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***The following is an unedited auto-generated transcript and may contain serious errors and speakers other than Dallas Willard. It is included here to assist your study. Please check the original audio for an authentic record of the event.

Dallas: Have your salmon sheet for Thursday and we can take notes on those or keep them before us they may help us stay with the material somewhat better. Now though I’ve been moving very quickly through a book as long as the book of Acts and not at all giving a detailed exposition I’m going to be moving even more quickly this evening and then about half of tomorrow evening because the end is upon us and I want to carry out the theme which I’ve been developing which is the theme of the cultural captivity of the church and then at least half of the time on tomorrow evening I want to be discussing this without any direct reference to the book of Acts at all but with a reference to our own times. What is the cultural captivity of the church today? I have already said that the triumph of the church in overcoming its Jewish pot was short-lived and it got captured in a Roman pot and it isn’t out yet. I haven’t said that already but now I have and I’ll be talking about that at length next time.

Alright, the verse at the top of the sheet is I most certainly understand now that God is not one to show partiality but in every nation, now nation does not mean a political entity that would be better read every people, every group of people, every cultural grouping, every nation. The man who fears him and does what is right is welcome to him. Now I hope that you will look at that in its stark simplicity and believe what it says. The Jews found it impossible and many people in the churches today also find it impossible. If you state it abstractly perhaps you’ll find wide agreement but in the concrete when you begin to face particular issues you’re apt to get well yes but there’s this other thing which is very important you know and well they might be Christians but well they’re so immature or they’re so different and so I hope you will look at this verse in its stark simplicity and keep it before you as we go through the period today.

The place we start is in the opening of the last section of the new outline which I have put up. I suggested last evening that you could take the eighth verse of the first chapter of the book of Acts and outline the book of Acts perfectly and I thought I’d give you a day to worry about that if you were going to worry about it and if you weren’t fine but in any case I wanted to put that up this evening because I think it helps us in seeing the structure of the book. It is different from the other outline which I handed out but the book of Acts divides cleanly very cleanly into three parts. One in which the work of God is going forward in Jerusalem. The other the one we spent our time on last evening in which the work of God is going forward in Judea and in Samaria and if you look at the beautiful work of art which I have put over on the blackboard you will see something which could be called a map and this of course is the Judea includes Jerusalem. You notice how the verse in Acts 1-8 says in Jerusalem then in all Judea. Why does it say that? Well because Jerusalem is a part of Judea. Then in all Judea and in Samaria and then into the uttermost parts. What’s uttermost mean? It means you can’t utter anymore than that right? You just utter and utter and utter and then you get to where you can’t utter anymore and that’s where that point is where it’s going.

So this is Samaria this is where all the action was last night and we just had gotten up to here when we quit. This is Syrian Antioch and something very different is going to happen there and then we’re going to see this out here is water you can’t tell. Water. Land. Maybe that will help. Very much in the news nowadays isn’t it there with Cyprus and all the folly going on over there.

So this new outline I hope will if you will look I think you’ll see that just fits perfectly. It’s almost too good to keep one from a slight suspicion that that’s what Luke had in mind. It just divides so cleanly and Luke I would love to have known Luke. Luke’s one of those people that is so given to his work that you know practically nothing about him. Luke was right and he was involved in the book of Acts I mean many of these things but all he says is we. He never says he never tells us anything about himself. Paul remarks that he’s a physician we know that. I’d love to have known him. I’d love to have known how he thought about this. We said it the first time he’s the only Gentile writer of the New Testament and I must tell you that I doubt that you could have ever found a Jew who could have written the book of Acts because it precisely is the record of how the kingdom of God was taken away from the Jews and given to a people who would bring forth the fruits thereof. And that is a hard thing to say a hard thing to say even for Paul. It would have been hard to say what Luke does and how he leads us through the agonizing events sometimes agonizing events that finally wind up with Paul saying you stiff necked people you people with ears that can’t hear God is going through me to go to the Gentiles and they’re going to hear. You won’t hear but they will.

All right now let’s look at this church at Antioch. You see the references on the board. We were in the 12th chapter last night when we quit and I want us to look carefully at this church because you cannot understand I mean this wasn’t your regular little Sunday morning meeting that they were having. It was a truly unusual sort of gathering and its effect was something which could not be believed by people who had lived shortly before that.

In the 12th chapter of the book of Acts I’m sorry the 11th chapter I believe I’ve got that reference wrong. No I’m doing all right. 11 26 through 30 I want to start there. Barnabas had been to the church at Antioch and he had sought out Saul and he brought him back to Antioch and it came to pass that a whole year they assembled themselves with the church. Now it’s Barnabas and Saul and as we shall see later on there were many other people and they taught much people nice phrase taught much people. There was a whole lot of teaching going on around there and the disciples were first called Christians at Antioch and by the way in one of the most important manuscripts the Codex Vaticanus the word is not Christian. It is an associated word which means good kindly fair useful or gracious and we don’t know whether that’s a slip or the other is a slip but it’s an interesting variant on the reading of the text there. The disciples were first called good kindly fair useful gracious in Antioch. Of course the argument against that reading is precisely that that wasn’t the first place they were called that the first place they were called that was in Jerusalem where the thing broke out in the first place they had favor with men. Men looked at them they saw something good in that.

All right a whole year teaching and preaching look at that time. What would you do in a year sitting around being taught? Do you think of anything more boring than that being taught for a year and after what we’ve been through in school and elsewhere teachings bad news wasn’t for these people wasn’t for these people they were there to hear they were there to learn and develop and grow.

There were some wonderful people in that church seems like the Spirit of God just picked up ministers and brought them in that area and here’s one we see in the next verse a prophet those days came prophets from Jerusalem unto Antioch and there stood up one of them named Agabus and signified by the Spirit that there should be a great dearth throughout all the world which came to pass in the days of Claudius Caesar and then the disciples every man according to his ability determined to send relief under the brethren which dwelt in Judea which also they did and we see Saul and Barnabas going down with this gift Saul seems to have spent half his time carrying money from people who wanted to give it to somebody else and in particular the desire of the Gentile disciples to in some measure repay and help the wonderful gift which had come to the Jews first and then to the Gentile and Barnabas and Saul take the gift back to the people in Jerusalem.

I’m going to skip this interesting story in chapter twelve it’s a story about Peter mainly and it’s an interesting story especially because this is Peter’s really his last act in the book of Acts with one small exception the book of Acts of the Apostles is really the Acts of four men Peter Stephen Philip and Paul so far as men are concerned that’s it Stephen and Philip very important people they were not apostles Paul also was not an apostle in one sense of the word he was not one of the twelve but you see the word apostle came to cover not just the twelve but those who exercised the work of those apostles and those who had been had seen Jesus bodily and Paul thought he qualified under that because he saw him on the road to Damascus yes I believe that you don’t hear anything out of the fellow they picked do you very little there is a reference or two to the twelve in the book of Acts which would seem to have included this one well in any case Paul whether he may have missed out on the position but he didn’t miss out on the power did he sure didn’t it didn’t need it anyway

All right now then I’m going to skip that story as I say and I’ll pick right up at the 24th verse of the 12th chapter the word of God grew and multiplied and Barnabas and Saul returned from Jerusalem when they had fulfilled their ministry and they took with them John whose surname was Mark another young man now getting involved in the expanding ministry of the church

Now again let’s look at this church the 13th chapter now there were in the church that was at Antioch certain prophets and teachers this is the Antioch in Syria up here in the corner of the of the Mediterranean Sea the Antioch in Syria not the Antioch in Syria that comes later they were there when that church certain prophets and teachers now we get a list Barnabas and Simeon that was called Niger you can figure out why he was called Niger you bet and Lucius of Cyrene may have been black himself and Manion which had been brought up with Herod the teeth rock and Saul now these people ministered notice who they ministered to they ministered to the Lord you know that’s who we ministered to is to the Lord they ministered to the Lord and as they ministered and fasted the Holy Ghost said separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work where into I’ve called them and when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hands on them they sent them away

Now I want to just call attention to what was going on there prophets teachers there was prayer there was fasting and then there was something called the laying on of hands with the exception of the laying on of hands all of these are disciplines they are Christian disciplines you know what a discipline is it’s what well now that’s interesting because it does come to be associated with that a discipline deals though more with practice does it not a discipline is a practice it’s a perfectly definite act like fasting is a perfectly definite act it’s going without food praying is a perfectly definite act laying on of hands is a perfectly definite act and there are other disciplines but just these and the reason I mention them is simply for this reason many times we hear a teaching of grace which goes something like the following there’s nothing you can do to receive the grace of God well what do you do then nothing you don’t do anything because you’ve been told there’s nothing you do to receive the grace of God there’s all kinds of confusion around grace and works and its role in salvation let’s just remember that when we’re told that we cannot earn salvation that does not mean that there is nothing we can do to receive it a person who wishes to give me a gift must find circumstances which I can fulfill in order to receive it a gift is not an imposition I can’t give you something by dumping it on your head you have to receive it a gift is not an imposition

There is an old phrase of some theologians and preachers called a means to grace are you familiar with that a means to grace is simply an opportunity appointed usually by God through the experience of his people it is an opportunity for God to confer his gracious assistance and help prayer the laying on of hands fasting silence poverty simplicity to add some others are all such disciplines they are opportunities they involve definite acts in which God allows us and encourages us and helps us to grow in grace we don’t grow in grace by sitting around and waiting for someone to pour it in the top of our head we grow in grace by taking the appointed actions in which we find the grace of God now that’s what these people were doing they were speaking to one another teaching prophesied they were praying they were fasting and as that process went along the discipline group

What is a disciplined person a disciplined person is a person who can do what needs to be done when it needs to be done that’s a disciplined person he can do what needs to be done when it needs to be done the Los Angeles Lakers lost several basketball championships because when they needed to control the ball they couldn’t do it I mean they were ahead many times you know how many times they played the Boston Celtics for the championship and they’ve lost over and they’ve never beaten the Celtics and the one thing the Celtics could do was they could do what needed to be done when it needed to be done and the Lakers couldn’t the Lakers had other things that were really great and outstanding it’s just that one thing they could not do they could not control the ball and you know if the Lakers were three points ahead and there were 20 seconds left you knew that they were going to do everything wrong they’re going to stick their foot in their ear and they did it with regularity as I recall in one of those championships games it was down to the seventh game the Lakers I believe were two points ahead Casey Jones got the ball and there were about five but three or five seconds left and Casey shot it he was he shot it from just a little past mid-court and just as he shot it Jim Hawkins ran up and fouled him and as I recall it now if if Jones had made it it would only have tied the game and thrown it overtime and as it was he made it and got a free throw in one championship now all Hawkins had to do was just keep his hands in his pocket that was just typical it wasn’t just Jimmy Hawkins it was a whole bunch they simply could not do what needed to be done when it needed to be done they could do it when it didn’t need to be done you know and that’s that’s like

Now I like playing you know if I sat down to play Tchaikovsky’s piano concerto I might be able to do these things given enough time I might be able to but I couldn’t do them when they needed to be done and the reason isn’t I wouldn’t intend to the reason is very simply I’m an I’m undisciplined in that respect I cannot make my fingers and my hands go in those ways you know how I could get that way by doing some perfectly stupid things if you just if I were to just sit there and work my fingers sufficiently in the right way and take instructions and do that over a long enough period of time I’d be able to do the thing that needs to be done when it needs to be done

That’s typical of a discipline you’re fasting and you say to yourself suddenly what am I doing doing without food isn’t this a silly thing here I’m hungry and there’s food there why not eat what’s that got to do with spirituality the action in itself isn’t the thing the point is that the action is an occasion of learning something that is so deep and goes beyond intention so far that because I have fasted then in a situation in which it matters I am able to deny myself with no sweat without making a big show and becoming a martyr about it and getting in the way of the good deed which I might want to do by denying myself it comes naturally effortlessly you know the phrase in Shakespeare is that the quality of mercy is not strained isn’t that what it says the quality of mercy is not strained that’s true of all piety all virtue it’s not strained and the reason it is not strained is because it is discipline if the person has to strain at art or athletics he may go for a while but not for long

Did you read the story on Mike Marshall today in the sports page this guy that can go out and pitch baseball every day and seemingly not hurt him other people go out and pitch they pitch one day their arm is swelled up for two days and then they can pitch again on the third or fourth day Marshall has studied this thing he has disciplined himself to the point to where even though he may be exceptional no one has ever been that exceptional before people have had good arms but you just don’t do that no matter how good your arm is but he has got himself disciplined and trained and he did the things which others would not do I mean he runs in certain ways he exercises in the winter in the winter time he throws three times a week other pitchers don’t do that he lifts weights they don’t do it he studies he uses his head and do you know there is no better exemplification of what one must do in the spiritual life than Mike Marshall because the spiritual life and the physical life are just like that in this regard when we flop spiritually it was not a miracle any more than it’s a miracle if I get out and try to run three miles I’ll drop dead that’s no miracle see that’s just a that’s the way it is

Now if I wanted to run three miles and feel good afterwards and not drop dead I could get my you may not believe it but I could get myself into a state where I could do that I’ve done it it doesn’t show but I’ve done it I can do that but I can’t do it just by saying wow I’d like to be a great runner wow isn’t it great to be a runner or I really intend to be a runner or I’m going to think about it or even I’m going to pray about being a great runner I’m going to pray the Lord will make me a great runner if I do that the Lord will say to me alright we start with first things first what is running what does it depend on how do you get to be that way and that’s the same way with praying that’s the same way with fasting that’s the same way with speaking that’s the same way with being an effective witness that’s the same way with dealing with our temptations it’s that way with everything that enters into the spiritual life and that’s why discipline is all important

Now when we wake up twelve thirteen years old some of us begin to wake up I was a little later than that but when we wake up we find we’re already in a mess we’ve got our habits shot all the training the movies we went to our parents our willing friends and all these other people have trained us and brought us into a place to where we’re all messed up we didn’t get that way overnight and we don’t get out of it overnight now the grace of God often will help people remarkably just remarkably I’ve known people who have tried to quit smoking for example and I’m not getting on you smokers but they were convicted about it and they tried to quit smoking for twenty years and have a religious experience and they never wanted it again never I’ve known the I know these people personally have seen the same thing happen with drink I’ve seen the same thing happen with many many types of things

I might I might also say that I know of certain other types of problems which that I’ve never known it to happen for example laziness I’ve never known a peace and person to be did you know laziness probably causes more trouble in people’s lives than most the other things we holler a lot about did you know that sloth that’s not just a three-toed monster down in the south american sloth is one of the seven deadly sins in classical christian literature sloth spell that s l o t h the english of which is lazyness laziness but I’ve never known a person to be delivered from laziness by religious experience never I could mention other things so then the reason for that I think is very simple these things gear into our lives in a different way laziness ties into our life in a very different way than smoking cigarettes does the bearings of it are very different they’re very different indeed I’ve known people to be delivered from drugs like that I expect you have to perhaps perhaps some of you know more of that than I have it’s quite common so different things work in different ways but in general you can say that the fundamental things in the spiritual life are things which come only through a process of discipline and discipline always means doing things which don’t make an awful lot of sense if you look at them in yourself and if you look at them in themselves

So what you’re doing without food right and you’re not even interested in losing weight what are you trying to do what’s that got to do with anything what is fasting after all you ever fast these people fast explore fasting someday go without food and see what it does to your mind more interesting than what it will do to your body one of the most interesting and revealing things about you will be when you do without food or when you do without talking try that sometimes these are disciplines these are disciplines they teach us what we are they give a place for God to work in our lives we learn many things and we grow through them and that’s what was going on in this church it was going on under the leadership of men who were spiritual masters to a more or less great degree they knew what they were talking about and they were able to lead and they were able to teach and they were able to inspire people and they had a whole bunch of them there and mind what it must have been like to have been in that in that city just look at that personnel tremendous

Now after this had been going on for quite a long while something happened that made as I have put up here the transition from one a to one B that is from Jerusalem to all Judea and Samaria how did that happen that happened unconsciously that happened because people got kicked out of Jerusalem the persecution fell and they that were scattered they that were kicked out of Jerusalem went everywhere preaching the gospel they didn’t know what was happening and they didn’t know what was going to happen it just happened but now then the outreach becomes a conscious process and the transition from one B to one C that is from all Judea and Samaria to the uttermost parts of the earth is a consciously undertaken project at the direction of the spirit of God these people went out quite consciously to convert the world to bring the kingdom of God to everyone

Now that is a great change what that really indicates is that the will of God in reaching all mankind God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that the will of God in reaching all mankind have now seeped down to the point to where the people who were chosen of God could finally understand that they were chosen not for themselves not because they were somehow the people or the pot but because there was a purpose to be accomplished they were to be a light unto the Gentiles and their prophets had told them that clearly unmistakably and now at last they were able to read the prophets and say oh yes that’s what that means they were able to put that together with Jesus’s command to go unto all the world and preach the gospel and now they said we understand we understand

But it wasn’t just enough to have a general direction the question arose as to who should go and the answer was Barnabas and Paul now just a part this was not just an arbitrary decision these were men who were eminently qualified to go and preach the gospel in the areas where they were to preach but I want to just make one final remark and that is they prayed after now after the direction had come we don’t know how it came whether it came by some audible or other explicit direction or whether it came as a sense upon the people in that group but after the direction had come to set them apart notice what they did they fasted and they prayed and then they laid hands on them and sent them away

What do you think of laying on hands if you have a concordance it would be worth your while to look up the number of times this phrase occurs in the New Testament and the role that the laying on of hands occurs role that laying on the hands of plays in the New Testament the laying on of hands was an act of transmittal it was an act it is the law of contact in the spiritual world that the spirit moves by contact and that we have the power to pass on to others our spirit by touching them we have the power to pass on to others our spirit by touching them the touching of bodies is very important in the Christian way

Heard a preacher the other day said that it is right he said Paul said it is right that a man touch not a woman so he said now in the churches men aren’t supposed to touch women and especially preachers are supposed to keep their hands off the women well there is a certain sense in which that is absolutely right of course he was misquoting Paul altogether as to the intent of Paul’s words Paul was talking about marriage and sexual intercourse but do you know that there are many people that are scared to death of touch and do you realize how important it is for people to take others into their arms and hold them maybe you say that’s wrong okay that certainly isn’t what it’s talking about here this is simply talking about the laying on of hands but do you know that there are many people who think that’s just superstition

Suppose someone came to you and wanted to lay hands on you and pray for you what would you do would you be willing to lay hands on and pray for another is this something that comes right and natural for you these people fasted and prayed and then laid hands on did you ever notice how often Jesus laid hands on people didn’t keep his hands off of them could he he touched them and they touched him they touched him touching is so important and in this particular context the transmittal of power for specific service is what is at issue

Our faith of course has to be informed by the normal way in which things are done in the kingdom of God now you don’t have to lay hands on anybody you don’t have to pray you don’t have to fast you probably go to heaven without that that’s what you want to do go to heaven I hope you want to go to heaven I hope you go to heaven but the book of Acts is not about heaven it’s about earth it’s about the kingdom of heaven on earth it’s about the kingdom of God here and now and one of the things we have to be very conscious of is that the way the kingdom of God functions in the group is not just a matter of some high blown spiritual unity it’s the matter of how we relate our bodies to one another not just touching looking listening all of these when we talk about the body being united and knit together in Christ and all that we can just get so holy and high blown but what does it mean right what does it mean in our relationships to one another the way some people talk about it we might just as well all be disembodied spirits already not not the New Testament this is a very touchy book a very touchy book

They laid hands on them and sent them away and let me tell you Paul never did things before like he did now never before did he do the kinds of things he did now and he was some big wig before never before did things happen as began to happen now I’m going to just look at some of the incidents very briefly now that come up and I especially want to show you the incident in Antioch in Pisidia but first of all just let me refer to the map again over here

Paul and Barnabas take off and go to Cyprus they did some good there but from the newspapers there was a little left to be done today and so they did some work there and then they went on up roughly below Derby there and then went on around all the way up to Antioch that I believe is the farthest point that they went to the north in that trip then they turned around and came back down and a very interesting thing in each of these places in each of these places he didn’t go through Tarsus this time that was his that was Paul’s old hometown and I expect he had already stumped the pastures around there pretty thoroughly already but at any rate he went right on up through there and came back down and as he came back down he ordained elders in each of these places in each of these places there were large numbers of people that were converted and then when he came back he went right over to Antioch went back to his home church they’d been praying for him they were anxiously waiting to find out what was going to happen and he told them what had happened

Now this was a short trip really quite a short trip and I see it as a kind of trial run I see it as something like this they were saying alright let’s see how this thing is going to work as a conscious project it had never been done before always before it had people had been converted simply because someone was going somewhere anyway and got to talking about it and all of a sudden people were being converted and entering the kingdom of God but now it was a conscious project and Paul and Barnabas went out and made this little short trip and came back and reported

Let’s look at some of the things that happened first of all in Antioch 13 chapter 13 verse 14 you know I think I’ve got Antioch located too high up Antioch is supposed to be down closer to the coast isn’t it I think I think I did that let me check if you’ve got a map of Paul yeah that’s right that’s right well the there are two of them there but I guess I got it fairly right anyway can’t say much for my art but roughly the spatial directions are right so they departed from Perga and came to Antioch this is the 14th verse of the 13th chapter and went into the synagogue now this is important because in this we’re going to see a contrast with Antioch and Lystra they went into the synagogue when there was a synagogue there that’s the first place they went and sat down and after the reading of the law and the prophets the rulers of the synagogue sent unto them saying you men and brethren if you have any word of exhortation for the people say on this was the custom it was customary if there were visiting people dignitaries who were men of some standing in the Jewish community they were invited to speak

Paul stood up and beckoned with his hand and said men of Israel and ye that fear God give audience now Paul now then I’m not going to read what follows this is the standard Christian sermon in the Jewish synagogue of the day and this was preached over and over and if you look at it you will see how extremely close this is to the one which Peter preached on the day of Pentecost it was the same sermon practically the same sermon the only difference being that instead of Peter saying you killed him in the 26th verse Paul says men and brethren children of the stock of Abraham and whosoever among you fear God to you is the word of salvation sin for they that dwell at Jerusalem and their rulers because they knew him not nor yet the voices of the prophets fulfilled the prophets by condemning them one is reminded of Santayana saying that the one thing we learned from history is that we learn nothing from history and these people the one thing they learned from reading the scriptures was how to fulfill them in this way and though they found no cause they condemned him to death

So there’s some change in the persons which are referred to in the discourse but the message is the same the reference to the raising from the dead and the reference to David as prophesying that he was to raise from the dead if you compare the sermons right in there the same thing and then over on verse 38 be it known unto you therefore men and brethren that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins and by him all that believe 39 are justified from all things from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses and the 41st verse he quotes the prophet Habakkuk I work a work in your days a work which ye shall in no wise believe though someone tell it to you that’s exactly right I’ve stressed that over and over that if you understand the book of Acts and the work of God in the book of Acts you have to get used to the idea that what God is doing is contrary to human expectation

So he strings this all out the standard Christian sermon in the Jewish synagogue of the day and then he gives a final summary statement in the 43rd verse I’m sorry and when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue the Gentiles they thought that these words might be preached to them the next day every Jewish synagogue had a section where the Gentiles sat the Jews were gone out the Gentiles said come back and preach this same sermon to us next Sabbath preached to him the next Sabbath and when the congregation was broken up many of the Jews and religious proselytes now those were Jews who had become Jews by conversion to the Jewish religion followed Paul and Barnabas who can to speaking to them persuaded them to continue in the grace of God

Well well well the effect was incommensurate with the act people were converted people were caught the hook was in they couldn’t get away if they wanted to because God had fixed something in their minds but then there’s the other party the next Sabbath day came almost the whole city together now why was that you suppose television advertisement you bet they talked about it didn’t they they talked about it you know I really have a hard time trying to press people to witness because I know I’ve seen it in my own experience if we I have a meeting and someone wants to pray for something and we pray for it and the next day we find out that it happened right at the time we were praying for it it’s how over half the San Fernando Valley people getting on the telephone and calling everybody and talking to everyone saying you know what happened I don’t know what happened you couldn’t shut them up

Listen when people feel the reality of the kingdom of God you can’t shut them up Jesus is always going around telling people please keep it quiet would you keep it quiet you know poor old wild man that stayed out in the cemetery you know healed him he went out and blazed it abroad that’s the way it was Jesus sent him back to his own people he set the whole countryside of fire and the next time Jesus came back the whole country came out to meet him remember that who needs television oh he shut them up because he didn’t want to play into their preconceptions about what the Messiah was supposed to be that was the that was absolutely essential if they got too stirred up he couldn’t finish his main work which was to train his disciples

And again you know you have to you have to hold these incidental things down and really miracles are incidental they are incidental we have to go for them because they are exciting aren’t they but they’re incidental and you can go out and speak in tongues and that’ll just stir up your neuroses and your psychoses to such a point that nobody can stand you and make you a plague to the face of the earth it won’t straighten you out Jesus saw that very clearly and he told people he said listen you’re going to come up to me in that day and you’re going to say we cast out demons in your name we did lots of wonderful works and he’s going to say I know you I don’t know you you remember what I say all that stuff is very external very external that doesn’t mean it’s unimportant it’s important it’s mainly important because people need help I mean if they’re sick they need to be well if they’re confused in their minds they need really miraculous help in the way of interpreting and speaking it’s very important stuff it’s just not central so Jesus had to keep a hand on that and he had to keep it quiet because if he didn’t keep it quiet he had a hard enough time you know Jesus spent a major portion of his time trying you see him oh he said let’s get let’s go across the sea again fellows right let’s go across the sea again and see if we can’t get away and get a little rest and he gets over on the other side of the sea and here they are all waiting on it hi master teach us help us give us bread and he does because he loved them and he saw them as the scripture says as sheep fainted scattered abroad sheep having no shepherd and his heart was torn with compassion for him he said the field is white unto harvest get as many people to help these people as you can and he was very full of compassion upon them but then he kept trying to get away and he couldn’t get away he’d have to go out finally they’d all go to sleep that’s one thing they did do and so he’d have to go out by himself pray all night and many times he’d be still out there praying in the morning and they would get up and go find him and he spent time trying to get away from people

We spend I’ll tell you evangelism is important outreach is important but beware about how you chase after people if there isn’t some reciprocal chasing after you as a church or as a Christian you better be worried better be worried now Paul went out see and there is a time for going out there’s a time to go but when he went out and when he spoke then he had to beat the people off of the club sometimes they had to club right so that’s another way of doing it I work a work in your days a work which no one will believe

And then the congregation broke up as I say the next Sabbath they came back and look what happens the Jews saw the multitudes verse 45 and were filled with envy and spake against those things which were spoken by Paul contradicting and blaspheming and Paul and Barnabas waxed bold and said it was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you but seeing you put it from you and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life lo we turn to the Gentiles

And the Gentiles jumped up and down and said whoopee that’s what the forty seventh verse says oh forty eighth verse when the Gentiles heard this they were glad and glorified the word of the Lord now here’s the you know you want to really think about the phrase that follows and as many as were ordained to eternal life believe that is what is called the prevenient grace of God by theologians prevenure is a French verb which means to go before and in your old versions you know in Thessalonians it says they which are alive shall not prevent them which are asleep and you think well what were they thinking of they’d be out there trying to hold them down in the grave or something like that and keep them from going off no it just means they won’t go before the ones who are asleep at the rapture prevent is an old word there and it has that meaning of going before and what this verse says is that the grace of God went before and you see that over and over in the book of Acts Paul having visions in places being told I have many people in this place

You know why we go out as missionaries in evangelist not to take God where he isn’t but to go where he already is God is already there it has struck some people that many people many people among the great missionaries were Calvinist that is they believed in predestination and that’s a long story into which I won’t go but that struck many people as being very funny if they’re Calvinist why go well they went out because they knew that God was going to save some people when they went and preached they went out in that confidence they were sure of it we don’t go somewhere where God isn’t when we go as missionaries we go somewhere where he is God is everywhere as Paul said in him we live and move and have our being

And as many as were ordained to eternal life believed now I’m not going to get into the details of what that might mean I just want to leave that for your contemplation and it certainly however you interpret it will carry out the theme that we’re stressing of God being the one who is acting in the book of Acts so the word of the Lord was published throughout the region and the honorable women got stirred up by the Jews and the chief men of the city and they took Paul and Barnabas and rode him out of town and they Paul and Barnabas shook off the dust of their feet against them and came into Iconium now notice the 52nd verse in all of the midst of all of this what we have the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Ghost who were the disciples they were the people who believed while Paul and Barnabas were in town every place they went they left the disciples the disciples

Now in Lystra we have a very interesting incident and I want to study it briefly just for the contrast because there was no synagogue in Lystra as far as we can tell it was completely untouched by the Jewish religion but Paul made no difference he went see he’s gone so Noah over in Lystra these people are Greek in their religious outlook and in the passage referred to here 14 6 through 14 20 they had gone through a number of cities and they come to Lystra and 7th verse says and they preached the gospel there they preached the gospel and 8th verse and there sat a certain man in Lystra impotent in his feet being a cripple in his mother’s womb who never had walked the same heard Paul speak who steadfastly beholding him Paul steadfastly beholding him and perceiving that he had faith to be healed said with a loud voice stand up on thy feet and he leaped and walked

Now Paul had no doubt preached Jesus unto them but the interpretation which they put upon these events is to say that Paul and Barnabas are Greek gods the Greeks very commonly I thought they thought the gods came down to earth very common I mean the Greeks don’t have exactly a sacred literature the Greeks didn’t I mean but if you look into the literature that they have you’ll see the very common reference to gods coming down some of you ever read the Iliad or the Odyssey and you know the gods are out there on the plains of Troy almost as much as Achilles and Agamemnon are and they’re always helping people out and hurting others and so that was very much a part of the Greek belief they didn’t make an awful lot of consistent sense out of it but they really believed it and when they saw this they said in the speech of Lyconia the 11th verse the gods are come down to us in the likeness of men and they called Barnabas Jupiter and Paul Mercury because he was the chief speaker

See those are familiar names aren’t they well that’s the best they could do I mean you got to do something in the face of events like this so you put the best construction on it you’ve got you say well that one’s like Mercury and that one’s like Jupiter Jupiter is a big stuff by the way he’s not you know he was really a big man and Mercury was no small god and so they they put a pretty nice construction on this and they didn’t stop there the 13th verse the priest of Jupiter got all warm to his task because after all if Jupiter is here one ought to get with it and go put one ought to put the best foot forward or the best bullock forward or whatever you want to say and so the priest of Jupiter which was before in the city that is he’d been there already he was a he was a established clergyman and did all the things and he brought oxen and garlands under the gates and would have done sacrifice with the people

That’s a very business like approach but when the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard of it they tore their clothes and ran in among the people crying out sirs why do ye these things we also are men of like passions with you remember I said one way of stating the theme of the book of Acts is the continuing incarnation and what the incarnation means is it’s real flesh and blood in which all of this is happening we’re men of like passions with you and preach unto you that you should turn from these vanities Jupiter Mercury and all that jazz unto the living God which made heaven and earth and the sea and all things that are therein very old prophetic theme in contrasting God who in times past suffered all nations to walk in their own way nevertheless he left not himself without a witness and that he did good and gave us rain from the heavens and fruitful season seasons filling our hearts with food and gladness and so on

Now you see there’s no appeal there to Hebrew history there’s no reference to anything with what these people understood and that was typical of the ministry of Paul he didn’t go around trying to hook people in with Moses in order to get them brought up to Jesus rather he presented the God which they acknowledged and which was present in their midst and when on Mars Hill he preaches his sermon to them he uses the same technique he takes the gods they acknowledge and says now wait a moment I’m going to take the gods you acknowledge and I’m going to tell you what they’re like the unknown God was just a perfect text for him you acknowledge an unknown God now him I declare unto you

And with these sayings scarce restrained they the people that they wouldn’t you like to have had a wouldn’t you like to have been standing there to watch that had a videotape of that see them trying to save that poor oxen’s life and picking these people up who were bowing down to him pushing the garlands away you know fill that in that will give you some reality to the events real that was a real meeting of human beings God working in some of them how the effect was tremendous again the twofold reaction people who were converted and then we have our friends following Paul and Barnabas around Paul had these people that followed him around and they thought that they would do everyone a favor if they could just stop him so they devoted their lives to that

And in the 19th verse there came dither certain Jews from Antioch and Iconium where Paul had already been and they persuaded the people and they took Paul and drew him out of the city and stoned him and left him for dead how be it as the disciples that’s the ones who believed stood around about him he rose up and came into the city and the next day he departed with Barnabas unto Derby

Now then let me just finish this chapter just read through this chapter quickly because this completes the experimental run when they had preached the gospel to that city that is to Derby they went to Derby from Lystra and had talked many they returned to Lystra to Iconium and Antioch they went back up see and then I didn’t draw the rest of this on there but after they got there they came back down to the coast and as they went through these places where they had been please note verse 22 confirming the souls of the disciples and exhorting them to continue in the faith that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God now we don’t have to do that anymore but they did in those days and we’ve got a better way of doing it now

And when they had ordained them elders in every church they appointed people as elders they laid hands onto the departed gifts and the elders were to govern by their authority not by their position but by their authority they were to govern in those churches while Paul was away you know it worked it worked because it was the work of the spirit of God it worked now today possibly we would have had people go to 15 years of school and get certified by all of the right groups of men and then turned them loose and then it would have died on them for sure these people had nothing much to depend upon except God and they depended on him and he worked it was his work anyway he was the shepherd they were just the under shepherds

So they appointed elders and then they came passed throughout the city and came to Pamphylia and they preached the word in Perga and they went to Atalaia and then they sailed to Antioch and went back home to Syria and Antioch and what do they do when they get back there oh I love that 26th verse from whence they had been recommended to the grace of God for the work which they fulfilled you see that church at Antioch was intimately involved in this whole thing it was with the power of that church that these people went out it was with the power of that church that these people went out now so they went out and then they come back with their report and when they were come 27th verse and had gathered the church together they rehearsed all that who had done God had done with them and how he had opened the door of faith unto the Gentiles and there they abode long time with the disciples another long dwelling there in that new center of Christianity from which there was now a conscious outreach in an effort to convert the world

If we were to read the story in Philippi of the coming to Philippi which we won’t we would see there that Paul as I mentioned the other night when he came to Philippi there was no synagogue and he heard that there was a place of prayer down by the river where the women washed their clothes and he went down there at the time of prayer and he talked to them and there was this lovely person who loved God and whom God loved called Lydia a seller of purple and she heard this and she said this is what I’ve been waiting for this is it and she immediately adhered to these people took them home made her house their headquarters and there were some mighty goings on in Philippi even led up to an earthquake shook the jailhouse down shook the jailer up one of my favorite points in this whole story is the way the people who had put Paul in jail had to eat crow and Paul fed it to them spoon by spoon Paul was not some little namby-pamby person who just made a doormat out of himself he really laid it on people and this guy found out he was a Roman citizen and said gee we’re sorry why don’t you just go on quietly out of town no you come and take us out through the city oh that’s great

Well now I want to talk about the council at Jerusalem because this is this is really an important point and I want to make this very strongly because the council at Jerusalem led up to the first official statement as I say here that one can be saved without the Jewish markings now the Jewish marking the only Jewish marking is circumcision is it not that’s the one and it doesn’t matter but other people practiced it long before it was taken over and became the mark of the Jew so circumcision became a big deal suppose that the mark of the Jew had become a long fingernail on that finger then the debate would have been whether or not a person can be saved without a long fingernail on his index finger as it was it was whether or not a person could be saved without a foreskin which kind of of course left one of the sexes out but then they didn’t matter much anyway and they got in just by the grace of the man if they got in

So this is a is one of the best illustrations I know of how we take over something which is completely incidental and go around trying to make it absolutely fundamental and you know that we are done doing that

Let’s look briefly at this 15th chapter of the book of Acts certain men came down from Judea and taught the brethren that unless you are circumcised as Moses said you can’t be saved now that is putting it as bluntly and as unequivocally as you possibly could put it unless you have a long fingernail on your index finger you cannot be saved or if you do you cannot be saved it doesn’t matter which way it all comes out about the same place

Now these people were very serious about this and they were very serious about it because it was something which had been ingrained into them from their first conscious moments it had been associated with God with holiness I’ve known people who thought that if you sang a hymn with a cultivated sort of voice couldn’t possibly be religious might be a nice opera singer but it couldn’t possibly be religious religious singing for some people has a certain kind of nosy twang through it you know just like for some people preachings like I know people who think that you can’t preach unless you are just going down the line hollering your head off and hiccuping for breath and screaming and ranting and that’s really preaching and people go listen to that and they’ll hear that and they can’t tell you a thing that man said but boy they’ll come and say he’s really preaching he’s really preaching and if a man comes along and he doesn’t talk in that way that particular way he doesn’t whine snort nor hiccup they will say they will say see their seminary ruined they can’t preach a lick can’t preach a lick

Well these things go back to these deep things that are ingrained in people by their early associations in their childhood experiences and circumcision is like that see the way the system of the world works is it enlists on its side the immediate revulsions and attractions which rest right flat in your viscera and other parts of your body why do we say that makes me sick to my stomach because it makes us sick to our stomach that’s right it rests right there people actually get sick to their stomach why do we say that stinks because that stinks and it stinks because of the way we’ve been conditioned and we wrinkle up our nose it’s located right there that stinks we make a face of a disgusting face a disgusted face maybe disgusting too but disgusted face and we express these things in our body and our body comes to bear and we’re ready to punch bite kick kill and do all of the other things which we do with our bodies to other people that’s why when they ran on Steven you should have seen their faces you know what they look like and those people were sick in their stomach they were revolted at these things and the idea of I won’t I don’t can’t really with delicacy go into that but the idea of what uncircumcision meant it was associated with revulsion it was a repulsive sort of thing and it was because this these people were very serious and they made a very close association in their mind between being uncircumcised and being unclean and everyone knows that cleanliness is next to godliness right isn’t that true that’s from Hezekiah Hezekiah 6 13 I think cleanliness is next to godliness and circumcision is unclean the unclean the uncircumcised

Now I say all of that to help us understand that this was really an important thing for these people it was something they got worked up about they were they it was fully justified to them that god should not let people with foreskins into heaven the dirty dogs deserved nothing less so when Paul and Barnabas ran into this in the second verse they had no small dissension now what that means is they had a big one and disputation and they said okay we can’t settle this out here we’re going to go to the source of authority we’re going to Jerusalem and so they went to Jerusalem and when they got up there they had some really good times on the way and when they got there then the debate began

The fifth verse there rose up certain of the sect of the pharisees and of course you would have known that they were the ones which believed now notice pharisees which believed you ever notice that before pharisees which believe that just again you have to understand that in these years Christianity was something which in a large measure was accepted as a Jewish sect and it continued to be that in the eyes of the Roman government for a very long while the pharisees which believed saying it was needful to circumcise them that is the gentiles and to command them to keep the law of Moses all right so there the issue is stated

And Peter rose up and said brothers men and brothers he gives a good statement of here of how God gave the gentiles the Holy Ghost in the eighth verse and ninth verse and put no difference between us and them the two cultures he put no difference purifying their hearts by faith without regard to whether they were foreskinned or unforeskinned and therefore Peter said very strong here he wavered a lot and Paul really had some run-ins with him about things like for example in one case when Paul went up to Jerusalem as it tells us in Galatians he slipped up and found Peter avoiding the tables where the gentiles were sitting to eat and he barked at him about it we believe Peter says here Peter had it straight in his head he knew he had learned his body language hadn’t come along all that much but he had learned and he says we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved even as they in other words it’s all on the same basis

Then all the multitude kept silent you see you’ve got the counterbalancing forces in effect you’ve got two motions on the floor one is by the Pharisees that believe which is they’ve got to be circumcised and keep it all Moses the other motion on the floor is they don’t have to do all that we’re going to be saved on the same basis

James who was the authority more than anyone else in this situation offers what is undoubtedly best understood as a compromised resolution he says men and brethren hearken unto me and so he gives a few good words to Simon and the motion by Simon and he concedes that God has gone to the gentiles now he does not directly introduce any considerations of the Pharisees motion until he gets to his conclusion this he just introduces in the 19th verse where for my sentence is that is the judgment I pass and you have to understand again that he was in the position essentially of the judge he was the man who was going to resolve this because he was the man in the position of authority and he said my judgment is that we trouble them not which are among the gentiles turned unto God would that he had put a period there but look at he doesn’t but that we write unto him that they abstain from pollutions of idols that is not the meat offered to idols because that was regarded as worship for those and from fornication and from things strangled and from blood not eat anything that was killed by strangling and from blood so this is not at all what he said it was going to be he said that it was going to be not to bother them but now they’ve got to do certain things

There’s so much of the you have to almost be used to councils and conferences to understand what happens here this is a priceless piece of work really because now James said this and the Pharisees sat there and thought well that that’s pretty good and the Christians sat there I’m sorry they were all Christians excuse me and the Peter and Paul and Barnabas sat there and well all right we’ll work with that

22nd verse then pleased at the apostles and the elders of the whole church to send chosen men with their company to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas namely Judas surnamed Barsabbas and Silas chief men among the brethren okay see they weren’t just going to send Paul and Barnabas back and ask the people there to take their word for what was done see they were going to send other men along to certify that this is what was done so let’s see how it how it looks when we get to back to Antioch they wrote a letter they put it in writing they took it back with them and when they get back to Antioch in Syria they read the letter

Verse 24 and following now here you give something to both parties there is a concession that you don’t have to be circumcised and you don’t have to keep the law of Moses that’s in the 24th verse but then there is the additions which are put on down in 28th verse I want to read this because the wording is really priceless I think 28th verse and I like this old English reading for it seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us to lay up on you no greater burden than these necessary things now when James said it initially he said not to burden him but now we have these necessary things

To get the impact of this you need to just list these things suppose they were handed the list and on the list were don’t eat meat offered to idols don’t eat blood don’t eat things strangled don’t fornicate what would you find in common on such a list I mean what did you say that list is a list of do you notice how by the way do you notice how in this discussion the two predominant issues are sex and food and it is around sex and food that the primary cultural issues center always

These necessary things these necessary things and if you do this you do well fare you well and when they had read this they rejoiced for the consolation

Now there seems to have been some disagreement as to exactly what this thing said and I’d like you to read Paul’s version with me out of Galatians 2 9 and 10 again please bear with me because this these little seeming small things are extremely important for the point of the entire book of Acts and for our understanding of what is involved in the gospel of the kingdom of God Paul here is recounting what happened at this council then he says in the ninth verse then James 9th verse of the second chapter of Galatians then James Cephas Cephas is Peter and John who seemed to be pillars of the church perceived the grace that was given unto me and they gave me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship notice the grace was given unto me the right hand of fellowship was given to me and Barnabas and that we should go unto the heathen and they unto the circumcision

Now here is Paul verse 10 gives you Paul’s reading of that report only they would that we should remember the poor the same which I also was forward to do and that was Paul’s reading of the recommendation of the council says nothing about blood doesn’t even mention fornication it doesn’t mention eating things that are strangled or things that are offered to idols

I hope you reflect on this because it is very helpful in understanding the kind of book the Bible is the Bible is a book which gives us the truth about the way these people experienced God and the truth of the matter is I am sure that this is exactly how Paul read that report exactly how he read that report the only thing they said was remember the poor James didn’t say anything about remembering the poor said don’t eat any of that blood you’ll be okay if you’re circumcised uncircumcised it doesn’t matter but these few necessary things don’t eat any blood don’t eat strangled animals another old Jewish problem very deep culturally still is for that matter

And Paul was so relieved I gather by the general statement that you don’t have to keep the law and you don’t have to be circumcised that he simply moved right directly past all those things now actually there is a way of seeing how he could have done that because if it is true that they don’t have to keep the law of Moses then what’s this business about blood because that was a command of the law of Moses see so it’s a very good way in which you can understand exactly how Paul did this without really much in the way of any skullduggery or shenanigans that you could holler about I mean he was just being consistent but Paul did be he was consistent and by being consistent he was able to bring people completely beyond those cultural distinctions

And whether you eat blood or not now what’s that got to do with whether or not you well again it’s a lot of associations in their bloods awful do you know that make you think blood is awful terrible terrifying and all those associations like uncircumcision unclean Gentile all those associations you remember all the associations with hippies I mean anyone with all that hair and dirt what wouldn’t they do I mean there were people who were scared to death of hippies I mean they might well have been but the clean people do bad things too and that soaked in finally

Why was it so important what was because of the association I mean these hairy dirty monsters it was the associations which counted it is the associations which governed it’s the associations which formed these people and it was the associations of blood it was the associations of a whole way of life and it was Paul who was able by the grace of God to break that

We have seen more recently in our own history the problems with race we are seeing now the problems with the women making their move and if you listen to people talk about these kinds of things you often can sense the deep irrational connections which are involved in the blackness of an individual or the maleness or the femaleness of all these associations which govern they short-circuit our brains and they and they say to us in effect sometimes these people aren’t they aren’t even people really I had an aunt who firmly believed that a negro is an animal a black was an animal and when she was told that you could transfuse black blood into white veins and conversely she was she wouldn’t believe it she rejected it now she was an otherwise intelligent person but the associations were too strong she could not see it those associations which govern

And you have to understand that that’s the dark power of the work of the flesh is to play upon those things and that is what has to be redeemed in our hearts that’s the work of God in renewing those things and taking those associations out and replacing them with something good something proper something right something that would allow people to extend the kingdom of God to anyone

Now we’re not by any means completely at home with all of these extensions and I want to say just a word or two about them how far does this freedom exist suppose we were to discover a culture in which people regularly stole from one another or a culture in which they offered up a young man every full of the moon on some high stone on some high hill suppose the young man counted it an honor to be offered I mean would we just go along and say well that’s fine it’s a local custom right it’s a local custom and if it’s a local custom it’s fine that is the thing which threatens us when we begin to understand that there are other pots which are just as good as our pot maybe even better to hold the treasure of the kingdom of God that’s the thing which threatens us because we get the feeling and it’s a right worry is just anything okay