What The Crucifixion Reveals About God (Luke 23:26-49; Mark 15:41; Matthew 27:32-56; John 19:16-37)

We are going to cover a lot of text today about the crucifixion of Jesus before we talk about the Resurrection on Easter Sunday.

So they took Jesus, carrying his own cross. As they led him away, the soldiers forced a passerby to carry his cross, Simon of Cyrene. (He was the father of Alexander and Rufus.) They placed the cross on his back and made him carry it behind Jesus.[1] Two other criminals[2] were also led away to be executed with him.

A great number of the people followed him, among them women who were mourning and wailing for him. But Jesus turned to them and said, “Daughters of Jerusalem,[3] do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children.

For the coming destruction is certain[4]: The days are coming when they will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, the wombs that never bore children, and the breasts that never nursed!’ Then they will begin to say to the mountains, ‘Fall on us!’ and to the hills, ‘Cover us! ’

They came to a place called Golgotha (which means “Place of the Skull”) and offered Jesus wine mixed with gall (myrrh) to drink. But after tasting it, he would not drink it.[5]

At ‘the third hour,’ nine o’clock in the morning[6] they crucified him there, along with the two other criminals, one on his right and one on his left, with Jesus in the middle. And Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.”

Pilate also had a notice of the charge against him written and fastened to the cross above his head, which read: “Jesus the Nazarene, the king of the Jews.” Thus many of the Jewish residents of Jerusalem read this notice, because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and the notice was written in Aramaic, Latin, and Greek.

Then the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The king of the Jews,’ but rather, ‘This man said, I am king of the Jews.’ “Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.” Now when the soldiers crucified Jesus, they took his clothes and made four shares, one for each soldier, and the tunic remained.

 (Now the tunic was seamless, woven from top to bottom as a single piece.)[7] So the soldiers said to one another, “Let’s not tear it, but throw dice to see who will get it.” This took place to fulfill the scripture that says, “They divided my garments among them, and for my clothing they threw dice.”[8] So the soldiers did these things and then sat down and kept guard over him there.

The people also stood there watching. Those who passed by defamed Jesus, shaking their heads and saying, “Aha! You who claimed to be able to destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days,[9] save yourself! If you are God’s Son, come down from the cross!”  In the same way even the chief priests – together with the experts in the law and elders – were mocking him among themselves.

“He saved others, but he cannot save himself! If he is the Christ of God, his chosen one, the king of Israel, let him come down from the cross now, that we may see and believe in him! He trusts in God – let God, if he wants to, deliver him now because he said, ‘I am God’s Son’!”

The soldiers also mocked Jesus, coming up and offering him sour wine, and saying, “If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself!” The robbers who were crucified with him also spoke abusively to him. One of the criminals who was hanging there railed at him, saying, “Aren’t you the Christ? Save yourself and us!”

But the other rebuked him, saying, “Don’t you fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we rightly so, for we are getting what we deserve for what we did, but this man has done nothing wrong. ”Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come in your kingdom.”  And Jesus said to him, “I tell you the truth, today you will be with me in paradise.” [10]

Now standing beside Jesus’ cross were his mother; his mother’s sister, Mary, the wife of Clopas; and Mary Magdalene. So when Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing there, he said to his mother, “Woman, look, here is your son!” He then said to his disciple, “Look, here is your mother!” From that very time the disciple took Jesus’ mother into his own home.

Now when it was about noon, darkness came over the whole land[11] until three in the afternoon, and the sun’s light failed.[12] Around three o’clock Jesus cried out with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” (“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”)[13]

When some of the bystanders heard it, they said, “Listen, he is calling for Elijah!” [14]After this Jesus, realizing that by this time everything was completed, said (in order to fulfill the scripture)[15], “I am thirsty!” 

A jar full of sour wine was there, so someone immediately ran, soaked a sponge with sour wine, put it on a hyssop stick[16], and lifted it to his mouth to drink. But the rest said, “Leave him alone! Let’s see if Elijah will come to take him down and save him.”

When he had received the sour wine,[17] Jesus cried out again with a loud voice, “It is completed!” Then Jesus bowed his head, and calling out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!” And after he said this, he breathed his last and gave up his spirit.

Now when the centurion, who stood in front of him, saw how he died, he praised God and said, “Certainly this man was innocent!” Just then the temple curtain was split from top to bottom.[18] The earth shook and the rocks were split apart.[19]

Now when the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and what took place, they were extremely terrified and said, “Truly this one was God’s Son!”[20] And all the crowds that had assembled for this spectacle, when they saw what had taken place, returned home in sorrow and repentance.

All those who knew Jesus stood watching from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joses (Joseph), and Salome, the mother of the sons of Zebedee. When Jesus was in Galilee, they had followed him and given him support. Many other women who had come up with him to Jerusalem were there too.

Then, because it was the day of preparation, so that the bodies should not stay on the crosses on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was an especially important one. the Jewish leaders asked Pilate to have the victims’ legs broken and the bodies taken down.[21]

So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the two men who had been crucified with Jesus, first the one and then the other. But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and blood and water flowed out immediately.

The person who saw it has testified (and his testimony is true, and he knows that he is telling the truth), so that you also may believe. For these things happened so that the scripture would be fulfilled, “Not a bone of his will be broken.”[22]And again, “They will look on the one whom they have pierced.”[23]

* * * * * 

There are a number of things we could focus on.

• Jesus’ deep care for other people even as he is going to the cross.

• His incredible forgiveness.

• The timing of his death as a Passover Lamb kicking off the Jewish celebration of deliverance from slavery.

I would like to focus on what is happening with all the citations of Psalm 22. Jesus quotes the first line; the gospel writers keep referencing it. Apparently, we are supposed to know this Psalm. Jesus invokes this psalm to refer to himself, but David probably didn’t realize he was pointing toward Jesus. At that point he was speaking about himself. So, not everything maps perfectly with Jesus. But think about how Jesus and the gospel writers hyperlinked to this passage as we read. (I left out a few paragraphs that weren’t as closely connected to my focus for the sake of time in my sermon).

Psalm 22

 My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me,
    so far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer,
    by night, but I find no rest.

 Yet you are enthroned as the Holy One; you are the one Israel praises.  In you our ancestors put their trust; they trusted and you delivered them. To you they cried out and were saved; in you they trusted and were not put to shame.

But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by everyone, despised by the people. All who see me mock me; they hurl insults, shaking their heads. “He trusts in the Lord,” they say, “let the Lord rescue him. Let him deliver him, since he delights in him….”

Many bulls surround me; strong bulls of Bashan encircle me. Roaring lions that tear their prey open their mouths wide against me. I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart has turned to wax; it has melted within me.

My mouth is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; you lay me in the dust of death. Dogs surround me, a pack of villains encircles me; they pierce my hands and my feet. All my bones are on display; people stare and gloat over me. They divide my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment.

 But you, Lord, do not be far from me. You are my strength; come quickly to help me. Deliver me from the sword, my precious life from the power of the dogs. Rescue me from the mouth of the lions; save me from the horns of the wild oxen.

 I will declare your name to my people; in the assembly I will praise you. You who fear the Lord, praise him! All you descendants of Jacob, honor him! Revere him, all you descendants of Israel! For he has not despised or scorned the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him, but has listened to his cry for help...

All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the Lord, and all the families of the nations will bow down before him, for dominion belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nations. All the rich of the earth will feast and worship; all who go down to the dust will kneel before him -those who cannot keep themselves alive.

Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the Lord. They will proclaim his righteousness, declaring to a people yet unborn: He has done it!

I want to land this morning on the unrelenting, self-sacrificing, overwhelming love of God for sinners as expressed by the crucifixion. Usually, this takes the approach of focusing on what Jesus suffered so that evil – sin, death, hades and the grave – could be defeated. That in itself is incredibly important and fantastically good news. But I want to look at it from a different angle this morning by looking at the interaction between God the Father and God the Son.[24]

Growing up, I was taught that God had forsaken Jesus on the cross because Jesus said, “Why have you forsaken me?” It seemed like the plain reading of the text. Why would God do this? All the sin. A key verse from which we get this idea is found in Habakkuk 1:13:

“Your eyes are too pure to even look at evil. You cannot turn Your face toward injustice.”

And the Christian claim is that, on the cross, Jesus in some sense took all of our sin into himself as a divine scapegoat[25] so that we could become righteous.

"God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." (2 Corinthians 5:21)

If a holy God cannot apparently even look at sin, and Jesus had taken upon himself all that sin, God the Father had to look away. He really had forsaken God the Son. This already concerns me theologically: can the Trinity really be divided against itself? But it turns out we just need to read more of the text.  Let’s just keep reading Habakkuk 1:13.

“Your eyes are too pure to even look at evil. You cannot turn Your face toward injustice.
So why do You stand by and watch those who act treacherously?”

It seems as if the first part reminds us of God’s holy and pure nature, and the second part assures us that God’s perfection does not mean he can’t be present and engaged with an imperfect world. Jesus is the fullest expression of that. If God couldn’t even look at evil and injustice, it would make no sense that God incarnated in Jesus into a world where he would be surrounded by evil and injustice. But God did that – and more. Paul reminded the church in Corinth that, on the cross,

“…God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them...” (2 Corinthians 5:19)

The Trinity was never divided. Yawheh was not the two-faced god Janus, with one face turned from us and another face turned toward us. Note where Psalm 22 leads us. After that opening cry about God forsaking him, David comes around.

“For he has not despised or scorned the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him, but has listened to his cry for help.”

What does God do when there is a world full of sin? He moves in closer. He makes himself more obvious. Jesus lovingly rubbed shoulders with sinful humanity on his way to saving them from the devastating wages of sin. He took our sin into himself and defeated it once and for all.

God is not a Father who turns his face away and leaves in the presence of sin. God is a Father whose love reaches through that mess of sin, grabs his image bearers by the hand, cleans them up, heals them, and sets them free from the bondage of sin and death,

“so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.” (Ephesians 5:27)

I like that plan a lot. And God is not going to be stingy in His grace.

“And I, [Jesus] if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw (literally “drag”)[26] all mankind unto Myself.” (John 12:32)

Our sin doesn’t make Jesus push us away. Our sin causes Jesus to reach for us to draw us to himself.

I don’t know what your past record of sin or current struggle with sin is. I just know that the cross reminds us that the Father has not turned His face away from you. Jesus is drawing you, me, everyone in the world, in whatever state of sin we are in, to gather at the foot of the cross for salvation, healing, restoration, and communion with God and each other.

I don’t know what kind of evil is trying to or has seduced you and threatens to control you. I just know that Jesus is drawing you to himself, not pushing you away. God has not turned his face from you; God has always set his face toward you.[27]

There may be shame (because sin is never something to be proud of), and hurt (because sin always leaves a mark), and hiding so that we are not exposed (#gardenofeden).

But God is convicting you, not shaming you. God wants to heal you, not double down on the hurt. God wants us to move toward Him, not hide from Him.

God is the Perfect Father who runs with joy to embrace even his most prodigal children.[28] God is the Good Shepherd who will search for that lost sheep until He finds it.[29] God is the farmer who saw a treasure – you - in a field of the world, and He gave all that he had to rescue me and you.[30]

While we were yet sinners, Jesus finished the path of cruciform love: giving his life so that we could live.

____________________________________________________________________________

[1] Simon of Cyrene was perhaps from a Jewish community in Libya. Church history says He became a disciple of Jesus and a missionary. Some speculate that the Rufus in Mark 15:21 is also in Paul's letter to the Romans.

[2] Likely Zealots, as crucifixion was the penalty for insurrection.

[3] Some women in Jerusalem “were in the habit of soothing the last hours of these condemned ones with narcotics and anodynes. These kindly offices were apparently not forbidden by the Roman authorities.” (Pulpit Commentary)

[4] A prophecy about the fall of the Temple and the death of a million Jews at Roman hands  in A.D. 70.

[5] Most commentators believe this was so that he did not avoid the full cup of pain and suffering.

[6] it aligns with the timing of the Jewish morning sacrifice in the Temple of a sacrificial lamb. 

[7] “Although the Old Testament does not tell us the high priest’s robe was seamless, Josephus does: “Now this vesture was not composed of two pieces, nor was it sewed together upon the shoulders and the sides, but it was one long vestment so woven as to have an aperture for the neck.”  John 19:24 tells us that the soldiers did not tear Jesus’ robe. Exodus 28:32 forbade the tearing of the high priest’s robe. John points out another quality of Jesus’ tunic in 19:23: it was woven from top to bottom, anōthen (ἄνωθεν)… Surely it is not by chance that John 19:23 tells us Jesus’ chitōn was woven from top to bottom (anōthen). It must mean something. This garment is not just any garment, but is drawing attention to some divine connection.  (“Jesus as High Priest: the Significance of the Seamless Robe.” Thomas Lane, stpaulcenter.com

[8] Psalm 22

[9] John 2:19

[10] There was no punctuation in the original manuscript. It could also read, “I tell you today, you will be with me in paradise. Church tradition, repeated by the likes of John Chrysostom and Augustine, claims that the two thieves were part of a band of robbers led by Gestas (the mocker) and Dismas (the believer) who held up Jesus’ family on their way to Egypt. The robbers were astonished to find expensive gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. In the legend Dismas was deeply affected by the infant, and stopped the robbery by offering a bribe to Gestas. Upon departing, the young Dismas was reported to have said: “0 most blessed of children, if ever a time should come when I should crave thy mercy, remember me and forget not what has passed this day.” (https://beyondthesestonewalls.com/posts/dismas-crucified-to-the-right-paradise-lost-and-found)

[11] Most scholars connect this darkness with Amos 8:9-10: “And in that day, declares the Lord GOD, I will make the sun go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the daytime. I will turn your feasts into mourning (think the Passover festival) and all your songs into lamentation. I will cause everyone to wear sackcloth and every head to be shaved. I will make it like a time of mourning for an only son, and its outcome like a bitter day.”

[12] “An account of it is given by Phlegon of Tralles, a second century historian… who says that, in the fourth year of the 202nd Olympiad, there was” a great and remarkable eclipse of the sun, above any that had happened before. At the sixth hour the day was turned into the darkness of night, so that stars were seen in the heaven; and there was a great earthquake in Bithynia, which overthrew many houses in the city of Nicaea.” Phlegon also mentions an earthquake…. Dionysius says that he saw this phenomenon at Heliopolis, in Egypt, and he is reported to have exclaimed, "Either the God of nature, the Creator, is suffering, or the universe dissolving." (Pulpit Commentary)

[13] The opening line from Psalm 22.

[14] There was a Jewish expectation that Elijah would return before the Messiah.

[15] Psalm 22 again.

[16] The hyssop may symbolize the cleansing and purification that Jesus' sacrifice provides. 

[17] Sour wine fulfills the prophecy in Psalm 69:21, which states, "They gave me vinegar to drink instead of wine." 

[18] No longer were only a few allowed into the ‘presence of God.’ Now everyone could access it.

[19] “And tombs were opened and, like Lazarus, many saints who had very recently died were raised out of their tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and went into the holy city, Jerusalem, and appeared to many people.” It is probable that they were persons who had recently died, and they appear to have been known in Jerusalem.” (Barnes’ Notes On The Bible). In this sense, this was probably similar to Lazarus: they had recently died, but had not yet been properly interred.

[20] “Tradition affirms that the centurion's name was Longinus, that he became a devoted follower of Christ, preached the faith, and died a martyr's death. “(Pulpit Commentary)

[21] It was the Sabbath beginning the Feast of Unleavened Bread, in which the Israelites celebrated their deliverance from slavery in Egypt. Because of the need to act quickly.

[22] Psalm 34:20

[23] Zechariah 12:10

[24] Trinitarian language can be really confusing. Generally, a Trinitarian God is described as One essence in Three persons. The three Persons are inseparable and live in one another, completely encompassing each other, meaning they are never separated, divided, or found apart. As God has one nature, every action of the Trinity is one, originating with the Father, through the Son, and realized in the Holy Spirit. Thus the Three are one not only because what they are is one and the same, but because their divine union allows of no separation or duality or division whatsoever. (I got some of this language from “The Trinity,” at oca.org. 

[25] A live goat chosen by lot on the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) to symbolically carry the sins of the Israelites into the wilderness, effectively removing them. See Leviticus 16.

[26] The image is that of a fisherman casting out a net and “drawing” all the fish back in.

[27] And if we want to be like Jesus, we will never turn our face away from those toward whom God has set his face.

[28] Luke 15

[29] Luke 15; Matthew 18

[30] One way of reading the parable in Matthew 13.

ARMAGEDDON, END TIMES, AND THE BOOK OF REVELATION

I noted last week that NOT to address the war with Iran seems like ignoring the elephant in the room, so I am going to talk about it, but not in terms of its merits - or lack thereof, depending on your opinion. Google “Just War Theory Iran” or some combination of words like that and take some time to study and reflect.

I want to address something different. Many people are asking questions like this right now:

“Is what’s happening in the Middle East a fulfillment of prophecy? Are we watching Revelation unfold on the news? Does this war with Iran mean the world is approaching the final battle of Armageddon? Should I be looking out for the Antichrist? How should we be responding?” [1]

If you have grown up in evangelical circles, war in the Middle East - especially if it involves Israel - has always led to speculation about eschatology (end times study). At least 20 countries are now involved; the global economy is stumbling; there are murmurs of WWIII. It feels potentially apocalyptic.

Since most of the “end times” text comes from the book of Revelation[2], I am going to condense my 30+ episode sermon series from 2021 into one sermon.

* * * * *

Faithful, Bible-believing Christians have interpreted Revelation differently throughout church history.

• Preterist: Revelation’s events happened in the 1st century.

• Poetic/Theopoetic: The text is poetic language expressing ultimate truths about God, evil, and history.

• Theopolitical: The text is a form of political protest and dissent against the Roman empire[3], a prophetic critique of Empire power.

• Pastoral/Prophetic: The text gives a timeless call for hope and faithfulness in the face of inevitable, ongoing conflict with all empires and their evils, injustices, and misguided allegiances.

• Predictive/Futurist: The text reveals future events that will happen at the end of time (“end times”). This is part of what is called Dispensationalism.[4]

For Christians raised in evangelical culture in the United States, Revelation has typically been taught in the Predictive/Futurist model: a roadmap of future wars, the Antichrist and geopolitical alliances that usher in the return of Jesus. #LeftBehind

It may surprise you to know that this view is not very old. The idea that Revelation provides a precise geopolitical map of the End Times developed through John Nelson Darby (1800-1882). He was heavily influenced by Margaret McDonald, a Scottish woman who claimed to have had visions of a pre-tribulation rapture in 1830. Soon, the Scofield Reference Bible (1909) was the first Bible to have footnotes for this Dispensational approach.

Do with that what you will. My point is that the earliest Christians did not read Revelation through that lens. For them, Revelation was a combination of the first 4 approaches. It was a message about how to avoid compromise, remain faithful, and live with hope in the midst of what was happening in their lifetime. I am going to try to explain that this morning so we can see what John’s audience saw, hear what they heard, and hold to the hope they had.

* * * * *

In the first century, Rome claimed a divine leader and an empire blessed by the gods. They had symbols everywhere to remind people of their allegiance: flags, statues of the emperor, coins with Caesar’s image, temples where incense burned in his honor, and citizens expected to say three simple words: “Caesar is Lord.”

Christians refused. Instead, they said: “Jesus is Lord.” That confession was deeply theological – and political. It put them at odds with a Rome that demanded allegiance. As you might imagine, the Empire was not happy with this turn of events, and life got really hard for Christians. As they suffered, there was a temptation to give up and join Rome.

Revelation was written to reveal spiritual realities behind the political power and false promises of Rome, and to help Christians remain hopeful and faithful when empires threatened their lives and demanded their allegiance.

John used apocalyptic literature[5] to communicate this. He narrated a vision through creative storytelling that is heavily symbolic, full of exaggerated imagery. Apocalyptic writing is less like a political news report and more like the political cartoons on the editorial page. I’ll try to show you what that looks like with some images I am going to use.

Revelation Was Written to First Century Christians Living in the Roman Empire, specifically to seven real churches in Asia Minor (Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea). It was written for us, but not to us. If the book only made sense thousands of years later, then it failed its first readers. It had to make sense first in their context, and second in ours.

John’s audience would not have seen the prophetic nature of Revelation as foretelling about future events 1000s of years down the road. After all, Jesus had kept telling them, in their moment, to look out for what was going to happen in the Last Days (Matthew 24, Mark 13, Luke 21). John, himself, writing in 1 John 2:18, made it clear:

Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour.[6]

John’s audience read Revelation’s prophetic voice as forthtelling,  interpreting the world’s current events theologically to give them wisdom and hope.

Revelation Is Primarily a Revelation of Jesus.

“The revelation of Jesus Christ…” (Revelation 1:1)

It is a revelation of Jesus first and foremost. That’s where the hope comes from. Revelation has wonderful imagery about Jesus:

• The faithful witness (1:5)

• The slain Lamb (5:6)

• The one who conquers by sacrifice (5:9–10)

• The rider whose robe is dipped in his own blood (19:13)

• The maker of new things from all that was broken (21:5)

The dominant image is that of a Lamb who was slain. Even when John hears a lion, when he looks, it’s a lamb. (5:7-9) Once the Lion has been revealed to be the Lamb, we never again find Christ referred to as a Lion, though he’s referred to as the Lamb twenty-seven more times.[7] It’s reinforcing a point Jesus made in his lifetime. When the people waved the palm branches of the violent Zealots to welcome him into Jerusalem (Luke 19), Jesus cried for them and their vain pursuit of peace. That’s not the kind of Lord Jesus is, and it’s not how he will usher in his kingdom then or in the future.

Revelation Exposes Empires. Revelation’s central claims would have been shocking to people overwhelmed by Rome’s power and grandeur:

• Rome claims to be blessed and ruled by divinity. John says Rome is a beast rising from the sea, empowered by a propaganda-fueled dragon that demands worship. John uses Rome/Babylon as stand-ins for all earthly kingdoms, nations, and empires. Any political authority that demands an unquestioning or ultimate allegiance, any ruler who relies on violent, destructive domination to rule, any earthly system that exalts itself as being a savior -  they are all trying to stand in a place that belongs to God, and Jesus has something to say about that.[8]

• Rome says it brings peace with the sword (Pax Romana). John says it is bathed in violence.Revelation unmasks false peace that trusts in violence, the kind of path that made Jesus weep when he entered Jerusalem, as it was clear that was the path the people wanted him to take. (Luke 19:41-44) Jesus is establishing a new kind of peace and way of peace (often referred to as Pax Christi, or peace of Christ). 

• Rome claims to be like a stunningly beautiful woman (the goddess Roma). John says she’s a blood-soaked, cruel seductress (played by Babylon). Babylon is covered with the blood of the saints (Revelation 17), suggesting many had already been devoured by the Empire, either willingly or forcefully.

• Rome says Caesar is Lord and Savior. Revelation says only Jesus is Lord and Savior. Empires will say, “I alone can save you,” but it’s hollow arrogance. Jesus alone can save us.

• Rome conquers by taking the lives of others so it can live. Revelation says the Lamb conquers through giving his own life so others can live.

Revelation is unmasking “how the sausage is made” in empires for an audience in danger of being overwhelmed by power or seduced by pleasure. The kingdoms of this world often look glorious on the outside, but from God’s perspective they are beastly. How do we follow Jesus when the nation we live in demands unquestioning loyalty - and compromise? First, we must see it for what it is.

* * * * *

“Is what’s happening in the Middle East a fulfillment of prophecy? Are we watching Revelation unfold on the news? Does this war with Iran mean the world is approaching the final battle of Armageddon? Should I be looking out for the Antichrist? How should we be responding?”

I will offer answers based on my understanding of how Revelation is meant to be read. Others have differing opinions, and we can hold those and still be on Team Jesus. I’m a big fan of listening to what a variety of people have to say and praying for discernment, and I encourage you to do the same.

Are we watching Revelation unfold on the news? Very much so – in the sense that John warned us about empires and how they work. They will either violently bully us to control us, or they will try to seduce us and distract us from Jesus and His Kingdom with worldly pleasure and power.[9] 

It’s a tale as old as history, for all of history. Revelation warns all Christians, in all places, at all times, about the beastliness and seductiveness of nations. No one is exempt. With that in mind, hear me carefully.

In today’s headlines, it’s a warning about Iran and the U.S., Israel[10] and Lebanon, Russia and Ukraine – name the country. Human governments have a beastliness and seductiveness that we must resist. The legacies of Rome and Babylon live on in their empire children. The people of God’s Kingdom stand in their midst as counter-cultural salt and light, shining cities on a hill surrounded by darkness.

Is this a fulfillment of prophecy? If by that we mean that John warned us about what to expect in the times we are living, then yes. Are we moving closer to the end of history? Of course. Eventually, the cycle will end. Maybe we are there. Someday we will be, for sure.

I’m just not convinced John was trying to give us signs to help us figure out “the day and hour” that Jesus will return when Jesus himself said nobody will know (Matthew 24:36).[11] Jesus didn’t seem concerned about being too specific, so I want to encourage us not to be too concerned about it either. If Jesus said, “Be ready,” to an audience 2,000 years ago, we might still have quite a while to wait, and we should still be ready. 

Should I be looking out for the Antichrist? Yes, as the church has been for 2,000 years. The Antichrist does not get a ‘shout out’ in Revelation, but John does in 1 John 2. After he talks about living in the Last Days, he warns:

“Whoever denies that Jesus is the Christ. Such a person is the antichrist—denying the Father and the Son.” (1 John 2:22)

He also revealed where to look for them:

“They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us.”

We don’t need to look “out there” for an antichrist. Apparently, the call will come from inside the house.

Does this war with Iran mean the world is approaching the Battle of Armageddon? A very popular speaker on End Times thinks so.[12] He claimed that Russia, Turkey, “what’s left of Iran” and other Muslim groups would soon invade Israel and be destroyed by God. Last week he prayed that,

“…God Almighty is brought onto the battlefield and the enemies of Zion and the enemies of the United States can be destroyed before our eyes. Let God arise and let his enemies be scattered.”[13]

The thing is, there is no battle between armies that happens at Armageddon, and God does not destroy the nations that gather. Let me explain.

Let’s say (for the sake of discussion) that at this point Revelation suddenly stops being full of symbolic apocalyptic imagery and is now meant to be read literally, like a (future) news report. That would be really different than how we read the rest of the book, but let’s grant a “future historical” reading.

The word “Armageddon” appears only once (Revelation 16:16), and no battle is described there. Nations gather, but nobody starts fighting. The confrontation happens in Revelation 19:11–21. A rider on a white horse –  Jesus - shows up. There is a confrontation, but not what one might expect.

“His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself. He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God. The armies of heaven were following him, riding on white horses and dressed in fine linen, white and clean. Coming out of his mouth is a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations.”

The sword of the Spirit is the Word of God (Ephesians 6), which cuts sharper than any two-edged sword (Hebrews 4). The weapon is Jesus’ mouth is His Word. It’s truth. It’s the gospel. It’s the message that the love displayed on the cross has conquered all that is evil – sin, death, hell, the grave.

Jesus’ robe is already dipped in blood before the battle begins. Most scholars agree this must be his own blood, the blood of the cross. Jesus conquers the world the same way he conquered death: through sacrificial love. The Lamb wins by being slain so that death does not get the final word.

Meanwhile, all the bad guys are still there. All these nations from all over the earth intent on making war are all still there. Now what?

“Then I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies gathered together to wage war against the rider on the horse and his army. But the beast was captured, and with it the false prophet who had performed the signs on its behalf.”

The Beast and False Prophet – keep in mind that these are national symbols of violence and lies, not individuals - are bound and given over to judgment, and that’s it. Nobody draws a sword except Jesus, and it’s the sword of the spirit, the word of God. Even when Gog and Magog gather in Revelation 20, there is no battle between people.[14]

Even if I were to give the most literal reading to these passages, there is no battle at Armageddon where people fight people. There is no blood-soaked field of slaughtered pagans killed by righteous people or heavenly armies. When it is time for judgment, God does it, and it’s not a battlefield slaughter (Revelation 20).

Another famous pastor[15] once described Jesus’ return in Revelation this way.

“In Revelation, Jesus is a prize fighter with a tattoo down His leg, a sword in His hand and the commitment to make someone bleed. That is a guy I can worship. I cannot worship… a guy I can beat up.”

This is….so wrong. Jesus is not an MMA prize fighter; he fights evil with truth and cruciform love. Revelation does not show a returning Jesus with a commitment to make someone bleed; it reveals a slain Lamb who bled on our behalf. And I do worship a man who people not only beat up but also crucified, whose cruciform love swallowed up evil as a result of his sacrifice. Jesus willingly gave up his life to conquer the power of sin, death, hell and the grave. (1 Corinthians 15:55)

So, how do God’s people live in these times? How do we stay true in the midst of beasts, false prophets and the seducers that try to dirty our hearts and divide our allegiance? Revelation 12:11 tells us.

“They conquered [the accuser] by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony, for they did not love their lives even unto death.”

The church participates in fighting against evil with the tools of the Kingdom: faithful witness, sacrificial love, a righteous presence (committed to “right”), perseverance, and a message of hope in Jesus. The church does not overcome the Evil One and his schemes by killing its enemies in the name of Jesus.

When the disciples asked Jesus to call down fire on a Samaritan town, he said “no” (Luke 9), then sent them there as missionaries (Luke 10). The church resists evil by being like Jesus. The point is to “Follow the Lamb wherever he goes.” (Revelation 14:4).

The story ends not with the destruction of the nations, but with the healing of the nations. The kings of the earth – the ones apparently gathered at Armageddon? - are shown coming to the celestial city, bringing “the glory and honor of the nations” (21:26). Water flows from the city for the healing of the nations. (Revelation 22:1-2)

Do you remember when we talked about the connection between theology and relationships? There is also a connection between eschatology and relationships.

If we think Armageddon needs to be bloody and violent – and if we think God expects us to bring it about – we might excitedly choose a bloody and violent path shouting the Crusades’ slogan of Deus Vult, “God wills it,”[16] and using the cross as a sign to militarily conquer. #constantine This is what happens when we think God conquers like Empires conquer.

But if we think the judgment that Jesus brings will also offer opportunity for repentance, healing, and restoration, then we will likely promote and pray for an approach that brings that about in the face of even national evil. This is what happens when we believe God conquers evil like Jesus conquered evil (because God is just like Jesus, because, well, God IS Jesus.)

How we think Jesus will return directs how we think we should prepare for it.

So, how are we to respond in this time?

John’s readers may find it hard to see in their neighbors on the street anything but cold, hostile stares and the threat of informing the authorities. They may be so aware of the present rule of the dragon, the monster and the false prophet that all they want is to escape, to be rescued, not to hold out to their neighbors God’s repeated and generous invitation.

But see they must, because the mercy of God is vast and his invitation wide as the world. Because he is who he is, the creator whose purposes are gloriously fulfilled in the slaughtered lamb, he will go on inviting and welcoming and pouring out the water of life for all the thirsty.  (N.T. Wright, Revelation For Everyone)

Empires will rise and fall. Wars will come and go. Nations will boast about their power. But above them all stands the Lamb who was slain and who has risen. Revelation reveals the self-giving, radically forgiving, co-suffering love of Jesus. The power of cruciform love gets the final word.

“Behold, I make all things new.” (Revelation 21:5)

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[1] The fancy term for this in Christian circles is eschatology.

[2] Daniel is commonly cited also, as well as 2 Thessalonians 2.

[3] The Topical Lexicon at Biblehub.com describes empire this way: “In the biblical context, the term ‘empire’ refers to a large political unit or state, usually under a single sovereign authority, that extends its dominion over diverse peoples and territories.”

[4] Dispensationalists believe God works through distinct historical periods (dispensations), with a key distinction between His plan for Israel (earthly people) and the Church (heavenly people), viewing the Church as a temporary "parenthesis" in God's focus on Israel, culminating in a future earthly millennial kingdom where Israel's promises are fulfilled literally, and often embracing a pre-tribulation rapture. 

[5] A style of writing the really began to flourish during their exile.

[6] I think this likely applies to the “man of lawlessness” in 2 Thessalonians 2.

[7] “The Key To Understanding Revelation.” https://reknew.org/2016/05/key-understanding-revelation/

[8] In Reading Revelation Responsibly, Michael Gorman gives this definition for an empire: “Empire is a system of domination that both seduces the powerful, partly with the promise of more power, and intoxicates common people with its alluring wine, perhaps the false promise of security that supposedly comes from increasing prosperity and power.”

[9] It’s Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World.

[10] If you find yourself resistant to the idea that Israel could be beastly, read the Old Testament, and why they went into exile.

[11] “It is not for you to know the times or seasons the Father has fixed.” Acts 1:7

[12] You can ask me who this is if you would like to know.

[13] Quoted here from a sermon streamed live on Facebook. https://theconversation.com/as-iran-war-expands-some-conservative-christians-interpret-the-conflict-through-biblical-prophecies-277488

[14] Gog and Magog appear to represent all nations deceived by Satan; numbered as "the sand of the sea" (20:8).

[15] You can ask me who this is if you would like to know.

[16] This Latin phrase was used as a battle cry and rallying cry during the First Crusade (1095–1099). It was  shouted by soldiers and clergy  alike in response to Pope Urban II’s speech calling for the Crusade in 1095. Theology even dictates geopolitical relationships between nations.

The Life and Death Of This Age #2 (Matthew 5; Luke 6)

The first three beatitudes provide a foundation for makarios, blessedness, participation in the life of this age that Jesus offers:

·      honest brokenness over our sin

·      humble mourning that leads to repentance and salvation

·      harnessed servanthood that leads to flourishing

These are three requirements for entering into aonios (eternal) life with God and building the kind of Kingdom God has planned. [1]

The desire for righteousness is next.  This is a worldview shift.  There are lots of things for which to hunger: riches, money, power, physical pleasure. But hungering for righteousness is hungering to know how to be in the world in the right way, and how to use the things we have in the right way. That’s a simple definition of righteousness. A hunger for “right”ness as defined by God. 

The fruit of brokenness, repentance and harnessed servanthood is a longing to live well in the path of rightness. And when we hunger to find this, “we will be filled." Our hunger has an answer: the Bread of Life. Jesus.

In this beatitude, for the first time, we see people actively seeking for God.  They are glad God pursued them; they are now pursuing Him as well. They are not content simply to be. These people are blessed, because God will “reward those who diligently seek him.”[2]

These people have a passion for righteousness in their own lives; however, it’s more than that. They long to see honesty, integrity, and justice in the church and the culture. These people desire not only that they may wholly do God's will from the heart, but also that justice may be done everywhere, and they actively engage in bringing this about. All unrighteousness grieves them and motivates them to display the goodness of righteousness through the testimony of their lives.

In contrast, the miserable are those who are hungry for the same old thing that never satisfied them before….. unrighteousness, I suppose, which will always leave us with what C.S. Lewis called “an ever increasing craving for an ever diminishing return.”[3] Those who hunger after unrighteousness always want more too. The difference is that what they are consuming is making them emptier. They “taste and see that X is fun, or entertaining, or gets me friends, or distracts me, or numbs me,” and don’t realize it is not good, and that it will never fill them, no matter how much they consume.

·  If you hunger for money, you always need one more dollar.

·  If you hunger for things, there is always one more toy or one size bigger of what you already have.

·  If you hunger for pleasure, you will long for the next experience before you are done with the first one.

·  If you hunger for fame, you need one more click on our website, one more follower, one more platform or you can’t rest.

If you hunger for power, there will never be enough people you control, or enough promotions, or enough positions of authority.

And there is a ripple effect here too. If the righteous long to see righteousness benefit the world and lead to the flourishing of others, the unrighteous build the opposite momentum.

· The longer they value things over people, the more they will value things over people.

· The longer they value power and control, the more they will value power and control.

· The longer they don’t care about others, the less they will care about others.

· The longer THEY determine what’s right for THEM #didGodreallysay?, the less they will care how their choices impact those around them.

This is why I keep saying that God’s righteous boundaries/path is for our good. Jesus didn’t come to squelch the life in us or take the joy out of the world; Jesus came that we might have abundant life. There is a reason joy came to the world when Jesus arrived in the world.

The next beatitude is the first category that gives a specific righteous action: In one ’s relations with other people — when one reaches beyond oneself toward another — one should be merciful. The Topical Lexicon describes biblical mercy this way:

“an active disposition of compassion that moves to relieve the misery of others.”

It goes on to describe the application:

The early church’s distribution to widows (Acts 6) sets a model for congregational mercy-ministries—food pantries, benevolence funds, medical missions.

Writings of Ignatius, Polycarp, and the Didache exhort churches to ransom captives, care for orphans, and practice hospitality.

Monastic and Medieval Hospitals: Mercy motivated the establishment of hospices and infirmaries, precursors to modern healthcare.

Mercy ministries accompanied gospel proclamation—whether in William Carey’s fight against infanticide in India or George Müller’s orphan houses in Bristol—demonstrating the indivisible bond between doctrine and deed.

All mercy requires is a position of the barest advantage over another, even for the most fleeting of moments.  With power comes responsibility, and the merciful are always thinking about how to pass on the mercy they were shown. They want to be a mirror of God to the world.

To be merciful means to be actively compassionate. God showed mercy through Jesus to us.  We imitate God when we pay this foundational mercy forward.[4]

In contrast, the miserable are the merciless, those who take every penny of power they have and try to turn it into a pound. Literally, they pound people with power. They are users of others to benefit themselves. If the merciful think of their responsibility toward others, the merciless plunder other people’s usefulness to them. Jesus told a parable about this very thing as recorded in Matthew 18:23-29.

“Therefore, the Kingdom of Heaven can be compared to a king who decided to bring his accounts up to date with servants who had borrowed money from him. In the process, one of his debtors was brought in who owed him millions of dollars. He couldn’t pay, so his master ordered that he be sold—along with his wife, his children, and everything he owned—to pay the debt.

 “But the man fell down before his master and begged him, ‘Please, be patient with me, and I will pay it all.’ Then his master was filled with pity for him, and he released him and forgave his debt. But when the man left the king, he went to a fellow servant who owed him a few thousand dollars. He grabbed him by the throat and demanded instant payment.

“His fellow servant fell down before him and begged for a little more time. ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it,’ he pleaded. But his creditor wouldn’t wait. He had the man arrested and put in prison until the debt could be paid in full.

“When some of the other servants saw this, they were very upset. They went to the king and told him everything that had happened. Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and said, ‘You evil servant! I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. Shouldn’t you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had mercy on you”?

When we think of the merciless or the exploitive, we might think of obvious things like human trafficking or slavery, but there’s much more common ways:

·  It’s the boss who exploits her workers.

·  It’s the predatory dater who sexually uses people over and over.

·  It’s the landlord who soaks every last penny possible from his renters.

·  It’s the friend who manipulates and controls and uses you.

As you might imagine, the unmerciful are cursed. What they sow, they will reap. Meanwhile, the merciful are blessed because the mercy that they show to others will be returned to them. 

The next group blessed are the “pure in heart.” These are the uncorrupted. Their heart is unmixed, “holy”, set apart in the truest sense of the word. The Bible uses the language of metals and alloys to make this point.

“All of them are stubbornly rebellions…they are bronze (copper + tin) and iron (iron oxides); they, all of them, are corrupt.” (Jeremiah 6:28-29)

“I will…refine them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, and I will answer them; I will say, ‘They are My people,’ And they will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’” (Zechariah 13:9)

For [God] is like a refiner’s fire and like fullers’ soap. He will sit as a smelter and purifier of silver, and He will purify the [priests][5] and refine them like gold and silver, so that they may present to the Lord offerings in righteousness. (Malachi 3:2-4)

Notice: the pure in heart have gone through the fire. However, the pure in heart are blessed, because they now better understand God’s nature because they increasingly participate in His character.

In 2 Corinthians 3, Paul talks about how the “ministry of the Spirit…brings righteousness…we are being transformed into His image with ever increasing glory...” This is a state where not only our minds – our worldview – mirror God’s mind, but our allegiances and our hrarts do too. The reality of “Christ in us”[6] is becoming clear to all.

Miserable, then, are the devious, the corrupt in heart.  They do not think like God, they do not feel like God, and they wallow in it. Even if they do good things, it is not because they want to. It is because they have to, or because they have found a way to blend self-serving acts with what appear to be good deeds. They do not desire what God desires, and they don’t feel about the world as God feels. Not only are they negatively alloyed instead of pure, but they want to be. The corrupt in heart will not see God, because they keep undermining their ability to see well.

When Peter drew his sword in the garden. Jesus rebuked Peter, who was trying to protect Jesus. Why?

“Peter’s focus wasn’t pure, meaning it wasn’t singularly set on heaven’s agenda and heaven’s way of winning. It was divided, mixed, interested in heaven’s wisdom to some degree, but trying to make room for earth’s agenda and earth’s way of winning too.” (Jasmine Holmes)

The pure in heart see God because there is a unity of allegiance and purpose in their desires, which translates into their lifestyle. As a result, they “see God” in that they understand God more and more as they are increasingly transformed into the kind of image bearer God intended.

After the pure in heart come the peacemakers. Just as God generously used His power for us, a desire for peacemaking will reflect our desire to pass on the peace God, through Jesus, has made with, within, and among us.[7]

Peace Makers seek out hostile environments, and they make peace as far as it depends on them (Romans 12:18). We think of it often as what happens when peace comes to a war zone, or conflict ends in genocidal countries, but it can happen in your house...in this church…. at school, at work, among your friends. We make peace by…

·  leading with love

·  speaking truth with grace

·  healing brokenness with patience

·  addressing sin with humility

·  bringing justice to the oppressed

·  diffusing violence with compassion

·  pointing toward Jesus while building a bridge between those who are at odds with one another

Peacemakers share God's peace with those around them by imitating Christ's sacrificial love and participating in His work.[8] Peacemaking can be difficult work. It cost Jesus a crucifixion; it will cost us too. However, peacemakers are recognized as children of God.[9] This is not how they become children of God—that can only happen by receiving Jesus Christ as Savior (John 1:12). By making peace, believers will be recognized as children of God. They bear the family likeness.[10]

In contrast are the chaotic, those who disturb the peace. They leave a trail of discord behind them wherever they go.

·  abuse of all kinds: physical, emotional, verbal

·  manipulation and bullying

·  cutting sarcasm, constant criticism, and the incessant highlighting of what’s wrong with everything but self.

·  spreading gossip, lies and slander

·  unforgiveness

·   the use of violence to bring peace (Rome’s pax romana, the peace by the sword).

·  the love of drama and the creation of it when there is none.

Instead of seeking out situations in which to make peace, they move into situations and create the very thing for which other people are going to have to bring peace.

But, if we persevere in peacemaking, we will be called children of God because there will be a family resemblance with the Great Peacemaker who bridged the gap created by our sin, granted us peace with him, and works in us so that we can introduce peace to those around us.

Jesus next mentions “those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness….when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.”

In this group, we find those whose desire for righteousness is obvious in their lives. This will not make life easy, but they are willing to pay whatever it costs for the sake of the Gospel. The persecuted will be in the company of a class of people of whom the writer of Hebrews said the world is not worthy (Hebrews 11).[11] This is the bookend to the ‘poor in spirit’ who get this Kingdom of heaven; those who go through this will also inherit the Kingdom of heaven.

There are three different things that full under the umbrella of this beatitude:

·  Persecuted (dioko) – hunted; put to flight

·  Insulted (oneidzo) – mocked; disgraced

·  Falsely say (pseudomai) – lie; willfully misrepresent

Some Christians have experienced all three; some just one or two. All three provide an opportunity to respond with meekness, righteousness, mercy, and pureness of heart. Remember, you participate in eternal life with God when you experience this.

For Christians, times that the going gets tough because of our righteous reflection of God is not cause for fear or anger. It’s to be expected. The powers of the Empires don’t like anti-empire nature of true Kingdom citizens.

·  They will want us to be proud, but we are poor in spirit.

·  They will want us to be hard, but we are people who mourn.

·  They want us to flex with power, but our power is harnessed by Jesus in service of others.

·  They will want to bribe and control by satisfying our earthly appetites, but we are hungry for the things of heaven

·  They will tempt us to be harsh and cruel, but we will be the merciful ones.

·  They will want to corrupt our affections and allegiance, but we will be pure in where and how we give our love and allegiance.

·  They will want us to break the world when needed, but we will insist on mending it, and using peaceful means to bring about peaceful ends.

As a final note of encouragement, Brad Jersak has pointed out that the Beatitudes that reveal to us what God has called us to be like have been perfectly revealed in Jesus already. Jesus has shown us what is good, and what the Lord requires of us. (Micah 6:8)

Jesus, whose poverty of spirit reveals the kingdom of heaven.
Jesus, who mourns for and with those who mourn,
Jesus, the meek, whose inheritance we are,
Jesus, whose hunger and thirst are filled in doing the will of his Father,
Jesus, the merciful, the all-merciful, the especially merciful,
Jesus, the pure in heart, Lamb without guile,
Jesus, the peacemaker, minister of reconciliation, restorer of all,
Jesus, the persecuted, the slandered the crucified.

HIS is the kingdom of heaven
HE is the comfort for those he mourns
HIS is the earth and all who live in it
HE fills the hungry with good things
HE showers us all with mercy
HE alone beholds his Father and reveals his face to us as
self-giving, radically forgiving, co-suffering love
HIS is the kingdom of heaven and
HIS resurrection life is freely given!

__________________________________________________________________________

[1] I recommend two books on the beatitudes. The first is called World On Fire: Walking In The Wisdom Of Christ When Everyone’s Fighting About Everything. By Hannah Anderson, Jada Edwards, Rachel Gilson, Ashley Marivittori Gorman, Jasmine Holmes, Rebecca McLaughlin, Jen Pollock Michael, Mary Wiley, and Elizabeth Woodson. The second is What If Jesus Was Serious, by Skye Jethani.

[2] Hebrews 11:6

[3] HT C.S. Lewis

[4] Believers Bible Commentary

[5] “sons of Levi”

[6]  Colossians 1:27

[7] “Some Judeans and Galileans believed that God would help them wage war against the Romans to establish God’s kingdom, but Jesus assigned the kingdom instead to the meek, the merciful, the persecuted, and those who make peace.”  (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible)

[8]  Orthodox Study Bible

[9] “In the light of the Gospel, Jesus himself is the supreme peacemaker, making peace between God and us (Eph 2:15-17; Col 1:20) and among human beings. Our peacemaking will include the promulgation of that Gospel. It must also extend to seeking all kinds of reconciliation. Those who undertake this work are acknowledged as God's "sons". In the OT, Israel has the title "sons" (Dt 14:1; Hos 1:10). Now it belongs to the heirs of the kingdom who are especially equipped for peacemaking and so reflect something of the character of their heavenly Father.” (Expositors Bible Commentary)

[10] Believers Bible Commentary

[11] CBS Tony Evans Study Bible

The Life And Death Of This Age (Matthew 5; Luke 6)

Last time I preached, we looked at eternal life. Let’s do a quick refresher. Around the time Jesus lived, the rabbis were discussing the difference between two kinds of living.

·      hayei olam (Hi-YAY Oh-LAHM) was the Hebrew phrase for eternal or everlasting life. It referred to living in a way that focused on matters of eternal importance. It was about a quality of life.[1]

·      hayei sha’ah (Hi-YAY Sha-AH) was the Hebrew phrase for fleeting or earthly life. It was only concerned with short-term material needs of today: working, making money, eating, etc.

The New Testament language is going to use more stark language of eternal/everlasting life vs. eternal/everlasting death.  Aiōnios, the word often translated as “eternal” or “everlasting”, means “of the Age” or “pertaining to the age.” Like “hayei,” it focuses more on quality rather than quantity.[2]

There were other Greek words that focused unambiguously on the time factor: aidios, aperantos(unlimited), adialeiptos (unceasing), or ateleutos (endless). The writers of the Bible were inspired by God to choose aiónios instead, so there must be something important here.

Think of the Bible as talking about the Now “the life/death of this age” or the Not Yet  “life/death of that age to come.”[3] It’s going to tell us something about how we are participating in the life Jesus offers starting right now – or how we are participating in the ways of death, starting right now.

I suspect the best overview of this is in the Sermon on the Mount, with a focus on the Beatitudes. Jesus explains how to enter into aonios life, the life of the age right now, as a foretaste of the life in the age to come. The contrast is going to show us what participating in the death of this age looks like, which is also a foretaste of the death in the age to come. From Matthew 5:

Then Jesus came down with them and stood on a level place. When he saw the crowds, Jesus went back up the mountain. After he sat down his disciples came to him. Then looking up at his disciples, he began to teach them by saying:

·  Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to them.

·  Blessed are those who mourn or weep, for they will be comforted and laugh.

·  Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

·  Blessed are those who hunger and thirst now for righteousness, for they will be satisfied.

·  Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

·  Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

·  Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called the children of God

·  Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to them.

·  Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you and insult you and reject you as evil and persecute you and say all kinds of evil things about you falsely on account of me. Rejoice in that day and jump for joy, because your reward is great in heaven. For their ancestors persecuted the prophets before you in the same way.

The Greek word for blessed, makarios, was used by the Greeks for the kind of happiness and well-being the gods themselves enjoy. When Jesus talked about the makarios, the blessed ones, he meant those who participate in life with God, as God intended.

The “blessed” follow an interesting pattern. Starting with the poor in spirit, they seem to lay out a progression of how to move into deeper spiritual, relational, and emotional aonios life of this age. We are only going to cover the first three this morning, but I think you will see that progression emerge.

You might also notice that the qualities described and approved are the opposite of those that empires typically value. So as we go through the Beatitudes, we are also going to look at what characterizes participating in the death of the age.

We begin with the “poor in spirit.” These are the ones who understand their spiritual situation: they are broken. They are struggling with the chains of sin; they are in a spiritual battle against principalities and powers, and they have at times fought with the enemy instead of against him. But in spite of this, they are living in a blessed state, because recognizing the problem is the first step in inheriting the Kingdom of Heaven.

The first beatitude gives the correct diagnosis: we need a doctor, not just to save us from death, but to continue to heal us. We have to see this to find life. We see in Luke’s gospel.

He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’

But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” (Luke 18:9-14)

I think this first beatitude is meant to be one on which the others are built. If the original sin was pride; the original virtue – humility - is the opposite of it. And, I might add, a powerful way to engage in spiritual warfare.

Kingdom people recognize their own inadequacy and insufficiency apart from God. To quote from the first step in a lot of recovery groups, “We admit that we are powerless, and our lives have become unmanageable.”

This kind of humility or ‘poorness of spirit’ is not self-loathing. It’s not incessantly focusing on our weakness, or thinking of ourselves as less than we ought. We are, after all, image bearers of God. If we are a follower of Jesus, we are an ambassador, a son or daughter of God, a temple – so much language in the Bible explaining our worth.

Humility involves not thinking more highly of ourselves than we should. It’s being realistic about the broken and sinful parts of who we are. It’s knowing the limit of our abilities; it’s seeing where we are weak and acknowledging it. The poor in spirit are very much just…honest about themselves.

The opposite is pride. The proud live in a cursed state; they think they are grand, that they are all put together. They would say, if they were in a group, “I admit that I am powerful, and my life will be what I make it.”[4] They thrive on insulting and humiliating others. Everything circles back to them. In their minds, they are the smartest, the most capable, the expert on everything. For you gamers, everyone else is a boring Non-Playable Characters (NPCs).

They don’t see how they are damaged and enslaved by sin, how badly they are in need of righteousness, how painfully they land in the world, or how their unaddressed participation in the death of this age is hurting those around them.

If there is one sin which God hates more than another, and more sets Himself against, it is the sin of pride. Like a weed upon a dung-heap, pride grows more profusely in some soils, especially when well fertilized by rank, riches, praise, flattery, our own ignorance, and the ignorance of others…

Those, perhaps, who think they possess the least pride, and view themselves with wonderful self-admiration as the humblest of mortals, may have more pride than those who feel and confess it. (J.C. Philpot)

One of the hardest things to deal with is people who say, “I’ve got this!” when you know they don’t got that. The hardest kids to coach are not the ones who know they are terrible; it is those who can barely dribble who think they have a shot at the NBA. The hardest person to counsel…the hardest musician to train…the hardest spouse or parent to live with… they all follow this pattern. They have so much awesomeness to defend.

Here’s how C.S. Lewis describes God’s plan for the poor in spirit:

[God] wants you to know Him: wants to give you Himself. And He and you are two things of such a kind that if you really get into any kind of touch with Him you will, in fact, be humble—delightedly humble, feeling the infinite relief of having for once got rid of all the silly nonsense about your own dignity which has made you restless and unhappy all your life.

He is trying to make you humble in order to make this moment possible: trying to take off a lot of silly, ugly, fancy-dress in which we have all got ourselves up and are strutting about like the little idiots we are.

 I wish I had got a bit further with humility myself: if I had, I could probably tell you more about the relief, the comfort, of taking the fancy-dress off—getting rid of the false self, with all its 'Look at me' and 'Aren't I a good boy?' and all its posing and posturing. To get even near it, even for a moment, is like a drink of cold water to a man in a desert.

Only by stopping my attempts to rule in the Kingdom of Me, where I must increase while God and others decrease, can I participate in the life of this age. Only by being humbly and desperately dependent on the saving and transforming grace of God can we become what God has created us to be.[5]

Next come the mourners. The context indicates that they are mourning over sin and evil; they especially mourn their own, but they also mourn the failure of mankind to live righteously.[6] They have moved beyond being aware of the problem to bemoaning the broken state of the world. The godly remnant of Jesus' day wept because of the humiliation of Israel as a result of their sin, both personal and corporate. Weeping for sins, to the Israelites, was a deeply poignant[7] act that covered societal sin and those who participated in it.

Mourners are not only thinking about the situation the way God thinks about it; they are feeling about the world the way God feels about it. They call good; good; evil, they call evil. (Isaiah 5:20) God grieves over the sin and brokeness of the world (Ephesians 4:30; Mark 3:5), and they do too.

This mourning is not sadness that leads to despair (see 2 Corinthians 7:10). God has promised comfort to his people (Isaiah 40:1; 51:3; 61:2 – 3; 66:13).  Holy sorrow is part of repentance, conversion, and virtuous action.[8] We are blessed as this drives us to the comfort of salvation. When know we are sick, and we want the cure, and we find the right doctor, we will be okay.  The life of the age commences.

In contrast, “Cursed are the hardened.” They know there is a problem – maybe - but they refuse to address it. They convince themselves that they will be okay, or that it’s not their problem. They have nothing to repent of, for sure. They define good in the world is that which benefits them; the evil, that which gets in their way. They detach the proper emotion from this reality, and off they go with a smile – or a scowl - fixed on their face.

They distract themselves or drown their emotions in a flood of parties, distractions, pleasures, and work. It’s a lifestyle of denial. They refuse to pursue empathy on behalf of the poor, the downtrodden, the weak, the marginalized. They don’t care about life in someone else’s shoes.[9] Even if they see the diagnosis, they don’t hate the sickness enough to care about the cure. #fruitofpride

Because - let’s be honest - the cure is hard. It requires mourning. If you know anything about Old Testament precedent, it was sackcloth and ashes, and fasting. Who looks forward to mourning brokenness and failure? And mourning might mean you care enough to get involved in a way that costs you something.

But….not mourning is hard too. The hardening of our lives has its own consequence. The things we use to drown our emotions will eventually drown us. The walls we build to wall off parts of ourselves we want to avoid will eventually be walls that separate us from others, because - let’s be honest - people who refuse to address their own issues are hard to be around.

Two paths, both of which are hard. Choose the one that leads to life. The beatitudes teach that we begin by embracing transformative sorrow to participate in the life of this age.

Counterintuitive, I know. But it’s the way to life, because God is at work in the midst of that process. In fact, the word used for “they shall be comforted” is parakaleo, from which we get parakletos, the Holy Spirit, our comforter who is also an advocate[10] for those whose mourning has led them to repentance and into salvation.

These first two beatitudes deliberately allude to the messianic blessing of Isaiah 61:1-3, the one Jesus read in his hometown to announce who he was. Here it is again – at least the portion Jesus read:

The Lord has appointed me for a special purpose. He has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to repair broken hearts, and to declare to those who are held captive and bound in prison, “Be free from your imprisonment!” 2 He has sent me to announce the year of jubilee, the season of the Eternal’s favor.

That’s where mourning is headed: gladness, victory, joy, and comfort. But it starts with mourning.

Then there are the gentle, or meek/humble.  The same word is used in the Greek in a variety of ways:

·  bulls that pull a plow

·  horses that pull a chariot

The meek are the ones who are willing to have their power harnessed into the service of the Kingdom. Our pattern for meekness or gentleness[11] is Jesus, who submits to the will of His Father.

Though Jesus set the pattern, we need this harnessing in ways Jesus did not in order for us to flourish in the life of this age. Unharnessed, we are wild and untamed.

The humble (the poor in spirit who mourn the effect of sin) know they need to be controlled, because on their own they will just tear things up. They know that they need a yoke; they know that if their life is harnessed in the right cause, they can be strong in the service of something greater than themselves. They began to gain a sense of what their life might mean to others.

In meekness, we see the beginning of a sense of community.

Because the meek are God-controlled, the Holy Spirit brings about the strength to have mastery over passions and emotions. Meekness is not passive weakness, but strength directed and under control to bring about good.

The problem with winter hurricanes and cyclones isn’t that there is wind; it’s that the wind is untamed and destructive. It leaves devastation in its wake. None of us look at that and think, “Well, wind is a terrible idea.” No, we look at it and say, “That much wind is a problem.”

·  If you physically bully people, the problem isn’t that you are too strong; it’s that you use your strength to break the world instead of fix it.

·  If you verbally abuse people, the problem isn’t that you can speak; it’s that you use the power of your words to bring death instead of life.

·  If your emotions lash out in a way that manipulates or wounds people, the problem isn’t that you have emotions; it’s that your emotions are unharnessed and destructive.

So it is with the things constrained by meekness. Holy Spirit-empowered meekness orders our lives for our good and the good of others. The life of this age flourishes when we surrender to God’s constraint to fulfill His design in ourselves and in the world around us. Participating in eternal life means participating in the lives of those around us in ways that reveal that goodness of the Kingdom of God.

In contrast, it is participation in the death of the age to remain wild, living an unharnessed or destructive life. The wild don’t want authority over them; they want to do their own thing, follow their own heart, use their strength for themselves and not bring their lives into submission or service to others. They are all about the self. “I can do what I want. Nobody tells me what to do.” They are bullies who love to force themselves onto the world. #stillafruitofpride

When I taught my ethics class at NMC, a key question that kept coming up was this: “What would it look like if everybody lived like you?” or “Would you like other people if they lived by your standards?” It’s a way of talking about the Golden Rule: “Do to others what you would like for them to do to you.” This does not happen when we are not meek.

This is the opposite of the meek, who have a sense of their place and responsibility in community. They see how their lives are situated in the midst of the lives of others. The meek seek to live out the Golden Rule: they want those around them to live with constrained power that brings about the flourishing of everyone, so they do it too.

The law of meekness is: If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, not only give him drink (which is an act of charity), but drink to him, in token of friendship, and true love, and reconciliation; and in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head, not to consume him, but to melt and soften him, that he may be cast into a new mold. (Matthew Henry)

One day the owner of the earth will pass an inheritance on to the meek. The ones who know what it’s like to be stewarded know how to steward well in turn, both in this age and the age to come. [12] 

The first three beatitudes lay a foundation:

·  honest brokenness over our sin

·  humble mourning that leads to repentance and salvation

·  harnessed servanthood that leads to flourishing.

We see here three requirements for entering into eternal life with God and building the kind of Kingdom God has planned.

FOR PART TWO, CLICK HERE
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[1] Consider, for instance, the “everlasting (olam) hills” in Canaan (Genesis 49:26), Aaron’s “everlasting” high priesthood (Exodus 40:15), Phinehas’ “everlasting” priesthood (Numbers 25:11–13), “everlasting” atonement rituals for the Israelites (Leviticus 16:34), etc. These “everlasting” ordinances were only for a time.

[2] In Matthew 25:46, Jesus speaks of “eternal punishment” (kolasin aiōnion) and “eternal life” (zōēn aiōnion). The Greek word aiōnios  derives from aiōn, meaning an age or era.

Classical and biblical usage shows that aiōnios often means “pertaining to an age” or “age-enduring.” The New Testament itself speaks of “long ages” (aiōniois chronois, Rom. 16:25) that have come to an end. It often is used in ways in Scripture that clearly do not mean “unending,” such as the phrases zoē aiónios – “life of the Age” (commonly translated "eternal life") or kolasis aiónios – “punishment of the Age.

[3] “In the New Testament the history of the world is conceived as developed through a succession of aeons. A series of such aeons precedes the introduction of a new series inaugurated by the Christian dispensation, and the end of the world and the second coming of Christ are to mark the beginning of another series. . . . He includes the series of aeons in one great aeon, ὁ αἰὼν τῶν αἰώνων, the aeon of the aeons (Eph. 3:21); and the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews describes the throne of God as enduring unto the aeon of the aeons (Heb 1:8). The plural is also used, aeons of the aeons, signifying all the successive periods which make up the sum total of the ages collectively. . . . This plural phrase is applied by Paul to God only.” (Vincent’s Word Studies)

[4] Psalm 10:4 “In his pride the wicked man does not seek him; in all his thoughts there is no room for God.”

[5] The kingdom of heaven, where self-sufficiency is no virtue and self-exaltation is a vice, belongs to such people. (Believers Bible Commentary)

[6] They mourn over both personal and corporate sins (see Ezra 9:1–4 as an example from the Old Testament).

[7] Ezra 10:6; Psalm 51:4; Daniel 9:19-20)

[8] Orthodox Study Bible

[9] There is a weird flex right now in evangelical circles in which empathy is considered a sin. That feels like the fruit of pride to me.

[10] It’s not like God doesn’t know about our repentance and salvation. It’s an earthly analogy (the biblical audience knew what a parakletos was and did in society) to illustrate a spiritual reality.

[11] The same Greek word is translated “gentle” elsewhere.

[12] “The ultimate fulfillment of the promise to Abraham and his offspring that they would be ‘heirs of the world’” (Romans 4:13). (ESV Global Study Bible)

Now and Not Yet

Some books have a prologue; this sermon does too.

The rabbis and the writers of the New Testament understood the term “the Kingdom of Heaven” to have a dual meaning: 

• The rule of God in the present

• the reign of God in the age to come.[1]

Christians have long called this “the now[2] and not yet.” In Northern Michigan we know what this is like when it comes to seasons. When the first day of spring shows up on the calendar, the age of fulfillment has come, but the consummation is still in the future. Here is a biblical example.

“Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.” (1 John 3:2)

Here are a few other examples where you are going to have to look up the address yourself :)

• We are already adopted in Christ (Romans 8:15), but not yet fully adopted (Romans 8:23)

• We are already redeemed in Christ (Ephesians 1:7), but not yet fully redeemed (Ephesians 4:30)

• We are already sanctified in Christ (1 Corinthians 1:2), but not yet fully sanctified (1 Thessalonians 5:23–24)

• We are already saved in Christ (Ephesians 2:8), but not yet fully saved (Romans 5:9).

• We are already raised with Christ (Ephesians 2:6), but not yet fully raised (1 Corinthians 15:52).[3]

The now and not yet. 

* * * * *

Last week we talked about what all the sermons in the book of Acts present. Today, we will talk about some really significant things that are not present in the speeches in the book of Acts.

Specifically, heaven and hell are not presented as motivators for following Jesus in the book of Acts. They are barely mentioned at all.

Hades is mentioned once in Acts 2, where Peter is quoting Psalm 16. There, Peter is just applying a prophecy to Jesus (“You will not abandon my soul to Hades/Sheol”). He’s not making a presentation about it.[4]

In the New Testament, heaven (Ouranos) can refer to the sky, outer space, or the third heaven (God’s dwelling place). Acts uses “heaven” language as shorthand for “where God reigns” twice: God “raised Jesus” and exalted him (Acts 2:33–36), and Jesus is enthroned at God’s right hand (Acts 7:55–56).[5]

Even the phrase “eternal/everlasting life” appears only in one speech (Acts 13:46-48), but the phrase “eternal/everlasting punishment” not at all.[6]

Clearly, what happens in the age to come is a very important part of the Christian worldview and is talked about by Jesus and others as recorded in Scripture. But in the midst of all the sermons and speeches in Acts, the life in the age to come – the “not yet” -  is not front and center, and punishment and reward in the age to come are not presented as motivators for following Jesus.

Acts focuses on the “now” part of the “now and not yet.”

Having said that, Acts absolutely does preach the importance of repentance with a coming judgment in view.

• Paul teaches that God “commands all people everywhere to repent” because God “has fixed a day” to judge the world through the risen Jesus (Acts 17:30–31). 

• Peter told Cornelius, “[Christ] commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead.” (Acts 10:42-43)

Clearly there will be a judgment that holds us accountable. Acts does not deny this at all. It just doesn’t record a detailed map of competing destinations in the afterlife, and it doesn’t incorporate a presentation of them into evangelism tools to reach their audience.

Why? I suspect that their audience had a grasp of reward and punishment that they took so seriously already that Paul and Peter didn’t need to raise the stakes for them as they considered whether or not to repent and follow Jesus. That is what we are going to examine.

When people in Peter and Paul’s audience were called to repent, they were generally trying to avoid “the wrath of God”.  HELPS Word-studies defines this wrath this way:

“Settled anger (opposition) proceeds from an internal disposition which steadfastly opposes someone or something based on extended personal exposure…a fixed, controlled, passionate feeling against sin . . . a settled indignation.”

So, God’s wrath isn’t God flying off the handle in a temper outburst. God is, after all, “slow to anger” (Psalm 86:15, etc).  God steadfastly opposes sin because He knows what it does (that’s the “extended personal exposure”). He has a settled indignation at the chaos it causes. He has a holy resistance to corruption. He loves His creation too much to let it be ruined without consequence.

In the framework of God’s Old Testament covenant with Israel, the wrath of God was more often than not very practical. Think of the OT blessings vs. curses within the covenant that mapped onto righteousness vs. sin. Wrath is God’s in that God warns us that sin will lead to consequences that God himself has ordained.

This was something the people of Israel had experienced already in this life, and the Jewish people continued to understand as seen in the writings of Paul.

Ezekiel 22:31 - “I will pour out my wrath…they have returned their conduct upon their heads, says the Lord God.”

Romans 1 -  “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people….  God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts… God gave them over to a depraved mind.” 

Galatians 6:7 - “Be not deceived; God is not mocked. What one sows, one will also reap.”

So what does the wrath of consequences look like? Two key results show up over and over again in the Old Testament; that pattern starts immediately in Genesis.

• loss of life (“if you eat you will surely die”)[7]

• loss of the land intended to give them life (exile from Eden).[8] To be exiled from the land is to be pushed back toward chaos and death. Wrath was the loss of life-giving space.

That pattern continues through so many stories. The wrath of God revealed as the wages of sin leads to death or loss of the land meant to give them life.

• The people go to Egypt for help during a famine instead of trusting God, and they lose their land (and a lot of lives).

• When they follow God out of Egypt, God leads them toward a land of Promise – and an entire generation dies outside the land because of sin.

• They make it to the land; when their sin overwhelms them, they are conquered and exiled.[9]

This is exactly the framework that the apostles in Acts assume when they warn about the consequences of “wrath” without needing to tap into imagery of life or death in the age to come. Their audience already knows the story: the wages of sin are death and exile from the blessing of the land God had provided for them.

I suspect this is why the afterlife isn’t central in Acts. There was plenty of material here already. When Jesus warned them about the punishment of Gehennah (literally right outside the city gates), they wanted to avoid it at all cost. They had seen what happened there to their ancestors.[10] They knew what that meant. The wages of sin were death and exile.

When John the Baptist said, “Flee from the wrath to come,” his audience had centuries of history that formed the legitimacy of this warning. So many times, God’s people had fallen into sin, failed to hear the prophets, and experienced the wrath of God through the consequences of their sin. It’s been an ongoing reality. That’s why Paul can write,

“The wrath of God is being revealed (present tense) from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness…” (Romans 1:18)

But that wasn’t the end of the story. The prophets had always insisted that the goal was always repentance, return, and restoration into a renewal of life. Here is just one (fairly famous) example.

This is what the Lord says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 

You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back from captivity I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.” Jeremiah 29:10-14)[11]

The Jewish people still thought of themselves as exiled even though they were back in their own land. Rome ruled them; they were convinced God’s Spirit had left them; the glory hadn’t returned to the Temple; and so many of the prophets promises had not been fulfilled.

And if they were still in exile, they were still under the wrath of God.

The apostles are convincing their audience that Jesus has conquered the power of death and exile. That’s why the focus is on Jesus’ resurrection/exaltation (He’s God!), the outpouring of the Holy Spirit (“The Kingdom is within you!”), and a new community of belonging (“You’re home!”).

In a sense, Jesus relives Israel’s history of death and exile by participating in it.

• Goes into Egypt (Matthew 2)

• Enters the wilderness (40 days)

• Crucified outside the city (Hebrews 13:12)

• Hung on a tree (Deuteronomy 21’s curse)

• Enters death (Hades)

On the cross, Jesus stepped into exile and overpowered it. He entered the realm of death and took away its power. Acts preaches that, because of what Jesus has done, the exile is over. The King has returned and sits on a throne in His Kingdom, which has now expanded to include all the nations. He is pouring out His life-giving Holy Spirit for renewal and refreshing. And he has even rebuilt the Temple, but this time it’s His people.

The age of exile is over because the risen King has come. A national and even cosmic restoration has begun.

Acts’ dominant evangelistic posture is a proactive summons into this new life of restoration and reconciliation. Repentance is a doorway into resurrection life and Spirit-formed community. The stress is on what it looks like to experience the Kingdom of God now.

• Forgiveness of sins

• Gift of the Holy Spirit

• Inclusion in a new community

• Participation in God’s renewing work

Acts invites its audience to align themselves with Jesus, because resurrection has already begun. They are no longer exiled from the true land that nourishes them with the true Water and Bread of life. The land – the Kingdom of God - is theirs to enjoy, beginning now. Paul told Timothy, 

“Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called.” (1 Timothy 6:12)

Every commentary I read said something like this: Believers have begun "eternal (aiṓnios) life" right now, experiencing this quality of God's life now as a present possession.[12]

Around the time Jesus lived, the rabbis were discussing the difference between hayei olam (Hi-YAY Oh-LAHM), meaning eternal life, which is contrasted with hayei sha’ah (Hi-YAY Sha-AH), which means fleeting or earthly life.

This wasn’t about before death and after death. Hayei olam was “lasting life,” and it referred to living in a way that focused on matters of eternal importance. Hayei sha’ah was about only being concerned with short-term material needs of today: working, making money, eating, etc.

We as followers of Jesus have hayei olam, and it begins now.  There’s more to come, but it begins now. Let’s go with John 4:14’s image:

“The water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

If you go to where the Boardman River pops out of the ground, and put your kayak in, you are on the Boardman river. But the spring is just the beginning. That river will take you somewhere. You are on the river “now” but you are “not yet” where it plans to take you. So, how do we start eternal life now?

“Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.” (John 17:3)

Knowing has to do with being transformed into the image of Christ, having the Holy Spirit at work in us, absorbing the truth of God’s word, ordering our life around the things of God, seeking to see God at work in every situation… It’s an active, all-encompassing, total life surrender and make over. 

Eternal life starts with repentance, turning away from all that is sinful and unrighteous and turning toward the path of life made possible through Jesus.  It’s living in God's righteous path centered in God's will, making it our highest priority to further God’s interests and kingdom in every way by having eyes that see what Jesus sees, hearts that respond like the heart of Jesus, and hands that do what Jesus would do.

And if we do this as entire communities of people, the “now” gives us clearer and clearer images of the glory and goodness that awaits us in the “not yet.”

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[1] “The Kingdom Of Heaven In The Here And Now And Future.” Marg Mowczko, https://margmowczko.com/the-kingdom-of-heaven-here-now-future/

[2] “The coming of the kingdom of God is not something that can be observed, nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is in your midst (or, within you).” (Luke 17:20b-21)

[3] https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/already-not-yet provided that list.

[4] The word “hell” did not exist when the Bible was written. Hell comes from a word with German roots, haljō, referring to a "concealed place" or the place of the dead. Norse mythology made it famous: “Hel” refers to both the realm of the dead and the goddess who rules it (no surprise – her dad is Loki.) “Hell” starts showing up in Bible translations around 1,000 AD. It eventually became a catch-all word that referred to Sheol (Old Testament realm of the dead in Hebrew); Hades (New Testament realm of the dead in Greek), ,Gehenna (the valley of Hinnom), and Tartarus. The individual words matter, because they meant different things to the audience in the book of Acts.

[5] Heaven is God’s headquarters. The emphasis in Acts is on exaltation and lordship, not relocation after this life

[6] You see “everlasting/eternal life/punishment” discussed more in the letters to the churches.

[7] Genesis 2. Also, “The soul that sins shall die” (Ezekiel)

[8] Genesis 3

[9] The Northern Kingdom was destroyed by Assyria and the people deported because of idolatry and injustice. (2 Kings 17) Jeremiah and Ezekiel record the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, and the people removed from the land.

[10] And, sadly, would happen again in A.D. 70.

[11] The author of Romans will note: ““We were enemies… we were reconciled… saved from wrath.” (Rom 5:9–10)

[12]  All the discussion that follows on eternal life as understood in the time of Jesus is from Lois Tverberg, writing in “Eternal Life, Here and Now.”

The Connection Between Theology and Relationships (Act 10 Continued…)

I noted last week that a change in theology will lead to a change in relationships. What I meant is that what we think is true about God has implications for how we live.

Saul is a classic example. He thought of God as not Jesus, and thus those who worshipped Jesus as God were blasphemous idolaters. When God made clear that Jesus was God’s revelation of himself—Jesus, who said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” of those who denied, betrayed, and killed him—well, this had implications for how Paul would live.

We keep seeing this correction in Scripture. Remember how Peter had the vision to stop viewing Gentiles as unclean? In Galatians 2, Paul writes that Peter eventually stopped eating with Gentiles because of pressure from Jewish people to stop hanging out with uncircumcised people. Even Barnabas joined in. So, Paul corrected their behavior by correcting their view of God.

“We who are Jews by birth and not sinful Gentiles know that a person is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law, because by the works of the law no one will be justified.” (Galatians 2:15-16)

So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:26-28)

For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”  If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other. (Galatians 5: 14-15)

Wrong theology produces unrighteous segregation. Right theology produces shared tables. Let’s try another cause/effect in Romans.

“While we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son.” (Romans 5:10)

“Bless those who persecute you… do not repay evil for evil.” (Romans 12)

Paul grounds the love of enemies explicitly in God’s character revealed at the cross. If God reconciles enemies, his people cannot justify vengeance. A distorted image of God always produces distorted relationships. A healed vision of God will heal how we treat people.

If we move beyond the book of Acts and look at church history, there are a ton of examples. Let’s look at just two that were momentous in church formation. One will be bad; one will be good. They will highlight that we can tell what people think about God by looking at who they are willing to harm, and who they are determined to love.

Constantine

Under Constantine, Christians moved from a persecuted minority to being partners with the state. Their leaders began to argue that Rome’s agenda was the church’s agenda, which suggested that Rome’s way of bringing about its mission was sanctioned by God. (Constantine claimed a vision in which he saw a cross and the words, “In this sign, conquer.”) Followers of Jesus who had formerly refused to help Rome’s violent pax romana (peace by the sword) as it conquered the world and subjugated people, well, they now joined in.

Basically, Jesus moved from Lord over/against empire to Lord underwriting empire. The cross increasingly becomes reinterpreted as a sign of geo-political victory rather than an expression of self-giving love. Peace became defined as coercive stability (pax Romana) rather than the reconciled shalom of the Bible.

Meanwhile, church bishops gained political power. Because the church and state were so closely intertwined, church dissent became dangerous. Heresy moved from errors to be corrected to crimes to be punished.

• Irenaeus (2nd Century) was the first person on record to define heresy. He simply warned about the dangers of a multitude of opinions on how God works.

• The first person to make heresy a crime was Emperor Constantine (320s).

• ·The first recorded execution of a Christian heretic, Priscillian of Ávila, occurred in 385 by Roman secular authorities.

Once Jesus was imagined primarily as Cosmic Emperor with Constantine as an earthly representation, violence became thinkable “for the good.” Relationships change when theology changes.

The Reformation

The push to remember that justification is by faith, not works, was long overdue. The Reformers stressed the priesthood of all believers (1 Peter 2:9); we did not need mediators to have a relationship with God. We have Jesus. (1 Timothy 2:5) Because God was the kind of God who directly related to all believers, a couple changes followed.

• Scripture was translated into the common language. It didn’t need to be filtered by those who could read Latin.

• Vocational holiness was stressed (work, family, farming). There was dignity in all walks of life, not just ecclesiastical hierarchies.

• Personal, pastoral care began to be emphasized over penitential systems. A personal, relational God wanted personal, relational people.

Whenever the church changes what it believes about God, it changes how it treats people.

In Acts, there are seven major speeches in chapters 2, 3, 7, 10, 13, 17, and 20. We now have four of them under our belt, so I think it’s time to look at what these speeches have in common. If you were to make a Venn Diagram with 7 bubbles, they would all overlap at some point, some more than others.

But there are actually more ‘sermons’ than that (Acts 2 14-40; 3:12-26; 4:5-12; 7; 10:28-47; 13:16-41;17:22-35; 20:17-35; 24:10-21). I couldn’t get them all on a Venn diagram, so let’s try a chart that will show how much they keep revisiting the same themes. (Keep in mind some audiences were Jewish and some Gentile, so things like Salvation History were only of interest to the Jews.)

We did a Harmony of the Gospels that combined the gospels (as best we could) into one harmonious flow. I am going to try to do that with the speeches this morning. Let’s read it, then we will discuss.

“Men and women, brothers and sisters, children of Abraham and Gentiles who fear God, hear these words.” [Acts 2:14; 13:16; 17:22]

“The God who made heaven and earth, the sea and everything in them, the God of our fathers and the giver of life to all peoples, has never been distant from what he has made.” [Acts 3:13; 17:24]

“From the beginning, he has been patient, faithful, and merciful, working through times and seasons so that people might seek him and find him, for he is not far from any one of us.” [Acts 17:26–27]

“From among the nations he called Abraham, and through Abraham he formed a people - not because they were great, but because he is good.” [Acts 7:2–8; 13:17]

“He bore with them in their rebellion, delivered them from slavery, walked with them through the wilderness, led them to the promised land, and spoke to them through the prophets. Again and again, God sent his servants, and again and again they were misunderstood, resisted, and rejected.” [Acts 7:9–52; 13:18–27]

“Yet God did not abandon his purpose, nor did human unfaithfulness cancel divine mercy. In the fullness of time, God sent Jesus of Nazareth, a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him.” [Acts 2:22; 3:20; Acts 7:35–38;10:38;13:30]

“He went about doing good, healing the sick, restoring the broken, announcing good news to the poor and freedom from the power of the devil. God was with him.” [Acts 10:38; 2:22]

“Yet this Jesus was handed over. He was rejected by leaders, condemned unjustly, and put to death by human hands. But God raised him from the dead. Death could not hold him. The grave could not keep him.” [Acts 2:23-32; 3:13–15; 4:10; 10:40; 13:27–37; 17:31]

“By raising Jesus, God has done three things: First, he has vindicated the one we rejected and declared him to be Lord and Messiah. Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.” [Acts 2:36; 4:10–12; 10:36]

“Second, he has confirmed all that the prophets spoke: suffering would not be the final word, that corruption would not triumph, and that God’s Holy One would see life again.” [Acts 3:18; 13:32–33; 26:22–23]

“And third, he has opened a new and living way not only for Israel,
but for all nations.” [Acts 10:34–35; 13:46–47; 15:7–11]

“This risen Jesus has been exalted to the right hand of God, and from there he has poured out the Holy Spirit, not on the deserving, the powerful, or on people only, but on all whom God calls. We have seen it with our own eyes. God shows no favoritism.” [Acts 2:32-33; 10:39–47; 15:8–9]

“He now commands all people everywhere to repent, then, and turn to God. Everyone who believes in him is justified. Turn from what is empty, what enslaves, and turn to the living God.

This repentance leads to forgiveness of sins, to freedom from what the law could never fully remove. from the power of Satan, and to times of refreshing from the Lord.”
[Acts 2:38; 3:19, 38-39; 10:43; 13:39; 14:15; 15:1117:30; 26:18]

“This same Jesus has been appointed by God as the one through whom the world will be set right. God has given proof of this to all by raising him from the dead.” [Acts 17:31; 24:15, 25]

“This message is for you and for those far away, for all whom the Lord our God will call. We do not preach ourselves or a new god; we proclaim what God has done through Jesus. So receive this grace, stand in this mercy, and walk in this new life.” [Acts 2:39-47; Acts 20:24-35; 26:22]

 Demonstrate your repentance by your deeds. And we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ” (Acts 20:35; 26:20)

Acts gives an epic presentation of corrective truth about who God is, what God has done, and what God expects of His people. I suspect that every audience in Acts basically go their own Damascus Road experience. Notice the close – which has text from the last two sermons.

Demonstrate your repentance by your deeds. And we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ” (Acts 20:35; 26:20)

My claim at the beginning of this message is that a change of theology will bring about a change in relationships. The last two speeches make this clear. So, what kind of community emerges on the other side?

The Teaching The Change

God shows no favoritism Table fellowship across boundaries (Acts 10–11)

Jesus is Lord                           Allegiance above empire (Acts 17; 24)

Grace precedes law Gentiles included without Torah knowledge (Acts 15)

Spirit is poured out on all Shared life & generosity (Acts 2; 4)

Leaders serve Lives of humility, self-giving (Acts 20)

In Acts, acting righteously or justly is not an add-on to the gospel. It is the inevitable consequence of believing certain things about God. When the church confesses that God shows no partiality, welcomes outsiders, pours out His Spirit on all flesh, and saves by grace, our practices must match or our theology is exposed as incomplete.

I also made the claim that whenever the church changes what it believes about God, it changes who it is willing to harm—or to love. On the other side of the life of Jesus and the teaching in the book of Acts, who were early Christians willing to harm? No one. Who were they willing to love? Everybody. The Bible makes this clear, but I would like to show you the record from the church as it built on the foundation it had been given.

“This is the way of life: first, thou shalt love the God who made thee, secondly, thy neighbor as thyself: and all things whatsoever thou wouldest not should happen to thee, do not thou to another. The teaching of these words is this: Bless those who curse you, and pray for your enemies, and fast on behalf of those who persecute you. What thanks will be due to you, if ye love only those who love you? Do not the Gentiles also do the same? But love ye those who hate you, and ye shall not have an enemy.” (The Didache, also known as The Teachings of the 12 Apostles, a Christian document written between 80AD – 90AD.)

“We who formerly treasured money and possessions more than anything else now hand over everything we have to a treasury for all and share it with everyone who needs it. We who formerly hated and murdered one another now live together and share the same table. We pray for our enemies and try to win those who hate us.” (Justin the Martyr, 100AD – 165AD)

“It is the Christians, O Emperor, who have sought and found the truth, for they acknowledge God…. They show love to their neighbors. They do not do to another what they would not wish to have done to themselves. They speak gently to those who oppress them, and in this way they make them their friends. It has become their passion to do good to their enemies…. This, O Emperor, is the rule of life of the Christians, and this is their manner of life.” (Aristides, written around 137AD)

“For the Gentiles, hearing from our mouth the words of God, are impressed by their beauty and greatness: then, learning that our works are not worthy of the things we say, they turn to railing, saying that it is some deceitful tale. For when they hear from us that God says: ‘No thanks will be due to you, if ye love only those who love you; but thanks will be due to you, if ye love your enemies and those that hate you. When they hear this, they are impressed by the overplus of goodness: but when they see that we do not love, not only those who hate us, but even those who love us, they laugh at us, and the Name is blasphemed.” (The 2nd Epistle of Clement, 140-160AD)

“Say to those that hate and curse you, You are our brothers!” (Theophilus of Antioch, died around 185AD)

“The Christian does not hurt even his enemy.” (Tertullian, 160AD – 220AD)

“None of us offers resistance when he is seized, or avenges himself for your unjust violence, although our people are numerous and plentiful…it is not lawful for us to hate, and so we please God more when we render no requital for injury…we repay your hatred with kindness.” (St. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, died 258AD)

“Having cleansed ourselves of all hatred, it is necessary to love even enemies, and, when need be, to sacrifice one’s soul for one’s friends, having the same love as God and his Christ has for us.” (St. Basil the Great, 330–379 AD)

“Thus, in keeping with the commandment to rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep (Romans 12:15), we must open up our mercy to all the poor and those who suffer for whatever reason; we are to offer people charity, whether they are widowed or orphaned, whether they are driven out of their homeland or oppressed by the rulers, whether they suffer the insolence of their superiors or the inhumanity of tax collectors or the murderous hand of thieves or the greed of robbers or the seizing of estates or shipwrecks. For they all have the same right to our sympathy, and look at our hands just as we look at the hands of God when we ask Him for something.” (St Gregory the Theologian, 329 AD – 390 AD)

Do not love wealth if it does not help the poor. Forgive if you have received forgiveness, and be merciful if you have been pardoned. Acquire human love by human love while you are still alive. May your whole life be renewed. May your paths be made new. (St. Gregory the Theologian, 329 AD – 390 AD)

We learn a lot about what the first followers of Jesus assumed God required of them because of their understanding of what God was like as revealed in Jesus. If we assume that theology maps onto our relationships, I have a question. If someone watched my (your) relationships for a month, where we are ambassadors for God, what would they conclude about my (your) view of God? Is God…

• Patient or harsh?

• Generous or stingy?

• More full of grace or judgment?

• Slow to anger or quick to anger?

• Punishment-centered or healing-centered?

• Callous or kind?

• Insulting or uplifting?

• Manipulative or invitational?

• Domineering or self-giving?

• Keeping score or canceling debt?

• Impatient with weakness or patient in formation?

• Perfectionistic or growth-oriented?

• Shaming people into change or loving them into it?

The book of Acts – and all of Scripture’s revelation of Jesus - offer an opportunity to assess whether or not we are living in the life Jesus has offered to us. Jesus modeled and taught a path to freedom from the power of sin and evil. He saves us not just from something but to something: a Kingdom characterized by righteousness and holiness. He invites us to join in his restorative plan for the world by demonstrating the beauty of the restoration that only Jesus can bring.

If you would like to put a song on your playlist that reflects this sermon, here it is.

Clean and Unclean (Acts 9:20 – Acts 10)

Today’s section goes from Acts 9:20 through the end of chapter 10. We don’t have time to read all of the text, so I am going to give you some highlights and encourage you to read all of it yourself. We may revisit parts of it later, but today we need the bigger narrative.  Here is a quick overview before we unpack some of the details.

In Acts 9, after Paul’s encounter with Ananias, he sticks around and does some proclamation of Jesus as Lord. The local Jewish people try to kill him (I’m guessing it’s his former colleagues), but he escapes. He goes to Jerusalem and meets a bunch of the disciples who, as you might imagine, were skeptical. A guy named Barnabas smooths things over. That name will come up later.  The section on Paul ends this way:

Then the church throughout Judea, Galilee and Samaria enjoyed a time of peace and was strengthened. Living in the fear of the Lord and encouraged by the Holy Spirit, it increased in numbers. (Acts 9:31)

The narrative returns to Peter. He is on the move, and He is crushing it. He’s preaching. He heals a paralyzed man, and,

“All those who lived in Lydda and Sharon saw him and turned to the Lord.” (Acts 9:35)

He raises a woman named Tabitha (Dorcas, in Greek) from the dead. The people love him, and,

“This became known all over Joppa, and many people believed in the Lord.” (9:43)

Then Peter decides to stay with a local tanner (9:44), a guy who was constantly ritually unclean because he handled dead animals. It seems like an odd choice… until it doesn’t. We’ll get to that.

He gets this vision of a sheet descending from heaven with clean and unclean[1] animals mixed together. A voice says, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.”

So Peter, faithful adherent to Jewish purity laws, says, “Surely not, Lord.”

God says, “What I have made clean, you must not call unclean.” (Acts 10:13-15)

This happens three times, which is par for the course for Peter (3 denials that he knew Jesus; 3 challenges by Jesus of, "Do you love me?")

Meanwhile, God is speaking in a Roman house to a Gentile family (Acts 10). Cornelius, an important dude in the Roman army, is a praying, generous, devout God-fearer whom the Jewish people respect. Cornelius receives a vision to summon Peter, so he does.

When Peter gets there, he enters a house he was trained to avoid because of ritual impurity – but he had just been in a house like that, so some preparation had been done. There, he announces a tradition - shattering truth:

“God has shown me that I should not call any person common or unclean.” (Acts 10:28)

Then he starts preaching, and the Holy Spirit lands on them, and a bunch of folks get baptized. Then they invite Peter to stay and eat together with a bunch of Gentiles, and he does.

Peter is starting to look a lot like Jesus.

* * * * *

That’s the forest. Let’s look at some beautiful trees.

Healing is Unifying

Peter heals two people:

• Aeneas had been paralyzed for eight years. He couldn’t worship in the temple (beyond the court of the Gentiles), and there was likely plenty of speculation about what sin he had committed to deserve that.

• Tabitha/Dorcas was a disciple beloved by widows, known for good works and helping the poor. Listing both of her names likely highlights that this female disciple was a bridge-builder between the Jewish and Greek cultures.

These healings introduce a theme that’s going to continue in Acts 10.  God’s saving power is not limited by boundaries that create insiders and outsiders. And the restoration is not going to be merely physical. The result will be a building of a community of faith populated by people free of the hierarchy of value labels that traditions and cultures can enforce.

Peter Joins What God Is Already Doing

We talked about Saul’s zeal needing correction, which happened on the road to Damascus.  Now Peter is going to get some holy disruption concerning categories of people he considered clean and unclean.

To be fair to Peter, he’s giving it a go. He’s staying with a tanner, which Jewish people just did not do. There are dead animals, blood, hides, stench, impurity.

“A wife, it is said, could claim a divorce from a husband who became a tanner (Mishna Khethuboth): “It happened at Sidon that a tanner died, and left a brother who was also a tanner. The sages held that his (childless) widow had a right to plead, ‘Thy brother I could bear but I cannot bear thee.’” (Cambridge Bible For Schools And Colleges)

Let’s give Peter the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he’s testing himself. Maybe he’s trying to bring the tanner some honor by staying with him (like Jesus eating with Zaccheus). I don’t know.

Either way, the fact that he needs a vision suggests he hasn’t stopped putting people into categories of clean and unclean. So, he gets a vision of universal equality of human value in the eyes of God. He has to catch up with what God is already doing.

This continues in Acts 10 where, Cornelius doesn’t convert because Peter is persuasive; Cornelius responded to Peter’s message because God had prepared the way first. Cornelius already prayed, gave alms, and was a “God fearer,” a Jewish way of saying revered God. The Jewish people respected him. God was already at work.

 “Three days ago I was in my house praying at this hour, at three in the afternoon. Suddenly a man in shining clothes stood before me and said, ‘Cornelius, God has heard your prayer and remembered your gifts to the poor. Send to Joppa for Simon who is called Peter. He is a guest in the home of Simon the tanner, who lives by the sea.’ 

So I sent for you immediately, and it was good of you to come. Now we are all here in the presence of God to listen to everything the Lord has commanded you to tell us.” (Acts 10:30-33)

Then, the Holy Spirit manifested before Peter even finished his sermon (10:44).

While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit came on all who heard the message. The circumcised believers who had come with Peter were astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on Gentiles. For they heard them speaking in different languages and praising God. (10:44-46)

It’s often viewed as a repeat of Pentecost, but this one is for the Gentiles.  There was no carefully orchestrated moment Peter had to create before the Holy Spirit was ready. Acts 10 is Pentecost without circumcision, without Torah observance, or without markers of “clean” and “unclean”. The Holy Spirit was way ahead of Peter.

Faithfulness is not about getting God to endorse our plans; faithfulness is recognizing where God is already at work and joining His mission.

Doctrinal change = relational change

Back to Peter’s vision. It wasn’t ultimately about food; it was about abolishing hierarchies of human worth. That was going to have massive implications about how Peter needed to interact with people. We are still on a theme of people zealous for God whose incorrect belief and practice – or both – need refinement.

Peter went inside and found a large gathering of people. He said to them: “You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associate with or visit a Gentile. But God has shown me that I should not call anyone impure or unclean. So when I was sent for, I came without raising any objection.” (10:27-29)[2]

Their relationship is changing because their understanding of what God is like, and what God is doing, has changed. The story ends with table fellowship:

“They asked Peter to stay with them for several days.” (10:48)

Note the progression: Peter went from living with a tanner (unclean Jewish man) to being in a Gentile home (unclean Gentiles, double whammy)  - and then sharing a meal, which clearly sent a signal of value, dignity and worth.

The gospel doesn’t just save souls; it erases unrighteous categories of value and creates a community that shares a common feast at a common table.

Acts 10 is not the story of Gentiles becoming acceptable to God. It is the story of God teaching the church about those whom God has always invited to be a part of His Kingdom. Which, it turns out, is everybody.

Most of us don’t wrestle with kosher laws, but I am guessing there are ways we still have a tendency to label people and place “unclean” so that we can avoid them, critique them from a distance, and maybe even celebrate how much better we are. Meanwhile, God is already at work in them and is calling us to them: “Don’t call unclean what I have made clean.” 

Note that God said this of Cornelius before Peter went there and before Cornelius converted to faith specifically in Jesus. I think we need to make a distinction between different kinds of clean. There are a lot of verses about how the cross makes it possible for us to be clean because of the sacrificial provision of Jesus.

But if we walk in the light, just as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanses us from all sin. (1 John 1:7)

There is also a cleansing baptism done by the Holy Spirit:

[God] saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit…” (Titus 3:5)

Cornelius and friends had not yet been washed by the regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, so this category shift God makes clear to Pter must be something different.

I suspect it addressed the laws of ritual uncleanliness that insisted that Gentiles were so unclean almost by nature that they must be avoided entirely. This is not based on Torah teaching. The idea that Jews shouldn’t be in Gentile homes or eat at their table was a rabbinic tradition that began during the Second Temple period (516 BC to 70 AD).

God tells Peter that distinction is gone. There are no homes or tables he must avoid to be clean; no cities he dare not go to; no people who aren’t worthy enough to be invited into the Kingdom of God.

I wonder if we have lines drawn where the “clean” ends and the “unclean” begins.

• It’s that group that has been so vilified that we just aren’t sure we should go to them with a message that God loves them and we do too.

• It’s the people we just don’t want to have a meal with because we think our reputation might take a hit.

• It’s those we fear have a spiritual darkness around them that’s so strong that we need to avoid them.

If I am reading the story of Cornelius correctly, the Holy Spirit is already standing on the other side of these lines waiting for us to catch up with the work the Holy Spirit is already doing.

We should be in contact with all people, because God is working them already. Isaiah records God saying,

“I made myself available to those who did not ask for me; I appeared to those who did not look for me.” (Isaiah 65:1)

They are, after all, His image bearers. He is not willing that any should perish, but that all would come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9), so He’s at work. I’m thinking now also of all the reports of dreams people are having in other countries preparing the way for the missionaries who arrive to introduce Jesus.[3]

When we embrace the reality that Jesus is already at work, our love and mercy will increasingly match the wideness of God’s love and mercy.

A couple questions for us to think about today as I invite us to join Jesus in the work He is already doing?

Where might God already be at work—healing, welcoming, and pouring out the Spirit—while I am still deciding who belongs, who’s clean, and whether I’m willing to enter their house?

Am I following the Spirit into unfamiliar places—or asking the Spirit to stay within my boundaries?”

Is my obedience shaped more by faithfulness to Jesus—or by comfort with people like me?

______________________________________________________________________________________

[1] As described in Old Testament Law

[2] Perhaps there are two miracles here: Cornelius received the Spirit, and Peter stopped resisting Him.

[3] “Have you seen The Man in White? Jesus is appearing to people in dreams” https://www.unreached.network/have-you-seen-the-man-in-white-jesus-is-appearing-to-people-in-dreams/

The Importance of Righteous Zeal (Acts 9; Philippians 3:4-6)

One of the things we talked about last Sunday[1] was Saul’s misplaced zeal. He genuinely believed he was carrying out God’s will by killing the first followers of The Way. He felt like the defender of the faith, the one with the most "biblical" backbone. He makes that clear in Philippians 3:5-6.

“…circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.”

He was the one doing something about idolatry and what he perceived as a betrayal of the faith. He was tragically wrong.

When God stopped Saul on the road to Damascus, God didn’t correct Saul because he hadn’t memorized enough of the Torah, or because he lacked conviction and courage. He corrected Saul because Saul misunderstood what kind of Messiah Jesus is—and therefore what kind of kingdom Jesus brings. Part of his conversion was coming to grips with how badly he had misunderstood God and God’s plan in spite of having all the information he needed.

Then we talked about a few times historically when Christians sincerely believed they were doing God’s will but were, in fact, working against the heart of Christ: The Inquisition; the Crusades; the church’s long defense of slavery in the Southern states, etc.

In nearly every one of these moments, the church was not trying to rebel against God. Let’s give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they were convinced they were on the side of righteousness. Like Saul, they were not.  

I started thinking about times in my life where I saw a zeal for righteousness lose its way. I grew up in a denomination where churches split over what kind of covering women should wear, what Bible translation to use, and whether or not Christians would have to go through the tribulation. Yes, they were zealous for honoring Scripture (as they understood it), but surely the division it caused (and the message it sent to people hurt by these positions and arguments) was not what Jesus had in mind for his children.

I couldn’t shake the sense that we aren’t done with this topic. If sincere, Bible-believing Christians have been this wrong before, where might we need Jesus to lovingly interrupt us today?”[2]

To be clear, I love that this church is full of people zealous to follow Jesus. I’ve been here almost 30 years, and I have known some of you that long, and I know your zeal. It’s a beautiful thing. But if you have been here long enough, you’ve been through a whole lot of differences of opinion about how to live in the Kingdom, from worship styles in our Sunday Service, to responding to Covid, to our discussion about immigration and ICE last Sunday in Message+, and to a multitude of other things. We are a people zealous to follow Jesus, and we at times have remarkably different conclusions about what faithful discipleship looks like.

Sometimes, it’s disagreements over matters of personal conviction, aka, “If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.”[3]  That’s fine; no Damascus Road intervention needed. But sometimes personal convictions were taught or defended as normative for all, and that needs a Damascus Road intervention to teach us something about humility and grace.

Other times, someone was right and someone was wrong about what Jesus is calling us to think and do. That can still happen. In those moments, we need Jesus to confront us on the road we are on.

So. I started a list of things sincere, zealous Christians disagree about, then went online to find what others were saying - and they had things to say. I have pared 15 pages of notes down to 9. As we go through just a portion of them, I want to challenge us to ask,

“Is it possible that I hold a position that reflects a misunderstanding about what it actually looks like for God’s Kingdom to come and His will to be done on earth as it is in heaven?“

Keep in mind that the issue will not be, ‘Does that person even care about God’s kingdom?’  Zeal for following Jesus will be assumed. The question for each of us to ask is,

“Does my zeal cause me to look more or less like Jesus, and my community to look more like His kingdom?”

I tried to end up with a list that will challenge all of us at some point - and maybe multiple points – to do one of two things:

1. Challenge us to give grace because we’ve made our opinion a law when it ought to be an issue of conscience, or

2. Challenge us to humility because we might be wrong.

Honestly, I kicked against the goads on this one. There are a lot of ways this could go wrong.  This list will be imperfect and incomplete. Don’t get hung up on things that don’t apply to you. But if the Holy Spirit starts to nudge you about one of these or something that didn’t make the list, I encourage you to be humble and responsive.

We start with the things closest to home. We have a deep, God-given desire to protect what is precious: our children, our bodies, and our health. This zeal is rooted in stewardship. That’s a great start. Does our zeal contain grace, and does it cause us to look more and more like Jesus?

Discipline

The zeal: We parents want to obey Scripture, raise godly children, and take discipline (correction) seriously, as we should.

The distortion: Authority can be emphasized without comfort and relationship, and behavior modification can replace spiritual formation. Some parents may fear using any firm correction because they associate discipline with past trauma or authoritarianism.

The Damascus Road Question. Does our discipline aim merely to control behavior, or to build authentic disciples? Does our zeal contain grace, and does it cause us to look more and more like Jesus?

Vaccines

The zeal: Protecting bodies and communities by getting vaccines and/or protecting autonomy and freedom by rejecting them

The danger: distrust of medical advice becoming unhealthy cynicism OR trust of medical advice becoming unquestioning loyalty.

Damascus Road question: If Jesus were physically present among believers who disagreed on this issue, would our words and posture look more like a conversation at a table of fellowship or more like tribal warfare? Does our zeal contain grace, and does it cause us to look more and more like Jesus?

Psychology vs. Faith for Emotional and Mental Healing

The zeal: Relying exclusively on spiritual maturity/supernatural healing OR relying exclusively on therapy and medicine.

The danger: Spiritualizing pain away or psychologizing sin away. One side fears that psychology denies sin (ignoring the soul's depravity).The other side fears that the church denies trauma (ignoring the body/mind's complexity).

Damascus Road question: Does our approach help people boldly bring their wounds to Jesus and others for healing, or would it cause them to hide and isolate out of shame for what we might say? Does our zeal contain grace, and does it cause us to look more and more like Jesus?

* * * * *

Beyond our homes, we have a zeal for our 'teams'—our nation, our politics, our people. But Saul's story warns us that when we commit ourselves to any identity flag other than Jesus (in Saul’s case, Jewish Pharisaism defended with Zealot means), we risk confusing the Empire’s culture with the way of the Kingdom.

Political Allegiance/Idolatry

The zeal: Wanting good leaders, biblically moral laws, and cultural stability.

The danger: Excusing sin in parties and people to gain cultural power; the temptation to baptize political strategies as “God’s plan”; defending the words and lives of leaders more fiercely than the teachings and the life model of Jesus.[4]

Damascus Road question: If Jesus refused to take the throne of the Empire to save the world, why do need the throne of the Empire to join in his mission? Does our zeal distract us from or cause us to bemore and more focused on Jesus?

Confusing the American Dream with the Kingdom of Heaven

The zeal: Gratitude for freedom, prosperity, and opportunity (which tracks with a just society).

The distortion: Material success, national identity, and personal advancement becoming signs of God’s Kingdom arriving.

Damascus Road question: Does our vision of a “blessed life” look more like Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount—or more like our culture’s promise of comfort, security, and upward mobility?[5] Does our zeal create a life in which we look more and more like Jesus?

Military Action to Stop Christian Persecution (e.g., Nigeria)

The zeal: Protecting persecuted believers, as we would like to be protected.

The danger: On the one side, are we failing to take the action we can to protect God’s persecuted children; on the other, are we trusting violence to do what resurrection love alone can do, and assuming Christ’s kingdom advances the same way empires do?

Damascus Road question: How would Jesus counsel us to protect his persecuted followers?[6] Does our zeal choose a path that looks like the path of Jesus?

Church as Prophetic Voice

The zeal: For the church to offer prophetic critiques of culture and pastoral care within existing cultural structures.

The danger: Becoming ideologically or politically captive to movements that give us platforms, prestige and power, then failing to speak gospel truth to power lest we lose our comfort and privilege.[7]

Damascus Road question: Are we consistently speaking Jesus’ Kingdom truth to the Empire’s power? Does our zealous message cause us to sound more and more like Jesus?

* * * * *

Many of us feel the fire of our zeal most when we see the brokenness of the world. We want to be the hands and feet of Jesus. This is a good impulse. Once again, does our zeal cause us to look more and more like Jesus? I offer one trend often associated with the Left, and one with the Right. In both cases, that challenge is how to respond when we start expecting the State to do the Church's work.

The Social Gospel

The zeal: A sincere concern for justice, the poor, the marginalized, and the oppressed.

The distortion: The fruit of the gospel being treated as the root of the gospel.[8]

Damascus Road Question: Are we proclaiming the same good news Jesus announced—repentance, reconciliation, and restoration—or only the practical outcomes of an embodied Kingdom? Does our zeal contain actions and words that point more and more clearly toward Jesus?

Christian Nationalism

The zeal: A desire to honor God publicly, preserve moral order, protect religious freedom, and see the nation flourish under righteousness.

The distortion: Confusing the Kingdom of God with national identity; prioritizing cultural dominance over cruciform witness.[9]

Damascus Road Question: Are we proclaiming allegiance to a cruciform King who will bring about Kingdom ends by Kingdom means, or are we looking to the Empire to bring about Kingdom ends by Empire means? Does our zeal refuse to step out of the ends and means of the kingdom, and does it cause us to look more and more like Jesus?

* * * * *

Finally, there is our zeal for the 'House of God.' We want to be orthodox. We want to protect the truth. But if our defense of the truth isn't characterized by the fruit of the Spirit, we may find ourselves like Saul: protecting the letter of the Law while dishonoring the heart of the Law – love - by trampling on God’s children. Does our zeal cause us to look more and more like Jesus?

Deconstruction vs…..Not Deconstruction

[Note: it seems like everyone describes deconstruction differently. Here’s what I mean: someone looks at their faith and sees something built shoddily on an unstable foundation because of bad teaching, hypocritical experiences, etc. They decide to tear it down. Some don’t start over and instead walk away. Others start rebuilding their faith, seeking a more stable foundation and more quality building material. This is about the Rebuilders.]

The zeal: On one side: protecting traditional orthodoxy, resisting relativism or cultural syncretism;. On the other: a zeal for authenticity, perhaps also a claim to protecting original orthodoxy; refusing to pretend everything is okay where there is doubt, hurt and confusion.

The danger: The danger for the defender is a defense of traditional orthodoxy without love or humility that might lead them to agree maybe not everything was what it should have been; the danger for the deconstructor who wants to rebuild is revisiting their faith without a humble curiosity that may lead them to reuse some of the material initially torn away..

Damascus Road question: Does our zeal contain both truth and grace that keep us humble and curious (as we always have more to learn), and does it cause us to look more and more like Jesus?

Christian Celebrity Culture

The zeal: Wanting strong leadership, gifted teaching, and effective ministry.

The danger: Confusing gifting with godliness, or excusing abuse because “God is using them.”[10]

Damascus Road question(s): Would Jesus recognize our definition of leadership as resembling His—washing feet, telling the truth, and laying down power—or something else entirely?[11] Does our zeal contain integrity, and does it cause us to look more and more like Jesus?

End-Times Fascination

The zeal: Taking Scripture seriously and longing for Christ’s return.

The danger: A fear-driven faith (when Revelation was meant to be hopeful!); moving from watchfulness to withdrawal and neglecting love, justice, and neighborliness now because it’s all gonna’ burn.

Damascus Road question: Does my focus on the future make me scared of the world, or does it make me care for my neighbor? Does our zeal for Christ’s return fuel loving outreach, and does it cause us to look more and more like Jesus?

* * * * *

In almost every case, the problem is not necessarily what followers of Jesus care about—it’s what we stop caring about. Maybe we stopped caring about people on the other side of an argument, and broke the bruised Isaiah said God would not break.[12] Maybe we are so zealous for a country to look like the Kingdom that we forgot the model of Jesus: sacrifice, love, invitation, example.

The most dangerous thing about being zealous for something is that it often feels indistinguishable from righteousness. Like Saul, we are sincere. Like Saul, we are certain. Like Saul, surely we are wrong in at least some ways in at least some places. And like Saul, we still need Jesus to stop us on the road when we misunderstand what kind of Messiah Jesus is – and, therefore, what kind of kingdom Jesus brings.

If Jesus is interrupting us today, I don’t believe His first words would be condemnation. As with Saul, I believe the first thing He would say would be our names, spoken tenderly, calling us to truth and healing by pointing us back to the nature, life and ministry of Jesus.

_____________________________________________________________________

[1] Acts 10

[2] Pete asked this question in Message +. Good work, Pete!

[3] James 4:17

[4] Zealous to defend our political side as the one that can bring the most good to the nation (good!), but not zealous to confront sin when it wears our team’s colors (not good).

[5] Zealous to enjoy God’s blessings and steward opportunity (good!), but not zealous to embrace the way of the cross when it costs comfort, status, or security (not good).

[6] Zealous to protect persecuted Christians (good!), but not zealous to ask whether the cross, rather than the sword, truly reveals the path of Jesus (not good).

[7] Zealous to be relevant or to be faithful (both good!), but not zealous to remain free from captivity to any power that competes with Jesus’ Kingdom (not good).

[8] Zealous to pursue justice, mercy, and good works (good!), but not zealous to proclaim reconciliation with God as the source of that work (not good).

[9] Zealous to preserve Christian influence and moral order (good!), but not zealous to follow Jesus when His way conflicts with national pride, political power, or cultural dominance (not good).

[10] Zealous to support gifted leaders and effective ministry (good!), but not zealous to insist on Christlike character, humility, and accountability as non-negotiable (not good).

[11] Would I defend or overlook this leader’s message, character and actions if they had no platform but were, instead, my next door neighbor, or led in my church?

[12] Isaiah 42:3; Matthew 12:20

Saul’s Misplaced Zeal (Acts 9, 22, 26)

 Back to Saul— breathing out threatenings and slaughter, who wanted to kill every last one of the Lord’s disciples: he went to the high priest in Jerusalem for authorization to purge all the synagogues in Damascus of followers of the way of Jesus. 

Christianity became known as The Way based on Christ calling Himself “the way” (John 14:6). It also reminds us that there is a path to following Christ. It’s not just a decision in a moment. It’s a lifestyle.[1]

 His plan was to arrest and chain any of Jesus’ followers—women as well as men[2]—and transport them back to Jerusalem. He traveled north toward Damascus with a group of companions.

Damascus was the middle of a huge commerce network, with trade stretching into Mesopotamia, Persia, and Arabia. If the new “Way” of Christianity flourished in Damascus, it would spread fast. To Saul, The Way had to be stopped in Damascus.[3]

Suddenly a light flashes from the sky around Saul, and he falls to the ground at the sound of a voice (speaking in Aramaic – Acts 26).[4] The Lord: Saul, Saul, why are you attacking Me?[5] It is hard for you to kick against the goads.” (Acts 26) Saul: Lord, who are You?

Goads are spikes used to prod farm animals.[6] Sometimes a stubborn ox kicks back against the goad and wounds itself. This proverb has to do with the pointlessness of rebelling against lawful authority.

The Lord: I am Jesus. I am the One you are attacking. Get up and stand on your feet. I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant and as a witness of what you have seen and will see of me. Enter the city. You will learn there what you are to do. 

 I will rescue you from your own people and from the Gentiles. I am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.” (Acts 26) 

 His other traveling companions just stand there, paralyzed, speechless because they, too, heard the voice; but there is nobody in sight.  Saul rises to his feet, his eyes wide open, but he can’t see a thing. So his companions lead their blind friend by the hand and take him into Damascus. He waits for three days—completely blind—and does not eat a bite or drink a drop of anything. 

Meanwhile, in Damascus a disciple named Ananias had a vision in which the Lord Jesus spoke to him. (He was a devout observer of the law and highly respected by all the Jews living there. – Acts 22) The Lord: Ananias. Ananias: Here I am, Lord. 

Ananias was likely one of Saul's targets for arrest in Damascus. He served as first bishop of that city.[7]The Greek Church has a tradition that Ananias was one of the seventy-two disciples, and that he was martyred; they celebrate his martyrdom on the first of October.[8]

The Lord: Get up and go to Straight Boulevard. Go to the house of Judas, and inquire about a man from Tarsus, Saul by name. He is praying to Me at this very instant. He has had a vision—a vision of a man by your name who will come, lay hands on him, and heal his eyesight. 

Ananias: Lord, I know whom You’re talking about. I’ve heard rumors about this fellow. He’s an evil man and has caused great harm for Your special people in Jerusalem. I’ve heard that he has been authorized by the religious authorities to come here and chain everyone who associates with Your name. 

The Lord: Yes, but you must go! He is my chosen vessel to bring My name far and wide—to outsiders, to kings, and to the people of Israel as well. I have much to show him, including how much he must suffer for My name. So Ananias went and entered the house where Saul was staying. He laid his hands on Saul and called to him. 

 Ananias: Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on your way here, sent me so you can regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit. (Acts 22 - “‘The God of our ancestors has chosen you to know his will and to see the Righteous One and to hear words from his mouth. 

 You will be his witness to all people of what you have seen and heard. And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name.” At that instant, something like scales fell from Saul’s eyes,[9]and he could see.  

So he got up, received the ceremonial washing of baptism identifying him as a disciple, ate some food (remember, he had not eaten for three days), and regained his strength. He spent a lot of time with the disciples in Damascus over the next several days.  

 Then he went into the very synagogues he had intended to purge, proclaiming, Saul: Jesus is God’s Son![10]

Let’s see what we can learn from Saul in this passage.   

“Saul, breathing out threatenings and slaughter.” That kind of language is also very frequent in the Greek writers, who use it to represent a remarkable amount of hostility.  Luke wrote in a sophisticated version of Greek called Koine Greek. It is likely he was trained in Greek classics. This kind of language is found often there. For example:

They came into the assembly, breathing mutual slaughter. (Theocritus)

They breathed spears, and pikes, and helmets, and crests, and greaves, and the fury of redoubted heroes. (Aristophanes)

His description of Saul shows someone desperately and incessantly bent on accomplishing the destruction of the objects of its resentment.[11]

Why was Saul so mad? He was convinced that Jesus was dead and buried. He did not believe the resurrection happened. As a Pharisee, a keeper of the law, he was bent on wiping out this idolatrous and blasphemous movement. You see a bit of zealotry shine through as he is determined to kill the enemies of his faith.[12] It’s not clear if he participated in the Zealot movement (as they generally targeted Rome), but his embrace of violence as a means of advancing or protecting God’s kingdom surely had some overlap.

So, envision Saul as a Jewish hero to probably all but the Essenes. He is a Pharisee, using the method of Zealots to kill these Jewish insurrectionists, which the Sadducees probably appreciated, since keeping their own people in line kept them in good standing with Rome.

I don’t think I can overstate this: Saul was profoundly convinced that he was God’s man doing God’s work. He told the church in Philippi,

“If someone else thinks they have reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.” (Philippians 3:4-6)

That was his mindset when God confronted him: “I am crushing it. Surely God is pleased with me!” In this context, Jesus’ greeting to him is either obvious or shocking. “Saul, Saul,” is a repetition that signifies intimate personal address. Here are all the examples in Scripture other than God’s address to Saul.

 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven,“Abraham! Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied. (Genesis 22:11) 

And God spoke to Israel in a vision at night and said, “Jacob! Jacob!”

“Here I am,” he replied. (Genesis 46:2) 

God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!” And Moses said, “Here I am.” ( Exodus 34:4) 

The Lord came and stood there, calling as at the other times, “Samuel! Samuel!” Then Samuel said, “Speak, for your servant is listening.” (1 Samuel 3:10) 

“Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things…” (Luke 10:41) 

“Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift all of you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.” (Luke 22:31)

In all cases, it is not language of anger or condemnation. It is the gentle address of a caring Heavenly Father.  Here is Saul, violently hunting down and killing followers of Jesus, and Jesus “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us,”[13] so of course Jesus loved him in the midst of his sin.

Meanwhile, Saul knows the OT, which is full of stories of God appearing to and speaking to people. This should be amazing for Saul: God is speaking to him! He must be doing GREAT!  But then Jesus says that Saul is actually persecuting him. (At that time, treatment of messengers reflected the attitude toward their sender.)[14]

It must have been overwhelming for Saul to do the math. If by persecuting the followers of Jesus he is persecuting God, then Jesus must be God, which means those pesky rumors about Jesus rising from the dead must be true.

It’s hard to imagine what was going on inside Saul.

In spite of all this, God calls him a “chosen vessel.”  It’s a very Jewish way of describing Saul as an excellent or well-adapted instrument, a choice or eminent person. How can this be? It turns out that Saul has attributes that, if applied to kingdom work, are fantastic.

• His character: dedicated zealously to the purity of his faith  

• His education: trained Jewish; trained in Greek by Roman benefactors, so primed to be all things to all people.

• His reputation: stellar. He was the upcoming next big thing in his circles.

To the early Christians, Paul must have looked like a monster because of the outcome of his actions, and understandably so. As church history unfolds, we continue to see far too many times when zealous followers of God get His will terribly wrong. 

• The Inquisition and other periods of intra-church violence, Christians believed they were protecting truth, saving souls, and guarding orthodoxy, yet used fear, coercion, imprisonment, and torture in the name of Christ. Even John Calvin had a man burned at the stake over theological differences.

• Colonial missionary efforts toward Indigenous peoples, including the forced removal of Native American children into government and church-run schools in order to “kill the Indian and save the man.” Cultural erasure and family separation were framed as obedience to the Great Commission.

• In the Crusades, nations and armies claimed to advance Christendom at the edge of the sword, and large segments of the church supported violence because they believed God’s kingdom would expand through conquest.

• The church’s long defense of slavery. Scripture was quoted sincerely.
  Pulpits defended the system. Faithful Christians believed they were upholding God’s order—while denying the image of God in others.

• Antisemitism within Christian theology and practice. People as famous as Martin Luther portrayed Jews as Christ-killers, cursed, or rejected by God. This theological zeal helped justify centuries of violence, exclusion, and persecution. (Hitler was a fan of Luther.)

• The silencing of abuse “for the sake of the church.” Victims were told to forgive quickly. Leaders were protected to avoid scandal. What was framed as protecting God’s reputation often perpetuated harm.

In nearly every one of these moments, the church was not trying to rebel against God. The church believed it was being faithful – but it wasn’t.

To the victims in all of these circumstances, it must be really hard to see people doing terrible things under the banner of zealous allegiance to God and respond with imprecatory prayers and a desire for their destruction. And I totally get it. It’s a very human response to human rights violations.

But Jesus has a Jesus-like response to Paul (and I assume others who have sincerely used their power and skills in the belief they were doing God’s will, but were actually in the service of evil).

God sees what is possible on the other side of redemption. There is something here about hope and potential.

Don’t hear me say that God does not see what is happening in the moment. A God whose love is just will not be indifferent to injustice. God stopped Saul, after all. The Bible is clear that God is on the side of the oppressed.

Yet a God whose love is merciful and redemptive also knows what could happen in a surrendered and repentant heart, which is why God did not give up on Saul, and God will not give up on…..here you fill in the blank. Think big.

Immediately, God asks His people to trust that He can do transformational miracles. Paul seeks fellowship with the very people he was there to arrest. God could have informed him at once what His will was – He and Saul were having a conversation after all – but God chose to send Saul to God’s people. Why? Believer’s Bible Commentary offers two suggestions. I’m going to paraphrase:

• First, so that those already in the Kingdom clearly understand the love and forgiveness God expects of them.

• Second, so that those new to the kingdom experience the goodness of God through the goodness of God’s people.

Being a follower of Jesus is a high calling. Much has been given to us; much is required. It will be hard to love, forgive, confront, embrace, repent, be peacemakers; it’s a challenge to consistently show gentleness, meekness, and humility when we want so badly to be harsh, blustering, and proud.

Following in the path of Jesus is a high calling and a hard one. There’s a reason Jesus told his disciples to count the cost. (Luke 14:28-30) Following Jesus is a sacrifice that will cost us something if we take it seriously. But when we do, we introduce people to the goodness of God by living as faithful ambassadors of God.

And when you consider that kind of community, does it not sound like a beautiful place to be? A place built on the foundation of the cruciform love of Jesus, empowered by the Holy Spirit, and filled with people who increasingly remind us of Jesus. 

No wonder the next thing we read is that Paul began to testify powerfully (Acts 9:20). He had met Jesus; that was life-changing. And then he met the followers of Jesus who faithfully represented Jesus, and that was life-changing.  

* * * * *

Pastor: Lord, when we are full of zeal but mistaken about what You are actually calling us to…

Congregation: Slow us down, open our eyes, and turn our passion toward Your heart.

Pastor: When we are convinced we are defending You, yet our lives reveal fear, anger, pride, or harm…

Congregation: Remind us that You call us by name, not to shame us, but to heal us.

Pastor: When we are confident in our knowledge, our tradition, or our certainty…

Congregation: Teach us again that You are Jesus, the One we meet in mercy, the One we meet in truth.

Pastor: When our blindness is self-inflicted, when we kick against what You are doing in us…

Congregation: Give us the courage to stop resisting and the humility to be led by Your hand.

Pastor: When we struggle to believe that transformation is possible in others, or in ourselves…

Congregation: Remind us that You see not only what is, but also what can be made new.

Pastor: When You call us to love difficult people, to forgive deeply, to welcome boldly…

Congregation: Fill us with Your Spirit, so Your goodness is made visible through Your people.

Pastor: Lord Jesus, You met Saul on the road, You met him through Your people, and You sent him out with good news.

Congregation: As you meet us on our roads, may we respond by declaring Your mercy and Your light.  In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.

[1] HT Orthodox Study Bible

[2] The fact that both men and women were targeted makes it clear that women had a prominent role in the early church. (Africa Bible Commentary)

[3] NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible

[4] My commentary crush Adam Clarke sees God using nature as a means of divine revelation: “Verse Acts 9:3.  This might have been an extraordinary flash of [lightning] accompanied with thunder… out of this thunder, or immediately after it, Christ spoke in a distinct voice, which appears to have been understood by Saul only.”

[5] To persecute Jesus’ disciples was to persecute Jesus (Matt. 5:10–12; John 15:19, 20).

[6] “Sometimes used as a metaphor for the promptings of God (Ecc 12:11, “pointed sticks”).” (Orthodox Study Bible)

[7] Orthodox Study Bible

[8] Adam Clarke’s commentary

[9] Some of Luke’s audience may have recalled the scales or films that fell from Tobit’s eyes when he was healed in a traditional Jewish story (Tobit 3:17; 11:11 – 13). (NIV Cultural  Backgrounds Study Bible)

[10] This translation is The Voice, which you can find on Bible Gateway.

[11] Adam Clarke

[12] Paul describes himself several times as “zealous,” which has raised some questions about whether or not he was referencing Old Testament characters who were zealous for Got, the temple or the Torah, or if there was some sense in which he took the approach of the Zealots (who were Pharisees, though not all Pharisees were zealots.)

[13] Romans 5:8

[14] See Exodus 16:8; 1 Samuel 8:7; Luke 10:16).

The Next Right Thing

There is a tension in the Christian life between what God does for us and what God expects us to do. He is always at work doing something in us and for us that we can’t accomplish on our own power. But the Bible is also clear that God expects us to actively participate. Here are two key scriptural passages that offer a foundation for our topic today. 

“Whoever hears these sayings of mine and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock, and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.  

But everyone who hears these sayings of mine and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand; and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on the house; and it fell.  And great was its fall.” (Jesus, in Matthew 7:24-27)

Jesus is the rock on which we build a foundation of life that will stand in the midst of storms. But we build. Whether on sand or stone, we build. After talking about people who were commended for their faith, Paul wrote, 

“Since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. Let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith...” (Paul, in Hebrews 12)

Jesus is the author of our faith and the finisher of our faith. But we “throw off,” “lay aside,” and “run with endurance.” Part of our union with God – the practical outworking of our communion – is that we participate in what God is doing.

There is often little information about 95% of the characters’ lives in the Bible. In the Old Testament especially, we get the details we need to move the narrative along, but it’s portions of their lives. It is easy to get caught up in the big moments that define the lives of Biblical characters. We forget that while they are important, they didn’t suddenly become the kind of people we see. There were years that formed them. 

• We don’t have a lot of biblical detail about Noah’s years before the ark building, but one does not get the reputation for being ‘blameless in his time’ (Genesis 6:9) in a moment. That has to unfold over time to get that title.

• By contrast, I doubt that Jonah become a bitter, rebellious prophet overnight. Something had been building for years in him in the ordinary moments of life.

• When we think of Moses, we often think of him confronting Pharaoh and parting the Red Sea. We can forget the 40 years he spent as a fugitive shepherd in Midian learning humility, patience, and restraint after killing an Egyptian. Before Moses confronted Pharaoh, he had to learn to tend sheep.

• The actions and attitudes we see in the disciples were not some kind of personality quirk that God put in them to teach us a lesson in jealousy or bravery or betrayal. The disciples became those kinds of people over time.

• Even with Jesus, we read that “Jesus grew in wisdom, maturity and in favor with God and people.” (Luke 2:52) There are 15-20 years of Jesus life for which we have no biblical record. There were apparently no marquee moments to add.

• Next week we are going to talk about Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus. That’s his start to becoming a missionary to the Gentiles and church planter. But he lived for years in obscurity after his conversion, studying and training (Galatians 1). His calling was instant, but his formation took some time.

 The high or low points of their lives, their ”ten minutes of fame” experiences that were recorded in Scripture, are related to what happened during the rest of the time in their lives up to that point.

I was watching bowl games this week, and there was a moment that stood out to me. There was a player having a fantastic day, and the announcers noted that this player would go to the school’s training facility during the offseason and work out all by himself. He had put in serious time just ordinary day after ordinary day, which prepared him for his extraordinary moment in the spotlight.

It’s cool to see this in sports, but there are other areas of life where we can observe commitment and then see output. No matter who you are and whether or not life has been good to you or hard for you, there is no substitute for faithful, committed hard work to take you to a better place than you are now.

From what I can see in the Bible, it is no different with character building. God has given us the privilege and responsibility of being what theologians call “significant moral agents.” In other words, what we do matters. Reaping and sowing is a principle God himself embedded in the world.

“Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap corruption;  whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life.  Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.” (Galatians 6:7-10)

On the cross, Jesus took upon himself the cost for all the corruption we have sown into the world and our lives and emerged victorious from the grave. That’s what God has done for us. We are invited to participate in what Jesus accomplished for us.

In the context of the life that Jesus offers, whenever we plant something spiritually or morally in our life, an appropriate crop begins to grow. We learn from this. This is the building of our character.

Here is a biblical truth that can be hard to accept: God does not gift character. God gifts identity and then empowers us to build character. God radically changes our identity through salvation (we are now children of God – Galatians 3:26). That’s salvation, God’s gift to us. But we also talk about sanctification, which means there is still work to be done, because we have a lot of room to grow. All of us in this room are a testimony to this.

It’s important to remember that God does not wait until we are perfect until He can do something with us. The Bible is loaded with stories of flawed people that God used for the good of the world and for His glory. 

So this is not about becoming good enough so God will choose you or use you. If that were the standard, none of us would ever be chosen or rise to the occasion. This is not about God noticing us because of how awesome we are.

This is about how the Bible shows discipline and character developing in the slow, ordinary, plodding times of life as we participate in what God is doing in us.

It’s not a popular thought. We live in a society that encourages us to see life not as a walk of baby steps, but of huge leaps and bounds.

• If I am going to lose weight, I want to be the biggest loser.  20 pounds over a year is hardly worth my time.  I want to win the show on TV by dropping 100 in a week.

• If I want a home makeover, I don’t have time for small improvements over time.  I want an extreme makeover now while I am on vacation.

• I shouldn’t have to be a singer who works my way to the top through hard work and fortitude. I want to be an idol with a big contract.

• And dare I say, we want God to finish working in our life now, and be done teaching us now, to get us past our struggles with sin now, to fix our marriage now, and to answer our prayers now. We don’t have time to just do the next thing.  We want the next big thing !!!!  

 Yet there are plenty of biblical images that reinforce the point that meaningful growth happens over slow, ordinary time. 

• The Fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5) Fruit grows slowly - so slowly that I can’t tell from moment to moment that it’s growing, and yet it does.

• Running a race (Hebrews 12)  It’s not a sprint being described. It’s a marathon that requires endurance, time, repetition, dedication, and fatigue.

• ·Building a house (Matthew 7)  It takes a while to build a house. It’s daily devotion, not dramatic moments.

This past week I was reading some prophecies or predictions for 2026. Most of them are pretty bold and startling about major breakthroughs and years of grandness. You know what I didn’t see?  

“God has revealed to me that this next year will be full of countless times when ordinary moments of faithfulness will build His people and His Kingdom. The Holy Spirit will move powerfully and help you not snap at your kids so that over time what you plant as a parent will lead to a good relational harvest.  

You will face temptation, and you will need to train: humble yourself, seek accountability, and do the hard work of resisting temptation. You will be overlooked, under-appreciated, ignored and demeaned, but God’s faithful presence will use this to build your character for the good of the Kingdom and for His glory.”

 I haven’t seen that yet, because that’s just not that exciting to us. Eugene Peterson once said:

“There is a great market for religious experience in our world; there is little enthusiasm for the patient acquisition of virtue, little inclination to sign up for a long apprenticeship in what earlier generations of Christians called holiness.”

Anyone who tells you there are shortcuts to character are not being honest with you. I once heard a self-proclaimed prophet claim that when God appeared to Him in a vision and told him to be a prophet, God told the man that this calling was so urgent that God would give him 10 years of maturity miraculously. That’s just not how it works. (And as this man’s life unfolded, it was clear that he had not, in fact, been gifted maturity).

There is no escaping this Godly practice of doing the next thing: Being faithful in the walk of life, in little things when there is no apparent inspiration, no applause, no crowd, no obvious, immediate payoff to myself. This is the means through which God so often does His restorative work of grace in us and around us.

Alexander Maclaren once said:

“If our likeness to God does not show itself in trifles, what is there left for it to show itself in?  For our lives are all made up of trifles.  The great things come three or four of them in the seventy years; the little ones every time the clock ticks.”

As I look back, as meaningful as our marriage ceremony was, the vows my wife and I gave each other offered an inaccurate view of what we would face. It kind of presented extremes: better or worse, rich or poor, sickness and health. I wish we had said something about the ordinary.  More often than not the majority of our life has been lived somewhere in between, not leaping from momentous event to momentous event, but taking a Tylenol and a nap and doing the next right thing.

Even as I think back on what became momentous shifts in our relationship, it was the daily ‘next things’ that led to significant change. No one stays married because of a great wedding. Love is built on 52 ordinary Tuesdays throughout the year, not 2-day anniversary get aways. Love deepens through thousands of what seem like unremarkable acts of choosing each other.

Let’s apply this to parenting. Good parents aren’t necessarily good parents because they create momentous moments (though that can be really cool if you can pull it off). Good parents are those whose character has matured by doing the next thing right, day after day. It’s thousands of bedtime prayers and stories, heart-felt apologies, working on consistency, exercising restraint when that one kid makes you late every Sunday.

I’ve been thinking about the past two years of therapy for childhood trauma. I would love so much for God to just clean that up in one dramatic moment of healing. I didn’t want one therapy session at a time; sharing week after week with my small groups; talking with the elders about what was unfolding; and trusting my wife day after day after day to sit with me and endure with me and cry yet again with me. That isn’t glamorous at all. It’s messy, and relentless, and moving at the pace of ordinary. And yet healing and maturity are both happening.

Many spiritual breakthroughs are recognized in hindsight. It turns out that Scripture reading when it feels boring, prayer when nothing dramatic happens, and pursuing community when we’d rather isolate – they all quietly prepare the way for what feels like a breakthrough in the moment, but it turns out it had been building for years.

I’m sure God can make us mature in a moment if He wants to, but there is no record in the Bible that He ever did. He apparently does not want to. He wants us to grow up, moment by moment, relying on His Spirit, reading His Word and living in a community of His people.

Let’s go back to Jesus’ parable in Matthew 7. When the rain comes we as follower of Christ will stand not because we were strong suddenly, by surprise, contrary to all expectations. We will stand because 1) God provided a foundation for our lives, and 2) we built on that foundation by hearing what Jesus has to say about life - and doing it.

This is how discipleship works: committing our lives to following Christ, then learning what it means to walk (with God’s help) in holiness and integrity, putting one foot in front of the other day after day after day, for the good of His Kingdom and the glory of God.