Friday, April 29, 2011

Acts 14:1-7

In Iconium
1 At Iconium Paul and Barnabas went as usual into the Jewish synagogue. There they spoke so effectively that a great number of Jews and Greeks believed. 2 But the Jews who refused to believe stirred up the other Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the brothers. 3 So Paul and Barnabas spent considerable time there, speaking boldly for the Lord, who confirmed the message of his grace by enabling them to perform signs and wonders. 4 The people of the city were divided; some sided with the Jews, others with the apostles. 5 There was a plot afoot among both Gentiles and Jews, together with their leaders, to mistreat them and stone them. 6 But they found out about it and fled to the Lycaonian cities of Lystra and Derbe and to the surrounding country, 7 where they continued to preach the gospel.


Dig Deeper
Many Christians these days seem to have a real problem with Christianity. Oh, they love certain aspects of it, like maybe the traditions, the encouragement that it can bring, and the camaraderie but there are also aspects of it that they do not like. People who claim to be Christians themselves are almost embarrassed at the idea of Christianity being divisive in any way. They have instead turned Christianity into a sort of universal catch-all where any beliefs are welcome and they don’t want to create waves at all. They cringe at and denounce anything Christian that actually divides the saved from the lost, the disciple from the wanderer.

As trendy and popular as that sort of Christianity has become in our world of tolerance, it stands in stark contrast to the beliefs and practices of the first century. This can be difficult because it is not acceptable in our culture to claim a singular truth. It is deemed offensive and arrogant to do so. But at the heart of the gospel message is the truth that Jesus claimed that he was “the way, the truth, and the life,” and that no one could come to the Father but through him (Jn. 14:6). Jesus also made it quite clear that his gospel would cause division: “Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division. From now on there will be five in one family divided against each other, three against two and two against three. They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law” (Lk. 12:51-53). The message of the gospel that brings peace to those who accept it is so demanding and challenging that most will not accept and that automatically causes division.

Nearly every religion, of course, makes truth claims at one level or another. That is important because truth claims necessarily separate those that accept those truth claims from those that don’t. What sets Christianity apart, however, is that it is the only religion, philosophy, or worldview that can actually plausibly back up its claim to be truth. The vital question to ask here is how do we determine that a religion or philosophy is true? Nearly all religions and philosophies that seek to answer that question respond by saying that an adherent will simply know within themselves that this is true. It is that inner witness and confirmation which will tell them that their beliefs are true. But that is not what the early Christians staked their claim on. In the first 19 verses of 1 Corinthians 15, Paul makes it quite clear that the veracity of the Christian faith lies in the historical fact of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. If it happened as claimed then Christianity is true and Jesus really is the rightful savior and Lord of the entire world. If it never happened, then Christianity is a sham and a waste of time.

Armed with the resurrection as the core of the truth of the gospel, as Luke has made clear throughout the book of Acts, the disciples went around boldly proclaiming the gospel. But just as surely as they preached the resurrection of Christ wherever they went they also encountered sharp opposition wherever they went. It was something that they could expect. Jesus had told them as much, saying “You will be hated by everyone because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved” (Matt. 10:22). Wherever they went the gospel divided between those who wanted the light that was revealed through the preaching of the truth of the word of God and those who hated the light and chose to stay in the dark. It’s a truth that we must firmly understand and accept or the Christian walk will always be painful and unbearable. Preaching the truth will not be popular; it will not always produce results; and it will always cause division and opposition.

As was their usual custom, Paul and Barnabas began their preaching Iconium at the synagogue. It served as a good based to reach out to the Jews and Gentile God-fearers. Those who were waiting for God to act on his promises and were open to the truth of Jesus being the Messiah and fulfillment of those promises were quick to believe so the mission in Iconium met some early success. But that did not mean that things were all pleasant. The Jews who refused to accept the truth of the gospel were not content to simply reject it and walk away. They, like Paul once was, were determined to show their zeal for God’s ways by fighting and hopefully destroying this new upstart Messianic movement. So they stirred up the Gentiles, presumably both the God-fearing Gentiles and the pagan Gentiles, by slandering the gospel and urging them to actively oppose and persecute the Christians.

Without the fully established witness of the word of God as contained in the New Testament, the Holy Spirit confirmed their message through the means of signs and wonders. Luke doesn’t specifically recount what those were in Iconium, but they no doubt included the same sorts of things like praising God in languages that were previously unknown to the speaker and miraculous healing as they had performed in other places. These signs were not meant to impress so much as to demonstrate the values and principles of the age to come. Through the preaching of the gospel and the establishment of the kingdom of God, the elements of that future age were breaking into the present age. The manifestations of that, the signs and wonders, were confirmation that access to that age of eternal life really was available through the Messiah just as they claimed.

As Christianity will do, their message divided the city. To some it was foolishness. To others it was a stumbling block and a scandal. But to others, they saw in the gospel presentation, the power of God. The life of God’s age to come really had broken into the present age through the resurrection of Jesus the Messiah and had been made available not just to the Jews but also the Gentiles.

It appears that there was a bit of lag time between the arrival of Paul and Barnabas in Iconium and the time that the persecution against them gained traction. Luke doesn’t tell us how much time they were able to spend there but it was enough time that they were able to establish the core of a Christian community when they left. God had established a window for them of just enough time to do what they needed to do there and then get out before the persecution got too stiff. Eventually a plot somehow came to their attention that their lives were in danger and God had more work for them to do. It is important to note that the reason they left was not because their lives were in danger or because they were afraid but precisely because it was God’s plan and will that they continue on in the mission. When the time came for them to face death, they would do that without flinching, as men who believed firmly in the resurrection of those in Christ.

Upon leaving Iconium, Paul’s group would head Southwest to the Lycaonian cities of Lystra and Derbe. This was no normal escape or vacation, however. They went there to continue their mission of preaching the gospel. This illustrates the importance of understanding the true nature of the gospel. If we rightly understand that the true gospel is the victory proclamation that Jesus is God’s promised Messiah who has defeated death through his resurrection and shown himself to be the true King and Lord of all people, and that the only proper response is to obey that proclamation by laying down our own lives and will, and entering into the body of believers that is God’s family, and live according to his will by putting the interests of the family of believers ahead of our own personal interests, then the path becomes clear. Wherever we go we can’t help but to declare this truth and live out the reality of the kingdom of God on earth. We realize that we are God’s people, called to live together as his family that is imperfect in this age but dedicated to the proposition of living here and now as a people that are committed to the values, principles, and realities of that future age. If this is our true mindset then we will naturally spread the gospel wherever we go.

If, however, we are confused on all of this and think of salvation as a personal issue between God and myself that does little more than change my future from an eternity in hell to one in heaven with God, then evangelism becomes a very different animal. It becomes something that I must constantly do rather than who I am. It becomes a task of which I can tire rather easily instead of a constant expression of the recognition of who we are in Christ and an ongoing expression of gratitude for calling us to be his family. It is when we really grasp that fully that we too will continue to preach the gospel wherever we go.


Devotional Thought
What is your attitude about evangelism? Is it something that you have to do or is it a natural expression of who you are? As you share your faith with those that need to hear the gospel have you embraced the fact that it will be divisive and not necessarily make you the most popular person? Why is that an important truth to grasp?

Monday, April 25, 2011

Acts 13:42-52

42 As Paul and Barnabas were leaving the synagogue, the people invited them to speak further about these things on the next Sabbath. 43 When the congregation was dismissed, many of the Jews and devout converts to Judaism followed Paul and Barnabas, who talked with them and urged them to continue in the grace of God.
44 On the next Sabbath almost the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord. 45 When the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy. They began to contradict what Paul was saying and heaped abuse on him.

46 Then Paul and Barnabas answered them boldly: “We had to speak the word of God to you first. Since you reject it and do not consider yourselves worthy of eternal life, we now turn to the Gentiles. 47 For this is what the Lord has commanded us:

“‘I have made you[f] a light for the Gentiles,
that you[g] may bring salvation to the ends of the earth.’[h]”

48 When the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and honored the word of the Lord; and all who were appointed for eternal life believed.

49 The word of the Lord spread through the whole region. 50 But the Jewish leaders incited the God-fearing women of high standing and the leading men of the city. They stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them from their region. 51 So they shook the dust off their feet as a warning to them and went to Iconium. 52 And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.


Dig Deeper
Nearly ten years ago, a well-known Hollywood actor and producer began to formulate an idea of creating a detailed movie about the crucifixion and death of Jesus the Messiah. He took the idea to virtually every movie studio and producer in Hollywood and shopped his idea of doing the film in a gritty and fully realistic style, complete with the use of ancient languages and only English subtitles. The studios laughed him out of their offices, despite his great fame and previous movie success, and turned him down flat. Most of them called him crazy for even thinking of such an idea. But he would not be deterred so he decided to make the movie himself and fund every bit of it from his own personal fortune. Once the movie was made and was released in theaters, a worldwide phenomenon began almost instantly. The movie, “The Passion of the Christ,” was a smash hit and eventually raked in more than 600 million dollars in box office sales alone around the world. When the movie eventually came out on VHS and DVD, it sold nearly 2.5 million copies in one day.

But once that movie came out, many of the studios and movie critics were highly critical of it. The creator of the movie was criticized for making it himself and spurning the normal way to make and release movies but it seemed to smack more of pure jealousy than anything else. They had all had a turn at the movie and passed on it. They were like immature young men who broke up with a girl and then got jealous when she started dating someone else. They could have been part of the movie and helped to make it but they refused. As a result they would miss out on the massive profits and impact that the film had around the world. But it was their choice to not be part of it.

It might be safe to say that there was no human being in the first century outside of Jesus himself that wanted to see the Jews come to the eternal family of God through Jesus Christ and be part of God’s kingdom forever. Paul knew that Israel had been God’s chosen people and because of that they had certain opportunities that no other people had. So that made it all the more devastating for him to see them hear the gospel of Jesus Christ and reject it. He knew that heart all too well because he had shared in that same attitude at one time. But he had come to recognize that through the resurrection, Jesus had been shown to be the true Son of God and that only those who would lay down their lives and enter into his life through faith would enjoy the corporate status in Christ of being the children of God. That the majority of Israel was rejecting all of that pained Paul deeply. In Romans 9 he would painfully declare that “I speak the truth in Christ—I am not lying, my conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit—I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race, the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption to sonship; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises. Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen” (Rom. 9:1-5).

Israel had been given the charge of being the faithful people of God and being a light to the nations but they had failed. What they had failed to do, Christ accomplished. He had faithfully done God’s will and fulfilled the role of the suffering servant culminating in his death on the Cross. He had declared himself to be the Messiah but Israel had rejected him as the holy one of God and had sentenced him to death. Yet, God vetoed that verdict and proved it monstrously unjust by raising him from the dead. Soon after, the good news was being declared by the apostles that all who would come to the Messiah in faith would be part of God’s family and receive the life of the age to come, dwelling in God’s kingdom forever. Some Jews listened and came and entered into Christ but most found the preaching of the gospel to be offensive and absurd. They would have no time for such blasphemy. But at any point, it all could have been theirs again. Everything that Israel had as the people of God could have been theirs forever in Christ but they were, much to Paul’s chagrin, rejecting that outright.

Despite this rejection by Jewish leaders and synagogues in city after city, Paul and Barnabas faithfully continued their practice of preaching first to the Jews in each city, usually in the local synagogue, and then to the Gentile. On this occasion there were many Jews and God-fearing Gentiles who continued to hear them out. Paul and Barnabas urged them to continue to be open to the grace that God had revealed in the life of the Messiah and when they showed up to preach on the next Sabbath, the place was packed with mostly Gentiles.

This apparently infuriated the Jews. Luke’s stated reason for their rage was jealousy. They had failed miserably in having such an evangelistic impact on the Gentile population and now in the span of a mere week, these men that they characterized as blasphemers and fools had done what they could only hope to do. They had drawn the Gentiles in huge numbers to their synagogue. It’s not hard to see why they were so jealous. Imagine showing up for a Sunday church gathering only to find that you can barely squeeze your way in because the place is packed to hear the very people that you have rejected as being outside of God’s truth.

Full of the Holy Spirit, Paul and Barnabas quickly responded to this petty jealousy with bold words. They made it clear to the Jews that they could have been a part of this. It was the role of Israel all along to be a light to the world. They rejected that mission and instead largely treated the pagan nations as unclean animals rather than human beings that were in the dark but needed to see the light. Jesus was that light and his gospel had been preached to them, offering them another opportunity to be part of God’s great ministry of reconciliation to the nations, but once again their own agenda superceded that of God’s. So the jealousy was really quite ridiculous. It was they who turned away. If this synagogue had been faithful to God and accepting of his Messiah then they would not be in danger of losing a large portion of their Gentile participants as well as a large number of Gentiles that had never been part of their synagogue.

The gospel had been rejected by a majority of the Jews and so would be made available to the Gentiles, not as a punishment for Israel’s rejection but as the ordained progression of the gospel (Rom. 1:16). It was made available first to the Jew, then the Gentile. This was a pattern that Paul would continue to follow throughout his ministry as he moved from town to town. While the Jews of that synagogue were filled with jealousy rather than the remorse that they should have been filled with, the Gentiles were thrilled. They understood the significance of what Paul and Barnabas were telling them. They grasped the full impact of the reality that they “were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus [they] who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ” (Eph. 2:19).

The Gentiles had joined those that were appointed for eternal life. This doesn’t mean, as some might mistakenly take it, that only the Gentiles that were specifically predestined by God for salvation had responded while those that were created to reject the gospel did so. It is true that God always takes the initiative in salvation but each person is allowed the free will by God to accept or reject the gospel on their own terms. What has been appointed by God since the very beginning is that he would have a Messiah shaped family. In other words, God had always pre-determined that he would have a people for himself that would come unto him through the death and resurrection life of Jesus. When the Gentiles responded in faith, they joined the number of those that were appointed for the life of the age to come.

In the face of some success in preaching the gospel, the Jewish leaders were able to whip up support among the Gentiles that were sympathetic to them against the further spread of the message of the apostles. Many had heard the word and believed but many more had rejected. The response from Paul and Barnabas was significant. Shaking the dust off of one’s feet was the common action of a Jew upon leaving a pagan town or area. It signified that they were shaking off the sin and evil influence of those that had rejected the ways of God and returning to God’s people. It was a sign of both judgment and repudiation. Now the Christians were turning that around on those who had rejected the gospel. It was a sign that the Jews who rejected the gospel were no longer part of God’s people and would now find themselves outside of the family God while the Gentiles who had never been part of God’s family would continue in their status of alienation from the true people of God (cf. Lk. 9:5 10:11).

The constant rejection that they faced, however, did not leave them dejected. They were filled with true joy and the Holy Spirit, two states of being that go together. You simply will not have one without the other. Jesus had well prepared them for the fact that his people would face much more rejection than acceptance. The true gospel always divides, always offends, and always demands sacrifice. That is certainly a reminder for modern Christians who often seem to seek favor, acceptance, and comfort. Could it be that we are lacking the full measure of the Holy Spirit in our lives and the joy that he brings because we are unwilling to go where he is really leading?


Devotional Thought
Paul and Barnabas continued to spread the truth of the gospel whether their message was accepted and became popular or if it was widely rejected and resulted in their persecution. Do you have that same resolve to share your faith and preach the gospel to those around you or do you begin to falter when you don’t encounter immediate and continued success?

Friday, April 22, 2011

Acts 13:26-41

26 “Brothers, children of Abraham, and you God-fearing Gentiles, it is to us that this message of salvation has been sent. 27 The people of Jerusalem and their rulers did not recognize Jesus, yet in condemning him they fulfilled the words of the prophets that are read every Sabbath. 28 Though they found no proper ground for a death sentence, they asked Pilate to have him executed. 29 When they had carried out all that was written about him, they took him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb. 30 But God raised him from the dead, 31 and for many days he was seen by those who had traveled with him from Galilee to Jerusalem. They are now his witnesses to our people.
32 “We tell you the good news: What God promised our fathers 33 he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. As it is written in the second Psalm:
“‘You are my Son;
today I have become your Father.[b]’[c]
34 The fact that God raised him from the dead, never to decay, is stated in these words:
“‘I will give you the holy and sure blessings promised to David.’[d]

35 So it is stated elsewhere:
“‘You will not let your Holy One see decay.’[e]

36 “For when David had served God’s purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep; he was buried with his fathers and his body decayed. 37 But the one whom God raised from the dead did not see decay.
38 “Therefore, my brothers, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. 39 Through him everyone who believes is justified from everything you could not be justified from by the law of Moses. 40 Take care that what the prophets have said does not happen to you:

41 “‘Look, you scoffers,
wonder and perish,
for I am going to do something in your days
that you would never believe,
even if someone told you.’[f]”


Dig Deeper
Many people seek out happiness in their life with ruthless passion. They place their own perceived need for happiness above everything else in their life and will go after it with tireless devotion. Of course there is a fundamental flaw with that mentality despite the fact that most humans spend their entire lives in the endless pursuit of this elusive happiness. The reality is that humans were really created to run on happiness we were created to run on the fuel of being God’s image bearers. It is when we realize that function in our lives that we find true joy and the elusive happiness that comes along with that. The problem that this fundamental misunderstanding causes, however, is that people often spend a good bulk of their lives seeking after happiness in the wrong things and putting their hope in the wrong places.

People will pursue money, fame, wealth, sex, food, and a countless number of other things looking to find that eternal and lasting happiness in their lives but it will never come through those things. In fact, people can become so desperate in their never-ending saga to find the pool of happiness from which to drink that they will allow themselves to be abused and mistreated. Will do horrible things to themselves with drugs and alcohol in order to find happiness. Or they will let another person come into and out of a relationship with them and abuse them because they suspect that this person might bring them the happiness that they so desire. The sad thing is that they are putting their hope in the wrong place. I’m not sure that there is anything sadder than that.

Although it may not seem like it at first glance, misplaced hope is at the heart of Paul’s message here. It all comes down to a matter of where they were placing their hope. The Jews and God-fearing Gentiles understood that God had a story that he was weaving throughout history to have a people for himself. They all desired, at one level or another, to be part of that story. But where were they placing hope to be part of God’s story and his people? Was their hope invested in the right place? That is the key question that lies just beneath the surface here.

In the first part of this particular narrative, Paul demonstrated for his audience the fact that the story he was telling was the only logical continuation of the story of God and his people. It simply had to go this way. But now he clearly states perhaps the most exciting aspect of all. God had given many specific promises in the Old Testament concerning the formation of his promised family, their freedom from the curse of sin, and the coming of the Messiah to bring all of that about. For hundreds of years God’s people had waited in eager anticipation for God’s promises to come true. In fact, Hebrews 11 is a primer course on the righteous men and women of the Old Testament times and how they remained faithful to hope of God’s promises despite difficult circumstances and seeming evidence to the contrary. All of those promises had finally arrived and the best part was that they were the ones that were part of the very early years. The incredible gift of God’s salvation had come in their lifetime!

But with great opportunity also comes great responsibility. The Messiah had come during their lifetimes and they had the incredible opportunity to accept his life and salvation but that also meant that those who refused to accept Jesus as the promised Messiah would be making the catastrophic mistake of refusing God’s salvation. The rulers and leaders of the religious groups in Jerusalem had made that mistake. Their condemnation of Christ was really their own condemnation for what it really accomplished was that they took the role of those that had been prophesied who would oppose the Messiah and cause him to suffer. Their opposition, in fact, should not shake the confidence of anyone who was drawn to putting their faith in the Messiah for it wasn’t a sign that he was not the Messiah but was a fulfillment of prophecy and a sign that he was indeed the Messiah.

At every point, Paul stresses that the Jewish leadership acted not out of genuine concern for God but in opposition to him. They had so set themselves up against God’s true purposes that they found themselves fulfilling the role of the villainous persecutors that were all part of God’s plan for his suffering servant. In that sense, they acted according to God’s plan but not according to his will. They had him killed despite having no lawful reason for doing so, they hung him ingloriously on a tree to identify him as one cursed by God, and they had him put in a tomb to rot.

That was the verdict of the religious leaders of Jerusalem but God had clearly vetoed that decision by resurrecting Jesus from the dead. God had overruled their will with his own mighty power and there were many eyewitnesses who could bare testimony to that fact. In point of fact, becoming witnesses to the truth of the resurrection is what all disciples then were called to do and what we are still called to be now. Not in the same way of course, but we still are given the task of calling people to look at the evidence of the power of the resurrected Christ in our own lives.

Like Peter did in Acts, Paul then launched into a series of Old Testament passages to show his audience that he and the other disciples were not claiming to be witnesses to something that was not of God. The sacred Scriptures had pointed to the type of Messiah that Jesus had proven to be all along.

They might not have been able to piece together the prophecies to fully understand the role of the Messiah before he came, but now they only need to look at the Scriptures concerning the Messiah. The second Psalm had declared that a specific day would come when the messiah would be shown to be the true Son of God. And passages like Psalm 16:10 had declared that God’s holy one, the Messiah, would die but his body would somehow not see decay as all people do when they die. Paul also quoted from Isaiah 55 to make the point that all of the blessings and promises of God’s people would find their fulfillment in David’s family. Yet that Psalm goes on to imply that people would not immediately grasp how the Messiah could be the fulfillment of all of God’s promises because man’s thoughts are not God’s thoughts, nor man’s ways, God’s way.

His point with all of that was sharp and clear. God had given these promises to the house of David but David could clearly not have been the fulfillment of those promises. David died like all men do. David was buried and then his body decayed like all bodies do. That would clearly disqualify him from being the one that the Psalms referred to. When you think that the answer is 3 but the question is shown to be 2 + 2, the answer clearly cannot be 3. There was only one who could claim to have died yet been resurrected by God without seeing decay. He alone was the one in whom their hope should and their faith should lay.

This isn’t all just a bunch of random and interesting facts though. Understanding who the Messiah is and accepting him as such isn’t just nice mental exercise or even an important philosophy. It is the most important thing that anyone must decide. Do they accept Jesus as God’s promised Messiah or not. Because, according to Paul and the gospel, in the resurrection lies the reality of forgiveness of sins that are available only to those in God’s family. That’s, in that sense, what it means to be justified. God’s promise was to create a family of those that would be blessed from the curse of sin and becoming part of that family is only available by having faith in Jesus and entering through baptism into his life. Following the Law of Moses could never accomplish that. The Law and any other religion or philosophy that still exists today can only conform one’s current behavior. They cannot and never could change one’s status from outside of the family God to a full member (see Eph. 2) and they can never restore and transform one back into the image of God that they were created to be (see 2 Cor. 3:18; Col. 3:10; Eph. 4:21-24; 1 Cor. 15:49).

Because this is such an important and pivotal issue is why Paul attaches a warning. Rejecting the Messiah means completely missing the boat of what God is doing in the world. Verse 41 quotes from Habakkuk 1:5 where God warns of the dangers of missing out on what he is doing. Habakkuk goes on to say that he will stand watch and make every effort to not miss God’s work. God then promises that soon he will justify those that live by faith. This is exactly what God has delivered through his resurrected Messiah. It is in the Messiah alone that we can be justified and brought into God’s promised family. There is great danger if we put our trust in anything else. That’s a truth that must be truly believed by God’s people and proclaimed with great confidence.


Devotional Thought
How confident are you in declaring that entering into the life of Christ is the only way to be restored in the image of God and reconciled with the Father? It is not a popular message in our day but it is the truth. Isn’t it time that you declared it boldly?

Monday, April 11, 2011

Acts 13:13-25

13 From Paphos, Paul and his companions sailed to Perga in Pamphylia, where John left them to return to Jerusalem. 14 From Perga they went on to Pisidian Antioch. On the Sabbath they entered the synagogue and sat down. 15 After the reading from the Law and the Prophets, the leaders of the synagogue sent word to them, saying, “Brothers, if you have a word of exhortation for the people, please speak.”

16 Standing up, Paul motioned with his hand and said: “Fellow Israelites and you Gentiles who worship God, listen to me! 17 The God of the people of Israel chose our ancestors; he made the people prosper during their stay in Egypt; with mighty power he led them out of that country; 18 for about forty years he endured their conduct[a] in the wilderness; 19 and he overthrew seven nations in Canaan, giving their land to his people as their inheritance. 20 All this took about 450 years.

“After this, God gave them judges until the time of Samuel the prophet. 21 Then the people asked for a king, and he gave them Saul son of Kish, of the tribe of Benjamin, who ruled forty years. 22 After removing Saul, he made David their king. God testified concerning him: ‘I have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.’

23 “From this man’s descendants God has brought to Israel the Savior Jesus, as he promised. 24 Before the coming of Jesus, John preached repentance and baptism to all the people of Israel. 25 As John was completing his work, he said: ‘Who do you suppose I am? I am not the one you are looking for. But there is one coming after me whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.’



Dig Deeper
One of the interesting things about watching certain movies on DVD is all of the extra features that they add to a disc in addition to the movie itself. Occasionally you will watch a movie that has an interesting ending only to go to the extra features on the DVD and find that they have an alternate ending or several alternate endings. I remember watching one movie that had something like five or six alternate endings. It’s always a bit interesting to watch those different scenarios but sometimes the alternate endings radically change the way the movie ends or even changes the way that you look at the whole movie. There has been a few times where I have watched the alternate ending and almost felt like it ruined the experience of watching the movie for me and seeing it come to a satisfying conclusion. I always have to wonder just how important the story actually was and how tightly was it written if it can end in multiple ways.

As we have already seen throughout the book of Acts, most notably in Acts 7 with Stephen’s account, the early Christians most generally relayed the gospel to others through the vehicle of telling story. This is especially true when they were speaking to Jews but it certainly wasn’t limited to that. Stories connect with people and invite them to join in and find their own place in the narrative and how they can carry the tale forward into the future. As human beings we seem to be programmed to connect with and be moved by a good story. I know of no one that will pay $10 to sit in a darkened room as interesting facts are scrolled on a screen but we will do so readily in a movie theater if we think that we are going to see a good story. Despite the fact that the gospel is rarely preached or told as a story in our day, that was the primary way that the early church shared about Jesus the Christ.

They usually did this by telling the story of Israel and brining out certain aspects to show that God’s story was moving in a specific direction the whole time. What really made this story unique, though, was the fact that it simply could not have an alternate ending. If told correctly, the story of the Old Testament can only end properly with Jesus Christ. Without Christ it is an incomplete story and without the true gospel about Jesus Christ, the story just does not come together rightly. This is precisely what Paul was getting at in Romans 8:29 when, in the middle of explaining just who God’s people are, he says that “those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers” (Rom. 8:29). In other words, from the beginning of time it was God’s plan to have a Christ-shaped family. The story of God’s people could only end with Jesus as the Messiah because that is precisely where the story was heading the entire time. If you change the ending the story became meaningless. That is what the early Christians wanted people to see and understand.

Luke begins this section by slipping in the detail that John Mark left the work as they arrived in Pamphylia and returned to Jerusalem. He doesn’t give us any details on why John Mark left and so any speculation on our part is nothing more than just that. Luke has slipped in this small detail here, though, because what seems insignificant right now will become important in the end of chapter 15 when a dispute will arise over this very incident.

It seems that by this time, Paul has come to the forefront in leadership which seems to be indicated by the fact that Luke refers to the group as “Paul and his companions” rather than “Barnabas and Saul” as he has fairly regularly up to this point. The usual practice for Paul on his missionary journeys was to start his base of preaching in the synagogues and work outward from there. This time was no different as he began preaching in Pisidian Antioch (a different Antioch than the one that served as the home church for Paul and Barnabas) on the Sabbath, the easiest time to find groups of Jews and Gentile God-fearers (Gentiles that respected certain aspects of the Jewish religion and even worshiped with them but had not become circumcised and were not considered to be full members of God’s family) gathered together. Paul jumped at the opportunity to speak, although whether this chance came about through common courtesy shown to visitors or if it was that those at the synagogue had heard of Paul and his gospel and were curious to hear it, we are not told.

Stephen spent a good deal of time expounding on the story of Israel, focusing on Abraham, Joseph, and Moses to make the point that Israel’s story was always pointing to a Messiah like Jesus. It was where the story had to end. Paul is going to make the same point but focus on different aspects of God’s story. He will do that by spending a great deal of time talking about Israel’s first two kings, Saul and David, and thus emphasizing Jesus’ kingly heritage.

There was no question in Paul’s mind that the one, true God had chosen Israel to be his people. He would preach that point strongly to Jews but also to a mixed crowd of Jews and Gentile God-fearers like this one. God had called Israel and brought them out of Egypt, patiently enduring their idolatrous conduct and bringing them into the land of Canaan. Paul stresses that God had worked patiently and slowly throughout all of this, taking, in fact, 450 years to bring this all about.

God continued to show patience and work slowly to bring about his ultimate plan through the time of the judges. This was a time when Israel repeatedly drifted from God only to cry out to him and experience his merciful deliverance. Again, though, God was slowly moving the story ahead that would culminate in his Messiah.

But God’s deliverance and mercy wasn’t enough for the people of Israel. They wanted a king and so God granted them one. He gave them Saul who ruled for forty years but God removed him as one who did not embrace God’s purposes and will. He then gave them David, not a perfect or sinless man, but a man who would seek God’s will in his life and during his reign.

David was the recipient of some key promises from God that tucked neatly into the original promises that God made to Abraham. Specifically, God had promised David that he would have an offspring that would come after him that would rule forever (2 Sam. 7:12-16; 22:51; Ps. 89:27-29, 35-37; 132:11-12). If this promised one was the one that would rule forever, then it only followed that this was the Messiah that would bring salvation to the people for eternity and bring about God’s long-promised family. To follow the story of God in what he did patiently to bring about David as the mighty king of Israel and then to look at the incredible promises that God gave to David, was to realize that this story could only culminate in Jesus Christ as the Lord and Messiah. The descendant that would rule forever could not have been referring to Solomon or any other of David’s descendants. It just could not have been a reference to any normal descendant or king. It had to refer to Jesus’ eternal rule over the world from the kingdom of God. He was the only possible way for this story to move forward. Take away Jesus and there were promises made by God that he would never fulfill and that simply could not be. If God failed to come through on his promises then he was no longer God.

But God would not send the promised king without him coming properly announced. That was John’s role. Repentance was a word used in the ancient world primarily in the military setting and often denoted one who was surrendering his way of life and joining the other army to avoid being annihilated. Baptism during the Old Testament times was used as someone was leaving their people and pagan gods behind and joining the people of Israel. It was a symbolic cleansing as one came to the God of Israel and joined the Jewish people. That John was using those terms was no small detail. The repentance and baptism that he declared were also symbols that would prepare people for the coming of the King. When the King came, the eternal repentance and the true baptism into the Messiah (that is why the New Testament writers were clear that water baptism into Christ by a believer was no mere symbol) would soon be available. John was pointing people to the next chapter, the coming of the Messiah as the fulfillment of God’s story. From David to John, all of the plot points of this story were pointing ahead to the only possible ending, the Messiah Jesus Christ.

The early Christians were masterful story tellers who consistently made the story of the gospel relevant to their audience. We face that same challenge today and it is our challenge to find new and relevant ways to show our audiences today where they fit into God’s story.


Devotional Thought
Have you done the work of being able to tell the story of God in the world and his Messiah in a way that includes and connects with people today? Spend some time contemplating what that might look like and how you might be the most effective that you can be in sharing the gospel with those around you that really need to hear it.