WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:12.240 This morning we're starting a new series called Vision and Values, and this is a very basic 00:00:12.240 --> 00:00:14.160 who we are and why we are. 00:00:14.160 --> 00:00:19.359 This is a DNA series, and Derek and I thought it would be a good time to do it as we, Lord 00:00:19.359 --> 00:00:25.519 willing, and we've said this before, take steps towards normalcy and enter into Lord 00:00:25.519 --> 00:00:29.179 willing endemic stage and not pandemic stage. 00:00:29.179 --> 00:00:34.359 It's a good time, we've got a lot of new faces and we want to revisit who we are as a church 00:00:34.359 --> 00:00:38.119 and why we're here in Edinburgh, and so we're going to do that in this series. 00:00:38.119 --> 00:00:44.280 Let me read to you our vision statement as we begin this new series, and it's this, 00:00:44.280 --> 00:00:51.760 we long to be a healthy city center church committed to the gospel of Jesus Christ in 00:00:51.759 --> 00:00:59.799 for Edinburgh in worship, community, discipleship and mission. 00:00:59.799 --> 00:01:07.939 Now there is a real danger when you do something like a vision series of taking a vision statement 00:01:07.939 --> 00:01:14.879 and then going and hunting for that vision statement in the Bible, and we want to be 00:01:14.879 --> 00:01:20.359 careful not to do that, we want to actually let the Bible tell us what we're here for, 00:01:20.359 --> 00:01:25.260 and the elders have done a really good job over the years of crafting a vision for our 00:01:25.260 --> 00:01:30.859 church that has been exegeted, pulled out of the Bible and not put into the Bible. 00:01:30.859 --> 00:01:36.180 So what we're going to do in this series is today look at the fact that we are a city 00:01:36.180 --> 00:01:42.039 center church committed to the gospel for Edinburgh, and then weeks two to five, how 00:01:42.039 --> 00:01:47.099 that works in worship, community, discipleship and mission. 00:01:47.099 --> 00:01:52.019 So we're going to come to the book of Acts for each one of those and see how Acts helps 00:01:52.019 --> 00:01:54.939 us to realize that vision. 00:01:54.939 --> 00:02:00.500 Luke wrote the book of Acts as he did the gospel of Luke, and he gives us a picture of what 00:02:00.500 --> 00:02:07.179 the first church is like, and while it's descriptive, the book of Acts also informs us because it 00:02:07.179 --> 00:02:11.819 is God's word to what we should be like even in the 21st century. 00:02:11.819 --> 00:02:13.699 And so that's what we're doing in this series today. 00:02:13.699 --> 00:02:15.740 We're looking at Acts 11. 00:02:15.740 --> 00:02:24.500 Acts 11 offers us is exemplary, I think, of a model and a mission for a city center church 00:02:24.500 --> 00:02:25.900 in particular. 00:02:25.900 --> 00:02:30.620 So let's look at those two things this morning, a model and the mission that we've been given. 00:02:30.620 --> 00:02:32.700 So first the model. 00:02:32.700 --> 00:02:36.740 If you have a copy of the text, you can see down in verse 19, the very first verse we 00:02:36.740 --> 00:02:45.580 read, it says, those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen. 00:02:45.580 --> 00:02:51.940 Acts 11 is picking back up from a story that had happened in chapter seven and eight, and 00:02:51.940 --> 00:02:58.020 then there was a pause to look at the conversion of Saul, and we're coming back in Acts 11 00:02:58.020 --> 00:03:00.020 to the end of chapter eight. 00:03:00.020 --> 00:03:08.540 And what happened was that Saul, the text tells us was actually ravaging and raging 00:03:08.540 --> 00:03:12.740 over hunger for murdering the early Christians. 00:03:12.740 --> 00:03:18.700 The text uses verbs that are often used in Greek of an animal that's slobbering like 00:03:18.700 --> 00:03:19.700 a wolf. 00:03:19.700 --> 00:03:27.140 He hated Jesus and his church so much that he wanted to kill the early Christians. 00:03:27.140 --> 00:03:30.580 In Acts chapter seven and the beginning of eight, he does that. 00:03:30.580 --> 00:03:38.100 He travels just north of Jerusalem to Judea, and he institutes the execution of Stephen, 00:03:38.099 --> 00:03:43.019 who was the first martyr of the church and one of the first deacons. 00:03:43.019 --> 00:03:49.419 And what happened is exactly the opposite of what Saul had hoped for. 00:03:49.419 --> 00:03:53.539 In the early church for the first several hundred years, there was a common phrase that Christians 00:03:53.539 --> 00:03:59.180 would use, and that was that the sea, the blood of the martyrs is the seat of the church, 00:03:59.180 --> 00:04:04.539 and a martyr is a person who bears witness to the facts of the gospel all the way to 00:04:04.539 --> 00:04:06.859 the point of death. 00:04:06.860 --> 00:04:12.380 And when Saul murdered Stephen, the blood of the martyr became the seat of the church. 00:04:12.380 --> 00:04:18.460 It did not do what Saul had hoped and crush this insurrection of religion that was happening 00:04:18.460 --> 00:04:20.100 in Jerusalem instead. 00:04:20.100 --> 00:04:21.100 It did two things. 00:04:21.100 --> 00:04:23.500 It emboldened the early Christians. 00:04:23.500 --> 00:04:30.580 They saw Stephen and thought that man believed in the resurrection, and they were emboldened 00:04:30.580 --> 00:04:31.740 and they had more courage. 00:04:31.740 --> 00:04:36.139 And then it also forced them to scatter. 00:04:36.139 --> 00:04:43.539 And so Saul killing Stephen spread the gospel to the other cities for the first time. 00:04:43.539 --> 00:04:49.779 And that's actually very important because at the very beginning of the book of Acts, 00:04:49.779 --> 00:04:54.500 Luke gives something of a thesis statement for what the book of Acts is all about. 00:04:54.500 --> 00:04:56.740 And it comes out of Jesus' mouth. 00:04:56.740 --> 00:05:00.259 He says, you are to be my witnesses. 00:05:00.259 --> 00:05:06.779 You are to take the gospel to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. 00:05:06.779 --> 00:05:15.699 Acts 11 is day one of the gospel moving outside of Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, to the ends 00:05:15.699 --> 00:05:17.099 of the earth. 00:05:17.099 --> 00:05:24.180 And we are on year 1991 now of the same mission. 00:05:24.180 --> 00:05:30.939 And the reason the church in Edinburgh exists today is because Saul murdered Stephen and 00:05:30.939 --> 00:05:32.939 it spread the gospel to Antioch. 00:05:32.939 --> 00:05:37.900 And Antioch became the hub city for the mission to what we call Europe. 00:05:37.900 --> 00:05:44.939 And so we come to Acts 11 today because Acts 11 is a pivotal moment that's describing how 00:05:44.939 --> 00:05:50.980 Antioch becomes the Gentile mission city center church hub. 00:05:50.980 --> 00:05:55.819 The man who started it all by killing Stephen will become the great missionary that the 00:05:55.819 --> 00:06:00.460 Antioch and church commissions for three different missionary journeys. 00:06:00.460 --> 00:06:02.900 And it's the background to why we exist here today. 00:06:02.900 --> 00:06:04.540 So it's an exemplary passage. 00:06:04.540 --> 00:06:08.580 And what happens here, it's picking back up this story. 00:06:08.580 --> 00:06:14.860 And at the very beginning you see in verse 19 and 20 that when these Christians flee 00:06:14.860 --> 00:06:18.939 from Jerusalem and Judea, they go to Antioch. 00:06:18.939 --> 00:06:25.819 And there are in this time Aramaic speaking Jews, which was the common language for Jews 00:06:25.819 --> 00:06:27.660 in Jerusalem. 00:06:27.660 --> 00:06:30.219 And there were Greek speaking Jews. 00:06:30.219 --> 00:06:36.139 And the Aramaic speaking Jews go to Antioch and they preach to the Jews in the Jewish 00:06:36.139 --> 00:06:39.659 sector of the city and the synagogue there as they always did. 00:06:39.659 --> 00:06:44.659 The gospel, they were wrestling these three chapters before. 00:06:44.660 --> 00:06:50.900 They're all about how the gospel is for more than just the Jew, but also the Gentile. 00:06:50.900 --> 00:06:52.900 And they're awakening to that. 00:06:52.900 --> 00:06:59.420 And it's almost as if we're told here in verse 20, but there were some from some Christians, 00:06:59.420 --> 00:07:05.420 some Jewish Christians from Cyprus and Cyrene who really just didn't know better. 00:07:05.420 --> 00:07:08.540 And they go to Antioch and they're Greek speaking. 00:07:08.540 --> 00:07:11.040 The New Testament calls them Hellenists. 00:07:11.040 --> 00:07:16.540 And they start telling the gospel to the Greeks and Gentiles and Romans in Antioch. 00:07:16.540 --> 00:07:21.660 And all of a sudden the Gentile church along with the Jewish church, the Christian church 00:07:21.660 --> 00:07:25.060 comes together and booms and spreads throughout Antioch. 00:07:25.060 --> 00:07:33.340 And this is really the first moment that there is a blossoming of a Gentile Christian community 00:07:33.340 --> 00:07:35.540 within the first century. 00:07:35.540 --> 00:07:40.780 It's when the church goes to Antioch and these Greek speaking Jews start to tell everybody, 00:07:40.779 --> 00:07:43.539 not just Jewish people about the gospel. 00:07:43.539 --> 00:07:47.539 And Antioch, why Antioch? 00:07:47.539 --> 00:07:49.819 And that's the point here. 00:07:49.819 --> 00:07:57.099 Antioch was the Roman military and administrative capital of the East of the Roman Empire. 00:07:57.099 --> 00:08:01.139 And this time they called Antioch the Queen of the East. 00:08:01.139 --> 00:08:07.539 And it's very important to understand that the population in the first century was much 00:08:07.540 --> 00:08:12.379 less than half the world population today, the world population. 00:08:12.379 --> 00:08:20.500 And Antioch has, it's estimated by most scholars, more than 500,000 people in its city. 00:08:20.500 --> 00:08:26.140 Meaning that it's the same size as Edinburgh, but it's in a time when there's about 30 to 00:08:26.140 --> 00:08:29.100 40% of the global population as we have today. 00:08:29.100 --> 00:08:30.900 Meaning this is Tokyo. 00:08:30.900 --> 00:08:32.500 This is Beijing. 00:08:32.500 --> 00:08:33.899 This is Paris. 00:08:33.899 --> 00:08:38.259 This is one of the massive metropolitan centers of the entire world. 00:08:38.259 --> 00:08:41.980 It's the, probably maybe the third largest city in the world. 00:08:41.980 --> 00:08:48.019 It's definitely the third largest city in the Roman Empire after Rome and Alexandria. 00:08:48.019 --> 00:08:52.819 And it was very famous because it was the center for trade for the whole East. 00:08:52.819 --> 00:08:58.539 It connected to the Eastern part of the world as far as trade had come at that point. 00:08:58.539 --> 00:08:59.740 It was multi-ethnic. 00:08:59.740 --> 00:09:06.779 It was highly international and it was divided actually into ethnic sectors. 00:09:06.779 --> 00:09:11.419 So there would be actual walls throughout the city that divided different people groups 00:09:11.419 --> 00:09:12.659 from each other. 00:09:12.659 --> 00:09:15.580 There was a Jewish sector with its synagogue. 00:09:15.580 --> 00:09:20.139 And that's where we see the Aramaic speaking Jews go to tell the gospel for the first time. 00:09:20.139 --> 00:09:25.779 But then there was a sector that had a temple at the center, a cultic center to Apollo and 00:09:25.779 --> 00:09:29.899 Daphne, Roman and Greek gods and goddesses. 00:09:29.899 --> 00:09:36.740 There was a sector that was the product of old Assyrian descendants that worshiped particularly 00:09:36.740 --> 00:09:38.899 Assyrian gods and goddesses. 00:09:38.899 --> 00:09:40.019 And there were more than that. 00:09:40.019 --> 00:09:46.139 The city was highly divided and bifurcated between different people groups. 00:09:46.139 --> 00:09:53.899 And it was very famous that we have copies of first century poetry dedicated to Antioch 00:09:53.899 --> 00:09:59.740 that sing about its great immorality, that it's famous throughout all the lands for how 00:09:59.740 --> 00:10:04.740 wicked and immoral and dirty it was at its city center. 00:10:04.740 --> 00:10:11.819 It was very, very much known for its public baths, which meant everything you could imagine 00:10:11.819 --> 00:10:18.100 and theaters and all sorts of public idolatry, public sin. 00:10:18.100 --> 00:10:19.579 It was very famous in those ways. 00:10:19.579 --> 00:10:22.579 And this is where the church moved. 00:10:22.580 --> 00:10:30.139 From Jerusalem, the great hub, the mother city where Christ's gospel happened next to 00:10:30.139 --> 00:10:35.420 Antioch preaching the gospel along the way as they arrived as they made their way to 00:10:35.420 --> 00:10:36.420 Antioch. 00:10:36.420 --> 00:10:42.580 But Antioch becomes actually more than Jerusalem, the hub for the Christian mission for the 00:10:42.580 --> 00:10:46.379 rest of the book of Acts and really for the whole first century. 00:10:46.379 --> 00:10:51.500 One scholar, one New Testament scholar, he says this, the Christians, they are called 00:10:51.500 --> 00:10:56.539 the vision and Antioch of an empire wide mission. 00:10:56.539 --> 00:11:01.299 Paul would be the one who would carry it out and Antioch would be the sponsoring church 00:11:01.299 --> 00:11:04.379 for the great missionary journeys. 00:11:04.379 --> 00:11:09.059 Antioch becomes the hub for the mission to the Gentiles for the mission to the end of 00:11:09.059 --> 00:11:11.940 the earth. 00:11:11.940 --> 00:11:15.220 That means that that acts 11. 00:11:15.220 --> 00:11:24.180 And what we see here is actually exemplary of a model for what it looks like to be a 00:11:24.180 --> 00:11:28.700 people, the people of God on mission to the ends of the earth. 00:11:28.700 --> 00:11:35.779 And New Testament scholars have talked a lot about how in the book of Acts, there's a very 00:11:35.779 --> 00:11:43.779 clear emphasis throughout the whole on the movement of the gospel from city center to 00:11:43.779 --> 00:11:46.179 city center. 00:11:46.179 --> 00:11:51.459 And there is a debate about this amongst scholars on the book of Acts, but the majority agree 00:11:51.459 --> 00:11:56.139 that there's a very clear emphasis in the history and in Luke's writing and in what 00:11:56.139 --> 00:12:02.459 God has offered us to show that there is a model for city to city, city center to city 00:12:02.459 --> 00:12:04.339 center movement of the gospel. 00:12:04.339 --> 00:12:09.299 Okay, so let me just lay that out very briefly before we move on to looking at the mission. 00:12:09.299 --> 00:12:10.299 And that's this first. 00:12:10.299 --> 00:12:11.379 And I've said it. 00:12:11.379 --> 00:12:17.860 The apostles very clearly move the church from city center to city center from Jerusalem 00:12:17.860 --> 00:12:24.779 to Antioch to Thessalonica to Corinth to Athens, but ultimately Paul desires, as you know, 00:12:24.779 --> 00:12:28.939 to get to Rome to take the gospel all the way to Caesar's household. 00:12:28.939 --> 00:12:30.379 And that's where the book ends. 00:12:30.379 --> 00:12:33.139 And remember, the book of Acts has no ending. 00:12:33.139 --> 00:12:34.340 It ends without an ending. 00:12:34.340 --> 00:12:36.700 And you're wondering, why is there no ending to the book of Acts? 00:12:36.700 --> 00:12:37.700 There's no conclusion. 00:12:37.700 --> 00:12:42.259 That's because Paul took the gospel to the city center of Rome to Caesar's household. 00:12:42.259 --> 00:12:45.620 And we're left saying, okay, now we're to fill in the rest. 00:12:45.620 --> 00:12:46.620 We're to keep going. 00:12:46.620 --> 00:12:52.660 We're to take it to all the other cities to go everywhere that Paul ended. 00:12:52.660 --> 00:12:55.379 We're to take the lead, the church is to take the lead from there. 00:12:55.379 --> 00:13:01.860 But actually, we've got to be very careful because there's a temptation in that emphasis 00:13:01.860 --> 00:13:06.340 of the gospel moving from city center to city center to say, well, what about the suburban 00:13:06.340 --> 00:13:07.340 as we call it? 00:13:07.340 --> 00:13:08.700 The rural. 00:13:08.700 --> 00:13:16.259 And in no way is this model at the neglect or expense of the suburban or the rural. 00:13:16.259 --> 00:13:22.500 Instead what we see is that Paul will go to the city center and then he fans out. 00:13:22.500 --> 00:13:27.460 And he establishes churches in the suburban, if you can call it that, and then the rural 00:13:27.460 --> 00:13:28.460 communities. 00:13:28.460 --> 00:13:32.860 One great example of this is in Acts 14, verses six to seven. 00:13:32.860 --> 00:13:39.300 Paul is preaching in a smaller city, the city of Iconium, and like many times he is 00:13:39.300 --> 00:13:43.259 under severe persecution and he's forced to flee. 00:13:43.259 --> 00:13:44.259 And this is what it says. 00:13:44.259 --> 00:13:51.060 He says he fled to Lystra, Derby, the cities of Iconia, and then to the countryside. 00:13:51.060 --> 00:13:54.740 And he went throughout the countryside preaching the gospel. 00:13:54.740 --> 00:14:00.620 And so he moves from the major city to each of the small cities and then to the countryside 00:14:00.620 --> 00:14:05.060 and visits all the rural establishments preaching the gospel and establishing the church in 00:14:05.060 --> 00:14:06.259 all of those places. 00:14:06.259 --> 00:14:08.940 Now why is it like this? 00:14:08.940 --> 00:14:10.659 And it's very simple. 00:14:10.659 --> 00:14:12.820 And there's lots of conjectures and there's lots of thought. 00:14:12.820 --> 00:14:14.940 But why a philosophy of ministry like this? 00:14:14.940 --> 00:14:21.299 Well, because number one, Jesus Christ came into the world to save people. 00:14:21.299 --> 00:14:23.899 And you've got to go where the people are. 00:14:23.899 --> 00:14:27.060 And that's why they go to Antioch because there are 500,000 people. 00:14:27.059 --> 00:14:32.539 There is a population that makes up such a large percentage of the Roman Empire. 00:14:32.539 --> 00:14:35.899 And so first off, they simply go where the people are. 00:14:35.899 --> 00:14:43.199 And then secondly, the city centers would have a diversity of people and enough people 00:14:43.199 --> 00:14:49.819 coming in every single day from outside that the gospel would spread very easily from the 00:14:49.819 --> 00:14:51.619 city center out. 00:14:51.619 --> 00:14:55.939 And so in the city center, you have the poor and you have the middle classes and you've 00:14:55.940 --> 00:14:57.740 got the rich. 00:14:57.740 --> 00:15:01.820 And you've got the government officials and the artists and the poets and the scholars 00:15:01.820 --> 00:15:06.460 and you've got the immigrants and the refugees and the kings and the emperors and the politicians 00:15:06.460 --> 00:15:12.100 and the magistrates and the university professors and every single different type of people 00:15:12.100 --> 00:15:14.460 need the gospel. 00:15:14.460 --> 00:15:19.220 And so it's in the city center that you find every single type of people with the possibility 00:15:19.220 --> 00:15:23.660 that those people will move and fan out from there and take the gospel to all the different 00:15:23.660 --> 00:15:24.660 places. 00:15:24.659 --> 00:15:28.779 And so very clearly in the book of Acts, wanted to get to Rome. 00:15:28.779 --> 00:15:31.740 He wanted to go to Caesar's household. 00:15:31.740 --> 00:15:37.139 He even tells Timothy in his letter to Timothy, encourage the church to pray for the king, 00:15:37.139 --> 00:15:42.620 the emperor, so that you may know peace in the land, meaning pray that the king would 00:15:42.620 --> 00:15:46.779 believe on Jesus so that the Christian church would know peace. 00:15:46.779 --> 00:15:53.059 He wants Caesar, he wants the power of Caesar to know the power of the gospel. 00:15:53.059 --> 00:15:55.059 And so that's the model. 00:15:55.059 --> 00:15:59.979 Now secondly and lastly here, very simply, we've already said it, then the city center 00:15:59.979 --> 00:16:07.219 churches often would form hub mission churches that would be interested in sending people 00:16:07.219 --> 00:16:11.939 out everywhere to plant, to take the gospel to other places. 00:16:11.939 --> 00:16:17.339 There was a deep relationship to the mother church in every single one of these episodes. 00:16:17.339 --> 00:16:22.259 And we see that here when Jerusalem hears about what's happening in Antioch, they say 00:16:22.259 --> 00:16:24.460 we've got to send somebody. 00:16:24.460 --> 00:16:29.899 So they send Barnabas and Barnabas goes up, he trains the Christians that have become 00:16:29.899 --> 00:16:30.899 Christians. 00:16:30.899 --> 00:16:32.059 He makes sure there's a pastor in place. 00:16:32.059 --> 00:16:33.100 He rejoices with them. 00:16:33.100 --> 00:16:34.299 He stays with them. 00:16:34.299 --> 00:16:36.259 He recruits Paul. 00:16:36.259 --> 00:16:41.500 Barnabas recruits Paul and then prepares to send Paul out on his missionary journeys. 00:16:41.500 --> 00:16:46.259 Antioch becomes a hub for church planning all across the Roman Empire. 00:16:46.259 --> 00:16:53.539 Now we here want to, if you've been around Sanctis for a while, you know we long and 00:16:53.539 --> 00:16:57.819 we are a church planting church by God's grace. 00:16:57.819 --> 00:17:02.980 And we want to participate in that biblically driven model. 00:17:02.980 --> 00:17:10.859 And it's so important today to see this model afresh because in 1900, in the year 1900, the 00:17:10.859 --> 00:17:19.179 turn of the 20th century, 14% of the world population lived in an urban context, 14. 00:17:19.179 --> 00:17:27.740 In 1968, we reached a point where 50% of the world population lived in a city. 00:17:27.740 --> 00:17:35.379 And in 2011, 75% of the world population lived in a city. 00:17:35.380 --> 00:17:43.100 If the numbers stay as they are in 2050, there will be more people living in cities than 00:17:43.100 --> 00:17:46.540 there is currently in the world right now. 00:17:46.540 --> 00:17:54.580 More people living in cities in 2050 in urban centers than there is a world population today. 00:17:54.580 --> 00:17:59.380 And so many of us are very aware of the urbanization of the world that has happened over the last 00:17:59.380 --> 00:18:00.380 century. 00:18:00.380 --> 00:18:06.020 And Edinburgh and Glasgow both, Edinburgh and Glasgow both are growing about one half 00:18:06.020 --> 00:18:13.060 percent per year in, which means 26 to 32,000 Edinburgh and Glasgow. 00:18:13.060 --> 00:18:18.020 26,000 people are moving to Edinburgh every year, new people. 00:18:18.020 --> 00:18:23.780 And Scotland's population remains stagnant, which means that it's urbanizing. 00:18:23.780 --> 00:18:28.940 People are coming to Edinburgh and Glasgow about 30,000 every single new people year. 00:18:28.940 --> 00:18:33.220 And so as more people come, more Christians are needed. 00:18:33.220 --> 00:18:37.380 And we want to see more Christians rise up and we want to see more ministry happen and 00:18:37.380 --> 00:18:39.059 we want to see more churches. 00:18:39.059 --> 00:18:44.059 And that's why we've shown this video today about the healthy church hopes and the 30 00:18:44.059 --> 00:18:48.500 by 30 hopes for planting 30 churches by 2030. 00:18:48.500 --> 00:18:49.779 It's right here in the book of Acts. 00:18:49.779 --> 00:18:50.779 It's a model. 00:18:50.779 --> 00:18:58.740 Now, at the same time, we could talk about this and really miss the point, which is the 00:18:58.740 --> 00:19:00.099 mission. 00:19:00.099 --> 00:19:04.500 So let's let's think briefly about the mission that's also here. 00:19:04.500 --> 00:19:05.660 What does it mean? 00:19:05.660 --> 00:19:10.900 We are a city center church, but we're a church committed to the gospel in and for Edinburgh. 00:19:10.900 --> 00:19:13.900 What does it mean to be in and for Edinburgh committed to the gospel? 00:19:13.900 --> 00:19:17.019 Acts 11 also shows us there's lots to say here. 00:19:17.019 --> 00:19:23.740 Let me just draw up four things briefly that acts 11 points us to what it means to be for 00:19:23.740 --> 00:19:24.740 Edinburgh. 00:19:24.740 --> 00:19:30.740 First, we've got to be a gospel, we're called, I think, in this chapter to be a gospel, sharp 00:19:30.740 --> 00:19:33.460 church. 00:19:33.460 --> 00:19:40.660 In verse 19 and 20, we're told very clearly, whether it was Jerusalem, Phoenicia, Cyprus, 00:19:40.660 --> 00:19:44.220 Antioch, they moved and they preached the gospel. 00:19:44.220 --> 00:19:49.859 This is very simple, but the emphasis, the mission was the gospel, the proclamation 00:19:49.859 --> 00:19:50.859 of the gospel. 00:19:50.859 --> 00:19:55.379 So we've got to be to put it in this terminology, gospel, sharp. 00:19:55.379 --> 00:20:04.659 This week marks one year anniversary of a surgery that I had to have February 12th of 00:20:04.659 --> 00:20:06.819 2021. 00:20:06.819 --> 00:20:11.619 Now some of you have had much more major surgeries than the surgery I had, but I did. 00:20:11.619 --> 00:20:15.299 I had to have six incisions in my abdomen for it. 00:20:15.299 --> 00:20:19.379 And you know, when you, if you're a person today that's had a surgery or you're facing 00:20:19.380 --> 00:20:26.420 something like that, when you, when that happens, you start thinking about the details of medical 00:20:26.420 --> 00:20:30.860 procedure unlike you in a way that you never had before. 00:20:30.860 --> 00:20:35.020 And you want to know, you know, what are the instruments that are being used? 00:20:35.020 --> 00:20:39.260 How many times has the doctor done this? 00:20:39.260 --> 00:20:41.060 Have you always been successful? 00:20:41.060 --> 00:20:42.060 Right? 00:20:42.060 --> 00:20:45.700 I want to know numbers, I need to see stats, all of it. 00:20:45.700 --> 00:20:50.660 And one of the most simple things that you think about when you're facing surgery perhaps 00:20:50.660 --> 00:20:55.180 is that most of the time when you're wielding a knife, you really don't want it to be razor 00:20:55.180 --> 00:20:56.180 sharp. 00:20:56.180 --> 00:21:01.380 You know, when you're slicing butter, when you put a knife in your child's hand to put 00:21:01.380 --> 00:21:07.140 butter on toast, you don't want that thing to be razor sharp, not at all. 00:21:07.140 --> 00:21:13.580 But when, when the surgeon's coming, you, you want to know who sharpened the scalpel, 00:21:13.579 --> 00:21:15.779 you know, is it ready? 00:21:15.779 --> 00:21:18.220 Because what is the surgeon doing? 00:21:18.220 --> 00:21:23.299 The surgeon is trying to cut you with the most sharp possible blade. 00:21:23.299 --> 00:21:24.299 Why? 00:21:24.299 --> 00:21:30.099 Because in cutting you with great precision, you're, you have a much better chance of healing 00:21:30.099 --> 00:21:31.099 perfectly. 00:21:31.099 --> 00:21:32.099 Right? 00:21:32.099 --> 00:21:37.220 And with a great, great scalpel, he can go in and he can pull out the rot and the death 00:21:37.220 --> 00:21:40.220 and the disease and put it all back together again. 00:21:40.220 --> 00:21:47.299 Now, now the gospel is a sword, the word of the Lord, the word of the gospel is a, is 00:21:47.299 --> 00:21:53.660 a sword that pierces to the division of, of soul and bone marrow, but it is not a sword 00:21:53.660 --> 00:21:54.660 that kills. 00:21:54.660 --> 00:21:57.140 It is a surgeon's scalpel and it is sharp. 00:21:57.140 --> 00:21:58.339 It is razor sharp. 00:21:58.339 --> 00:22:02.819 It goes down all the way in order to pull out the rot and the power of the gospel can 00:22:02.819 --> 00:22:04.579 do that. 00:22:04.579 --> 00:22:09.620 We as a citizen, as a city center church, what does it mean to be for the city? 00:22:09.619 --> 00:22:14.219 It means that we have to be gospel sharp, meaning that we have to actually know the 00:22:14.219 --> 00:22:21.339 gospel, which is God's great scalpel with sharp, sharp precision. 00:22:21.339 --> 00:22:27.739 Now the gospel is that we are saved by Jesus Christ to work and not our work. 00:22:27.739 --> 00:22:32.379 And that, and that the gospel is good news, not good advice. 00:22:32.379 --> 00:22:38.939 And it is that God has reconciled a people to himself because of Christ's free finished 00:22:38.940 --> 00:22:45.500 and costly work, not to us be glory and not by our works of righteousness. 00:22:45.500 --> 00:22:49.980 Can we get in, but only by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ has God offered 00:22:49.980 --> 00:22:52.539 the forgiveness of sins to the world. 00:22:52.539 --> 00:22:55.380 And that's the, the basic gospel. 00:22:55.380 --> 00:22:59.460 And what it means to be gospel sharp is that we've got to know that gospel really well, 00:22:59.460 --> 00:23:07.860 because if we're fuzzy about it to the right or to the left, we lose its power. 00:23:07.859 --> 00:23:14.299 And for example, you can go to the right of the gospel by being a religious legalist, 00:23:14.299 --> 00:23:20.219 by maybe talking about Jesus, but also having too much of an emphasis on, on works to the 00:23:20.219 --> 00:23:24.979 point where your morality becomes the thing that actually saves you. 00:23:24.979 --> 00:23:27.219 That would be to move to the right, but there's also moved to the left. 00:23:27.219 --> 00:23:29.459 There's a legalism that's to the left. 00:23:29.459 --> 00:23:33.979 And Tim Keller calls it humanitarian legalism. 00:23:33.980 --> 00:23:38.180 And that's where we become a community that says, you know, we're all about gathering 00:23:38.180 --> 00:23:45.140 people together and we are, and we're all about cutting through the animosity that exists 00:23:45.140 --> 00:23:46.500 in our society. 00:23:46.500 --> 00:23:50.620 And we want to see the different races and ethnic people groups come together and we 00:23:50.620 --> 00:23:55.339 want to see male and female come together, not an enmity with one another, Genesis three. 00:23:55.339 --> 00:23:58.819 We want to see rich and poor come together. 00:23:58.819 --> 00:24:04.859 And there's a way of missing the gospel with that message. 00:24:04.859 --> 00:24:09.819 There's a way, in other words, to put it like this, secondly, we've got to let not only 00:24:09.819 --> 00:24:15.460 know the gospel well, but let everything else we do in worship, community, discipleship, 00:24:15.460 --> 00:24:20.299 and mission be gospel soaked and saturated, be founded by the gospel. 00:24:20.299 --> 00:24:24.619 In other words, we love here at St. Columbus hospitality. 00:24:24.619 --> 00:24:30.019 And one of the reasons Heather and I loved this church from top to bottom when we moved 00:24:30.019 --> 00:24:35.059 here in 2013 was because we were so well loved by your hospitality. 00:24:35.059 --> 00:24:37.459 And we've come back in part because of that. 00:24:37.459 --> 00:24:42.219 And it's a unique place that has deep affection for one another. 00:24:42.219 --> 00:24:46.619 But there's a way of saying, you know, we love hospitality. 00:24:46.619 --> 00:24:49.539 We love to bring people together and forgetting why. 00:24:49.539 --> 00:24:51.139 Why is it that we love hospitality? 00:24:51.139 --> 00:24:53.059 We love hospitality. 00:24:53.059 --> 00:24:58.460 We love hospitality because in Christ's death and resurrection, God has gathered a people 00:24:58.460 --> 00:25:04.940 once scattered by sin and set against one another by the power of the cross of Jesus 00:25:04.940 --> 00:25:05.940 Christ. 00:25:05.940 --> 00:25:12.379 We love hospitality because in our hospitality, we say, I want you to experience the grace 00:25:12.379 --> 00:25:16.019 of the gospel like I've experienced, no matter who it is. 00:25:16.019 --> 00:25:23.819 I want the sin and animosity that has separated us to be no more because of Jesus Christ, 00:25:23.819 --> 00:25:28.900 because of his death and resurrection, because we can turn to one another and say, he saved 00:25:28.900 --> 00:25:31.220 a wretch like me. 00:25:31.220 --> 00:25:32.940 You too. 00:25:32.940 --> 00:25:33.940 You too. 00:25:33.940 --> 00:25:39.420 We can come together no matter what background American and Scott and English and wherever 00:25:39.420 --> 00:25:42.819 you might come from, whatever ethnicity might be and say, you too, you've experienced 00:25:42.819 --> 00:25:44.980 the power of this gospel. 00:25:44.980 --> 00:25:52.779 We've got to be gospel sharp and gospel soaked because otherwise we might just be humanitarian, 00:25:52.779 --> 00:25:55.940 a humanitarian social club. 00:25:55.940 --> 00:25:58.940 But instead we're called here to be gospel sharp. 00:25:58.940 --> 00:26:04.539 Now secondly, and much more briefly, we've got to be an empty and hungry church. 00:26:04.539 --> 00:26:06.140 Acts 11 teaches us that. 00:26:06.140 --> 00:26:14.180 You see here that the power of the movement of the gospel from Jerusalem to Antioch was 00:26:14.180 --> 00:26:15.180 the power. 00:26:15.180 --> 00:26:16.180 Where was it? 00:26:16.180 --> 00:26:17.180 In part, it was subjective. 00:26:17.180 --> 00:26:23.140 It was that all these Christians saw Stephen martyred and they were actually emboldened. 00:26:23.140 --> 00:26:29.460 And so they would go preach, but the objective power, the real the power underneath the power 00:26:29.460 --> 00:26:36.940 were told very clearly in verse 21, the hand of the Lord was with them. 00:26:36.940 --> 00:26:43.100 And we said it twice this morning already, we can build things, but unless the Lord be 00:26:43.099 --> 00:26:46.259 the real builder, we will build in vain. 00:26:46.259 --> 00:26:52.179 We've got to be empty as we take the gospel to the city before God and say without the 00:26:52.179 --> 00:26:55.139 hand of the Lord, this will not work. 00:26:55.139 --> 00:27:00.539 And so we've got to be hungry and ask God for that. 00:27:00.539 --> 00:27:05.980 That means we talk a lot around here about revival and revival is revival. 00:27:05.980 --> 00:27:06.980 What is revival? 00:27:06.980 --> 00:27:12.259 Revival is simply an intensification of the work of the Holy Spirit through the normal 00:27:12.259 --> 00:27:18.259 means of grace, through preaching and prayer and witness and good work and intensification 00:27:18.259 --> 00:27:23.940 of the work of the Spirit where he chooses, he desires to bring an unusual amount of people 00:27:23.940 --> 00:27:25.579 into God's kingdom at one time. 00:27:25.579 --> 00:27:27.379 That's a revival. 00:27:27.379 --> 00:27:32.259 And revivals, if you look at revivals throughout history, the precondition of revival is always 00:27:32.259 --> 00:27:34.019 the same. 00:27:34.019 --> 00:27:41.379 Revivals happen most often in history when people spend seasons before God and intense 00:27:41.380 --> 00:27:44.380 kingdom focused prayer. 00:27:44.380 --> 00:27:49.060 And so this text says, without the hand of the Lord, we cannot do this. 00:27:49.060 --> 00:27:54.260 And so we've got to be big, bold, intense kingdom centered prayer people. 00:27:54.260 --> 00:27:56.860 Thirdly, afford. 00:27:56.860 --> 00:28:01.380 Acts 11 calls us also to be a city center church. 00:28:01.380 --> 00:28:03.420 Why does it, how does it do that? 00:28:03.420 --> 00:28:04.420 How are we called? 00:28:04.420 --> 00:28:05.820 Why are we called to be a city center church? 00:28:05.820 --> 00:28:10.180 And the answer is very simple because we are a city center church. 00:28:10.180 --> 00:28:13.900 One of us planted St. Columbus. 00:28:13.900 --> 00:28:17.539 We received it and we're here and we are a city center church. 00:28:17.539 --> 00:28:23.420 We're on the royal mile and there are all sorts of audiences out there, students, tourists, 00:28:23.420 --> 00:28:28.340 university professors, the poor, the middle class, the wealthy, the immigrant, the refugee 00:28:28.340 --> 00:28:32.340 that come into the royal mile and into our church quite often. 00:28:32.340 --> 00:28:36.820 And so we're called, we're called to do something very important with the gospel message and 00:28:36.820 --> 00:28:39.820 that's to contextualize. 00:28:39.819 --> 00:28:42.779 Now very, very quickly, let me show you this. 00:28:42.779 --> 00:28:49.379 In verse 21, it says that when the Hellenists go into Antioch to preach, they preached 00:28:49.379 --> 00:28:52.339 the Lord Jesus. 00:28:52.339 --> 00:28:58.220 And that's a very key phrase because if you look at the way it's written every time the 00:28:58.220 --> 00:29:02.980 Christians take the gospel to the Jews, it doesn't say Lord Jesus. 00:29:02.980 --> 00:29:06.460 It says they talked of the Christ. 00:29:06.460 --> 00:29:07.859 Why? 00:29:07.859 --> 00:29:12.379 Because the Christ is the word for Messiah, the anointed one. 00:29:12.379 --> 00:29:16.099 Meaning the Jews knew the Old Testament and so they contextualized. 00:29:16.099 --> 00:29:19.859 They went to the synagogue and said, let me tell you about the one that your Old Testament 00:29:19.859 --> 00:29:21.779 tells you about. 00:29:21.779 --> 00:29:25.179 But when they came to the Greeks who didn't know the Old Testament, they spoke of the 00:29:25.179 --> 00:29:30.619 Lord Jesus because that word Lord in Greek is Kyrios. 00:29:30.619 --> 00:29:36.619 In Kyrios, the word Lord is the word that was very commonly used to refer to the emperor 00:29:36.619 --> 00:29:38.500 of Rome. 00:29:38.500 --> 00:29:42.579 And the emperor of Rome demanded that he be called Lord. 00:29:42.579 --> 00:29:43.579 And you see what they're doing. 00:29:43.579 --> 00:29:46.419 They're saying, yes, you call this Caesar Lord. 00:29:46.419 --> 00:29:48.419 You Greek, you Roman, you Gentile. 00:29:48.419 --> 00:29:53.219 But I'm here to tell you that there is a greater Lord who's truly divine and it's Jesus. 00:29:53.219 --> 00:29:59.699 And you see everywhere they took the gospel to every sector, they would contextualize. 00:29:59.699 --> 00:30:04.819 And contextualizing is not giving people what they want to hear. 00:30:04.819 --> 00:30:11.259 But it's telling the truth, showing how the Bible answers the questions people are asking 00:30:11.259 --> 00:30:14.019 in a way that they can hear it. 00:30:14.019 --> 00:30:16.220 And we see that very clearly. 00:30:16.220 --> 00:30:17.700 And how do we do that? 00:30:17.700 --> 00:30:18.700 That's a long answer. 00:30:18.700 --> 00:30:22.619 We hope to treat that on Wednesday nights in the next series. 00:30:22.619 --> 00:30:29.299 But we're called to be a city center church that speaks the gospel in every context that 00:30:29.299 --> 00:30:34.899 God has put each of us and as a community to the audiences that God has put us in front 00:30:34.899 --> 00:30:38.220 of in a way that they can hear it. 00:30:38.220 --> 00:30:45.740 Fourth and finally, Acts 11 teaches us that we've got to be abroad and not a narrow church. 00:30:45.740 --> 00:30:51.059 Very simply, in verse 22, we mentioned this earlier, Jerusalem heard what was happening 00:30:51.059 --> 00:30:54.899 in Antioch and they sent Barnabas. 00:30:54.899 --> 00:30:58.819 And they said, we have got to be connected to this. 00:30:58.819 --> 00:31:02.819 And we've got to train the Antioch and church and we've got to support them. 00:31:02.819 --> 00:31:10.259 And Barnabas as a elder of Jerusalem becomes the planter in a way in Antioch, the establish 00:31:10.259 --> 00:31:15.259 or the pastor, and he sends out Saul Paul from that. 00:31:15.259 --> 00:31:23.019 Now, a narrow church is an insular is a church that is insular and really disinterested in 00:31:23.019 --> 00:31:24.460 the work of other churches. 00:31:24.460 --> 00:31:30.779 It's one that is so interested in the particular institution of their church that they're not 00:31:30.779 --> 00:31:36.900 interested in what's happening in other places where God's hand might really be moving. 00:31:36.900 --> 00:31:43.500 And what we learn here is that the church in Acts was always a Catholic church. 00:31:43.500 --> 00:31:46.180 Now don't run out on me on that. 00:31:46.180 --> 00:31:49.740 Not Roman Catholic, not at all, but truly Catholic. 00:31:49.740 --> 00:31:54.340 The word Catholic in the Nicene Creed, it says the church is one holy Catholic and apostolic, 00:31:54.339 --> 00:31:59.659 meaning Catholic is just a word that means universal, everywhere, connected. 00:31:59.659 --> 00:32:00.659 What does it make? 00:32:00.659 --> 00:32:02.500 How do you get into that church? 00:32:02.500 --> 00:32:05.059 Believe in Jesus by faith. 00:32:05.059 --> 00:32:09.299 That Jesus Christ is your savior, you're a member of the universal church everywhere. 00:32:09.299 --> 00:32:15.539 And so a broad church sees that because the church goes everywhere, we want to celebrate 00:32:15.539 --> 00:32:21.339 what God is doing anywhere where God's hand is clearly powerful. 00:32:21.339 --> 00:32:26.579 And so we want to go and plant churches and if we see a place where God's hand is powerful, 00:32:26.579 --> 00:32:29.859 we want to celebrate it, we want to send resources. 00:32:29.859 --> 00:32:35.779 We want to be a city center church that looks for the connections that the gospel makes 00:32:35.779 --> 00:32:37.579 all around. 00:32:37.579 --> 00:32:41.339 First in Edinburgh, then in the surrounding communities, Haddington and Winchborough, 00:32:41.339 --> 00:32:43.699 and then all of Scotland. 00:32:43.699 --> 00:32:47.419 And we see the calling here to be a broad church, not a narrow church. 00:32:47.420 --> 00:32:54.460 That means that we are called to really lean into as empty, yet hungry people are calling 00:32:54.460 --> 00:33:00.060 to be a city center community for the gospel because, because, and this is the last sentence, 00:33:00.060 --> 00:33:05.300 because the gospel is the power of salvation. 00:33:05.300 --> 00:33:11.220 And the gospel of Jesus Christ alone is the power of salvation to anybody who would believe, 00:33:11.220 --> 00:33:15.300 to the Jew and to the Greek. 00:33:15.299 --> 00:33:17.539 So let's pray and ask that God would do a great work. 00:33:17.539 --> 00:33:25.779 Father, we ask that you would stir us up as a city center community, that we would be 00:33:25.779 --> 00:33:35.059 moved in love for our great city and for this, this land, Scotland and for the United Kingdom 00:33:35.059 --> 00:33:36.779 and for the world, Lord. 00:33:36.779 --> 00:33:43.940 And so we ask today that you would create a clean and affected heart within us by the 00:33:43.940 --> 00:33:48.420 power of the spirit as we turn to sing now of your great gospel. 00:33:48.420 --> 00:33:50.259 And we pray this in Christ's name. 00:33:50.259 --> 00:34:17.260 Amen.