March 20, 2024 • 58 mins
In this episode, Kyle shares his recent trip to Mexico where he and his team built a home for a family. He highlights the efficiency of the home building process and the special experience of taking his son with him. The podcast hosts discuss their partnership with I-68 in Mexico and the importance of sharing the gospel. They then dive into the book of Acts, focusing on Paul's approach in Athens and his message about Yahweh being everyone's God. They explore the contrast between the one true God and other gods, emphasizing God's sovereignty and providence. The conversation concludes with a discussion on the relationship between God and humanity and the greatness of God's creativity. In this conversation, Kyle and David discuss the importance of contextualization in missions and the debate surrounding it. They also explore the concept of God as judge and the call to repentance. The significance of the resurrection and the cross is examined, along with the question of why God chose this method of salvation. The different responses to Paul's message are also highlighted.
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
Welcome to the Be Disciples podcast with yours,
kyle Morris, dakota Smith andDavid Glavin.
This is episode number 112.
Please share this podcast.
Follow us on social media,whether that's Facebook or
Instagram.
You can follow our church atOttawa Bible Church on YouTube
at Ottawa Bible Church.
I'll have those posted hereSubscribe, share, like whatever.
(00:34):
We just want people to hear thegospel.
We want people to be equippedin God's Word.
That's why we have this podcast.
So welcome to the podcast guys.
What's going on?
It's good to be home.
Yeah, you were in Mexico or ona nine day trip that included
time in Mexico.
Tell us a little bit about it.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Yeah, we have been taking our church down to Mexico
for the last three years now,and this is the longest one that
we made in attempt that.
So we took two and a half daysof travel there, two and a half
days of travel back and aboutfive days in between almost five
days in between and we built ahome for a family in Mexico.
(01:12):
The father was 21 years old,the mom was 24.
And they had three kidstogether.
And the father grew up in theChandler Gilbert area for all
his life, but his wife is acitizen in Mexico, so she's
unable to come over.
So I was literally speakingwith someone who I could have
(01:33):
crossed paths with at any givenpoint in time when we lived
there.
Yeah, he went to Perry HighSchool, okay, yeah, but also
spoke perfectly English perfectSpanish, of course.
And yeah, it was really coolbecause we got to dedicate this
home that our whole team builtto this family and I got to
share the gospel with this youngman who was from my same
(01:57):
neighborhood, and that was areally touching moment.
So we built a three bedroomhome in about three days.
Our team put up the home fasterthan any team I've ever been a
part of.
I've been on these trips withI6A in Mexico eight times for a
house build, four times forother occasions.
This was by far, by far thefastest that we have ever put up
(02:21):
a home and it helps to have abunch of Kansas boys who know
what they're doing and who builthomes, I mean we were like
literally a whole day ahead ofschedule and they're like you're
a small team, comparativelyspeaking, and you're way ahead.
So it's actually prettyimpressive.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Like guys, we came to work, we're not messing around.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
We came to work.
We're from Kansas, we don't?
We don't fool around here.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yeah, nice, and you got to take your son.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
I did.
That was probably the biggesthighlight for me is it's kind of
like a coming of age thing forour family.
It's a family tradition whenyou reach, you know, six years
old, you can go on your firstmission trip.
And so I brought Jojo and hewas at my hip the whole time.
I mean there were very fewmoments where he wasn't with me.
So we traveled together,colored together in the car, I
(03:09):
read him the Bible, stayedtogether in the cabins, stayed
together in the tents, went on ahike with him, shoveled dirt
with him, did stucco with him.
I mean every, every moment itwas with my son.
That was really special.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Yeah, that's awesome.
We it's been great to partnerwith I six eight for the last
few years in multiple differentways.
The the trip in January we wenton was with Scott from I six
eight and we've also gone upthere, which we will again this
year in September, to trainpastors in that same area.
And so our churches continue toinvest in that area of Mexico,
(03:48):
equipping, helping out withphysical needs as well.
But really the heart of thatministry is getting the gospel
out, reaching the lost.
And we know that because weknow Scott and sometime we'll
have to have him on the podcastbecause he'll just be able to
share his heart, not just thatpeople get a house built, but
that people hear the gospel,know the word and then continue
(04:09):
to disciple others.
So just what we're doing here,so we have a very similar
heartbeat and what we'resupposed to be doing as
Christians absolutely, david.
How was it a week withoutDakota?
It's probably the best weekwe've ever had.
I think it was stress free forhim.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
No comment.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
This is recorded.
No comment.
I love my pastor.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Brownie points I missed.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
Dakota man.
I hugged him big yesterday.
It wasn't fake either.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Yeah, I'm grateful to know you don't fake, hug me.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Yeah, it was.
It was a good.
Honestly, it's nice to have ateam.
Yeah, because if any of us aregone, we can.
We can help each other out andkeep going.
It doesn't usually nothingreally too much, too many
hiccups or anything like that.
So, yeah, last week was good.
So, let's, let's pray and we'regoing to continue.
In the book of Acts, we've beenin chapter 17.
(05:07):
And now Paul is on the verge ofhaving really a kind of a
debate, a teaching moment, andso he has been in Athens.
He's kind of been in rubbingshoulders with the philosophers
of the day, the thinkers of theday, having these discussions
about is there a God?
(05:27):
Who is this God?
And so Paul is going to getinto that today.
So let's pray and we're going tostudy the word.
Let's go, father, what awonderful day it is to just come
together in your word any daythat we get to open the Bible
and learn more about who you are.
That helps equip us in ourrelationship with you, but also
(05:47):
in opportunity to share thegospel with others and to
disciple others to do theministry, lord.
So we pray that this podcastwould go out into the world for
the purpose of your glory andfor the purpose of saving
lossals, and that people wouldreplicate Bible studies,
replicate opening the word.
(06:07):
So I thank you for all thoselistening and for all those who
are sharing and being a part ofthis conversation.
It's such a blessing to do thiseach week, and so just be with
us as we talk about your word.
Lead this conversation, lord,with the Holy Spirit, and just
bless our time In Jesus' name,amen.
Amen.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
So we're in Acts 17, 22 to 34.
And I think if there was like astructure, we would just give
to the text before we even readit.
Paul, of course, is approachingthe Athenians with the gospel,
and if there were like two bigideas that anchor us today, it's
one he's explaining to themthat Yahweh, the God he's
(06:50):
speaking about, is everyone'sGod.
This is not just, you know, aparticular group of people and
their God.
Yahweh is everyone's God.
That's the first idea.
The second idea is that he iseveryone's judge.
Yahweh is everyone's judge.
Maybe you could say it likethis Yahweh is everyone's
creator and Yahweh is everyone'sjudge.
(07:12):
So, with those two ideas, let'spick up the text and see in
verse 22.
It says so.
Paul stood in the midst of theAreopagus and said Men of Athens
, I observe that you are veryreligious in all respects, for
while I was passing through andexamining the objects of your
worship, I also found an altarwith this inscription to an
(07:36):
unknown God.
The Greek would literally sayto unknown God.
Therefore, what you worship inignorance, this I proclaim to
you the God who made the worldand all things in it, since he
is Lord of heaven and earth,does not dwell in temples made
with hands, nor is he served byhuman hands as though he needed
(08:00):
anything, since he himself givesto all people life and breath
and all things, and he made fromone man every nation of mankind
to live on all the face of theearth.
Having determined theirappointed times and the
boundaries of their habitation,that they would seek God.
If perhaps they might grope forhim and find him, though he is
(08:23):
not far from each one of us, forin him we live and move and
exist, as even some of your ownpoets have said, for we also are
his children.
Verse 29 probably closes, thefirst idea being then the
children of God.
We ought not to think that thedivine nature is like gold or
(08:45):
silver or stone, an image formedby the art and thought of man.
So 22 to 29 kind of gives usthat first overarching thought
Yahweh is everyone's creator.
So, guys, what do you see fromthe first few verses here, verse
22, verse 23,.
Let's just start there.
(09:05):
What is Paul doing?
What's his strategy?
I mean, what's the shape ofthis text?
What do we do with it?
Speaker 3 (09:16):
Well, one.
I think it's important to notethat Paul was speaking to the
Athenians, but first he was inthe synagogue and in the market
right, we looked in the pretextand then the Stoics, the
Epicureans, then they engagedhim and brought him to more of a
(09:36):
theater of philosophicalthought and discussion.
And so from a more generalpodium to a very specific podium
with, well, the thinkers of theday right.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
So this is an opportunity for him to influence
in some way the influencers andto bring back, bring their
minds to focus in on on Christand taking up a part of their
worship and their culture to doit Nice.
I think that's an importantconnection that he was invited
(10:13):
into this arena.
For what reason?
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Yeah, and we know his audience shifts from a Jewish
audience, where you normallywould go to the synagogue, to a
Gentile audience, specificallyGreek audience Greek, yeah.
And so you see a strategy shift.
Instead of going straight tothe scriptures, he's going to
address their religion andaddress some of the things that
(10:39):
he's noticed, and he's going tothen go in into who is the one
true God, who through creation.
So he's going to start anargument not based off of
necessarily the word right away,but off of their own thought,
and I think so it takes a bit ofa different strategy.
Paul is reaching the Gentilenations, so they may not have as
(11:01):
much of an understanding of theJewish culture, believes, and
so he's addressing it from adifferent angle.
So this would have this wouldhave meant Paul was thinking
through how he was going to doit.
He had a strategy, he he's anextremely smart individual who
would have said hey, I need touse logic, I need to use reason,
I need to use the things or theculture around me and to show
(11:24):
them who God truly is.
And so that's what Paul startsoff with with how many, use your
stuff, challenge it, push it alittle bit and say and then
start moving and then heeventually does use scripture,
but that's where he starts out.
So I think that's unique to hisaudience.
So he shifts based off of wherehe is, his own context.
He doesn't just go in and sayyou need to serve the Jewish God
(11:45):
.
He goes in with a differentunderstanding.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
He also kind of starts with tooting their horn a
little bit, you know.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
I need to use their culture.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
I see that you're very religious and show them why
they're wrong or they're seenthings incorrectly.
But I think it was all in moreflattery, or just to say yeah
yeah, all right.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Just, I see that you guys, I see that you guys are
thinkers, you guys aren'tignoring that something's going
on around you.
Something made this place orsomething you know.
There's something bigger thanus, and I recognize.
You guys recognize that.
So let's start there.
Let's start in common ground.
We believe in something of ahigher power of some kind,
whether that's multiple gods orone God.
(12:30):
So let's start there and thenmove in that direction.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Yeah, there's a quote that I read earlier, just in
preparation for this episode,and it said that in Olympus, the
city of Olympus, olympus had aplace where you could worship
like any God that you wanted.
Olympus was a very religiouscity and you know you'd have a
shrine or altar here or there.
But there's another quote thatthen went on to say but if you
(12:55):
were in Athens, every God wasgiven much more than just a tiny
little shrine, like every Godwas given a temple, every God
was given a much more seriousplace of worship.
And so what Paul has basicallysaid is this is the most
religious city that I've been tooutside of Jerusalem religious
in a different way.
So I think what he's saying isactually a reality.
(13:17):
I observe that you are veryreligious, and he's now Kyle, as
you said, seeking to use theirculture and their thinking not
to affirm their beliefs, but touse it as like a vehicle or a
segue to declaring the truth.
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Yeah, because he goes from I recognize your religious
place to the God who made theworld and everything in it,
being Lord of heaven and earth,does not live in temples made by
man.
So then he makes thedistinguishing statement between
what you believe in and what Ibelieve in.
Here's where it splits youthink these temples hold your
(13:58):
gods, where my God created allthings, even you.
So that kind of starts hisargument in the direction of who
is the one true God and startsto branch off from.
Okay, we all believe in somesort of God or gods, but the one
true God of heaven, the creatorof all things, doesn't dwell in
these temples.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
Well, and I think you know, speaking of Paul's
strategy, this very much is themodel of university apologetics
today.
We had an episode a couple ofweeks ago, when Chance was here,
concerning, you know, paul'sarguing and reasoning and
defending of the faith withindividuals.
(14:41):
And here Paul very specificallyshows you, I think, an
apologetic tactic calledpresuppositionalism.
And presuppositionalismbasically says it doesn't matter
where you go, what you do, whatyou face in life.
You are actually presupposingthat this ultimate God exists.
(15:02):
And if I were to sum up theargument of presuppositionalism
maybe a little further, I dothis in my classroom.
All the time I say there'sthree principles that you can't
deny, regardless of what youthink about God, even if you're
an atheist.
Number one, the principle iscalled the law of induction,
which means the next fiveminutes of our experience here
(15:26):
in this physical world will belike the last five minutes.
I'm not talking about likechanges in weather.
I'm talking about, likeeverybody assumes, like the laws
of gravity.
And so, therefore, the nextfive minutes is going to be like
the last five minutes, becausethe law of gravity doesn't
change.
And so, you know, this is theillustration I give in my class.
(15:48):
Everybody sitting in this roomright now sitting in their chair
is actually placing their faithin a creator or in the creator.
And they say what?
How could that be?
Just by sitting in my chair.
And I'm like have you everreached a point where you're
afraid of floating off intoouter space?
No, of course not.
Why are you not afraid ofsuddenly floating out of your
(16:08):
chair?
Well, because of gravity.
Okay, gravity is a law, yes, itis.
And does that law ever change?
No, it doesn't.
So then, do laws exist withouta lawgiver?
No, laws don't exist without alawgiver.
So if I appeal to the physicallaws of creation, of physics,
that that we're sitting in rightnow, you actually have to trust
(16:31):
in God just by sitting in yourchair.
So that's induction.
The next would be that of logic.
Everybody sitting herelistening to me right now in
this class is waiting for me tocontradict myself, because
subconsciously, you know what'slogical versus illogical.
In order for something to belogical, you have to first have
an ultimate mind.
You can't create logic, you uselogic.
(16:52):
And third would be the argumentof morality, which I think he's
going to get to later in thissection.
But Paul is straight up using apresuppositional argument to
say no, no, like there is theultimate God, who's created
everything, and he needs nothinghimself.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Yeah, and he starts to break down in his, in this
first part, the distinctionsbetween the one true God and
their gods, like, startshammering them, like, right away
he says the God who madeeverything, my God has created
all things.
Your gods have these piddlytasks right?
My God is the God of heaven.
(17:31):
Your Mount Olympus is nothing,right, that's just a little
mountain.
My God is the God of all things.
And then he goes into this.
He says in verse 25, nor is heserved by human hands, as though
he needed anything, since hehimself gives to mankind life
and breath and everything.
See, my God doesn't need ourworship, like your gods do.
(17:54):
Like your gods do, that's right.
In order to please your gods,to get things from them, and
they always they're going to getangry if you don't and there's
going to be punishment for it.
See, my God glorifies himself.
He doesn't need us, he createdus for his purpose and his glory
.
So he starts to really dig into, like, the main things that
they believe in and starts tojust chip away and say I know my
(18:19):
God's better because my God'sreal and your God is.
Your gods are not.
Yeah, and so the character ofGod, the attributes of God, paul
goes right into it to startthis argument off.
It's really cool.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Well, I think the gods lower case G of the ancient
world were nothing more thanthe machinations or the
representation of humansthemselves.
Truly, these gods and theiridea were reflections of people,
because people created them.
(18:52):
But our God is not someone thatwe create in our minds.
Our God is someone that we aredependent on.
He is not dependent on us,right, and that's what separates
the biblical understanding oftranscendence.
God is so transcendent that heis above his creation.
He's the one who's eternal.
(19:13):
He's above it all.
We are just in the midst of hisplayground, which he has
created.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:18):
So while every other God says no, I need your worship
, god says no, I don't need it.
In fact, you're only worshipingme because I've given you
breath.
Without me, you have no breathat all.
Right?
So, definite contrast.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
And then in 26, he continues right.
And he made from one man everynation of mankind to live on all
the face of the earth, havingdetermined allotted periods and
boundaries of their dwellingplaces.
So God is sovereign, hecontrols all movement of all
mankind.
He created the one man in whichall humanity came out of.
So he's sovereign, he controlsall things.
(19:57):
He's also talking about hisprovidence, how God interacts
with humanity in time and how hechooses who dwells where.
Athenians, you are here becauseGod put you here.
He controls the leaders, hecontrols the nations, he
controls the movement of thepeople.
And so Paul's breaking downevery major attribute of God
(20:19):
that Paul knows, revealed by theHoly Spirit, how God operates
and works.
And so he doesn't have to.
He's not going back into theOld Testament and go all right,
let's go to Genesis, and maybeeventually he will, with some of
these people, he'll go into thescriptures, but he's just
taking all the key elements ofhow God has revealed himself,
both general revelation and thensome special revelation, and so
(20:41):
he's how does God, how has Godrevealed himself to humanity and
to us?
And he's just pointing thosethings out.
And so, again, a very base,apologetic, I think, structure
here by Paul hitting the mainthings where you want to start
and get people to agree on.
But man, what a cool littlepassage of attribute, attribute,
attribute, just listed, listed,listed, as Paul goes and that
(21:04):
helps us as we get equipped togo share God's word, who God is,
with people.
This is a great, just a great,like oh, I can go to Genesis, oh
, I can go here, I can go there.
We just did Genesis one throughthree at the college for brave
worship.
It was really cool because theygot to see how God made
humanity and God's view ofhumanity before the fall and
(21:25):
that it was very good.
And these are all reallyimportant things when we do this
.
I think that's the argument.
Paul's ramping up Like the wayyou view yourselves is so less
than that how God views you.
And I want you guys to know,athenians, that God loves you,
that he values you, he actuallycreated you for a purpose, that
humanity is something God wantsto be in relationship with, not
(21:49):
that he needs it unlike your God.
Speaker 3 (21:50):
What are the things that usually would be?
discussing this form and so hedoesn't need it, but he wants it
, and what an amazing thing tobe unwanted by God.
The pursuit of the ultimategood, or what is life about?
And I think it's probablyimportant to note that it
specifically says Epicureans andStoics.
(22:13):
So why is it important that itwas these two schools of thought
that drew him into thisdiscussion?
And so Epicureans, stoics, theywould have been like rivals in
a sense.
Epicureans philosophy andideology would have been around
longer than Stoicism Newthoughts are something they like
(22:35):
to tackle, but the Stoics andEpicureans would have always
been kind of at odds with eachother in debate.
And so you have, like theEpicureans with more of the
physical pleasure, you know, thegreatest pleasure for the
greatest good, kind of puttingaside pain and frustration, kind
(22:57):
of avoiding those things, andpleasure is the ultimate goal
and the Stoics is virtue.
So all these things that areimportant to them, you know, are
very self-centered, and Paul isalso taking these ideologies
and kind of just setting all ofthose things aside.
And it's not about the greatestgood or the greatest life here,
(23:20):
or what's important for you.
What's most important is whomade you and who made all of us,
and it's the great unifier, god, our Creator.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Yeah, and then he gets into.
He didn't just make you.
And then he, then he goes intoa quote in him we live and move
and have our being, and evensome of your own poets have said
for we are indeed his offspring.
Paul is going right to the tosay you are image bearers of the
one true God, like he getsright into, like how you were
(24:00):
created, your identity, likehe's playing off of.
You guys have kind of had someof these thoughts.
You guys have kind of talkedaround this about where you come
from.
It is true that God created youand he created you in his image
.
In him we live and move andhave our being.
He is in control of our verybreath.
He is in control of all thelaws that we just talked about.
(24:21):
He is the Creator of those, hecontrols those.
He makes sure everything movesthe way it's supposed to and so,
yeah, you right here, livingand breathing is all because of
God and you have that connectionwith God, whether you believe
in him or not, and that is thereand you have to wrestle with
that.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
I kind of alluded to this on Sunday, although in a
little bit different of a format, but everyone has a
relationship with God.
I mean, there is no such thingas an atheist.
There are people who haveconvinced themselves because of
the sinful nature of their ownthoughts.
They have deceived themselvesinto thinking that there is no
(25:01):
God, but the reality is based onRomans one.
Mankind is without excuse, soeveryone knows that there's a
God.
It's just rather, do you wantto address him or not?
How are you dealing with him?
Like you don't have a choice.
You have a relationship withGod, but it's either a good one
or it's a bad one, and so Ithink what Paul is getting at
(25:23):
here is that you have yourliving, your moving, you have
the very events of life that allcome underneath the fact that
God has allowed you to evenexist.
What I love when we were justtalking a minute ago, though,
about God determining theappointed times and the
boundaries of their habitation.
(25:45):
Actually, this is somewhat of ahot topic in America right now,
with what I would call theborder crisis, and what I would
say is a very difficult time, Ithink, if you are seeking to
lead and protect a group ofpeople, your nation.
As a leader, then you do what'snecessary to protect the
borders and the boundaries ofthat nation for your people.
(26:07):
And yet, at the same time, weknow that none of these moments
in human history are outside ofthe hand and the movement of God
.
There may be people who arecoming across the border from
different nations who weren'tbeing reached with the gospel,
and you don't know, generationsfrom now, how their children
will hear the gospel in America.
(26:28):
Like, as long as Christians arefaithful to preach it right,
it's a double-sided coin, on onehand, like you need to protect
your country, that's what makesyou a country.
On the other hand, it's likewell, yeah, but Lord, if people
are coming, then maybe it'sbecause the nations will be
reached with the gospel.
What I find interesting is,despite all of the comments
(26:51):
about sovereignty, look what hesays in verse 27.
It says that or so that theywould seek God if perhaps they
might grope for him and find him, though he is not far from each
one of us.
This seems to allude to thefact that every person, based on
(27:12):
their appointed times,boundaries, habitation, has the
ability to seek, or literally togrope, to grab, to reach out
for God, and that's God's willis that mankind would seek after
him.
That doesn't mean that it'sdone, but that's his desire.
Seek after me.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Yeah, and then he ends in 29 with more of the
direction that we're going in.
It says an image formed by theart and imagination of man and
so, being a God's offspring, weought not to think that the
divine being is light, gold orsilver or stone and image formed
in that way.
But, man, what an amazing thingthat we can't even really
(27:53):
explain what it means.
Totally.
We're broken image bearers, andthe creativity of God that made
us the order, the design thatwe see around us, the things
that we're still studying, theunknown that we still have no
idea, the reason there arescientists and all these
archaeologists and historiansand all these people studying
(28:15):
human life is because there's somuch mystery, because God has
so much more creativity than theGod's you worship.
The God of thunder, that's onelittle tiny thing that God made
Right.
Oh, the God of this, the God ofthat, like no, your guys, as
imagination came up with thesethings, but God's creativity
(28:36):
into the image that you bear asa human is so much greater.
And so he's almost sayingyou're missing out on such a
relationship with a real Godthat you're substituting it with
stones, like you can have somuch more God's who are limited,
yeah, and so, like I think he's, he's appealing to their hearts
(28:59):
more than anything else hereand he's saying you guys could
have so much more.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
And their intellect.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
Yeah, he's getting them to think the gods that you
worship are limited, they arewithin, they are bound by the
creation, but the God that Iworship is above creation.
But one last thought in thissection about how Yahweh is
everyone's God.
If you look back to verse 23,Paul, again, he looks at their
(29:28):
objects of worship and he findsthe one with the inscription to
an unknown God.
So he is using their cultureagain as a vehicle to his
message.
If you study the subject ofMissiology, which is the study
of missions, there's actually avery big debate today as to how
appropriate it is, how far youcan go to using another
(29:52):
culture's you knowcharacteristics in order to
bring them the gospel.
So, for instance and Bo Horlandtaught me all about this stuff
Bo is a former pastor and elderat Mesa Baptist, where we were
at, but he was a career,lifelong missionary in the
Philippines, and basicallythere's this concern that in the
(30:17):
field of missions, people canjust reach after anything they
want in order to get the gospelacross, and I don't think that's
appropriate either.
It's an issue calledcontextualization, and so where
you find this a really bigproblem is if you are a
missionary and you're trying toreach a group of Muslims who
(30:38):
you're in a Muslim majoritycountry.
Do you then say, hey, it's okayfor you to accept the gospel
but still to go to the mosqueand to pray, so much so that
people think you're stillpraying to Allah, but really
you're praying to Jesus?
Like, is that a level ofcontextualization we're okay
(30:58):
with?
Hey, read a Bible with Muslimfriendly language that has been
retranslated so that it's not asoffensive to your initial
Muslim reader.
I think that goes too far.
I don't think that you shouldencourage someone to continue to
deceptively portray themselvesas a Muslim, to change
(31:22):
translations of the Bible, to gointo the mosque, making others
thinking you're praying to Allah.
No, like.
Unfortunately, there is anecessary separation.
Once you become a Christian,you, regardless of where you're
at, you, have to separateyourself from the world, and so
I don't think Paul is affirmingyou know this unknown God as
(31:43):
anything else.
He's just saying I see thatyou're thinking about this.
I'm gonna take that as anopportunity to tell you who he
really is, whether you intendedto get there or not.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Yeah, so and Paul's a great example in other letters
that he writes to churches about, you know, doing the things of
the culture that would then giveyou an identity of another
belief system and notChristianity, right?
Yeah, like you don't need to goto that feast and eat of that
food because of what it wassacrificed for Not not for your
(32:15):
God, but for other gods and sothat's something you need to not
participate in.
That's would be a way toseparate yourself and say no, we
don't do that.
And so there's theseopportunities to say I'm a
Christian, I don't do that.
But then there areopportunities to say, yeah, I
could participate in that and Ican be a part of the culture of
(32:35):
the day and Still eat thiscertain food or go to this
certain event or whatever,because it doesn't say it
doesn't go against what Ibelieve, it doesn't say I'm
associated with another God oranother religion, but I'm just a
part of the people.
And so in a Muslim community,maybe you still wear Just what
the people wear the clothingclothing.
(32:57):
Yeah, not for the purpose ofwhat Allah would say right but
you'd wear it because, well,everyone else wears this
clothing.
That's like I'm wearing jeans.
I'm in a farming community,right, probably wear some jeans
or some boots or something.
You know like I could dressthat way, even if they don't
believe in Jesus.
So I think it's okay.
There's some things where we weneed to stay in our own context
a little bit, but not cross theline of saying I now identify
(33:20):
with something else.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Well, culture is always subject to the word of
God.
Culture doesn't come before it.
Another example Maybe we'llwrap a bow on this topic here.
Another example would be likesome churches you know, maybe
they want to reach like a wholegroup of you know
Harley-Davidson writers orsomething like that, and you
(33:44):
know what this?
This has actually happened.
Churches have decided to playfor their time of worship like
classic or Contemporary rocksongs which have nothing to do
with God.
You've seen, this Church isplaying just popular songs that
people have known over time andthen they go into like a 15
minute message afterwards.
I think that's too far.
(34:04):
Like, what are you singing andwho are you singing to?
If you're getting people toshow up and to sing Garth Brooks
Because, like you know, peoplearound here listen to country
music that's not worship, that'snot appropriate.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
But you can use.
You can use similar style ofsong, but change words.
Speaker 2 (34:24):
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
Then you would say we appeal to the style.
That's okay, you can play somerock.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
music is the rock for the Lord is the words For the
Lord, is the country musicglorifying the Lord?
Speaker 1 (34:36):
right, or glorifying the self, or whatever.
So I think, yeah, we can dothat.
I mean, we do that in musictoday.
Right, there's?
No, we don't.
There's contemporary music I'mlooking worship guy,
contemporary music, hymns.
I mean we've had thisdiscussion before.
There's all kinds of styleswithin music and we have
substance and but it's what the,it's what the words say, it's,
(34:56):
it's what we're actually sayingout loud to God.
We can't sing songs that havenothing to do with Jesus while
we're in church Worshiping Jesus, like that would be
inappropriate, you know, and wecan't pause.
I think we can change the style, but not the content when in
Rome do as the Romans do and Ithink as you were saying, to
(35:17):
make the distinction betweenDoing and being.
Speaker 3 (35:21):
If you were trying, if we're putting on a facade,
like I'm, I'm being like you andI'm acting.
That's not what Paul wastalking about.
He's talking about making aconnection and Coming to, to the
level that other people are atculturally so that you can
relate to them and they canrelate to you.
(35:42):
But yeah, but just pointing out, be with people in such a way
that you can help lead them toJesus where they're at, and and
often, if you're coming from aposition of you know, seen as
being condescending, or ifyou're coming from an outward
perspective, you won't belistening to as greatly if
(36:05):
you're seen as a peer and equal,or somebody who is, who is
actually carrying when you're atand and leading you to where,
yeah, god wants you to be, andthat is, you know, with Jesus.
Speaker 1 (36:21):
Yeah, yeah, I think it's well.
We know this, because Jesuspreaches that it's your heart
that changes and what comes outof your heart will come out of
your mouth, but it's it's yourcharacter that you're
distinguishing.
When you're in the community,your character should be that of
(36:44):
what God tells us in the Bibleto show, which is through Christ
.
So our foundation in Christchanges our heart, transforms us
, and so our character should bedifferent.
Right when in Rome, act as youknow, be with the Romans.
Well, yeah, don't act.
If you're Jewish, why would youseparate yourself externally
like the Pharisees would, and tocreate this distance between
(37:06):
you and them because of, well,you're not dressed like me and
you don't talk like me and youdon't eat the things that I eat,
what Paul's like.
How would that?
How would you then share thegospel with that if you did so
much external separation?
Your character separates youfrom them.
The way you behave separatesyou from them.
The way you talk separates youfrom them.
I think he's getting, he'sgonna get more into that,
(37:27):
especially in his letters tochurches, because that's that's
how a Christian should be.
I shouldn't walk around withthis External holiness that says
, well, I can't approach thatguy because you've so separated
yourself from me externally thatI don't feel like I can even
associate with you.
Now we're causing barriers inbetween.
Speaker 2 (37:47):
Who the gospel should be reached.
I think maybe a rule of thumbto just close this up would be
if I'm not Sacrificing mydoctrine and if I'm not
sacrificing my morals which gohand-in-hand on the altar of
culture, then it's okay.
If I'm not sacrificing my, mybeliefs and my morality, then I
(38:11):
can engage in culture.
If I have to sacrifice eitherof those two, then I should not
engage with culture.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
Yeah, I mean examples , like I Go to professional
baseball games.
But maybe there are some thingsthat that organization chooses
do that I don't agree with.
Well, I'm just not gonnaparticipate in those things.
I'm still gonna participate inlike cultural things.
It just may not be certaintimes right, we went to bull
riding with our families.
(38:38):
Yeah right, I'm sure the bullriding culture is somewhat is
probably not.
We wouldn't want our kidsaround the cowboys.
Right, they may say some words.
We may not want our kids around, but we went to the bull riding
event.
It was a lot of fun, right.
The event was family friendly.
We engage in a cultural eventthat has nothing to do with the
Bible.
It was a fun event.
We went and had fun, and so wecan.
It doesn't mean you can't goand do the things in the world
(39:00):
that the world has as offeredfor entertainment sake, as long
as you're not setting aside yourfaith, setting aside your
relationship with the Lord to godo it, and there's times you're
going to have to say no, forsure, yep.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
So, with that being said, we've talked about how
Yahweh is everyone's God.
Now we talk about how he iseveryone's judge.
Paul has started to allude tothis, his desires that people
would seek Him.
So, looking verse 30.
Now.
Therefore, having overlookedthe times of ignorance, god is
now declaring to men that allpeople everywhere should repent.
(39:35):
Why?
Because he has fixed a day inwhich he will judge the world in
righteousness through a manwhom he has appointed, having
furnished proof to all men byraising Him from the dead.
Now, when they heard of theresurrection of the dead, some
(39:56):
began to sneer, but others saidwe shall hear you again
concerning this.
So Paul went out of their midst, but some men joined him and
believed, among whom also wereDionysius the Areopagite and a
woman named Damaris and otherswith them.
So, guys, 30 to 34, he'severyone's judge.
(40:16):
The Gospel is at the forefrontin this passage.
What are some of the contoursof this section that you see?
Speaker 1 (40:26):
Well, paul preaches the Gospel at the end.
He does I mean, that's what hegets into the foundation of our
faith right at the endrepentance, turning away from
sin, accepting Christ or God asyour Savior, and he talks about
a resurrection.
Those are all really importantthings to our faith.
(40:46):
That is doctrine, that isfoundational.
So he starts to introduce thenthings that God has done for us,
but he also talks about thatthere will be a day where there
will be judgment on the world,and so there's a bit of a sense
of urgency.
I think, with Paul, like youguys can't mess around.
You need to turn in repent,because the one who saves also
(41:09):
judges, which you alreadymentioned.
That, dakota, yeah, the one whosaves is also the one who
judges.
And so, really, which side ofthat line do you want to be on?
Do you want to be on God sideor the world side?
And there, because there's onlytwo sides, right, there's not
why I'm on the side of Zeus andI'm on the side of this God and
that God.
No, no, no, no, no.
(41:29):
There's one God.
You're either on his side oryou're on the world side, the
sin side, god side, or an agentof Satan, and he's
distinguishing that here and so,but he's also doing it with the
message of hope, with themessage of grace, with the
message for everybody in allplaces and all people, that God
came to die on a cross and beresurrected.
(41:52):
So there's a message of hope,but the reality of judgment and
adjust God, and so again,hammering the characteristics
out of God, hammering out what,how he has revealed himself and
how he is going to work amongsthumanity and how he has handled
sin and how he's saved people.
But there will be a time wherejudgment will come.
(42:13):
And so man really wrapping upso many like you could write
books on one of these topics,but he'd narrow, he breaks it
down so fast here.
But he gets to the gospel and Ithink that's the biggest point
we have in this passage.
Paul gets to the place to sayhere's the creator of all things
.
He came to save you and this ishow you get saved, and he wants
to get there every single time.
(42:34):
I think that should be our goalas Christians.
In conversations you know, we'vetalked about books like Greg
Koko's book, who talks all abouthow to have conversation to
then kind of get to that pointwhere, boom, share the gospel.
You want to kind of guide thatconversation to that place.
Paul takes that opportunity.
He doesn't shy away from it,even though some mocked him.
(42:54):
But some believed and it'sworth it when they believe.
Who cares if I get mocked,because I'm telling the truth.
I want people to know it.
And then people did.
Some came and believed.
And that was the whole point ofwhy Paul was in there, not to
uplift himself like the rest ofthe thinkers were doing, but to
say I glorify the one true Godand I'm here to share the
(43:14):
message of truth.
And I don't care if youdisagree with me, I'm going to
do what God has told me to do.
And results people came to knowJesus.
Speaker 2 (43:23):
It does seem like there's a question that we could
ask, though, in verse 30,therefore, having overlooked the
times of ignorance, like whatdoes that mean?
Does that mean that, like Godwould not hold anybody
accountable in the past?
Thomas Constable, you shouldfind this resource if you can
Just look up Constable's notes,and he has hundreds of pages of
pastoral research donethroughout his career on every
(43:46):
book of the Bible.
So I'm on Constable's notes forthe book of Acts, I'm looking
at what he has to say forchapter 17, verse 30,
overlooking the time, times ofignorance, and just two
paragraphs here.
I'm going to read it because hewould say it more precisely
than I would say it.
Before Jesus Christ came, godnot view people as being as
(44:08):
guilty as he does now, now thatChrist has come.
People before were guilty offailing to respond to former
revelation, but now they aremore guilty in view of the
greater revelation that JesusChrist brought at his
incarnation.
God quote unquote overlookedthe times of ignorance in a
(44:28):
relative sense only.
Before the incarnation peopledied as unbelievers and were
lost, but now there is morelight.
God has revealed more of hisself, more of his plans.
Consequently, people's guilt isgreater this side of the
incarnation.
Obviously, many people have notheard the gospel and are as
(44:49):
ignorant of the greaterrevelation of God that Jesus
Christ brought as people wholived before the incarnation
were.
Nevertheless, they live in atime when God has revealed more
of himself than previously.
Therefore, god demands that allpeople everywhere should quote
unquote repent, and I thinkthat's the idea.
Now that Christ has come,there's less excuses than you
(45:13):
had before, and so he's appealedto the position of
presuppositionalism.
He said you're without anexcuse.
You know this creator exists,and even if you haven't heard
the gospel message, you shouldbe asking the question who is
this God who created me?
And if you truly seek after him, even if the gospel hasn't been
(45:36):
reached to you yet, god willfind a way to get it to you.
God will find a way to get thegospel to your doorstep.
Doesn't matter if you're in theAmazon or like off somewhere in
a country that prohibits thegospel.
If you've really sought afterhim, he'll get the gospel to
your doorstep.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
And so I think this is an interesting thing here,
because sometimes in ouropportunities to share the
gospel, sometimes people shyaway from judgment.
They say I'm just going toshare the love of Christ.
I just want people to know Godloves them.
I just want people to know Godis compassionate towards them
and that he wants them to followhim and do nice things for
(46:15):
people.
Be kind, consider others, loveyour neighbor.
Just kind of points to all thefeel good stuff which everything
I just said, god, jesus, doeswant you to do, those things,
that's true, but for what reason?
Speaker 2 (46:28):
For what reason?
Speaker 1 (46:30):
Why repent?
Speaker 2 (46:32):
if there isn't a judgment.
Speaker 1 (46:34):
What are you repenting of, then?
And so you can't do thelovey-dovey Jesus, why die on a
cross?
Speaker 2 (46:40):
if death is not a real penalty.
Speaker 1 (46:42):
Right.
So if you have the power toresurrect, you have the power to
stop people, you have the powerto heal, you have the power to
control all of humanity, why dieon a cross, right?
That doesn't make much sense.
And so when we share the gospel, it's got to be repentance and
you have to talk about judgment.
That is loving.
It is God is essentially sayingI didn't just warn you, but I
(47:08):
gave you myself to save you fromyour sin, to save you from the
wrath of God that is coming uponyou if you do not repent and
believe.
Paul does not shy away, he doesnot preach a soft Jesus, he
preaches the resurrected king,and that requires repentance and
a recognition of God's wrathand judgment on the people.
(47:29):
Now, he got mocked because of aresurrection here.
That's fine, that's fine.
But what he did was he gave himthe truth, mocked me.
All I want that.
I believe in a resurrected God,that one that came down, but
the evidence is abundant aboutthose who followed Christ, about
those who have eyewitnesses ofthe resurrection, who walked
(47:51):
with Jesus after his death.
And so, man, you can mock meall I want, all you want, but
the reality is you have toanswer individually to the one
true God on that day.
And yeah, I would rather be onthe side of Jesus than the side
of the world on that day.
(48:12):
And so I'm going to keepfollowing him because of what
he's done for me, because I'veexperienced his grace and
recognize that I'm a sinner.
That is what Paul's getting tohere.
That's where he gets to withthe resurrection.
That's where he gets to withrepentance.
He's addressing the Atheniansin.
So we went from I'm going toaddress your religion, I'm going
(48:32):
to address your gods and I'mgoing to show you that they
don't mean anything, they don'tsave you from anything, but I'm
going to tell you about my God,who saves you from the worst,
who saves you from his own wrath, who has died for you.
And well, what a message.
Now, the thinkers of the day maythink this is not logical.
(48:53):
A resurrected person, a God whocame down to be a man like this
, is illogical.
Why would he do that?
So what do you guys think ifyou were asked that question by
somebody?
Resurrection seems illogical.
It doesn't seem to really makemuch sense.
Why would he?
Why doesn't he just save usanother way?
(49:14):
Why does he have to die?
What's the point of that.
Why can't he just makeeverything good again?
No bad stuff can be in theworld.
No more evil.
Speaker 3 (49:21):
It'd be so powerful if he created all this, what's
the point of the cross?
A common question, goodquestion to ask.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
What do you guys think if somebody said what's
the point of the cross.
What if God is so powerful?
Right?
Paul just said he created allthings.
He is sovereign over all things.
Speaker 3 (49:45):
He controls the borders, he controls the
people's movement.
Speaker 1 (49:47):
He is the ultimate power over all things
Relationship.
God created us to be inrelationship.
Speaker 3 (49:52):
Snap his fingers and say everyone's good God
continued to seek out thatrelationship first through the
Jews through the Hebrew peoplethroughout time and time and
time again he was rejected.
But this is, I mean, theresurrection is kind of like the
end all to be all of, like asifting tool.
It's this, is this, is it?
(50:13):
And it's like that trump card.
And one question that came tomind, sorry, one question that
came to mind.
One was the response right,Because you have that question
why?
Why is it important that Goddid it this way?
But when your, both of yourtranslations said sneered, right
, when they, when they heardresurrection, some sneered and
(50:35):
some stuck around, Right, so wewritten, you guys had said
mocked, do we?
Yours did?
So we're reading sneeredspecifically as mocked.
Yeah, but that's a differencebetween the responses that he
gets in the Jewish community.
And says you know, because hegets anger, he gets resentment
or acceptance, a smorgasbord, asit were, of responses.
(51:02):
It gets it present in the inthis world, in this realm a
little more extreme than he getsthat guy's dumb and that's, but
I think when taken seriously,that's a dividing line.
I mean he's he's drawing a linein the sand, philosophically and
religiously.
Yeah, he's saying that, though,even in this arena,
philosophically, and in theGreek religion, it's endless
(51:24):
gods.
If you need this, this is theGod you go to.
You need that.
If you don't, you build astatue, do an unknown God, and
he'll give you what you need.
Philosophically, that was oneof my frustrations in my
undergraduate when studyingphilosophy.
It was just this endless cycleof just talking and arguing and
it never ended, and I think theyliked it that way because there
was no resolve and noresponsibility.
(51:45):
But Paul is showing them wherethe responsibility is, because
that's like they were on boardwhen he was talking about one
God and we were all created byhim.
But it's like wait theresurrection.
That's absurd and some mightrespond the resurrection.
Speaker 1 (52:11):
Yeah, if Paul goes back to creation and explains to
them, you know this is what weget.
I don't know how deep Paul goesinto other details, but if he
goes back to Genesis and goesback to the relationship between
God and Adam and Eve, there wasa relationship before the fall
and so in order to restore thatrelationship, we have the cross,
(52:32):
like you talked about.
And so if you get on board withcreation and you get on board
with how all of that took place,you have to respond to the
brokenness of mankind, you haveto respond to the fall and you
have to respond to whateverrelationship was broken.
And that's what Paul is gettingto, and he's saying it's Jesus
that restored it, it's Jesusthat died on a cross, it's Jesus
(52:54):
that rose from the grave inorder to say it is complete, it
is finished.
I have now done what isrequired in order to be in
relationship again with humanity, to be in a true relationship,
to walk alongside.
Now the Holy Spirit can abidein the believer.
I'm now one with Christ.
I have accomplished the task inorder for that to happen, and
so the cross is important.
Speaker 3 (53:15):
The resurrection is important because without it it
isn't the snap of a finger fromGod God does more because he
wants relationship.
Speaker 2 (53:34):
When it comes down to it, I think the resurrection
implies that the God we believein has took on the creation, has
took on human flesh, and Ithink that may have been one of
the facets of their rejection isthat the gods that they knew of
, some of them were so out ofthis world and so non-relational
(54:00):
.
I mean, that's what the gods ofthe ancient world were.
They weren't after love and arelationship, they were after
their own gain and in a selfish,human, sinful way.
And so when Paul now speaksabout the resurrection of the
Son of God, what he just did wasintroduce a concept where God
became a man, and that wassomething that was inconceivable
(54:23):
for them.
But if you think about it, thereis no other way to solve the
sin problem unless you have God,who alone can forgive sins, and
unless you have another man whocan stand as a substitute for
mankind.
You've got to have a God man inorder to satisfy both sides
God's justice and man's sins.
So that was the concept that heintroduced.
(54:46):
Maybe to close up, I see threedifferent responses.
Some sneered verse 34, somecompletely believed and followed
, but there's like this littlestatement made in verse 32,
others said like a neutral group.
We shall hear you againconcerning this.
So, and that's nothing more thanthe parable of the soils, some
(55:08):
rejected right away, someaccepted and then some are like
well, we'll listen to more, butthat's what's happening and I
think Paul is perfectly happy if100 people in the Areopagus
reject and maybe three or fourget saved, as long as, like,
you've really gotten saved inhallelujah.
Speaker 1 (55:27):
Yeah, then a church can be planted, then church can
be planted, then they can reachthose people brought as a path
to destruction, narrow as thegate to eternal life.
Speaker 2 (55:33):
But some are saved.
Let's go.
Speaker 1 (55:35):
Yeah, I think sometimes we get disappointed
that the masses didn't get savedlike we're at like a Billy
Graham revival or something.
You know what I mean.
Yeah, and sometimes God doesthat, but we know that
multiplication happens throughindividuals, right, and when one
or two gets saved, what anamazing thing that God can do
through the one or the two,because we see people discipling
(55:57):
others and growing the church,and it's God working through
those people that does that work.
We, we preach the word.
You said this yesterday in yoursermon.
I can be as prepared and be aseloquent I can be, I can do all
the things which we want to dobecause we want to honor God in
the way that we preach.
Yeah, but we don't save people.
That's right.
The message God saves people,and so Paul Paul here isn't, I
(56:24):
would say, paul's extremely goodspeaker and very intelligent,
but he himself knows it'srepentance and the resurrection,
which he didn't accomplish, whocame to Paul in the road to
Damascus.
God, right, god sought him out,god changed his heart, god drew
him to him.
Paul knows that and that's whathe's doing here.
He's being obedient to the toGod, he's preaching the word and
(56:45):
God is moving, and so we needto make sure we don't get stuck
in that place where we think wegot to save everybody, thank you
.
Let God do the work and let'sjust be obedient to what he has
told us to do.
I think that's what Paul'sdoing.
Yeah, amen.
Any other comments, david?
No more comments.
Thank you so much for listeningto the Be Disciples podcast.
Make sure you subscribe onYouTube.
(57:07):
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Church as well as the BeDisciples podcast.
You can follow us on those fordifferent content.
You can go to our website,autoabiblechurchcom, for all of
our services, for all of ourother content, such as sermons,
which will be on YouTube as well.
Also, if you're in the area,resurrection Sunday is coming up
, march 31st, and we're going tobe doing a service at the
(57:30):
Ottawa Memorial Auditoriumdowntown one service at 10am.
We want you to join us there,if you're in the area, to hear
the gospel, to celebrate theresurrection of Jesus Christ,
which we've mentioned much today, as we do in every episode, and
so we're going to celebratethat.
We're going to have a greattime with family, with friends.
We're going to eat together.
(57:50):
What a great opportunity.
So come out, have fun.
We're so excited that you'relistening to it on YouTube, that
you're coming on.
We're able to reach more peopleand so continue to share.
We want people to know thegospel, study God's Word.
Be equipped to go make moredisciples.
Have a blessed week, thank you.
Welcome to the Be Disciples podcast with yours,
kyle Morris, dakota Smith andDavid Glavin.
This is episode number 112.
Please share this podcast.
Follow us on social media,whether that's Facebook or
Instagram.
You can follow our church atOttawa Bible Church on YouTube
at Ottawa Bible Church.
I'll have those posted hereSubscribe, share, like whatever.
(00:34):
We just want people to hear thegospel.
We want people to be equippedin God's Word.
That's why we have this podcast.
So welcome to the podcast guys.
What's going on?
It's good to be home.
Yeah, you were in Mexico or ona nine day trip that included
time in Mexico.
Tell us a little bit about it.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Yeah, we have been taking our church down to Mexico
for the last three years now,and this is the longest one that
we made in attempt that.
So we took two and a half daysof travel there, two and a half
days of travel back and aboutfive days in between almost five
days in between and we built ahome for a family in Mexico.
(01:12):
The father was 21 years old,the mom was 24.
And they had three kidstogether.
And the father grew up in theChandler Gilbert area for all
his life, but his wife is acitizen in Mexico, so she's
unable to come over.
So I was literally speakingwith someone who I could have
(01:33):
crossed paths with at any givenpoint in time when we lived
there.
Yeah, he went to Perry HighSchool, okay, yeah, but also
spoke perfectly English perfectSpanish, of course.
And yeah, it was really coolbecause we got to dedicate this
home that our whole team builtto this family and I got to
share the gospel with this youngman who was from my same
(01:57):
neighborhood, and that was areally touching moment.
So we built a three bedroomhome in about three days.
Our team put up the home fasterthan any team I've ever been a
part of.
I've been on these trips withI6A in Mexico eight times for a
house build, four times forother occasions.
This was by far, by far thefastest that we have ever put up
(02:21):
a home and it helps to have abunch of Kansas boys who know
what they're doing and who builthomes, I mean we were like
literally a whole day ahead ofschedule and they're like you're
a small team, comparativelyspeaking, and you're way ahead.
So it's actually prettyimpressive.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Like guys, we came to work, we're not messing around.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
We came to work.
We're from Kansas, we don't?
We don't fool around here.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Yeah, nice, and you got to take your son.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
I did.
That was probably the biggesthighlight for me is it's kind of
like a coming of age thing forour family.
It's a family tradition whenyou reach, you know, six years
old, you can go on your firstmission trip.
And so I brought Jojo and hewas at my hip the whole time.
I mean there were very fewmoments where he wasn't with me.
So we traveled together,colored together in the car, I
(03:09):
read him the Bible, stayedtogether in the cabins, stayed
together in the tents, went on ahike with him, shoveled dirt
with him, did stucco with him.
I mean every, every moment itwas with my son.
That was really special.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Yeah, that's awesome.
We it's been great to partnerwith I six eight for the last
few years in multiple differentways.
The the trip in January we wenton was with Scott from I six
eight and we've also gone upthere, which we will again this
year in September, to trainpastors in that same area.
And so our churches continue toinvest in that area of Mexico,
(03:48):
equipping, helping out withphysical needs as well.
But really the heart of thatministry is getting the gospel
out, reaching the lost.
And we know that because weknow Scott and sometime we'll
have to have him on the podcastbecause he'll just be able to
share his heart, not just thatpeople get a house built, but
that people hear the gospel,know the word and then continue
(04:09):
to disciple others.
So just what we're doing here,so we have a very similar
heartbeat and what we'resupposed to be doing as
Christians absolutely, david.
How was it a week withoutDakota?
It's probably the best weekwe've ever had.
I think it was stress free forhim.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
No comment.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
This is recorded.
No comment.
I love my pastor.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Brownie points I missed.
Speaker 3 (04:35):
Dakota man.
I hugged him big yesterday.
It wasn't fake either.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Yeah, I'm grateful to know you don't fake, hug me.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
Yeah, it was.
It was a good.
Honestly, it's nice to have ateam.
Yeah, because if any of us aregone, we can.
We can help each other out andkeep going.
It doesn't usually nothingreally too much, too many
hiccups or anything like that.
So, yeah, last week was good.
So, let's, let's pray and we'regoing to continue.
In the book of Acts, we've beenin chapter 17.
(05:07):
And now Paul is on the verge ofhaving really a kind of a
debate, a teaching moment, andso he has been in Athens.
He's kind of been in rubbingshoulders with the philosophers
of the day, the thinkers of theday, having these discussions
about is there a God?
(05:27):
Who is this God?
And so Paul is going to getinto that today.
So let's pray and we're going tostudy the word.
Let's go, father, what awonderful day it is to just come
together in your word any daythat we get to open the Bible
and learn more about who you are.
That helps equip us in ourrelationship with you, but also
(05:47):
in opportunity to share thegospel with others and to
disciple others to do theministry, lord.
So we pray that this podcastwould go out into the world for
the purpose of your glory andfor the purpose of saving
lossals, and that people wouldreplicate Bible studies,
replicate opening the word.
(06:07):
So I thank you for all thoselistening and for all those who
are sharing and being a part ofthis conversation.
It's such a blessing to do thiseach week, and so just be with
us as we talk about your word.
Lead this conversation, lord,with the Holy Spirit, and just
bless our time In Jesus' name,amen.
Amen.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
So we're in Acts 17, 22 to 34.
And I think if there was like astructure, we would just give
to the text before we even readit.
Paul, of course, is approachingthe Athenians with the gospel,
and if there were like two bigideas that anchor us today, it's
one he's explaining to themthat Yahweh, the God he's
(06:50):
speaking about, is everyone'sGod.
This is not just, you know, aparticular group of people and
their God.
Yahweh is everyone's God.
That's the first idea.
The second idea is that he iseveryone's judge.
Yahweh is everyone's judge.
Maybe you could say it likethis Yahweh is everyone's
creator and Yahweh is everyone'sjudge.
(07:12):
So, with those two ideas, let'spick up the text and see in
verse 22.
It says so.
Paul stood in the midst of theAreopagus and said Men of Athens
, I observe that you are veryreligious in all respects, for
while I was passing through andexamining the objects of your
worship, I also found an altarwith this inscription to an
(07:36):
unknown God.
The Greek would literally sayto unknown God.
Therefore, what you worship inignorance, this I proclaim to
you the God who made the worldand all things in it, since he
is Lord of heaven and earth,does not dwell in temples made
with hands, nor is he served byhuman hands as though he needed
(08:00):
anything, since he himself givesto all people life and breath
and all things, and he made fromone man every nation of mankind
to live on all the face of theearth.
Having determined theirappointed times and the
boundaries of their habitation,that they would seek God.
If perhaps they might grope forhim and find him, though he is
(08:23):
not far from each one of us, forin him we live and move and
exist, as even some of your ownpoets have said, for we also are
his children.
Verse 29 probably closes, thefirst idea being then the
children of God.
We ought not to think that thedivine nature is like gold or
(08:45):
silver or stone, an image formedby the art and thought of man.
So 22 to 29 kind of gives usthat first overarching thought
Yahweh is everyone's creator.
So, guys, what do you see fromthe first few verses here, verse
22, verse 23,.
Let's just start there.
(09:05):
What is Paul doing?
What's his strategy?
I mean, what's the shape ofthis text?
What do we do with it?
Speaker 3 (09:16):
Well, one.
I think it's important to notethat Paul was speaking to the
Athenians, but first he was inthe synagogue and in the market
right, we looked in the pretextand then the Stoics, the
Epicureans, then they engagedhim and brought him to more of a
(09:36):
theater of philosophicalthought and discussion.
And so from a more generalpodium to a very specific podium
with, well, the thinkers of theday right.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
So this is an opportunity for him to influence
in some way the influencers andto bring back, bring their
minds to focus in on on Christand taking up a part of their
worship and their culture to doit Nice.
I think that's an importantconnection that he was invited
(10:13):
into this arena.
For what reason?
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Yeah, and we know his audience shifts from a Jewish
audience, where you normallywould go to the synagogue, to a
Gentile audience, specificallyGreek audience Greek, yeah.
And so you see a strategy shift.
Instead of going straight tothe scriptures, he's going to
address their religion andaddress some of the things that
(10:39):
he's noticed, and he's going tothen go in into who is the one
true God, who through creation.
So he's going to start anargument not based off of
necessarily the word right away,but off of their own thought,
and I think so it takes a bit ofa different strategy.
Paul is reaching the Gentilenations, so they may not have as
(11:01):
much of an understanding of theJewish culture, believes, and
so he's addressing it from adifferent angle.
So this would have this wouldhave meant Paul was thinking
through how he was going to doit.
He had a strategy, he he's anextremely smart individual who
would have said hey, I need touse logic, I need to use reason,
I need to use the things or theculture around me and to show
(11:24):
them who God truly is.
And so that's what Paul startsoff with with how many, use your
stuff, challenge it, push it alittle bit and say and then
start moving and then heeventually does use scripture,
but that's where he starts out.
So I think that's unique to hisaudience.
So he shifts based off of wherehe is, his own context.
He doesn't just go in and sayyou need to serve the Jewish God
(11:45):
.
He goes in with a differentunderstanding.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
He also kind of starts with tooting their horn a
little bit, you know.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
I need to use their culture.
Speaker 3 (11:51):
I see that you're very religious and show them why
they're wrong or they're seenthings incorrectly.
But I think it was all in moreflattery, or just to say yeah
yeah, all right.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
Just, I see that you guys, I see that you guys are
thinkers, you guys aren'tignoring that something's going
on around you.
Something made this place orsomething you know.
There's something bigger thanus, and I recognize.
You guys recognize that.
So let's start there.
Let's start in common ground.
We believe in something of ahigher power of some kind,
whether that's multiple gods orone God.
(12:30):
So let's start there and thenmove in that direction.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Yeah, there's a quote that I read earlier, just in
preparation for this episode,and it said that in Olympus, the
city of Olympus, olympus had aplace where you could worship
like any God that you wanted.
Olympus was a very religiouscity and you know you'd have a
shrine or altar here or there.
But there's another quote thatthen went on to say but if you
(12:55):
were in Athens, every God wasgiven much more than just a tiny
little shrine, like every Godwas given a temple, every God
was given a much more seriousplace of worship.
And so what Paul has basicallysaid is this is the most
religious city that I've been tooutside of Jerusalem religious
in a different way.
So I think what he's saying isactually a reality.
(13:17):
I observe that you are veryreligious, and he's now Kyle, as
you said, seeking to use theirculture and their thinking not
to affirm their beliefs, but touse it as like a vehicle or a
segue to declaring the truth.
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Yeah, because he goes from I recognize your religious
place to the God who made theworld and everything in it,
being Lord of heaven and earth,does not live in temples made by
man.
So then he makes thedistinguishing statement between
what you believe in and what Ibelieve in.
Here's where it splits youthink these temples hold your
(13:58):
gods, where my God created allthings, even you.
So that kind of starts hisargument in the direction of who
is the one true God and startsto branch off from.
Okay, we all believe in somesort of God or gods, but the one
true God of heaven, the creatorof all things, doesn't dwell in
these temples.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
Well, and I think you know, speaking of Paul's
strategy, this very much is themodel of university apologetics
today.
We had an episode a couple ofweeks ago, when Chance was here,
concerning, you know, paul'sarguing and reasoning and
defending of the faith withindividuals.
(14:41):
And here Paul very specificallyshows you, I think, an
apologetic tactic calledpresuppositionalism.
And presuppositionalismbasically says it doesn't matter
where you go, what you do, whatyou face in life.
You are actually presupposingthat this ultimate God exists.
(15:02):
And if I were to sum up theargument of presuppositionalism
maybe a little further, I dothis in my classroom.
All the time I say there'sthree principles that you can't
deny, regardless of what youthink about God, even if you're
an atheist.
Number one, the principle iscalled the law of induction,
which means the next fiveminutes of our experience here
(15:26):
in this physical world will belike the last five minutes.
I'm not talking about likechanges in weather.
I'm talking about, likeeverybody assumes, like the laws
of gravity.
And so, therefore, the nextfive minutes is going to be like
the last five minutes, becausethe law of gravity doesn't
change.
And so, you know, this is theillustration I give in my class.
(15:48):
Everybody sitting in this roomright now sitting in their chair
is actually placing their faithin a creator or in the creator.
And they say what?
How could that be?
Just by sitting in my chair.
And I'm like have you everreached a point where you're
afraid of floating off intoouter space?
No, of course not.
Why are you not afraid ofsuddenly floating out of your
(16:08):
chair?
Well, because of gravity.
Okay, gravity is a law, yes, itis.
And does that law ever change?
No, it doesn't.
So then, do laws exist withouta lawgiver?
No, laws don't exist without alawgiver.
So if I appeal to the physicallaws of creation, of physics,
that that we're sitting in rightnow, you actually have to trust
(16:31):
in God just by sitting in yourchair.
So that's induction.
The next would be that of logic.
Everybody sitting herelistening to me right now in
this class is waiting for me tocontradict myself, because
subconsciously, you know what'slogical versus illogical.
In order for something to belogical, you have to first have
an ultimate mind.
You can't create logic, you uselogic.
(16:52):
And third would be the argumentof morality, which I think he's
going to get to later in thissection.
But Paul is straight up using apresuppositional argument to
say no, no, like there is theultimate God, who's created
everything, and he needs nothinghimself.
Speaker 1 (17:10):
Yeah, and he starts to break down in his, in this
first part, the distinctionsbetween the one true God and
their gods, like, startshammering them, like, right away
he says the God who madeeverything, my God has created
all things.
Your gods have these piddlytasks right?
My God is the God of heaven.
(17:31):
Your Mount Olympus is nothing,right, that's just a little
mountain.
My God is the God of all things.
And then he goes into this.
He says in verse 25, nor is heserved by human hands, as though
he needed anything, since hehimself gives to mankind life
and breath and everything.
See, my God doesn't need ourworship, like your gods do.
(17:54):
Like your gods do, that's right.
In order to please your gods,to get things from them, and
they always they're going to getangry if you don't and there's
going to be punishment for it.
See, my God glorifies himself.
He doesn't need us, he createdus for his purpose and his glory
.
So he starts to really dig into, like, the main things that
they believe in and starts tojust chip away and say I know my
(18:19):
God's better because my God'sreal and your God is.
Your gods are not.
Yeah, and so the character ofGod, the attributes of God, paul
goes right into it to startthis argument off.
It's really cool.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Well, I think the gods lower case G of the ancient
world were nothing more thanthe machinations or the
representation of humansthemselves.
Truly, these gods and theiridea were reflections of people,
because people created them.
(18:52):
But our God is not someone thatwe create in our minds.
Our God is someone that we aredependent on.
He is not dependent on us,right, and that's what separates
the biblical understanding oftranscendence.
God is so transcendent that heis above his creation.
He's the one who's eternal.
(19:13):
He's above it all.
We are just in the midst of hisplayground, which he has
created.
Speaker 3 (19:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:18):
So while every other God says no, I need your worship
, god says no, I don't need it.
In fact, you're only worshipingme because I've given you
breath.
Without me, you have no breathat all.
Right?
So, definite contrast.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
And then in 26, he continues right.
And he made from one man everynation of mankind to live on all
the face of the earth, havingdetermined allotted periods and
boundaries of their dwellingplaces.
So God is sovereign, hecontrols all movement of all
mankind.
He created the one man in whichall humanity came out of.
So he's sovereign, he controlsall things.
(19:57):
He's also talking about hisprovidence, how God interacts
with humanity in time and how hechooses who dwells where.
Athenians, you are here becauseGod put you here.
He controls the leaders, hecontrols the nations, he
controls the movement of thepeople.
And so Paul's breaking downevery major attribute of God
(20:19):
that Paul knows, revealed by theHoly Spirit, how God operates
and works.
And so he doesn't have to.
He's not going back into theOld Testament and go all right,
let's go to Genesis, and maybeeventually he will, with some of
these people, he'll go into thescriptures, but he's just
taking all the key elements ofhow God has revealed himself,
both general revelation and thensome special revelation, and so
(20:41):
he's how does God, how has Godrevealed himself to humanity and
to us?
And he's just pointing thosethings out.
And so, again, a very base,apologetic, I think, structure
here by Paul hitting the mainthings where you want to start
and get people to agree on.
But man, what a cool littlepassage of attribute, attribute,
attribute, just listed, listed,listed, as Paul goes and that
(21:04):
helps us as we get equipped togo share God's word, who God is,
with people.
This is a great, just a great,like oh, I can go to Genesis, oh
, I can go here, I can go there.
We just did Genesis one throughthree at the college for brave
worship.
It was really cool because theygot to see how God made
humanity and God's view ofhumanity before the fall and
(21:25):
that it was very good.
And these are all reallyimportant things when we do this
.
I think that's the argument.
Paul's ramping up Like the wayyou view yourselves is so less
than that how God views you.
And I want you guys to know,athenians, that God loves you,
that he values you, he actuallycreated you for a purpose, that
humanity is something God wantsto be in relationship with, not
(21:49):
that he needs it unlike your God.
Speaker 3 (21:50):
What are the things that usually would be?
discussing this form and so hedoesn't need it, but he wants it
, and what an amazing thing tobe unwanted by God.
The pursuit of the ultimategood, or what is life about?
And I think it's probablyimportant to note that it
specifically says Epicureans andStoics.
(22:13):
So why is it important that itwas these two schools of thought
that drew him into thisdiscussion?
And so Epicureans, stoics, theywould have been like rivals in
a sense.
Epicureans philosophy andideology would have been around
longer than Stoicism Newthoughts are something they like
(22:35):
to tackle, but the Stoics andEpicureans would have always
been kind of at odds with eachother in debate.
And so you have, like theEpicureans with more of the
physical pleasure, you know, thegreatest pleasure for the
greatest good, kind of puttingaside pain and frustration, kind
(22:57):
of avoiding those things, andpleasure is the ultimate goal
and the Stoics is virtue.
So all these things that areimportant to them, you know, are
very self-centered, and Paul isalso taking these ideologies
and kind of just setting all ofthose things aside.
And it's not about the greatestgood or the greatest life here,
(23:20):
or what's important for you.
What's most important is whomade you and who made all of us,
and it's the great unifier, god, our Creator.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Yeah, and then he gets into.
He didn't just make you.
And then he, then he goes intoa quote in him we live and move
and have our being, and evensome of your own poets have said
for we are indeed his offspring.
Paul is going right to the tosay you are image bearers of the
one true God, like he getsright into, like how you were
(24:00):
created, your identity, likehe's playing off of.
You guys have kind of had someof these thoughts.
You guys have kind of talkedaround this about where you come
from.
It is true that God created youand he created you in his image
.
In him we live and move andhave our being.
He is in control of our verybreath.
He is in control of all thelaws that we just talked about.
(24:21):
He is the Creator of those, hecontrols those.
He makes sure everything movesthe way it's supposed to and so,
yeah, you right here, livingand breathing is all because of
God and you have that connectionwith God, whether you believe
in him or not, and that is thereand you have to wrestle with
that.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
I kind of alluded to this on Sunday, although in a
little bit different of a format, but everyone has a
relationship with God.
I mean, there is no such thingas an atheist.
There are people who haveconvinced themselves because of
the sinful nature of their ownthoughts.
They have deceived themselvesinto thinking that there is no
(25:01):
God, but the reality is based onRomans one.
Mankind is without excuse, soeveryone knows that there's a
God.
It's just rather, do you wantto address him or not?
How are you dealing with him?
Like you don't have a choice.
You have a relationship withGod, but it's either a good one
or it's a bad one, and so Ithink what Paul is getting at
(25:23):
here is that you have yourliving, your moving, you have
the very events of life that allcome underneath the fact that
God has allowed you to evenexist.
What I love when we were justtalking a minute ago, though,
about God determining theappointed times and the
boundaries of their habitation.
(25:45):
Actually, this is somewhat of ahot topic in America right now,
with what I would call theborder crisis, and what I would
say is a very difficult time, Ithink, if you are seeking to
lead and protect a group ofpeople, your nation.
As a leader, then you do what'snecessary to protect the
borders and the boundaries ofthat nation for your people.
(26:07):
And yet, at the same time, weknow that none of these moments
in human history are outside ofthe hand and the movement of God
.
There may be people who arecoming across the border from
different nations who weren'tbeing reached with the gospel,
and you don't know, generationsfrom now, how their children
will hear the gospel in America.
(26:28):
Like, as long as Christians arefaithful to preach it right,
it's a double-sided coin, on onehand, like you need to protect
your country, that's what makesyou a country.
On the other hand, it's likewell, yeah, but Lord, if people
are coming, then maybe it'sbecause the nations will be
reached with the gospel.
What I find interesting is,despite all of the comments
(26:51):
about sovereignty, look what hesays in verse 27.
It says that or so that theywould seek God if perhaps they
might grope for him and find him, though he is not far from each
one of us.
This seems to allude to thefact that every person, based on
(27:12):
their appointed times,boundaries, habitation, has the
ability to seek, or literally togrope, to grab, to reach out
for God, and that's God's willis that mankind would seek after
him.
That doesn't mean that it'sdone, but that's his desire.
Seek after me.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
Yeah, and then he ends in 29 with more of the
direction that we're going in.
It says an image formed by theart and imagination of man and
so, being a God's offspring, weought not to think that the
divine being is light, gold orsilver or stone and image formed
in that way.
But, man, what an amazing thingthat we can't even really
(27:53):
explain what it means.
Totally.
We're broken image bearers, andthe creativity of God that made
us the order, the design thatwe see around us, the things
that we're still studying, theunknown that we still have no
idea, the reason there arescientists and all these
archaeologists and historiansand all these people studying
(28:15):
human life is because there's somuch mystery, because God has
so much more creativity than theGod's you worship.
The God of thunder, that's onelittle tiny thing that God made
Right.
Oh, the God of this, the God ofthat, like no, your guys, as
imagination came up with thesethings, but God's creativity
(28:36):
into the image that you bear asa human is so much greater.
And so he's almost sayingyou're missing out on such a
relationship with a real Godthat you're substituting it with
stones, like you can have somuch more God's who are limited,
yeah, and so, like I think he's, he's appealing to their hearts
(28:59):
more than anything else hereand he's saying you guys could
have so much more.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
And their intellect.
Speaker 1 (29:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:07):
Yeah, he's getting them to think the gods that you
worship are limited, they arewithin, they are bound by the
creation, but the God that Iworship is above creation.
But one last thought in thissection about how Yahweh is
everyone's God.
If you look back to verse 23,Paul, again, he looks at their
(29:28):
objects of worship and he findsthe one with the inscription to
an unknown God.
So he is using their cultureagain as a vehicle to his
message.
If you study the subject ofMissiology, which is the study
of missions, there's actually avery big debate today as to how
appropriate it is, how far youcan go to using another
(29:52):
culture's you knowcharacteristics in order to
bring them the gospel.
So, for instance and Bo Horlandtaught me all about this stuff
Bo is a former pastor and elderat Mesa Baptist, where we were
at, but he was a career,lifelong missionary in the
Philippines, and basicallythere's this concern that in the
(30:17):
field of missions, people canjust reach after anything they
want in order to get the gospelacross, and I don't think that's
appropriate either.
It's an issue calledcontextualization, and so where
you find this a really bigproblem is if you are a
missionary and you're trying toreach a group of Muslims who
(30:38):
you're in a Muslim majoritycountry.
Do you then say, hey, it's okayfor you to accept the gospel
but still to go to the mosqueand to pray, so much so that
people think you're stillpraying to Allah, but really
you're praying to Jesus?
Like, is that a level ofcontextualization we're okay
(30:58):
with?
Hey, read a Bible with Muslimfriendly language that has been
retranslated so that it's not asoffensive to your initial
Muslim reader.
I think that goes too far.
I don't think that you shouldencourage someone to continue to
deceptively portray themselvesas a Muslim, to change
(31:22):
translations of the Bible, to gointo the mosque, making others
thinking you're praying to Allah.
No, like.
Unfortunately, there is anecessary separation.
Once you become a Christian,you, regardless of where you're
at, you, have to separateyourself from the world, and so
I don't think Paul is affirmingyou know this unknown God as
(31:43):
anything else.
He's just saying I see thatyou're thinking about this.
I'm gonna take that as anopportunity to tell you who he
really is, whether you intendedto get there or not.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Yeah, so and Paul's a great example in other letters
that he writes to churches about, you know, doing the things of
the culture that would then giveyou an identity of another
belief system and notChristianity, right?
Yeah, like you don't need to goto that feast and eat of that
food because of what it wassacrificed for Not not for your
(32:15):
God, but for other gods and sothat's something you need to not
participate in.
That's would be a way toseparate yourself and say no, we
don't do that.
And so there's theseopportunities to say I'm a
Christian, I don't do that.
But then there areopportunities to say, yeah, I
could participate in that and Ican be a part of the culture of
(32:35):
the day and Still eat thiscertain food or go to this
certain event or whatever,because it doesn't say it
doesn't go against what Ibelieve, it doesn't say I'm
associated with another God oranother religion, but I'm just a
part of the people.
And so in a Muslim community,maybe you still wear Just what
the people wear the clothingclothing.
(32:57):
Yeah, not for the purpose ofwhat Allah would say right but
you'd wear it because, well,everyone else wears this
clothing.
That's like I'm wearing jeans.
I'm in a farming community,right, probably wear some jeans
or some boots or something.
You know like I could dressthat way, even if they don't
believe in Jesus.
So I think it's okay.
There's some things where we weneed to stay in our own context
a little bit, but not cross theline of saying I now identify
(33:20):
with something else.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
Well, culture is always subject to the word of
God.
Culture doesn't come before it.
Another example Maybe we'llwrap a bow on this topic here.
Another example would be likesome churches you know, maybe
they want to reach like a wholegroup of you know
Harley-Davidson writers orsomething like that, and you
(33:44):
know what this?
This has actually happened.
Churches have decided to playfor their time of worship like
classic or Contemporary rocksongs which have nothing to do
with God.
You've seen, this Church isplaying just popular songs that
people have known over time andthen they go into like a 15
minute message afterwards.
I think that's too far.
(34:04):
Like, what are you singing andwho are you singing to?
If you're getting people toshow up and to sing Garth Brooks
Because, like you know, peoplearound here listen to country
music that's not worship, that'snot appropriate.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
But you can use.
You can use similar style ofsong, but change words.
Speaker 2 (34:24):
Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
Then you would say we appeal to the style.
That's okay, you can play somerock.
Speaker 2 (34:28):
music is the rock for the Lord is the words For the
Lord, is the country musicglorifying the Lord?
Speaker 1 (34:36):
right, or glorifying the self, or whatever.
So I think, yeah, we can dothat.
I mean, we do that in musictoday.
Right, there's?
No, we don't.
There's contemporary music I'mlooking worship guy,
contemporary music, hymns.
I mean we've had thisdiscussion before.
There's all kinds of styleswithin music and we have
substance and but it's what the,it's what the words say, it's,
(34:56):
it's what we're actually sayingout loud to God.
We can't sing songs that havenothing to do with Jesus while
we're in church Worshiping Jesus, like that would be
inappropriate, you know, and wecan't pause.
I think we can change the style, but not the content when in
Rome do as the Romans do and Ithink as you were saying, to
(35:17):
make the distinction betweenDoing and being.
Speaker 3 (35:21):
If you were trying, if we're putting on a facade,
like I'm, I'm being like you andI'm acting.
That's not what Paul wastalking about.
He's talking about making aconnection and Coming to, to the
level that other people are atculturally so that you can
relate to them and they canrelate to you.
(35:42):
But yeah, but just pointing out, be with people in such a way
that you can help lead them toJesus where they're at, and and
often, if you're coming from aposition of you know, seen as
being condescending, or ifyou're coming from an outward
perspective, you won't belistening to as greatly if
(36:05):
you're seen as a peer and equal,or somebody who is, who is
actually carrying when you're atand and leading you to where,
yeah, god wants you to be, andthat is, you know, with Jesus.
Speaker 1 (36:21):
Yeah, yeah, I think it's well.
We know this, because Jesuspreaches that it's your heart
that changes and what comes outof your heart will come out of
your mouth, but it's it's yourcharacter that you're
distinguishing.
When you're in the community,your character should be that of
(36:44):
what God tells us in the Bibleto show, which is through Christ
.
So our foundation in Christchanges our heart, transforms us
, and so our character should bedifferent.
Right when in Rome, act as youknow, be with the Romans.
Well, yeah, don't act.
If you're Jewish, why would youseparate yourself externally
like the Pharisees would, and tocreate this distance between
(37:06):
you and them because of, well,you're not dressed like me and
you don't talk like me and youdon't eat the things that I eat,
what Paul's like.
How would that?
How would you then share thegospel with that if you did so
much external separation?
Your character separates youfrom them.
The way you behave separatesyou from them.
The way you talk separates youfrom them.
I think he's getting, he'sgonna get more into that,
(37:27):
especially in his letters tochurches, because that's that's
how a Christian should be.
I shouldn't walk around withthis External holiness that says
, well, I can't approach thatguy because you've so separated
yourself from me externally thatI don't feel like I can even
associate with you.
Now we're causing barriers inbetween.
Speaker 2 (37:47):
Who the gospel should be reached.
I think maybe a rule of thumbto just close this up would be
if I'm not Sacrificing mydoctrine and if I'm not
sacrificing my morals which gohand-in-hand on the altar of
culture, then it's okay.
If I'm not sacrificing my, mybeliefs and my morality, then I
(38:11):
can engage in culture.
If I have to sacrifice eitherof those two, then I should not
engage with culture.
Speaker 1 (38:17):
Yeah, I mean examples , like I Go to professional
baseball games.
But maybe there are some thingsthat that organization chooses
do that I don't agree with.
Well, I'm just not gonnaparticipate in those things.
I'm still gonna participate inlike cultural things.
It just may not be certaintimes right, we went to bull
riding with our families.
(38:38):
Yeah right, I'm sure the bullriding culture is somewhat is
probably not.
We wouldn't want our kidsaround the cowboys.
Right, they may say some words.
We may not want our kids around, but we went to the bull riding
event.
It was a lot of fun, right.
The event was family friendly.
We engage in a cultural eventthat has nothing to do with the
Bible.
It was a fun event.
We went and had fun, and so wecan.
It doesn't mean you can't goand do the things in the world
(39:00):
that the world has as offeredfor entertainment sake, as long
as you're not setting aside yourfaith, setting aside your
relationship with the Lord to godo it, and there's times you're
going to have to say no, forsure, yep.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
So, with that being said, we've talked about how
Yahweh is everyone's God.
Now we talk about how he iseveryone's judge.
Paul has started to allude tothis, his desires that people
would seek Him.
So, looking verse 30.
Now.
Therefore, having overlookedthe times of ignorance, god is
now declaring to men that allpeople everywhere should repent.
(39:35):
Why?
Because he has fixed a day inwhich he will judge the world in
righteousness through a manwhom he has appointed, having
furnished proof to all men byraising Him from the dead.
Now, when they heard of theresurrection of the dead, some
(39:56):
began to sneer, but others saidwe shall hear you again
concerning this.
So Paul went out of their midst, but some men joined him and
believed, among whom also wereDionysius the Areopagite and a
woman named Damaris and otherswith them.
So, guys, 30 to 34, he'severyone's judge.
(40:16):
The Gospel is at the forefrontin this passage.
What are some of the contoursof this section that you see?
Speaker 1 (40:26):
Well, paul preaches the Gospel at the end.
He does I mean, that's what hegets into the foundation of our
faith right at the endrepentance, turning away from
sin, accepting Christ or God asyour Savior, and he talks about
a resurrection.
Those are all really importantthings to our faith.
(40:46):
That is doctrine, that isfoundational.
So he starts to introduce thenthings that God has done for us,
but he also talks about thatthere will be a day where there
will be judgment on the world,and so there's a bit of a sense
of urgency.
I think, with Paul, like youguys can't mess around.
You need to turn in repent,because the one who saves also
(41:09):
judges, which you alreadymentioned.
That, dakota, yeah, the one whosaves is also the one who
judges.
And so, really, which side ofthat line do you want to be on?
Do you want to be on God sideor the world side?
And there, because there's onlytwo sides, right, there's not
why I'm on the side of Zeus andI'm on the side of this God and
that God.
No, no, no, no, no.
(41:29):
There's one God.
You're either on his side oryou're on the world side, the
sin side, god side, or an agentof Satan, and he's
distinguishing that here and so,but he's also doing it with the
message of hope, with themessage of grace, with the
message for everybody in allplaces and all people, that God
came to die on a cross and beresurrected.
(41:52):
So there's a message of hope,but the reality of judgment and
adjust God, and so again,hammering the characteristics
out of God, hammering out what,how he has revealed himself and
how he is going to work amongsthumanity and how he has handled
sin and how he's saved people.
But there will be a time wherejudgment will come.
(42:13):
And so man really wrapping upso many like you could write
books on one of these topics,but he'd narrow, he breaks it
down so fast here.
But he gets to the gospel and Ithink that's the biggest point
we have in this passage.
Paul gets to the place to sayhere's the creator of all things
.
He came to save you and this ishow you get saved, and he wants
to get there every single time.
(42:34):
I think that should be our goalas Christians.
In conversations you know, we'vetalked about books like Greg
Koko's book, who talks all abouthow to have conversation to
then kind of get to that pointwhere, boom, share the gospel.
You want to kind of guide thatconversation to that place.
Paul takes that opportunity.
He doesn't shy away from it,even though some mocked him.
(42:54):
But some believed and it'sworth it when they believe.
Who cares if I get mocked,because I'm telling the truth.
I want people to know it.
And then people did.
Some came and believed.
And that was the whole point ofwhy Paul was in there, not to
uplift himself like the rest ofthe thinkers were doing, but to
say I glorify the one true Godand I'm here to share the
(43:14):
message of truth.
And I don't care if youdisagree with me, I'm going to
do what God has told me to do.
And results people came to knowJesus.
Speaker 2 (43:23):
It does seem like there's a question that we could
ask, though, in verse 30,therefore, having overlooked the
times of ignorance, like whatdoes that mean?
Does that mean that, like Godwould not hold anybody
accountable in the past?
Thomas Constable, you shouldfind this resource if you can
Just look up Constable's notes,and he has hundreds of pages of
pastoral research donethroughout his career on every
(43:46):
book of the Bible.
So I'm on Constable's notes forthe book of Acts, I'm looking
at what he has to say forchapter 17, verse 30,
overlooking the time, times ofignorance, and just two
paragraphs here.
I'm going to read it because hewould say it more precisely
than I would say it.
Before Jesus Christ came, godnot view people as being as
(44:08):
guilty as he does now, now thatChrist has come.
People before were guilty offailing to respond to former
revelation, but now they aremore guilty in view of the
greater revelation that JesusChrist brought at his
incarnation.
God quote unquote overlookedthe times of ignorance in a
(44:28):
relative sense only.
Before the incarnation peopledied as unbelievers and were
lost, but now there is morelight.
God has revealed more of hisself, more of his plans.
Consequently, people's guilt isgreater this side of the
incarnation.
Obviously, many people have notheard the gospel and are as
(44:49):
ignorant of the greaterrevelation of God that Jesus
Christ brought as people wholived before the incarnation
were.
Nevertheless, they live in atime when God has revealed more
of himself than previously.
Therefore, god demands that allpeople everywhere should quote
unquote repent, and I thinkthat's the idea.
Now that Christ has come,there's less excuses than you
(45:13):
had before, and so he's appealedto the position of
presuppositionalism.
He said you're without anexcuse.
You know this creator exists,and even if you haven't heard
the gospel message, you shouldbe asking the question who is
this God who created me?
And if you truly seek after him, even if the gospel hasn't been
(45:36):
reached to you yet, god willfind a way to get it to you.
God will find a way to get thegospel to your doorstep.
Doesn't matter if you're in theAmazon or like off somewhere in
a country that prohibits thegospel.
If you've really sought afterhim, he'll get the gospel to
your doorstep.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
And so I think this is an interesting thing here,
because sometimes in ouropportunities to share the
gospel, sometimes people shyaway from judgment.
They say I'm just going toshare the love of Christ.
I just want people to know Godloves them.
I just want people to know Godis compassionate towards them
and that he wants them to followhim and do nice things for
(46:15):
people.
Be kind, consider others, loveyour neighbor.
Just kind of points to all thefeel good stuff which everything
I just said, god, jesus, doeswant you to do, those things,
that's true, but for what reason?
Speaker 2 (46:28):
For what reason?
Speaker 1 (46:30):
Why repent?
Speaker 2 (46:32):
if there isn't a judgment.
Speaker 1 (46:34):
What are you repenting of, then?
And so you can't do thelovey-dovey Jesus, why die on a
cross?
Speaker 2 (46:40):
if death is not a real penalty.
Speaker 1 (46:42):
Right.
So if you have the power toresurrect, you have the power to
stop people, you have the powerto heal, you have the power to
control all of humanity, why dieon a cross, right?
That doesn't make much sense.
And so when we share the gospel, it's got to be repentance and
you have to talk about judgment.
That is loving.
It is God is essentially sayingI didn't just warn you, but I
(47:08):
gave you myself to save you fromyour sin, to save you from the
wrath of God that is coming uponyou if you do not repent and
believe.
Paul does not shy away, he doesnot preach a soft Jesus, he
preaches the resurrected king,and that requires repentance and
a recognition of God's wrathand judgment on the people.
(47:29):
Now, he got mocked because of aresurrection here.
That's fine, that's fine.
But what he did was he gave himthe truth, mocked me.
All I want that.
I believe in a resurrected God,that one that came down, but
the evidence is abundant aboutthose who followed Christ, about
those who have eyewitnesses ofthe resurrection, who walked
(47:51):
with Jesus after his death.
And so, man, you can mock meall I want, all you want, but
the reality is you have toanswer individually to the one
true God on that day.
And yeah, I would rather be onthe side of Jesus than the side
of the world on that day.
(48:12):
And so I'm going to keepfollowing him because of what
he's done for me, because I'veexperienced his grace and
recognize that I'm a sinner.
That is what Paul's getting tohere.
That's where he gets to withthe resurrection.
That's where he gets to withrepentance.
He's addressing the Atheniansin.
So we went from I'm going toaddress your religion, I'm going
(48:32):
to address your gods and I'mgoing to show you that they
don't mean anything, they don'tsave you from anything, but I'm
going to tell you about my God,who saves you from the worst,
who saves you from his own wrath, who has died for you.
And well, what a message.
Now, the thinkers of the day maythink this is not logical.
(48:53):
A resurrected person, a God whocame down to be a man like this
, is illogical.
Why would he do that?
So what do you guys think ifyou were asked that question by
somebody?
Resurrection seems illogical.
It doesn't seem to really makemuch sense.
Why would he?
Why doesn't he just save usanother way?
(49:14):
Why does he have to die?
What's the point of that.
Why can't he just makeeverything good again?
No bad stuff can be in theworld.
No more evil.
Speaker 3 (49:21):
It'd be so powerful if he created all this, what's
the point of the cross?
A common question, goodquestion to ask.
Speaker 1 (49:27):
What do you guys think if somebody said what's
the point of the cross.
What if God is so powerful?
Right?
Paul just said he created allthings.
He is sovereign over all things.
Speaker 3 (49:45):
He controls the borders, he controls the
people's movement.
Speaker 1 (49:47):
He is the ultimate power over all things
Relationship.
God created us to be inrelationship.
Speaker 3 (49:52):
Snap his fingers and say everyone's good God
continued to seek out thatrelationship first through the
Jews through the Hebrew peoplethroughout time and time and
time again he was rejected.
But this is, I mean, theresurrection is kind of like the
end all to be all of, like asifting tool.
It's this, is this, is it?
(50:13):
And it's like that trump card.
And one question that came tomind, sorry, one question that
came to mind.
One was the response right,Because you have that question
why?
Why is it important that Goddid it this way?
But when your, both of yourtranslations said sneered, right
, when they, when they heardresurrection, some sneered and
(50:35):
some stuck around, Right, so wewritten, you guys had said
mocked, do we?
Yours did?
So we're reading sneeredspecifically as mocked.
Yeah, but that's a differencebetween the responses that he
gets in the Jewish community.
And says you know, because hegets anger, he gets resentment
or acceptance, a smorgasbord, asit were, of responses.
(51:02):
It gets it present in the inthis world, in this realm a
little more extreme than he getsthat guy's dumb and that's, but
I think when taken seriously,that's a dividing line.
I mean he's he's drawing a linein the sand, philosophically and
religiously.
Yeah, he's saying that, though,even in this arena,
philosophically, and in theGreek religion, it's endless
(51:24):
gods.
If you need this, this is theGod you go to.
You need that.
If you don't, you build astatue, do an unknown God, and
he'll give you what you need.
Philosophically, that was oneof my frustrations in my
undergraduate when studyingphilosophy.
It was just this endless cycleof just talking and arguing and
it never ended, and I think theyliked it that way because there
was no resolve and noresponsibility.
(51:45):
But Paul is showing them wherethe responsibility is, because
that's like they were on boardwhen he was talking about one
God and we were all created byhim.
But it's like wait theresurrection.
That's absurd and some mightrespond the resurrection.
Speaker 1 (52:11):
Yeah, if Paul goes back to creation and explains to
them, you know this is what weget.
I don't know how deep Paul goesinto other details, but if he
goes back to Genesis and goesback to the relationship between
God and Adam and Eve, there wasa relationship before the fall
and so in order to restore thatrelationship, we have the cross,
(52:32):
like you talked about.
And so if you get on board withcreation and you get on board
with how all of that took place,you have to respond to the
brokenness of mankind, you haveto respond to the fall and you
have to respond to whateverrelationship was broken.
And that's what Paul is gettingto, and he's saying it's Jesus
that restored it, it's Jesusthat died on a cross, it's Jesus
(52:54):
that rose from the grave inorder to say it is complete, it
is finished.
I have now done what isrequired in order to be in
relationship again with humanity, to be in a true relationship,
to walk alongside.
Now the Holy Spirit can abidein the believer.
I'm now one with Christ.
I have accomplished the task inorder for that to happen, and
so the cross is important.
Speaker 3 (53:15):
The resurrection is important because without it it
isn't the snap of a finger fromGod God does more because he
wants relationship.
Speaker 2 (53:34):
When it comes down to it, I think the resurrection
implies that the God we believein has took on the creation, has
took on human flesh, and Ithink that may have been one of
the facets of their rejection isthat the gods that they knew of
, some of them were so out ofthis world and so non-relational
(54:00):
.
I mean, that's what the gods ofthe ancient world were.
They weren't after love and arelationship, they were after
their own gain and in a selfish,human, sinful way.
And so when Paul now speaksabout the resurrection of the
Son of God, what he just did wasintroduce a concept where God
became a man, and that wassomething that was inconceivable
(54:23):
for them.
But if you think about it, thereis no other way to solve the
sin problem unless you have God,who alone can forgive sins, and
unless you have another man whocan stand as a substitute for
mankind.
You've got to have a God man inorder to satisfy both sides
God's justice and man's sins.
So that was the concept that heintroduced.
(54:46):
Maybe to close up, I see threedifferent responses.
Some sneered verse 34, somecompletely believed and followed
, but there's like this littlestatement made in verse 32,
others said like a neutral group.
We shall hear you againconcerning this.
So, and that's nothing more thanthe parable of the soils, some
(55:08):
rejected right away, someaccepted and then some are like
well, we'll listen to more, butthat's what's happening and I
think Paul is perfectly happy if100 people in the Areopagus
reject and maybe three or fourget saved, as long as, like,
you've really gotten saved inhallelujah.
Speaker 1 (55:27):
Yeah, then a church can be planted, then church can
be planted, then they can reachthose people brought as a path
to destruction, narrow as thegate to eternal life.
Speaker 2 (55:33):
But some are saved.
Let's go.
Speaker 1 (55:35):
Yeah, I think sometimes we get disappointed
that the masses didn't get savedlike we're at like a Billy
Graham revival or something.
You know what I mean.
Yeah, and sometimes God doesthat, but we know that
multiplication happens throughindividuals, right, and when one
or two gets saved, what anamazing thing that God can do
through the one or the two,because we see people discipling
(55:57):
others and growing the church,and it's God working through
those people that does that work.
We, we preach the word.
You said this yesterday in yoursermon.
I can be as prepared and be aseloquent I can be, I can do all
the things which we want to dobecause we want to honor God in
the way that we preach.
Yeah, but we don't save people.
That's right.
The message God saves people,and so Paul Paul here isn't, I
(56:24):
would say, paul's extremely goodspeaker and very intelligent,
but he himself knows it'srepentance and the resurrection,
which he didn't accomplish, whocame to Paul in the road to
Damascus.
God, right, god sought him out,god changed his heart, god drew
him to him.
Paul knows that and that's whathe's doing here.
He's being obedient to the toGod, he's preaching the word and
(56:45):
God is moving, and so we needto make sure we don't get stuck
in that place where we think wegot to save everybody, thank you
.
Let God do the work and let'sjust be obedient to what he has
told us to do.
I think that's what Paul'sdoing.
Yeah, amen.
Any other comments, david?
No more comments.
Thank you so much for listeningto the Be Disciples podcast.
Make sure you subscribe onYouTube.
(57:07):
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Church as well as the BeDisciples podcast.
You can follow us on those fordifferent content.
You can go to our website,autoabiblechurchcom, for all of
our services, for all of ourother content, such as sermons,
which will be on YouTube as well.
Also, if you're in the area,resurrection Sunday is coming up
, march 31st, and we're going tobe doing a service at the
(57:30):
Ottawa Memorial Auditoriumdowntown one service at 10am.
We want you to join us there,if you're in the area, to hear
the gospel, to celebrate theresurrection of Jesus Christ,
which we've mentioned much today, as we do in every episode, and
so we're going to celebratethat.
We're going to have a greattime with family, with friends.
We're going to eat together.
(57:50):
What a great opportunity.
So come out, have fun.
We're so excited that you'relistening to it on YouTube, that
you're coming on.
We're able to reach more peopleand so continue to share.
We want people to know thegospel, study God's Word.
Be equipped to go make moredisciples.
Have a blessed week, thank you.
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