WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.000 Okay, well you turn back with me this morning to that passage we read in Acts, if you have a Bible, 00:00:06.000 --> 00:00:12.000 it's on page 926 of the Pew Bible certainly, and the story that we have of Paul and Athens. 00:00:12.000 --> 00:00:20.000 Now, one of the great things that we have as Christians is that we possess something really great. 00:00:20.000 --> 00:00:29.000 We've got something really tremendous as Christians, and we have experienced the power of God changing our lives 00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:36.000 and we believe that that power is available to change the lives of other people too. 00:00:36.000 --> 00:00:41.000 And we recognize that, and the Bible speaks about that as really good news, that is good news. 00:00:41.000 --> 00:00:49.000 The trouble is, the difficulty is that this is great news, and it's paradoxical. 00:00:49.000 --> 00:00:54.000 It's great news that people don't want to hear. People don't want to hear it. 00:00:54.000 --> 00:01:00.000 It's not like a baptism. It's not like a birth. It's not like an engagement. It's not like a new job. 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:03.000 It's not like winning the lottery or whatever it might be. 00:01:03.000 --> 00:01:12.000 This is good news that generally people don't want to hear. It's unlike any other good news because it exposes in us very often 00:01:12.000 --> 00:01:18.000 a deep antipathy towards the things of God. We would rather close the door on that particular discussion. 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:24.000 Never talk about religion, never talk about politics, and what's the other thing? 00:01:24.000 --> 00:01:27.000 Religion and politics are pretty major anyway, and never talk about them. 00:01:27.000 --> 00:01:34.000 And even that antipathy, that immediate reaction to talking about this good news that we find as Christians, 00:01:34.000 --> 00:01:42.000 when we want to share our faith with others, speaks of already, speaks of the difficulty and the problem that there is in society 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:46.000 and that there is in our spiritual relationship with God. 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:55.000 So as Christians, it's very important when we live out our lives as Christians and when we seek to share our faith with Christians, 00:01:55.000 --> 00:02:00.000 the first thing that we recognize is the need for prayer, okay? 00:02:00.000 --> 00:02:04.000 We need to be praying for our friends. We need to be praying about the gospel. 00:02:04.000 --> 00:02:10.000 We need to be praying about our lives because primarily what we've come to understand in our own experience 00:02:10.000 --> 00:02:18.000 is that the rejection people have of God is not primarily an intellectual one, a mental one. 00:02:18.000 --> 00:02:22.000 It's not a head issue, in other words, it's a heart issue. 00:02:22.000 --> 00:02:29.000 So the primary problem is in the heart, and we can't necessarily deal with that in the lives of anyone else. 00:02:29.000 --> 00:02:34.000 We can't even deal with it in our own lives. We need God to come in and change our heart and change our attitude. 00:02:34.000 --> 00:02:38.000 So prayer is very important, and that's why we have seven days of prayer. 00:02:38.000 --> 00:02:42.000 It's why we pray for our friends. It's why we recognize that that is the forerunner 00:02:42.000 --> 00:02:46.000 and the ongoing background to living our lives as Christians. 00:02:46.000 --> 00:02:51.000 We also need wisdom, okay? We need great wisdom. 00:02:51.000 --> 00:02:55.000 We've been doing a study in Proverbs in our evening worship, and it says, 00:02:55.000 --> 00:02:58.000 the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. 00:02:58.000 --> 00:03:03.000 In that place where we worship the Lord through Christ, where we recognize His rightful place, 00:03:03.000 --> 00:03:10.000 and we seek that wisdom to give Him the preeminence in our lives and share that with others, 00:03:10.000 --> 00:03:19.000 and also as disciples that we are willing to learn how better to love Him and love other people 00:03:19.000 --> 00:03:27.000 and share the gospel with other people in a loving and sensitive and respectful way, 00:03:27.000 --> 00:03:29.000 which the Bible tells us to do. 00:03:29.000 --> 00:03:33.000 So we've come to this study in Acts for those of you who are visiting today, 00:03:33.000 --> 00:03:39.000 and it's the study of the early church, and it's got a lot to do with sharing faith 00:03:39.000 --> 00:03:44.000 and planting churches and all these kind of things, and the opposition and the difficulties as well, 00:03:44.000 --> 00:03:47.000 that sometimes arose in the early church. 00:03:47.000 --> 00:03:50.000 We believe it to be God's word that has authority for us, 00:03:50.000 --> 00:03:55.000 and it is continuing to be relevant because of that. 00:03:55.000 --> 00:04:01.000 So this story is about the gospel coming to Athens, okay? 00:04:01.000 --> 00:04:05.000 So Paul comes with the gospel to this great Greek city of Athens, 00:04:05.000 --> 00:04:10.000 and it's a city that had a tremendous history and a tremendous background 00:04:10.000 --> 00:04:16.000 and tremendous culture, it was an intellectual and a cultural kind of hub, 00:04:16.000 --> 00:04:21.000 particularly in the past, possibly by this time it was fading a little bit. 00:04:21.000 --> 00:04:26.000 It was only the memory of Plato and Aristotle and Socrates, 00:04:26.000 --> 00:04:29.000 and that's not the one that played for Brazil. 00:04:29.000 --> 00:04:34.000 We recognise, and not only people of a certain generation will get that joke, 00:04:34.000 --> 00:04:41.000 but it is this ancient Greek city was a free city in the Roman Empire 00:04:41.000 --> 00:04:45.000 and remained really a cultural and intellectual metropolis. 00:04:45.000 --> 00:04:52.000 And we have in this account from Luke two particular philosophies of life 00:04:52.000 --> 00:04:54.000 that governed that city. 00:04:54.000 --> 00:04:57.000 There was Epicurean and there was Stoicism, 00:04:57.000 --> 00:05:07.000 both very difficult philosophical underpinnings that lay behind the thinking of the city. 00:05:07.000 --> 00:05:13.000 The Epicureans believed that God, there was lots of gods that were all very remote, 00:05:13.000 --> 00:05:16.000 and that people were just physical. 00:05:16.000 --> 00:05:20.000 They were materialists or atomists, as you maybe say, 00:05:20.000 --> 00:05:23.000 we just were made up of all the atoms that we are physically. 00:05:23.000 --> 00:05:27.000 There's no afterlife and there's no judgement, that was really what they believed. 00:05:27.000 --> 00:05:32.000 And their idea was Carpe diem, seize the day, live for pleasure, 00:05:32.000 --> 00:05:35.000 make the most of every day and just have as much fun as you could. 00:05:35.000 --> 00:05:39.000 So the Epicureans were really kind of into culture and arts 00:05:39.000 --> 00:05:42.000 and just living for pleasure every day. 00:05:42.000 --> 00:05:46.000 But the Stoics, this other philosophical grouping within the city 00:05:46.000 --> 00:05:50.000 that's spoken about in the passage we read in verse 18, 00:05:50.000 --> 00:05:53.000 they also recognized that God was everywhere, 00:05:53.000 --> 00:05:58.000 but probably in everything, he wasn't a personal being, 00:05:58.000 --> 00:06:01.000 he was very impersonal and they were very rationalistic 00:06:01.000 --> 00:06:05.000 and they believed in fate and going with the flow, 00:06:05.000 --> 00:06:10.000 they were self-sufficient and they thought it was important to endure pain as part of life. 00:06:10.000 --> 00:06:13.000 So we talk about Stoics, being a Stoic, 00:06:13.000 --> 00:06:18.000 just keeping going in good times and in bad times. 00:06:18.000 --> 00:06:21.000 It's a pretty rubbish philosophy, I would have thought. 00:06:21.000 --> 00:06:26.000 Naturally, I'm much more attracted to the Epicurean philosophy if there's no God. 00:06:26.000 --> 00:06:30.000 But the Stoics just seemed to think it was good for them character-wise 00:06:30.000 --> 00:06:34.000 to endure pain and also recognize it as part of life. 00:06:34.000 --> 00:06:39.000 So that was the kind of thinking behind the people of the city of Athens 00:06:39.000 --> 00:06:42.000 and the people to whom Paul came with the Gospel. 00:06:42.000 --> 00:06:46.000 And interestingly, we are in Edinburgh, we're the Athens of the north. 00:06:46.000 --> 00:06:48.000 That's what we're called. 00:06:48.000 --> 00:06:50.000 And we're called that for the reason we're called that 00:06:50.000 --> 00:06:58.000 because similarly we're a culture and intellectual kind of focused city for Scotland. 00:06:58.000 --> 00:07:04.000 And the postmodern secular mind has many parallels 00:07:04.000 --> 00:07:10.000 to the kind of thinking and mindsets of both the Epicureans and the Stoics. 00:07:10.000 --> 00:07:13.000 So you might find, and I might find today in Edinburgh, for example, 00:07:13.000 --> 00:07:16.000 it's very difficult to share our faith 00:07:16.000 --> 00:07:19.000 because people's philosophy is either heathenistic, 00:07:19.000 --> 00:07:22.000 let's just live for pleasure, let's just live for today. 00:07:22.000 --> 00:07:26.000 Carpe diem just make the most of the day because that's all it is. 00:07:26.000 --> 00:07:28.000 There's no judgment, there's no afterlife. 00:07:28.000 --> 00:07:33.000 We just are what we are, we're just made up, we come and we go and there's no reason. 00:07:33.000 --> 00:07:34.000 There's nothing. 00:07:34.000 --> 00:07:39.000 Or they think we're fatalists. 00:07:39.000 --> 00:07:42.000 You know, what we'll be, we'll be and there's no personal life, 00:07:42.000 --> 00:07:47.000 there's no personal God, there's no afterlife. 00:07:47.000 --> 00:07:51.000 And we do sometimes recognize that it reveals itself in different ways, 00:07:51.000 --> 00:07:55.000 but there's nothing really new under the sun, the Bible says that, 00:07:55.000 --> 00:08:01.000 and that we kind of go circular, cyclical ways of thinking. 00:08:01.000 --> 00:08:06.000 And many of these ways just push God out of the picture altogether. 00:08:06.000 --> 00:08:10.000 So we believe the Bible speaks to us, and the Bible speaks into our situation, 00:08:10.000 --> 00:08:14.000 and we see how Paul brought the gospel to these people, and it's great. 00:08:14.000 --> 00:08:16.000 And I hope we can learn something from it. 00:08:16.000 --> 00:08:22.000 Because in this passage that we read, I've called it God's Evangelistic Smorgasbord, okay? 00:08:22.000 --> 00:08:29.000 Because what we have in this small section is Paul working with all kinds of different groups. 00:08:29.000 --> 00:08:34.000 It's very varied and it's very detailed. 00:08:34.000 --> 00:08:38.000 In this one encounter, he meets all kinds of different people, 00:08:38.000 --> 00:08:44.000 and he models a huge variety of interaction with different groups of people 00:08:44.000 --> 00:08:48.000 and different philosophies and different thinking. 00:08:48.000 --> 00:08:52.000 So the reminder is that when we share our faith, when we live our lives, 00:08:52.000 --> 00:08:54.000 we don't have a formula. 00:08:54.000 --> 00:08:56.000 We don't go out and say, this is the way we share the gospel. 00:08:56.000 --> 00:09:01.000 ABC, bang, bang, bang, people will come to faith, or they'll not if we do this, this and this. 00:09:01.000 --> 00:09:08.000 Because Paul reveals here a variety of ways of sharing faith in such a way 00:09:08.000 --> 00:09:15.000 that will interest and trigger the thought process of the different kinds of people 00:09:15.000 --> 00:09:18.000 that he witnessed to us. 00:09:18.000 --> 00:09:25.000 So I'm going to ask three questions briefly and then finish with a little bit more. 00:09:25.000 --> 00:09:27.000 I'll try and be short in brief, okay? 00:09:27.000 --> 00:09:30.000 The three questions are simple. Where, why and how? 00:09:30.000 --> 00:09:33.000 In this passage, does Paul share his faith? 00:09:33.000 --> 00:09:35.000 Well, where does he share his faith? 00:09:35.000 --> 00:09:41.000 Well, in a sense, it's almost a model of, I think, I believe, of sharing faith. 00:09:41.000 --> 00:09:43.000 And the Johnny Cash song comes to mind. 00:09:43.000 --> 00:09:47.000 I've been everywhere, man, and where that song just speaks about, 00:09:47.000 --> 00:09:49.000 everywhere that Johnny Cash had been in America, 00:09:49.000 --> 00:09:54.000 and he lists all the different places, the towns, the cities, and the states that he'd been to. 00:09:54.000 --> 00:09:58.000 And it's a bit like that here, because what we're seeing here is that 00:09:58.000 --> 00:10:04.000 God is telling us that we can go everywhere and to any people to share the faith 00:10:04.000 --> 00:10:06.000 that we have, to share our faith. 00:10:06.000 --> 00:10:08.000 There's nowhere that's out of bounds. 00:10:08.000 --> 00:10:15.000 So you've got, in really three different groups that summarise, I guess, the whole of life. 00:10:15.000 --> 00:10:19.000 He starts by going to the synagogue, which was often his way. 00:10:19.000 --> 00:10:24.000 So Paul goes to the synagogue, and that is, I think, the modern-day equivalent of the church. 00:10:24.000 --> 00:10:31.000 So he goes to the church to tell the church of his day about Jesus Christ and about the resurrection. 00:10:31.000 --> 00:10:33.000 And we need to still do that, don't we? 00:10:33.000 --> 00:10:39.000 We still need to speak about the gospel and the resurrection, the death and resurrection of Jesus in the church, 00:10:39.000 --> 00:10:43.000 because people come to church and they might not be Christians. 00:10:43.000 --> 00:10:48.000 And they might believe intellectually, maybe, but their hearts might not be changed. 00:10:48.000 --> 00:10:54.000 So we have this ongoing duty to share the gospel, as we do, and challenge one another 00:10:54.000 --> 00:10:58.000 with the message of the gospel in the church context. 00:10:58.000 --> 00:11:02.000 But then we also see that he goes out in verse 17 to the marketplace. 00:11:02.000 --> 00:11:10.000 And the marketplace was the place where people socialised, where people spoke to one another and discussed things. 00:11:10.000 --> 00:11:14.000 We probably do it much more than we do, in a sense, in the 21st century. 00:11:14.000 --> 00:11:18.000 But we can go to the marketplace with the gospel. 00:11:18.000 --> 00:11:25.000 That means wherever people socialise, in cafes and in pubs and in social events and in our homes, 00:11:25.000 --> 00:11:35.000 we can go and we can share and we can befriend and we can talk to people outside of the church about our faith in Christ. 00:11:35.000 --> 00:11:43.000 And we have legitimacy from the Bible and from God's example in Jesus for doing that. 00:11:43.000 --> 00:11:49.000 But he also speaks at a place called the Areopagus, which translates, Mars Hill, 00:11:49.000 --> 00:11:53.000 a famous place in the middle of the city of Athens. 00:11:53.000 --> 00:11:58.000 Previously it was probably a law court where judgments were meted out. 00:11:58.000 --> 00:12:03.000 But I think by this time it was probably more a council of philosophers. 00:12:03.000 --> 00:12:08.000 A place where philosophers gathered and discussed the latest ideas. 00:12:08.000 --> 00:12:20.000 The idea we get from the passage we read and maybe even sometimes judged whether that particular philosophy was allowed to be shared with the public in the city of Athens. 00:12:20.000 --> 00:12:25.000 And so they make an informal inquiry about Paul and this message. 00:12:25.000 --> 00:12:27.000 They want to hear him again. 00:12:27.000 --> 00:12:33.000 And so he comes to this semi-formal organ, this grouping to share his message. 00:12:33.000 --> 00:12:39.000 One comment that I was reading called a slightly contemptuous indulgence of Paul's ideas. 00:12:39.000 --> 00:12:42.000 You know, he's a babbler, he's crazy man. 00:12:42.000 --> 00:12:46.000 But they wanted to hear a little bit more of what he had to say about Jesus and the resurrection. 00:12:46.000 --> 00:12:54.000 Now I don't think we've got a direct parallel to that Canary, the Areopagus as such in our city or in our culture. 00:12:54.000 --> 00:13:00.000 I think the nearest thing would be universities, the media and the political arena. 00:13:00.000 --> 00:13:10.000 These kind of idea-formulating groups of people who are thinking and philosophies are shaped for the whole of society, 00:13:10.000 --> 00:13:18.000 whether it's universities or politically or increasingly, sadly, in the media. 00:13:18.000 --> 00:13:21.000 But we can go there with the gospel. 00:13:21.000 --> 00:13:23.000 We can go there to befriend people. 00:13:23.000 --> 00:13:36.000 We can go there and stand up without shame and without intellectual inferiority at any point and share the gospel in a reasoned way. 00:13:36.000 --> 00:13:38.000 So where? Anywhere. Why? 00:13:38.000 --> 00:13:49.000 Because Paul was told his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full of idols. 00:13:49.000 --> 00:13:51.000 In other words, he had this great motivation. 00:13:51.000 --> 00:13:58.000 When he came out of Athens, he looked round and just in his heart, the kind of words, a really strong word, 00:13:58.000 --> 00:14:10.000 he was greatly, deeply distressed and frustrated and angry and just saddened that around him was a forest of idols. 00:14:10.000 --> 00:14:15.000 And his spiritual insight was such that he could see that idolatry was a waste of time 00:14:15.000 --> 00:14:21.000 and the living God was being ignored and they were missing the point, they were confused and hopeless, 00:14:21.000 --> 00:14:23.000 and they had inverted everything. 00:14:23.000 --> 00:14:29.000 The First Commandment is worship the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind. 00:14:29.000 --> 00:14:31.000 And they weren't doing that. 00:14:31.000 --> 00:14:34.000 They were choosing to worship idols instead. 00:14:34.000 --> 00:14:39.000 And that was the core that he could see of their rebellion and sin against God. 00:14:39.000 --> 00:14:45.000 He was jealous for God's rightful place in society and in life. 00:14:45.000 --> 00:14:54.000 Remember who Paul was and remember that he once was like them and that he had met with Jesus and been changed. 00:14:54.000 --> 00:14:59.000 His own heart was transformed. It was real. It was absolutely real to him. 00:14:59.000 --> 00:15:02.000 And so he was deeply distressed. 00:15:02.000 --> 00:15:09.000 That motive, it's a great motive that we could possibly look at in our own hearts and lives about having, 00:15:09.000 --> 00:15:18.000 do we sense that same frustration and sadness and recognition that it's only the living God 00:15:18.000 --> 00:15:25.000 that's transformed our lives and hearts and yet people are sticking their two fingers up at him and ignoring him 00:15:25.000 --> 00:15:31.000 and putting other things in a place of preeminence that shouldn't be the case. 00:15:31.000 --> 00:15:36.000 And then how? How did he share his faith? 00:15:36.000 --> 00:15:42.000 And we can only really skim this very briefly because we recognize that in this short passage, 00:15:42.000 --> 00:15:50.000 and I'm sure it's there under the guidance of the Spirit of God to cover a huge reality, 00:15:50.000 --> 00:15:57.000 that he was, in this short time, he was willing to reason, verse 17, he was willing to debate, verse 18, 00:15:57.000 --> 00:16:02.000 and he was willing to proclaim verse 22. So there's different ways that he spoke, 00:16:02.000 --> 00:16:07.000 different ways that he was willing to go and tell people, he was willing to listen, 00:16:07.000 --> 00:16:16.000 he was willing to reason, he was willing to be an apologist to defend the truth intellectually 00:16:16.000 --> 00:16:21.000 from the heart in his life, from his experience. It was all of these things. 00:16:21.000 --> 00:16:32.000 And it speaks of a simple but a profound and well thought out and engaging, respectful, confident sharing of his faith 00:16:32.000 --> 00:16:41.000 with religious theologians, with what I would call the punters, and also with the intelligentsia. 00:16:41.000 --> 00:16:46.000 So you've got the different levels that Paul is confidently bringing the gospel into, 00:16:46.000 --> 00:16:54.000 and it's great, isn't it? Isn't that great for us? They're the gospels for every type and grouping of people 00:16:54.000 --> 00:17:00.000 that he came to see in Athens, and he does so very powerfully. 00:17:00.000 --> 00:17:05.000 I just want to mention just a little bit about where he gets back to the Areopagus, 00:17:05.000 --> 00:17:11.000 and what he says to them, which what we have is just a two minute thing, obviously a summary, 00:17:11.000 --> 00:17:17.000 and some people get in their high horse and say, well, he's not presenting the whole gospel, and it's not all this and that. 00:17:17.000 --> 00:17:22.000 Of course it's not, it's a summary that we've got here, and people need to get a grip sometimes. 00:17:22.000 --> 00:17:29.000 So what we have is, what we recognize is that he finds commonality, doesn't he? 00:17:29.000 --> 00:17:35.000 In verses 22 and 23 he says, you know, I perceive that in every way you're very religious. 00:17:35.000 --> 00:17:41.000 So he tries to come alongside them and find commonality in their experience and what they're doing, 00:17:41.000 --> 00:17:45.000 and he says, you're worshiping people, that's what you are, you worship. 00:17:45.000 --> 00:17:49.000 And he says, I've walked around here, I've been a tourist in your city, 00:17:49.000 --> 00:17:52.000 and I've seen you've got a plaque for the unknown God. 00:17:52.000 --> 00:17:59.000 And well, I'm going to tell you about that God that you don't know, that you worship in the ignorance, 00:17:59.000 --> 00:18:07.000 and I'm going to challenge you to reconfigure your priorities and who you're worshiping and why you're worshiping. 00:18:07.000 --> 00:18:13.000 He finds commonality, and it's around that whole theme of them being idolatrous. 00:18:13.000 --> 00:18:20.000 And he wants to take what people, every one of us do by nature is to idolize. 00:18:20.000 --> 00:18:26.000 We might not idolize idols of stone and wood, 00:18:26.000 --> 00:18:31.000 but idolatrous, as you know, we've often said that here, just putting someone in the place of God, 00:18:31.000 --> 00:18:35.000 usually ourselves, putting ourselves first, and ignoring God. 00:18:35.000 --> 00:18:40.000 And he wants to take that whole concept of idolatry and the things that they are worshiping, 00:18:40.000 --> 00:18:45.000 the things that they are putting first, and he says, I want to replace it with who you ought to be worshiping, 00:18:45.000 --> 00:18:49.000 because we all worship, we all worship. 00:18:49.000 --> 00:18:54.000 But he says, we worship things that are created rather than the Creator, 00:18:54.000 --> 00:19:01.000 and he wants to highlight that to them, and he wants to bring the light of God into their situation, 00:19:01.000 --> 00:19:06.000 and say, I want you to worship God and who He is, 00:19:06.000 --> 00:19:12.000 instead of worshiping and chasing everything in your life that is only a shadow 00:19:12.000 --> 00:19:18.000 and a pale, empty reflection of who God is. 00:19:18.000 --> 00:19:24.000 So we all put something there, we all have a preeminence and a priority, 00:19:24.000 --> 00:19:27.000 and that's the problem of the brokenness of sin in the world, 00:19:27.000 --> 00:19:32.000 is that we've dismissed God and His rightful lordship in our lives, 00:19:32.000 --> 00:19:38.000 and we've chosen to be kind of gods, I guess, ourselves, in control and in charge. 00:19:38.000 --> 00:19:44.000 So it's vital for us in our lives to find commonality with people, to find association with people, 00:19:44.000 --> 00:19:48.000 and a handle into their lives and into their thinking, 00:19:48.000 --> 00:19:55.000 whether it's football or whether it's wider sport or whether it's culinary gifts, 00:19:55.000 --> 00:20:00.000 or whether it's whatever their talents or gifts or time or energies or relationships, 00:20:00.000 --> 00:20:06.000 looking at them and seeing them as people and seeing what they are placing before God 00:20:06.000 --> 00:20:10.000 and seeking to have a handle that will make them think, 00:20:10.000 --> 00:20:16.000 rather than splurging out something that seems to be formulaic and seems to be from a distance 00:20:16.000 --> 00:20:21.000 and doesn't seem to be filled with passion and love and concern for them. 00:20:21.000 --> 00:20:25.000 Find commonality, offer identity. 00:20:25.000 --> 00:20:28.000 He also then offers them an identity, doesn't he? 00:20:28.000 --> 00:20:33.000 He says that we are all image bearers of God. 00:20:33.000 --> 00:20:37.000 He speaks about who God is. God is our Creator. 00:20:37.000 --> 00:20:42.000 Verses 24 to 29, and he speaks briefly here about the character of God. 00:20:42.000 --> 00:20:48.000 God is not in the pillars, he's not in the mountains and the trees, there's some kind of pantheistic God. 00:20:48.000 --> 00:20:54.000 Not as a kind of one of many gods that we've created. 00:20:54.000 --> 00:21:03.000 He is the supreme sovereign, self-sufficient Lord of all humanity, personal and sovereign. 00:21:03.000 --> 00:21:08.000 They give us the gift of life, they give us reason, they give us purpose. 00:21:08.000 --> 00:21:15.000 Who is over this world in which we live. It's a huge, it's a huge reality for us to consider. 00:21:15.000 --> 00:21:20.000 But he goes more from God the Father and moves into God, sorry, God is Creator, 00:21:20.000 --> 00:21:26.000 and gives the identity of God as Father, very interesting and one that maybe we don't think of enough. 00:21:26.000 --> 00:21:31.000 And he speaks about their own poets and saying, for indeed we are his offspring. 00:21:31.000 --> 00:21:34.000 And then he goes on to say, being then God's offspring, 00:21:34.000 --> 00:21:37.000 we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver. 00:21:37.000 --> 00:21:41.000 So he, what does he do here? 00:21:41.000 --> 00:21:47.000 He uses the we language, he associates with them. We are, we are God's people. 00:21:47.000 --> 00:21:54.000 This is about us. We, basically what he's saying is we belong to God, because he's our Father, 00:21:54.000 --> 00:21:58.000 but we are estranged by nature. So that paradox isn't it? 00:21:58.000 --> 00:22:02.000 We belong because we are made in this image, but it's broken. 00:22:02.000 --> 00:22:07.000 We're estranged, and all of us are in that condition naturally. 00:22:07.000 --> 00:22:15.000 So we associate with everyone because of that, but he made us to be close to him. 00:22:15.000 --> 00:22:20.000 And that's the good news. The good news is not only that we're made to be close, 00:22:20.000 --> 00:22:26.000 but the brokenness that has brought the separation, the sin and the death has been dealt with by Jesus 00:22:26.000 --> 00:22:31.000 on the cross for us. And so for people who believe in fate 00:22:31.000 --> 00:22:36.000 and who believe that we are just random atoms, is that not good news? 00:22:36.000 --> 00:22:42.000 Is it not good news that we have, that this world is made by a personal loving and just mind, 00:22:42.000 --> 00:22:48.000 that we're not just bouncing around as random, pointless atoms in this world, 00:22:48.000 --> 00:22:55.000 simply pleasing ourselves until our time has gone, with little wider respect and dignity, 00:22:55.000 --> 00:23:05.000 but just random pieces of chemical reality? 00:23:05.000 --> 00:23:10.000 Our identity is God as Father, but that relationship is broken. 00:23:10.000 --> 00:23:13.000 That's why we struggle with the good news. 00:23:13.000 --> 00:23:16.000 So he introduces the divine image in verse 31. 00:23:16.000 --> 00:23:21.000 He speaks about Jesus Christ, who came and who rose from the dead, 00:23:21.000 --> 00:23:26.000 and he spoke about Jesus to them. Christ, not a complete sermon, 00:23:26.000 --> 00:23:34.000 but he speaks here not of an idol, but he speaks about God in the flesh. 00:23:34.000 --> 00:23:38.000 People say, I would love to see God. Wouldn't we all love to see God? 00:23:38.000 --> 00:23:42.000 Well, we find that Christ is God in flesh, 00:23:42.000 --> 00:23:48.000 and Christ is the answer to the family estrangement that we find ourselves 00:23:48.000 --> 00:23:55.000 in this world in which we live, the death, the brokenness, the evil, 00:23:55.000 --> 00:24:01.000 which we all recognize and see not only outside, but we see it in our own failings and fallings 00:24:01.000 --> 00:24:05.000 and mortality and our questions and our longing for God. 00:24:05.000 --> 00:24:10.000 We see it in Him. And so God the Father sends the Son. 00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:18.000 I was saying one of these memes this week about if Dad can't fix it, no one can. 00:24:18.000 --> 00:24:22.000 You know that whole idea that, oh, get Dad to fix it. 00:24:22.000 --> 00:24:29.000 Maybe you can't say these things now in the world of equality in which we live. 00:24:29.000 --> 00:24:35.000 Sorry, old. But there's that whole thing is, you know, Dad will fix it. 00:24:35.000 --> 00:24:41.000 It doesn't work in my house. But there's that whole idea, isn't there? 00:24:41.000 --> 00:24:52.000 This is Dad fixing it. This is God the Father sending the Son to fix what we can't put right, 00:24:52.000 --> 00:25:00.000 to pay the price in all the desperate costs that involve for the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit on the cross. 00:25:00.000 --> 00:25:07.000 He took our sin and He took our death and He took our guilt and He paid the price because He loved us 00:25:07.000 --> 00:25:13.000 and because we couldn't do it ourselves so that we could have that estrangement dealt with. 00:25:13.000 --> 00:25:22.000 Jesus, therefore, for his matters, he's not just some kind of philosophical guru that we think has a good morality 00:25:22.000 --> 00:25:27.000 and an interesting way of living. He's our redeemer. He's our Savior. He's our brother. 00:25:27.000 --> 00:25:32.000 He's our friend, and we have come to worship Him as believers today. 00:25:32.000 --> 00:25:40.000 And as believers, we believe in His great work covenantally through not just individuals but through families, 00:25:40.000 --> 00:25:48.000 and that is our belief and hope in baptism, that as we share Him with our lives and as we pray for Him as a community, 00:25:48.000 --> 00:26:00.000 and as children, that they rise to come to faith themselves in the knowledge of what God has already done in Jesus Christ. 00:26:00.000 --> 00:26:06.000 And so there's also, as we close in an inevitable challenge, He always does that. 00:26:06.000 --> 00:26:12.000 He says that God in Christ and Jesus Christ is the redeemer, and He's also the judge. 00:26:12.000 --> 00:26:20.000 And there's a recognition that as He says in verse 30, there's a, and now a need to repent, to turn round, in other words, 00:26:20.000 --> 00:26:27.000 to stop having gods that are idols or stop replacing Jesus a God in our lives with other things 00:26:27.000 --> 00:26:30.000 and turn back to Him for forgiveness and help. 00:26:30.000 --> 00:26:37.000 So as we share our faith, it's not enough really for us to be dispassionate and just simply give the facts, blah, blah, 00:26:37.000 --> 00:26:45.000 blah, blah, blah, this, this, this and this, but we long for people to turn to Jesus Christ because 00:26:45.000 --> 00:26:53.000 that's what we recognize as transformed our lives, is that two-sided reality, which is why people don't like the good news, 00:26:53.000 --> 00:26:58.000 because Jesus is both Savior and Judge. 00:26:58.000 --> 00:27:07.000 There is a judgment day, and we are idolaters, we're lawbreakers, we may not fall short of our own standard or the standard of those around us, 00:27:07.000 --> 00:27:15.000 but we do of God's, and He is the one who is judge, because we worshiped created things rather than the Creator, 00:27:15.000 --> 00:27:19.000 but Christ has paid the price to put it right. 00:27:19.000 --> 00:27:24.000 And you may, when we throw up our hands in horror and say, oh, you can't believe in judgment today, 00:27:24.000 --> 00:27:30.000 you can't believe in that old Victorian idea, but that's what the cross is. 00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:33.000 That's exactly what the cross is. 00:27:33.000 --> 00:27:45.000 The cross is about God, the Father, judging in His own Son the sins of His people and redeeming and setting us free. 00:27:45.000 --> 00:27:47.000 So, I went on too long. 00:27:47.000 --> 00:27:53.000 I just finished with recognizing that along with the challenge, there was also a response, 00:27:53.000 --> 00:27:58.000 and you can look at that yourselves in the last couple of verses, the different responses there was. 00:27:58.000 --> 00:28:02.000 There was mockery, there was curiosity, and there was faith. 00:28:02.000 --> 00:28:05.000 And all I'm saying is that's what we will find. 00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:14.000 That's what we will find when we live our lives, share our faith respectfully, lovingly, gently, powerfully, 00:28:14.000 --> 00:28:20.000 challengingly, we will find some will mock, they will just sneer and laugh at it. 00:28:20.000 --> 00:28:22.000 God's telling us that's what happens. 00:28:22.000 --> 00:28:29.000 Some will be curious, it's interesting, I want to hear you again, but again and maybe again, 00:28:29.000 --> 00:28:35.000 without any real serious recognition that He demands a response. 00:28:35.000 --> 00:28:42.000 And also faith, that there was those who came to faith and whose lives were transformed. 00:28:42.000 --> 00:28:47.000 Because it is by telling people about Jesus that other people come to faith. 00:28:47.000 --> 00:28:53.000 Telling their friends, telling their family, praying for them, loving them. 00:28:53.000 --> 00:28:58.000 Not preaching at them, loving and serving and sharing. 00:28:58.000 --> 00:29:03.000 That's the message we have, tell them about Jesus and Him crucified. 00:29:03.000 --> 00:29:07.000 That's what we need to do, that's what we're called to do. 00:29:07.000 --> 00:29:16.000 He is, you know, in any other area of our lives, if something as radical and transformational would have happened, 00:29:16.000 --> 00:29:19.000 we would be buzzing to tell others. 00:29:19.000 --> 00:29:24.000 But we don't, and I recognize that in myself, because I'm afraid. 00:29:24.000 --> 00:29:27.000 Because I know the response in others. 00:29:27.000 --> 00:29:36.000 And it's not simply neutral good news as it were, but it pierces into our very hearts and conscience. 00:29:36.000 --> 00:29:43.000 But we know the Bible says that how will they hear about Jesus unless someone tells them 00:29:43.000 --> 00:29:47.000 how beautiful are the feet of those who bring the good news. 00:29:47.000 --> 00:29:59.000 Now feet are particularly ugly, but your feet are beautiful if you use them to walk metaphorically 00:29:59.000 --> 00:30:05.000 into people's lives with the gospel and love them in the way Christ has loved you. 00:30:05.000 --> 00:30:10.000 And that should, that does transform everything. 00:30:10.000 --> 00:30:18.000 And we are all responsible to respond to God and His Word and the challenges of Jesus Christ, His death, 00:30:18.000 --> 00:30:19.000 and His resurrection. 00:30:19.000 --> 00:30:22.000 It's interesting that the focus is here so much on the resurrection. 00:30:22.000 --> 00:30:26.000 It's so important that we have a risen Savior and ascended Savior. 00:30:26.000 --> 00:30:33.000 And it's just His living Word and that He's coming back because He's alive to judge first in salvation, 00:30:33.000 --> 00:30:37.000 second in judgment, very significant, very important. 00:30:37.000 --> 00:30:45.000 May we respond, each of us, renewal, refreshment, crying out for the first time, 00:30:45.000 --> 00:30:52.000 taking us out of that rut sometimes of not caring and sharing Jesus Christ. 00:30:52.000 --> 00:30:55.000 So let's bow our heads briefly in prayer in response. 00:30:55.000 --> 00:31:02.000 Father God, help us to respond to you by faith, to love you more, to serve you better, 00:31:02.000 --> 00:31:15.000 and to share our faith personally, flexibly, intellectually from our hearts in a reasonable way, 00:31:15.000 --> 00:31:23.000 in a passionate way also, and be unperturbed by the audiences that we will face. 00:31:23.000 --> 00:31:33.000 And sometimes they are tremendous intelligence and cynicism or apparent massive disinterest. 00:31:33.000 --> 00:31:41.000 Help us to persevere and help us to pray and help us to see many people coming to faith in days 00:31:41.000 --> 00:31:48.000 and months ahead in St. Columbus through our contacts and our prayers because that is what we really want. 00:31:48.000 --> 00:31:56.000 Not only in covenant families, which is wonderful, but also among our friends and those that we are placed beside. 00:31:56.000 --> 00:32:22.000 Hear our prayers, we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.