:27:23.519 --> 00:27:30.680 up, but, you know, one of the really big points for this entire sermon is going to be that to know 00:27:30.680 --> 00:27:38.299 Christ Jesus and to grow in Christ Jesus, you need to put all your envy to death and choose to grow in 00:27:38.299 --> 00:27:43.619 open-mindedness. That's going to be the big point of the whole sermon, that to know Christ Jesus and to 00:27:43.619 --> 00:27:55.879 grow in Christ-likeness, you need, I need to put all my envy to death and choose to grow in open-mindedness. 00:27:58.079 --> 00:28:03.399 Now, these are two things that don't generally go together when people think, first of all, 00:28:03.400 --> 00:28:09.900 most people don't, they just don't go together, but it's profoundly wise and insightful. If you could 00:28:09.900 --> 00:28:18.980 put up the third point, Claire, that would be good. Envy is both a common, is, sorry, envy is a common, 00:28:19.680 --> 00:28:28.360 deadly vice that robs you of joy and makes you experience the truth as offensive and painful. 00:28:28.359 --> 00:28:51.879 Envy asks questions and open-minded people ask questions, but they're radically different. 00:28:51.880 --> 00:28:59.720 And anybody on the other side of those questions know that they're radically different. 00:29:01.440 --> 00:29:06.460 It's at least two of the Gospels, I forgot to write down the reference, in two of the Gospels, it says, 00:29:06.880 --> 00:29:14.380 it says, why is it that the Jewish leaders at the time wanted to crucify Jesus? It was out of envy. 00:29:14.380 --> 00:29:23.080 They went from envy to wanting to kill him. And so when you ask questions out of envy, 00:29:24.000 --> 00:29:30.020 when you're asking questions out of experiencing the truth as painful, the questions aren't really 00:29:30.020 --> 00:29:35.180 trying to figure out what's going on. They are a form of attack. And people might say, 00:29:35.280 --> 00:29:40.960 I'm just asking questions. You're not just asking questions. I'm not just asking questions. 00:29:40.960 --> 00:29:47.860 We all know when we're on the other side of it that there's something going on with certain types 00:29:47.860 --> 00:29:54.579 of questions that reveal a vice within us, a vice that can keep us from Christ or can keep us from 00:29:54.579 --> 00:30:03.319 becoming Christ-like. That's why it's considered a deadly thing. It's when you experience, you want to 00:30:03.319 --> 00:30:13.139 see them. And here's the other thing about envy. And you can actually see it. So let's say, you know, 00:30:13.159 --> 00:30:17.599 in that particular place, what probably happened is that the speakers, the people who are the rulers 00:30:17.599 --> 00:30:21.779 of the synagogue, they preached every week. How many people have seen Ferris Bueller's Day Off? 00:30:22.359 --> 00:30:26.980 A couple of you. So you know this school scene at the very, very beginning where they have a guy, 00:30:27.079 --> 00:30:31.919 it's Ben Stein, I think, with the most unbelievably boring voice talking about the most unbelievably boring 00:30:31.920 --> 00:30:36.140 topic. And everybody hates it. So that's probably how they were teaching. And all of a sudden, 00:30:36.180 --> 00:30:39.700 they see all these other people getting excited about Jesus and getting excited about reading 00:30:39.700 --> 00:30:44.980 the Bible. And rather than them saying, gosh, I wish I could teach the Bible like that, 00:30:45.039 --> 00:30:49.500 goes, oh yeah, I understand that. I agree with that. Whoa, that's fantastic. 00:30:51.560 --> 00:30:55.539 They don't want, it isn't that they try to learn how to teach like that or even teach the same things. 00:30:55.539 --> 00:31:01.819 They just want it shut down. You see, that's what envy does. It's sort of, so when you envy that 00:31:01.819 --> 00:31:07.740 person with that position that you wish you had, you're just happy if they lose it. You're just 00:31:07.740 --> 00:31:11.960 happy, you're happy if the whole church falls apart, the whole marriage falls apart. Like, 00:31:11.980 --> 00:31:15.480 you're actually sort of happy about that. It's not as if you want to get like that. You see, 00:31:15.899 --> 00:31:21.440 envy is the perversion, the opposite of two things which are really important for human beings to 00:31:21.440 --> 00:31:32.580 flourish, which is appreciation and aspiration. So I'm, by the way, just so you know, this has been 00:31:32.580 --> 00:31:40.039 a hard sermon for me this week because I have envy issues, which I wasn't recognizing, which I had to 00:31:40.039 --> 00:31:47.039 confess. And I'm not going to share with you what they are. That's between God and me. I am definitely 00:31:47.039 --> 00:31:52.099 not saying to you folks, you guys got envy problems. If I do, I have three fingers pointing back at me, 00:31:52.220 --> 00:32:00.659 okay? But why was I telling you that? Oh yeah, Louise and I were at this thing for church planters in 00:32:00.659 --> 00:32:05.099 Whistler, BC a couple of weeks ago. And one of the guys who spoke at it was a guy by the name of Larry 00:32:05.099 --> 00:32:11.680 Throness. And I mentioned it because go Google him, read his book, read his stuff, go to his webpage. 00:32:11.680 --> 00:32:17.000 He's solid gold. And I'm watching him speak and listening to him speak. And I'm thinking to myself, 00:32:17.360 --> 00:32:24.420 if I could only be one-tenth as good at that as him, I would be so happy. Just one-tenth. 00:32:25.519 --> 00:32:31.759 He's fantastic. You see, that's what you need for human flourishing. You know, if I could only preach 00:32:31.759 --> 00:32:39.380 one-tenth as well as Tim Keller, boy, Jesus can come and take me home right now. I'll be happy, 00:32:39.380 --> 00:32:47.100 right? And so that's aspiration, right? And the thing about aspiration and appreciation is that 00:32:47.100 --> 00:32:51.820 it's not a zero-sum game. Like, you know, other people can teach like that. Other people can tell 00:32:51.820 --> 00:32:55.820 the truth like that. Other people can learn to paint like that. Other people can have relationships 00:32:55.820 --> 00:33:01.080 like that. Other organizations can thrive. It's no threat to me. I don't have to see them wanting to 00:33:01.080 --> 00:33:06.980 all fall and all be failed. Wouldn't it be better if we just all got better? That's aspiration. 00:33:06.980 --> 00:33:14.640 That's appreciation. And envy is, I just want that person to fail. I just want it to stop. I don't 00:33:14.640 --> 00:33:24.680 even care if nobody gets to enjoy it, if it just comes to an end. You see, and that's why envy closes 00:33:24.680 --> 00:33:30.640 the mind. So here, if you could put up the next thing about what is the open-minded, and that's, 00:33:30.700 --> 00:33:35.180 if you put up the fourth point, that would be very helpful. The object of opening the mind, 00:33:35.180 --> 00:33:42.500 as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid. And I should say G.K. Chesterton, 00:33:42.620 --> 00:33:47.799 because I'm not smart enough to figure that stuff out for myself. The object of opening the mind, 00:33:47.900 --> 00:33:54.820 as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid. You see, you open your mouth 00:33:54.820 --> 00:34:00.740 to drink and to eat. My body needs fluid, and my body needs food. If I'm going to live, I'm going to thrive. 00:34:00.740 --> 00:34:08.380 And you know what? Our mind needs truth. Our mind needs beauty. Our mind needs excellence, 00:34:08.380 --> 00:34:16.780 if it wants to grow. That's what our minds need. Truth, beauty, excellence to grow. 00:34:18.960 --> 00:34:29.059 And so we have this really odd situation where the Bible is teaching us that we need to put envy to 00:34:29.059 --> 00:34:33.860 death and grow in open-mindedness. And I bet if there were a whole pile of people outside the 00:34:33.860 --> 00:34:37.619 Christian faith listening to this, they'd say, George, that's like the weirdest thing for a 00:34:37.619 --> 00:34:42.320 conservative Christian like you to say. When we think of Christians who are Bible-believing and 00:34:42.320 --> 00:34:48.019 conservative, we don't usually think of them as being open-minded. Now, let's be honest. Some of that is 00:34:48.019 --> 00:34:55.739 prejudice, but a lot of it's accurate. A lot of the times what characterizes Christian groups 00:34:55.739 --> 00:35:02.959 is not open-mindedness. It's fear of truth, fear of beauty, fear of excellence. 00:35:04.299 --> 00:35:08.139 And we fear these things because on one level we secretly envy them. 00:35:08.699 --> 00:35:16.239 And we'd rather just see the whole topic go away and that other, that whole irksome source just fail. 00:35:16.619 --> 00:35:23.759 Just fail. But no, the big point of this text is going to be that to know Christ Jesus and to grow 00:35:23.760 --> 00:35:31.480 in Christ's likeness, you need to put all your envy to death and choose to grow in open-mindedness. 00:35:32.020 --> 00:35:39.560 Choose to grow in that. To put one to death and try to embrace open-mindedness with the other hand. 00:35:39.640 --> 00:35:44.640 That's what this text is teaching us. And then you see the question, open-minded questions are very 00:35:44.640 --> 00:35:49.420 different. You know, questions that are coming from, you know, like if I just wanted this Larry 00:35:49.420 --> 00:35:52.760 thrown us to fail, I could say, oh yeah, but you know, what about this? And what about this? And 00:35:52.760 --> 00:35:56.119 what about this? And you can even see from my face because that's what's going on. And even if we have 00:35:56.119 --> 00:36:00.800 really good people skills and we can cover our face underneath the mask, it's what about this? And 00:36:00.800 --> 00:36:06.079 what about this? And what about this? Rather than, my gosh, like how would you handle this? Or how would 00:36:06.079 --> 00:36:11.539 you handle this? Or wow, can you give me some help on this? I'd like to grow in this. Completely 00:36:11.539 --> 00:36:17.659 different questions. And the big message of the text is to know Christ Jesus and to grow in Christ 00:36:17.659 --> 00:36:26.539 likeness. You need, I need to put all your envy to death and choose to grow in open-mindedness. 00:36:30.139 --> 00:36:35.559 Now, it's not just a moral rule. Just in closing, there's something about all of this. 00:36:35.559 --> 00:36:42.579 It's not just some moral rules. So I'm not, listen, here's the thing which is so wonderful 00:36:42.579 --> 00:36:48.179 about the Christian faith is that it's not just that the Bible tells me I got to do something, 00:36:48.799 --> 00:36:54.599 but the Holy Spirit comes to help me do that. And I have a person, Jesus, who will walk with me that 00:36:54.599 --> 00:36:58.480 will help me to do that. But not only that, it's like every Sunday when we gather and celebrate the 00:36:58.480 --> 00:37:05.539 Lord's Supper, we're learning about a different truth, a different story to form our lives and to 00:37:05.539 --> 00:37:10.639 stand on and to start to see the world by and to start to be able to look within and see ourselves. 00:37:11.000 --> 00:37:16.239 So just think in two ways about this story. Just think about the fact that they say three things. 00:37:16.380 --> 00:37:20.139 The first thing is that they say these Christians, they're coming and they're turning the whole world 00:37:20.139 --> 00:37:27.059 upside down. And we Christians should embrace that. We should say, come to us, we're hoping to turn the 00:37:27.059 --> 00:37:34.119 whole world upside down. Why? Well, because the world right now is upside down and the only way to put it 00:37:34.119 --> 00:37:39.359 right is turn an upside down world upside down, which is another way of saying make it right. 00:37:39.480 --> 00:37:46.119 That should be what we, we should embrace that. Yes, that's us. Help me to be one who turns the world 00:37:46.119 --> 00:37:51.960 upside down. How's it upside down? I've said this lots of times. It's an important thing to say over and over 00:37:51.960 --> 00:37:57.960 and over and over again. The wisdom of the world is that kings send out young men to die for their glory. 00:37:57.960 --> 00:38:03.079 We remembered that last week. Now it was a just war. I'm not, I'm not saying anything about that. It was a 00:38:03.079 --> 00:38:08.440 just war, but it's a very common thing. Just an unjust wars that kings send young men out to die for 00:38:08.440 --> 00:38:21.079 their glory. Jesus is the king who died for ordinary people, for his glory, a radically different glory. 00:38:21.079 --> 00:38:28.679 The book of John says the glory of God is most fully revealed when Jesus is hanging on the cross. 00:38:33.079 --> 00:38:37.000 Muhammad started 83 wars. 00:38:40.360 --> 00:38:41.880 Jesus died on a cross. 00:38:43.639 --> 00:38:47.000 That's a very different story. It's an upside down story. 00:38:47.000 --> 00:38:54.920 And even if you think about it, it's an upside down story to understand how in envy you, you see 00:38:54.920 --> 00:38:59.159 somebody with a particular good and you just want them to come down. But what's the story of the 00:38:59.159 --> 00:39:04.039 gospel that we're going to celebrate in a few moments at the Lord's Supper? We're going to celebrate 00:39:04.039 --> 00:39:09.559 that God, the son of God set aside his glory and splendor and divine prerogatives and seen 00:39:09.559 --> 00:39:20.199 our sorrow. Humbled himself, taking into himself human nature and dying on a cross so that our 00:39:20.199 --> 00:39:28.039 sorrow would be turned to joy. Our lovelessness would be turned to being, to knowing the love of God. 00:39:28.039 --> 00:39:33.000 It's a complete opposite of envy. If you could put up the fifth point clear, that would be very helpful. 00:39:33.000 --> 00:39:40.840 Filled with envy, you want to knock others down, down, down, down. Jesus Christ humbled himself, 00:39:41.639 --> 00:39:49.400 came down and humbled himself to death upon a cross. Love to the loveless shown that you might 00:39:49.400 --> 00:39:57.639 loved and lovely be. It's an upside down world. In a world with envy, it's upside down. And that's the 00:39:57.639 --> 00:40:04.199 gospel. We're formed by a different story. And we walk with one who lived that story and wants us to 00:40:04.199 --> 00:40:10.119 live that story. And the Holy Spirit wrote that story down and wants us to know it and will help 00:40:10.119 --> 00:40:14.119 us to try to live it. Because you and I need help. If you could put up the final point, that's the big 00:40:14.119 --> 00:40:20.359 point of the sermon. To know Christ Jesus and to grow in Christlikeness, you need to put all your envy 00:40:20.360 --> 00:40:27.880 to death and choose to grow in open-mindedness. Is there an amen? Well, there's a couple of amens. 00:40:27.880 --> 00:40:31.720 There you go. I know I caught you by surprise. All of a sudden, I'm talking like I'm a Southern Baptist, 00:40:31.720 --> 00:40:36.599 not an Anglican. Caught you all by surprise. Let's stand. We're going to pray and close. 00:40:36.599 --> 00:40:55.799 Father, you know how many of us struggle with envy. And you know how it bends us out of shape. And you 00:40:55.799 --> 00:41:03.960 know how we are blind to it. How maybe we can see it in others. We can't see it in ourselves very 00:41:03.960 --> 00:41:10.760 easily. And Father, but you see it. And Jesus died knowing that we struggle with it. Actually, 00:41:10.760 --> 00:41:17.480 Father, Jesus died knowing that we don't struggle with it. We live out of it. So Father, we ask that 00:41:17.480 --> 00:41:23.320 you help us to go from living out of it, blind and driven by it, making us have closed minds about 00:41:23.320 --> 00:41:28.360 things, and that your Holy Spirit, your words, start to convict us of the envy in our lives. 00:41:28.840 --> 00:41:33.940 That we might put it to death. And we ask, Father, that you grow within us a desire to be open-minded, 00:41:33.960 --> 00:41:40.760 to have a mind like a mouth that opens so that it might receive the nourishment of truth from your 00:41:40.760 --> 00:41:46.119 word and truth in the world and beauty and excellence. And that we might open our mouth to 00:41:46.119 --> 00:41:53.159 chew on that and be filled and formed by that and to be filled and formed by the bread and the wine, 00:41:53.159 --> 00:42:00.840 your blood given in your body broken all because you did not envy but humbled yourself so that in 00:42:00.840 --> 00:42:06.280 Christ, loved and lovely we would be. So Father, we ask that you would so fill us with that story that 00:42:06.280 --> 00:42:13.640 we have the confidence to die to all envy and to grow in open-mindedness and the freedom that comes 00:42:13.640 --> 00:42:20.840 from knowing Jesus and having an open mind, open to the beauty and wonder and truth and glory and 00:42:20.840 --> 00:42:27.079 excellence that is around us. And we ask all these things in the name of Jesus and all God's people said, 00:42:27.079 --> 00:42:28.039 Amen. 00:42:28.039 --> 00:42:28.279 Amen.