11-09-25 Study of Acts Chapter 13:14-23 Paul Preaches Christ Part 1

➡ This Bible study focuses on the book of Acts, specifically chapter 13, and how it relates to the church’s establishment by Paul. It discusses Satan’s shift from controlling bloodlines to targeting the church, and how this plan hasn’t changed over time. The study also emphasizes the importance of understanding this plan to avoid falling back into worldly conditions. Lastly, it highlights the crucial role of Jesus Christ in history, as depicted in Psalms Chapter 2, and the need for continuous teaching and preaching in the church, despite the availability of religious texts.
➡ The text discusses the importance of preaching in the church, highlighting its role in guiding people towards understanding God’s word. It criticizes the decline in preaching due to loss of belief in scripture’s authority, misuse of the pulpit, and a shift in focus towards entertainment. The author suggests that if churches can’t provide full scriptural teaching, small group discussions might be a better approach. However, this could lead to fragmentation due to lack of authority. The text also criticizes churches for focusing on business needs rather than spiritual growth, and for replacing preaching with social activities.
➡ The text discusses how the church has shifted from its original purpose to a more social role, which the author believes is a deviation from its true mission. The author argues that the church’s priority should be teaching the Word and prayer, not social activities or entertainment. The author also emphasizes the importance of preaching in the church’s history, citing it as a catalyst for significant movements within the church. Lastly, the author discusses the transformation of Paul, a once murderer turned preacher, as an example of the power of change and redemption.
➡ The text talks about the journey of Paul and Barnabas, who were chosen by God to spread the teachings of Christ. They started in Antioch, Syria, where they established a church and then moved on to other regions, including Cyprus and Asia Minor. They faced challenges, including conflicts with pagan gods, but they overcame these with their faith and determination. Their mission was to spread the word of God and establish churches in different regions, which they successfully did.
➡ The text discusses the challenges of leadership, particularly when leading those older or more experienced than you. It also explores the difficulties faced by Paul and Barnabas in their journey, including treacherous terrain and potential illness. The text emphasizes the importance of forgiveness in leadership, but notes that forgiveness does not necessarily mean reestablishing a relationship. It concludes by suggesting that Paul may have been very sick during his journey, possibly with malaria, which could explain certain decisions he made.
➡ Despite being very ill, Paul showed great courage and determination by embarking on a dangerous journey through the Taurus Mountains. Even though the journey was treacherous, with jagged cliffs and dangerous rivers, Paul persevered, driven by his desire to serve the Lord. He faced many hardships, including hunger, thirst, and exposure to the elements, but he never gave up. His journey serves as an example of the sacrifices one might make in their own journey for Christ.
➡ The text discusses how salvation is available to everyone, including Jews, through individual faith, not as a nation. It explains how Paul, a respected Jewish figure, used his understanding of Jewish law to introduce Christ’s teachings in a synagogue. The text also emphasizes the importance of respect, listening, and finding common ground in any negotiation, including religious discussions. Lastly, it highlights the role of the Holy Spirit in guiding the church and individuals, and the need for patience to understand God’s work.
➡ The speaker discusses the importance of allowing the Holy Spirit to guide our actions, rather than acting on our own assumptions of what is right. He shares a personal story of transformation and growth, emphasizing that change starts within the church. The speaker also engages in a discussion about the origin of the term ‘Jews’ and the concept of perfection in the Bible. The talk concludes with a prayer of gratitude and a request for continued guidance and healing.

Okay, welcome. This is our Sunday morning Bible study. We’re in the book of Acts. We’re having to be almost right square in the middle of it. We’re into the transition book, chapter 13 of, of Acts. We’ve looked at this, the first part of this chapter by looking at Satan’s shift from his bloodline control, trying to control bloodline before Christ was born to actually now having, if he’s going to get any control, he’s got to come after the church. And we’ve looked for two weeks how, how that transition happened. But we’re going to shift now in, in verse 14 to the end of the chapter over the next three weeks and looking at Paul’s setup of the church.

Okay, so we’re, we’ve now got Lucifer’s setup of how he’s going to attack the church. And we, and we said very clearly that his plan is a plan, is a plan. It’s his plan then is the same plan now. There’s no change. So you, we’ve studied it in a way that I hope you came away with the understanding of what that plan is, how you can see it in your life and what you can do in regards to removing yourself from any conditions as you see them come up to capture you back into the, into the conditions of the world.

So we’re going to look at now Paul’s process of setting it up. We’re going to do this methodically, guys, because this is really important because as Paul sets up the church, so he sets up here, follow. I’m saying this, this is almost like an application process like we’re studying in Ephesians now. So this goes hand in glove with Ephesians. And we need to make sure that you, you get an understanding that while Ephesians is basically pointed directly at you, Paul points this to you as the church. So both of these are applicable in application of things that you want to put on your self assessment to ensure that you’re moving towards.

So we’re going to start off a little differently. I’m going to go into Psalms because in building this, I felt that the backdrop of Psalms Chapter two was, was a condition for understanding Paul in Acts chapter 13. So in Psalms 2, there’s an old Testament prophecy d delineating us how to, how history. See, that’s, that’s the issue. History will culminate in Jesus Christ. All right, so we’re going to stop right here. The reason why I picked this is because of this. We don’t have any history without Jesus Christ. The Only reason we have history is Jesus Christ.

Think about the Bible this way. The Old Testament is getting pointing to a person to come redeeming them in their history. Why? Because that, that redeeming factor. If you recall, when Jesus died on the cross, he went to hell to what, Open up the gates to allow all of the old saints to come home so that they wouldn’t have their history, eternal life without Jesus Christ. And once Jesus Christ performed that activity, he culminated in history, the ability for everybody to go home immediately upon death, not have to be held anywhere. So we have no history without Jesus Christ.

He is our history. And so the Psalms goes on and says, why do the heathen rage and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against his anointed, saying, let us break their bands asunder and cast away their cords from us. He who sitteth in the heavens shall laugh. The Lord shall have them in derision. Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath and vex them in his great displeasure. Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion.

I will declare the decree the Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I shall give thee the nations for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession thou shalt break them with a rod of iron, thou shalt dash them in pieces like the potter’s vessel. Be wise now. Therefore, O ye kings, be instructed. Ye judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the sun, lest he be angry and you perish from the way when his wrath is kindled.

But a little blessed are they, are they who put their trust in him. That’s jam packed with history from beginning to end. That psalm sets for us the fact that God controls history and history finds its resolution in one person, Jesus Christ. Now, when we go to Acts, chapter 13, as we look at this passage that we’re going to talk about today, we’ll see how Jesus Christ is presented by Paul as the culmination, the goal, the climax of history. As we come into verse 14 through 41, we’re not going to do. We’re breaking this down over three weeks and we’re going to consider just the first part of Paul’s first sermon and in the sense is his first recorded sermon.

Paul has been preaching for many, many years before now and but this is the first one that we have in print in the Word of God. And it sets in mind a thought that we just need to explore. Now, I pray to God that from our midst here we will rise, raise people up to serve him and their gifts. We’ve been talking about that with you guys for a long time. But I think in looking at this way, as you study this, I think you’re going to understand that we need to pray for that all the time.

One of the things that I pray God will raise up is that he will raise up teachers. Because I see in my own mind, and I think maybe you too, and now in your studies, such a dearth of real biblical teaching. And I hear about it and I see it and I’m aware of it, and I just pray the guy that any of you men and women are not excluded at this point from that joy of teaching. Now, in recent years, I feel that preaching has. Especially biblical preaching. There’s a lot of ranting and raving going on, but real biblical preaching with content has been minimized.

We’ve talked about that. We’ve talked about the church, the corporate church, and why it has failed the people and why has it failed the ministry of Jesus Christ. And it’s been given a back seat to counseling, to administration, programming, entertainment, and so forth and so on. And some even feel that with the flood of available books, and this is an interesting thought, that some writers have come up with a flood of books, and it’s considered that preaching is really no longer even necessary. Well, that’s not what scripture says. Remember, when you’re called, God calls you, you respond, and a messenger has to be sent to you to confirm the response.

So there has to be teaching in this constant teaching. And some of you are in that position today. And it’s my hope that all of you will be put in that position sometime within your life. See, the preaching was good for a day when people couldn’t read or books couldn’t be printed. And now that there are books in print, and now that people can read and literacy is at such a high percentage, preaching can be eliminated altogether. And that is the condition of many churches today. But I is I strenuously react to that premise. I feel that God has ordained the preaching and teaching of the cross.

But is the. Which is the energy in terms of sharing the gospel? It’s not all, but I think it’s very. It’s at the very heart of all things. Some of the writers of books have even gone so far as to say orators are people who talk and never do anything. But that can Be resisted easily. If you look at history, if you go through history and find that the greatest man who ever lived, the men who move people to action, invariably there were men who had great powers of oratory. Those are the kind of men who move people to do things.

And so it’s not just a do nothing stand in your ivory tower existence. It’s not to be minimized in any way because there a lot of books in print. And I think there’s an energy and a power of authority that is exerted in the church with teachers who basically provide shepherdship. You follow what I’m saying? That’s mentorship. That’s what you guys do every day. And that comes from the sense of the church, okay? Ephesians looks at, looks at you as individuals, acts put you in to the church and begins to wrap around you the ministry of Jesus Christ.

So I think teachers stand in the place of Jesus Christ, representing him to the people. And it reminds the people of the whole concept of the submission of the body to the head, which is Jesus Christ. Okay? That’s the structure of your home, right? Nothing’s going to start unless you have your home in order. If the church turns into a large discussion group, authority suffers. And authority is at the very heart of the unity of the body, of the existence for the church. Now I like our discussions on Tuesday nights. Okay. I think there’s a huge benefit in having an open discussion for purposes of getting your mind set in the right direction on what you’re studying.

All right. I think that’s a great idea, but that’s not open chaos. It’s. It’s a controlled discussion. And it is a further. What I think is a ministry of what we’re doing on Thursday nights and Sundays as well now it’s recorded in the Bible. For example, preaching was the very heartbeat in the life of men before God. Whether you go into the Old Testament or the New Testament, prophets were preachers. They were there to tell the people what’s to come. Because of their sin and the New Testament, the preachers become the implementers of the completed system of God’s authority, gospel into our lives, government in the nations associated with the removal of the pagan gods.

And that’s what they did in the New Testament. Jesus himself spent his time preaching and you might call it teaching. I, I don’t, I don’t think that Jesus so much preached like some preachers do today. Hellfire and brimstone as my grandmother used to call it. But I think that Jesus sat down and had a discussion and in that discussion, he presented the doctrine and the theology in a manner of teaching people and allowing them to ask questions. As you see from Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The disciples asked questions all along the way. And it wasn’t until Jesus came back after his resurrection that he taught them history, how he fulfilled the historical points of prophecy in the Old Testament.

That’s the reason why the Old Testament is so important to us today. Martin Lloyd Jones, in his book Preachers and Preaching, which is a very helpful book for those of you who might want to pick it up, he says that he feels there are these three reasons why preaching has declined. One, the loss of the belief in the authority of Scripture. That’s what we’ve talked about as far as the reason the corporate church is on decline because they have failed to preach more than just the Gospel. They have failed to take the people into sanctification as Scripture tells them to do.

If you don’t believe that the Bible is the inspired word of God, you don’t believe that it speaks authoritatively the mind and the will of God, then you can’t preach because you can’t say, thus saith the Lord. When, when you get into the full study of Ezekiel, you’re going to find a. A couple of phrases that just keep coming up and coming up and coming up all the time. This is one of them. And if you can’t say that, you cease to preach. Now, if you’re going to give your opinion, that’s not preaching. Remember what I’ve always said.

You only want to tell the truth, and you don’t. You can’t tell the truth unless it’s biblical truth, history as it was, as it came forth, and men and women did what they did and created that point in time in history’s activities that was already done in Ephesians 1, 2, and 3. So you have to understand that the. If you lose the authority of Scripture, which is your history, you lose the right to teach, preach, to stand in the place of Christ and say, thus saith the Lord. The second point Jones suggests is that preaching has declined because of a reaction against professional pulpitism.

And I think that’s very valid. I’ve said that many times. I think there are some people who react to the fact that one man can use the pulpit to dominate people, or that there has been so much emotionalism injected into the pulpit that it ceases to be a preaching tool at all. And it’s usually a tool or just moving and manipulating people. Remember, the church is a business. And as a Business, you need people to respond to the outcome that you seek. And if the outcome that you see is not scriptural based, the outcome that they seek is a world based.

They’re there for mainly one reason. Reason. How can I build the pews to get the pews to influence more money into the system? That’s the business. The business has to make a profit regardless if it’s a non profit business or non profit business. The only thing, the only difference, as you have studied with me on business structures, the only difference in business structures of a profit and nonprofit is whether one’s taxed or one’s not. The business is the business. You still have to have capital to move. And I think there is a sense in which perhaps brow beating emotionalism and preaching, which is nothing but dramatics and entertainment, has resulted in a reaction against just that concept of manipulating people, which has really been pushed too far.

And now people are reacting against the preaching and church in total. Now I’ve read articles, lengthy articles about the fact that what the church needs is to eliminate the preacher altogether and get back to small group discussions. If the church, the corporate church, cannot get into the avenue of full 100 scriptural based teaching and moving the people through not only receiving the Gospels, but into sanctification and then into discipleship, then I think small group discussions most likely is the way to go. What happens is you’ll have all kinds of fracturing when that happens because there is no authority in the church.

There’s no representation of the mind of Christ through the elders. There was a reason why the structure of church was put in place. Eldership is a needed condition within a church. In the corporate church, let’s see here, in the sense of the corporate church, with the elders, the people don’t see the activity that’s described by scripture inside that deacon or eldership today. Thirdly, Jones points out that preaching has suffered in the church because the church has moved to a wrong emphasis. Okay guys, this is the rubber meets the road with why, with the spread of the world’s media and the invention of all kinds of entertainment ideas, the church has jumped on the bad bandwagon and substituted for preaching all kinds of things.

It’s a psychological bonanza. They’re there to try to to motivate, manipulate people in moving in a direction to fulfill that business needs, not in fulfilling the scriptural needs inside of their life. Now, you might disagree with Matt to some point, and to some point I would agree with you. But I have not seen, except just a handful of churches, the Church is focused on sanctification and disciples and that’s the goal. How do you continually, as, as the Gospels say, continually move in the direction of being Christlike? If you, if the church does not move you into sanctification and then move you into discipleship, how do you do that? How do you move.

You get complacent because the church, the corporate church, provides you information as to activities in your life that can be viewed from scriptural base and what you may be able to do when those activities come upon you in getting out of them, they never move you into fulfillment. The requirement of being sanctified in Christ, that would. That’s a command, guys. That’s not me saying it. After you have been saved, your next command is be sanctified in Christ. And that’s the key. We’ve substituted administration, program, entertainment, etc. Etc. Until preaching becomes a 15 minute sermonette for Christianettes.

In many churches, a social kind of preoccupation has replaced preaching of the word. And believe me, this is very, very lost. They’ve lost their touch in with this fact. And if you do a review of churches, you’re going to find that that is very true today. See, that’s the typical social, social approach to the church. Social approach to the church. They want people to feel good in coming to the church. In other words, they want you to be entertained when you leave. The church is in the business of dispensing canned food. Think about that. They’re nothing but a smart and final outlet.

And this is a pressure that the church undergoes. And that’s another example and trend to minimize the priority of the church today. It’s nothing new at all between churches. Do you know that the early church was pressured to give away canned food instead of preaching? You say, oh, you’re just kidding. Well, no, I’m not. Go to Acts chapter six, it’s right there. It doesn’t say canned food. That’s a free translation on my part. But they were pressured to get into the social issues. Okay, now I want you to, I want you to just think about this.

In chapter six, verse one, it says, and in those days when the number of disciples was multiplied, growth in gospel. And that always creates a problem when you get a lot of people. Another reason for small groups. There arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews. Now the Gentile Jews, the Hellenistic Jews, the non Jerusalem Jews were gripping against the Jerusalem Jews because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration. The gentile influence to the church. I want you to hear me, the Gentile influence to the church, even in the first church was to go to socialistic viewpoints.

Who did that? That’s part of Lucifer’s plan. As we learned the last two weeks. They moved the church into a social viewpoint as a means to what? Gain control. That was not the premise of the church. The Greek speaking Jews, widows weren’t getting the canned fit. See, in other words the ivory tower was going along all fine. Everybody was coming to hear the gospels and all of that stuff. But the widows were starving. We’re and they complained that we’re not getting our food. Now I believe Satan used that to divert the priorities of the church. Think about what the churches are today and what they do, what they focus on and then go back to Scripture and see what the priorities of the church is required to do.

All of this griping and what, and what could have happened? Well, all of the apostles could have gotten sidetracked into making sure the food was passed out, etc. Etc. But in verse 2 they had the right reaction. The apostles had the right reaction. It wasn’t upon the apostles to correct that situation. Listen, it says this. Then the 12, 12 apostles called the multitude of disciples unto them and said look, it is not fitting that we should leave the word of God the preachers. It is not fitting that a preacher leave the word of God to pass out canned food to create a social environment in the church, to serve tables.

That is not the priority of the church. Then he goes on, you look among you for seven men appoint over this. Business, social activities in the church, entertainment, all of that mess is business. And it tells you in Scripture in Acts chapter two, it’s not a priority of the church, but we will continue to give ourselves the ministry to prayer and ministry of the Word. You see Satan at the very beginning when you, when you looked at the last two weeks, now apply it to the creation of the church. You can see Satan’s activities working side by side with the development of the church to gain control.

Satan at the very beginning and endeavored to make the church into a social agency. What in the world have churches become today? They chose people who can do that, but that’s not the priority. The priority is to give yourself to the teaching of the Word into prayer. And so Satan was fraught at the very beginning and said to say they there are many churches today that have deteriorated into simple, simply social agencies. And consequently they’ve fallen into the very temptation that the early church resisted. Now you see your history. Today’s church is a reflection of the.

Of the battle that took place in Acts chapter six. Who was going to gain control over the church social order for a good feeling of the people or the word of God in regards to truth and righteousness. Now, let me say another thing. I’m not saying preachers is not important because every really great injunction in the New Testament toward the teaching of elder is to preach. Paul said to Timothy, preach. That’s your job. Preach. He told him to give himself to sound doctrine, to teach others to give it out. Okay? Daily bread today was doctrine equals discernment.

The truth preaching is a very dominant thing in the instructions to the preacher, to the teachers in the church and to the elders. I think preaching is important also because it’s been a catalyst at the heart of every great movement in the history of church. Somebody has to stand up and start it. Whether you call it a preacher, a teacher, an elder, you know, evangelist, whatever term you want to label it, somebody’s got to start something. The great movements that have happened in the church for the glory of God and the progress of the gospel have been bathed in powerful teaching and preaching.

You can go back to the Great Awakening in America by what, by the way we’ve looked at that in the Return of the Gods a bit. You can go back to the Wesleyan revivals. You can go back to the great days of Martin Luther and Hus and all those men who were preaching. And Calvin, Calvin in the days of the Reformation. And when there has been a vacuum around the area preaching, there’s also been a dearest thing happen in the life of the church. Somebody’s got to stand up and go do something. See, now in the book of Acts, we find that there have been three movements in the church.

Think about this. Think about the Great Commission. Jerusalem, Jews, Judea, Samaria, half Jewish after f. Gentiles. Then the third is the rest of the world. So we’ve had three movements into the church to get us to where we’re at today already. And in the beginning in Jerusalem, what was the catalyst that shot everything off in Jerusalem? It was a sermon of a spirit filled man by the name of Peter that the Spirit used. Remember day of Pentecost? First. First day. And then the gospel was moved into Judea and Samaria. And what was that catalyst? It was the sermon of the spiritual man named Stephen.

Remember that God used. And now we come into the uttermost part of the earth and the gospel going to the Gentiles. And we are bang, right here in chapter 13, the start of the Church. And as the church begins to explode. What is that? What, what, what would made that happen? It’s the teaching and preaching that made that happen. It was the preaching of Paul and Barnabas. And here we find a great sermon by another spirit filled preacher in chapter 13. See the first three movements of the church then were bathed with a catalyst of preaching.

And it’s, I believe that it continues to be the energy that God uses in the right spirit filled man to accomplish his will. And as we come now to chapter 13, we come to the third great sermon in the book. We’ve actually heard Peter preach several times along the way as we’ve studied. And it, it’s not the third sermon, but it’s the third kind of catalyst sermon. It’s the third, third movement in completion of the Great Commission. It’s the third kind of monumental movement. And it’s, it’s, it’s a moment when a new thing was in process of happening.

Something brand new and something exciting was exploding. And a sermon is at the heart of it. And Paul is the preacher. We s, we’ve heard some good preachers are already in our study of Acts. Peter, Stephen, and they’ve given us a lot of help in knowing what preaching is all about. And now we’re going to hear the master of them all, Paul. Now I want you to think about Paul’s history. Here’s a man that was a murderer. He went against everything that Jesus Christ taught. He was educated at the, at the, at the most highest level in the universities.

He knew the Jewish law back and forth. He was part of the Sanhedrin. And Jesus called the Sanhedrin right, the sons of the devil. And here is this man in today’s world, we wouldn’t even talk to, we wouldn’t even consider what he would if he was even talking about Christianity in any way today as truth. Why? Because we label people. We have a mindset that wants to go into their past. Which is, which is a good thing. You need to understand their past because unless they have gone through a regenerated process, they will never change. See, that’s what you are.

Look at your past. Self assessment time. Look at your past, look at all of the things that you’ve done in your past and think about what people would think if they knew all those things. But see, that’s the regenerated process. You become new. You now have something that people could relate to. That’s Paul. And this isn’t the first time he preached in scripture. Studying Paul, we know he’s Preached for years. He’s preached at least three years, right? That’s what he was with Barnabas in learning about all of this stuff. He was in Arabia even before he even got to Jerusalem.

He preached after that when they shipped him out of the town because he caused so much trouble for the Christians, stirring up everything anywhere he went. And they got so fed up with him, they shipped him back to Tarsus where he, where he came from. And when he got there, he still went everywhere in that territory, preaching and founding churches. So he’s been preaching quite a while. He went to Antioch and preached there for a year. And it’s not new to, to him or to preach for him. Okay. And it’s just new in Scripture. Okay, so we know that in Acts they’re talking about the first Gentile church at Antioch.

And now Paul, Paul has, has gone to Antioch with Barnabas to start this Gentile church. But he has been preaching for a very, very long time. And it’s incidentally in Scripture, this is the longest sermon recorded. Paul’s first recorded sermon in the book of acts, in Ephesians 3:8, he states his calling unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. So he acknowledges that his calling. I don’t know, nor do I understand how a man such as me, I’ve said this over and over again, I know my past, I don’t know.

And I don’t understand how a man like me could ever be chosen by God to do what we’re doing other than grace. Because I am unworthy of that. I can tell you God’s called me to be a truth teller and a watchman. And God called Paul to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. So he knew what his calling was. He was to preach. And so we’re going to hear his sermon. That’s what we’re going to do today. We’re going to get in, starting into this, the first sermon at the first Gentile Church. So let me bring you up to date as we look at verse 14.

Let me give you, let me lay the picture of what, of the historical point at that time the church had expanded already from Jerusalem. Those were the beginning days. At the day of Pentecost and following, it’s reached to Judea and Samaria. People have come, Jews saved to the city of Antioch in, in Syria and they’re. And they have established a church. Barnabas came to be the pastor. Barnabas couldn’t handle it alone. It was growing so quickly. So he went and found Saul, not Paul yet, but Saul, and brought him over. And Saul and Barnabas preached for one year.

And these two men in that church were, was solid, okay? Three other fine leaders came from that church. We looked at that and, and verse one of chapter 13, Simeon, Lucius and Minan. And so there were five leading elders, leading teaching men there. And the church is solid and it’s growing and it’s spirit filled and it’s dynamic. And God says this, it’s time now to reach out. It’s time to split this leadership to start another church. I want two men from your five and I want to send them to the world. The third movement of the Great Commission.

And so the church lays their hands on them and says, we agree that God has called you. We stand behind you. Go. And they sent out Paul, Barnabas and off they go. And they’re going from the beachhead of Antioch to reach the world. That’s the setting, that’s the calling. Now let’s look at the preparation of who’s who they’re going to see. So God established Antioch in pagan lands as a beachhead and from there to go out and reach the world. First Gentile Church. God has prepared Antioch already to receive Paul and Barnabas. He called, just like he did with Peter and Cornelius.

Right. God called Paul and Barnabas to go to what the Spirit had already prepared in Antioch to receive. So the first place they went was to Barnabas home, Cyprus. And if you read scripture, they had a great time. They preached the gospel there and they had a victory over Satan, which was very important. Ah, okay. That’s two things. They preached there and they had a victory over Satan by changing the people and removing the pagan guts. See, two commissions. That’s what they did all the time at the very beginning because they didn’t go out in, in fear.

From there on they knew they were conquerors. Okay, the word conquerors is a battle term. And what they did was allow the Holy Spirit to convert and regenerate people. But they had to conquer the pagan gods. The battle. The battle today. You see, we can’t overcome the evilness in this world if we don’t become the conquerors as the apostles were in Acts. We’re studying that in the return of the gods, the edge of fear was completely removed. In Cyprus we live in such a fierce state that we cannot make the shift in the change necessary to become the conqueror.

Now there’s a Whole reason for that. I’m not going to go down that rabbit hole. But. But we have to realize that this world has such a stronghold, key word stronghold, over the societal conditions and the church that were on the edge of fear. They immediately ran into conflict with Elimus and the sorcerer over the soul of Sergius Paulus. If you recall from the last two weeks, they came out on top. However. Now Elimus the sorcerer was there to prevent what? The removal of the pagan gods. Sergius Paulus, now he was the head, right? You got, you gotta remember, he was the head over all of this region.

He got saved. And then great things began to happen. They fired out of there knowing that they had a victory over Satan. The pagan gods were gone. Therefore the people could live in the glorious righteousness of Jesus Christ’s government. The agifier in regard to that domain was removed, pagan gods removed, and they pursued their first missionary journey. Now we’re going to pick it up right there at verse 13. Now when Paul and his company loosed from Pappas, that’s the city there that they were in, in Cyprus, the main city, it was the capital at that time.

They came to Perga in Petal, which meant that they had to get a boat and go across the Mediterranean going north, and they landed right there at the coast. Now this is a little place at the coast called Antelia and seven miles inland from Perga. Now, Pamphylia is the name of a district, a county. Today it’s shaped like an Oscar Meyer wiener. Okay? It’s long and skinny out. It’s just as long a skinny piece right along the coast. And it’s just north of, of a large area called Pasadea. So you have Pamphylia and Pia, two different regions.

Now the whole area is called Galatia. And Paul wrote the Galatians. So you can see that the reason why I’m going through this from a historical. You can see how the history to form Galatia, to create the church that Paul wrote to in Galatians, okay? When he wrote to the Galatians, he wrote all the people in all this area, okay? They passed the letter around just like we talked about in Revelation, the regions and all of the cities of that whole area. So it was like a circular letter. Now and Pamphylia and some other states make up Galatia.

All right? So we’re. Paul, Scripture is trying to show us that our, our format of our government is the same that existed in the Roman Empire. That’s all I’m saying. We had city, we have Cities, we have counties, we have states, we have regions, we have national government. This structure that we live in is the same structure of the Roman Empire at the time of the church. No different. We are an extension of the Roman Empire. So Galatia and a few other big provinces, Louisiana provinces, instead of counties, they have provinces. Just a different word for the same meaning make up Asia Minor.

Asia Minor was a region, so they’re now going to Asia Minor. And incidentally, that’s the place that Paul came from. So first they went to Cyprus, where Barnabas was from, and then they went to Asia Minor, narrowing it down. The Galatian section of Asia Minor. Galatian is a state narrow down, landing in Pamphylia on the coast. Now, at this point we have an interesting note from Scripture. We talked about this last last week. And John departing from them, returned to Jerusalem. We talked about this last time. That’s John, Mark, the writer of the Gospel. Mark, he left.

And I suggested to you last time a couple reasons for it. And just to review real quick, he left perhaps because he didn’t like Paul taking over. He may have been a Barnabas fan himself. And Paul just kind of, by the nature of the kind of the guy he was, became the head of the whole deal. And maybe he felt bad about that. Some writers think that is true. And it starts out and Saul and Barnabas and Saul and Barnabas. And then all of a sudden you keep reading through Acts and it’s Paul and company. All right.

So the scripture says, basically tells us that a leader stepped out and took control. Paul, well, that was the condition that Christ gave him to do. And he put him under Barnabas for a time to learn the, the doctrine and theology of Jesus Christ. But see, that’s the way Paul works. And sooner or later, Paul was going to take charge. Now this is the sooner rather than later. But anyway, he was a leader by nature. You know, that’s just the way he was. And, and of course, that was by God’s design. Jesus Christ chose Paul to be the leader of the church.

And one way or the other, he had to come through his discipleship through that process of people who he was under in understudy. And he was then going to become the leader over those people. Management skills, guys. We all start as an understudy. When we first come out of school or college or whatever, we start out as an understudy. And as we grow in our knowledge and our experience with additional education maybe or whatever, we surpass those that taught us. This is exactly when you do that, if you, if you’ve ever done that, and I’ll tell you, I did that at 20.

At 27, I was managing people twice my age. And your skill sets to do that have to change. You can’t be the bull in the china closet like you were with others at 24, 25, 26 and 27. We all knocked it out, okay? We could grind it out in a way that’s much different than managing people that are much older than you. Think about this self assessment a bit. How do you manage people older than you? By the grace of God that you have to respect them because you’re your elders. How do you do that? Becomes a very much more difficult management set than what you think now.

Think about Paul. He just broke through. And so there’s going to be a struggle here, all right? And people leave. They do that in business today. People leave. That’s the nature of the human side of life. So you ought to be able to relate to what happened in history here by looking at your own life. So let’s go. Let’s go on foreign. John Mark was a little upset about that. A little conflict there in personalities. And it’s really possible when you look at scripture and look at humanistic events as you, as you view someone that’s been in, in leadership all, almost all of his life, in somebody then taking over, that doesn’t have quite the years of experience that that individual had.

Okay, think about that. That’s, that’s the condition here. Paul rises to the leadership. Barnabas had more experience than him, and John Mark got upset. All right, so. But it’s also possible that John Mark knew what lied ahead from Pamphylia, and that was the Taurus mountains, Tarsus mountains. And crossing those mountains was a treacherous, fearful journey. And he just really wasn’t that hearty of a soul and wasn’t too sure that he wanted. Wanted to get involved. So he chickened out. Okay? That’s the other side. They had. They had a journey to go. And maybe he just did not want to do that.

And there’s a third possibility is that the remain romance of ministry work had worn off. He’d lost his first love and so he wanted to go home. We don’t know the truth, but we can surely see the conditions as they exist in our current state of life and look back and see the process that took place at the time Paul took over the ranks. Whatever reason, Scripture doesn’t tell us, but Mark, John, Mark left. Now we’re going to see Mark again, but the next time we’re going to see him, he’s going to create a conflict because he wants to go the second time on the trip.

And Paul won’t take him because he chickened out the first time. Leadership, leadership, leadership. Somebody jumps bell on you, you come back to you and ask for forgiveness. I want you to think about this. Ask for forgiveness, and they do it for a selfish go. Your decision is, do I accept the forgiveness and take them back into the process, or do I accept the forgiveness and not another management tool that you always use. You do this in friendships, by the way. This is probably the most exercised process in life. Over friends that have hurt you in whatever way to.

The Bible says you need to forgive them, but it doesn’t say that you need to be reattached to them. Forgiveness is the criteria of righteousness. But you don’t have to have a relationship after that. And so power bar split over that. Okay? They split church. Think about church splits today. Always two people that started and always those two people split. And if the church was doing what they were supposed to do, that would not happen. Think about that. If they were reaching out and moving people to sanctification and discipleship, they would not have time to be concerned over social issues, which is the reason of the split of the church.

So Paul and Born is split over it. And it was a serious thing because we saw last week how Satan uses internal strife to destroy the body. And there’s a classic illustration of it right there. So Paul and Barnabas are all alone, no more helper. He had come along as their helper in verse five says, and now they haven’t got any helper. They’re going alone. Verse 14. When they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia. Now, that’s not Antioch, Assyria, by the way, the first church. That’s a different Antioch. That’s a. Antioch was a fairly common name back then.

And if you remember the ruler Anticus Epiphanes. And that name had people up here and there, all throughout that part of the world as the name of various cities. So people use common names, familiar names to name cities and so forth and so on. So in the Bible, when you study, you need to understand the words, right? Because in Acts 13, he talks about Antioch being the first Greek church. Now they’re moving by Scripture through Antioch in a different area. That’s not the first church. And if we don’t study it correctly, we don’t separate that to understand that they’ve gone from the first church to another church.

This was the Antioch of Pisidia, or it was called Pidian Antioch. So they came there from Antioch in Syria. Now, it’s interesting, and I want you to notice this, that the Bible passes over what may be one of the greatest points of heroism in the history of the early church with just a simple statement. They departed from Pergia and came to Antioch. You might say, what are behind those words? Well, only God knows and the people who have asked Paul since they got to heaven. But that was not an easy thing to get to Perga. To get from Perga to Antioch was a fantastic job.

The journey was a fantastic job. Okay, let’s look at it. Antioch of Presidia was 3, 600ft high on a plateau up on the Taurus Mountains. So you had to climb 3, 600ft on foot to get there. It was a hundred miles from Perga, and it was a hundred miles up and through and over and around The Taurus Mountains. 300 miles. They had to go through treacherous terrain. It wasn’t easy and just glibly passed by was that trek and they had to make to get to that Antioch of Perin. Now this Antioch was a pretty well known city back then.

It was a colony originally founded by Augustus, by the way. It was made the administrative center of South Galatia. It was the most important city in that part of Asia Minor area. And it had a large settlement of Jews and there were a lot of Jews in Asia minority over the place. But this city had a particular large settlement. Now there’s an interesting possibility here that entered the mind of many commentators. Why didn’t Paul preach in Perga? He stopped there. Why didn’t he preach there? Why does it say he just departed from Perga and went directly to Antioch? Well, there are some suggestive reasons and we’ll cover them.

It’s likely that he was very sick while he was in Perga. And you can see that as indicated in Galatians 4:13. Just an interesting note. As you study the Bible, remember it’s a code book. So you can’t take the book of Acts and when he’s in that part of the country and not read the letter while he’s in that country. So if you go to Galatians 4:13, there’s an interesting note. He says to the Galatians and this whole territory in Galatia, you know how through infirmity of the flesh sickness, I preach the gospel unto you at the first.

Okay, this was the. His first time coming into this area. And now he’s telling the people of Galatia. This is the reason why I did what I did. In other words, when I came to Galatia, I was very sick. Then the next verse he says, in my trial of my trouble, which was in my flesh, it was physical. You didn’t despise, despise, you didn’t reject. You received me as an angel of God, even as Jesus Christ. So what he’s doing is laying out the fact that he came into the glacier area and why he didn’t preach.

He was very sick. Maybe he had a contagious thing. They had disease back then just like we have disease today. Maybe it was contagious. William Ramsey suggests that he had malaria and that he had contracted malaria and was very sick. This temperature would have risen up and down in the cold and the heat and so forth and so on, on the very varying temperature to perhaps maybe 106. That’s what one commentary thinks as he studied the scripture. Now you got to understand there’s no drugs then you treated this naturally, but you go through the horrible anguish and the pain of the stress and malaria with no relief.

And he was a very, very sick man in the lowlands of Pera. And perhaps he felt that going to a higher country, says Commentary. Ramsay may have been a redeeming thing in terms of his physical illness, whatever it was. He didn’t preach there. But we know he was a very sick man. But he pursued an unbelievable journey at the same time without a helper. Think John Mark left. Did John Mark leave in the time that Paul was sick? Okay, what is the conditions of that? We don’t know all of that stuff. All we can do is sort of put it together from other scripture as it relates to that particular time in history.

But see, Paul had fortitude and he had determination and the courage like few other people. And he pressed that thing on to Antioch in all of his sickness. That’s the reason why I said that that brief little thing in scripture was probably the most heroes point in time. In all scripture got a man. It wants to serve the Lord so much that even in his sickness he journeys. Oh, self assessment. How many of us get sick and want to curl up and die? Just want to sleep, Think about today. Oh, and you got drugs to help you out to ease the pain.

We don’t have a quarter of what Paul have. Think about that. So part of us along with him, the journey, they, they went up. The journey itself would have, wouldn’t, would have been treacherous beyond our belief in complete health. The Taurus mountains were jagged, ragged cliff like mountains, the trails clung to the cliffs that ascended up dizzy heights. Think about you got fever and you’re walking and you’re dizzy and you’re on a cliff. And think about this treachery. Treacherous journey of 300 miles Paul had to do, being sick. Two of the most treacherous rivers in the world had to be forded, the Cistrus and the Uran.

And both of these rivers cascaded, just kind of plunged through the canyons and were very difficult to get across. Alexander the Great and another point of history, for example, in one of his particular escapades, had desired to join Permit Permino in Fergia. And in order to do that, he had to cross the Taurus Mountains. And he said this, the toughest part of all his campaign was to get through the mountain range, especially to shake off the brutal, lawless tribesmen who live there. Alexander the Great stated that, and it’s written in history. So you can imagine what Paul and them were faced with.

The Taurus Mountains were famous for being inhab inhibited by robbers and brutal tribesmen who had just confiscated, installed and slaughtered everything they came through that came through there. So they would hide in caves. See, you gotta think, I tell you this story because you got to see the journey. They would hide in caves, in the cracks and so forth. And people were in such precautious positions anyway that they had to just barely hold on to save their, their lives. And so it was some kind of journey. That’s the point here. The journey of life you live, it cannot be even close to the journey of life of Paul.

It may have been that maybe Paul and Barnabas joined a caravan through just for safety sakes, who knows? We’re not told by scriptures. But you think of the times, you think of what was going on, you think all this stuff, they did whatever they needed to do to protect themselves. That’s the key. Paul said this in remembrance of his life. He said this in 2nd Corinthians 11. In my ministry I’ve been in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, dangers from the wilderness, in toil and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure, etc.

Etc. Etc. It might have been that most of that all or all or nearly all of that occurred right there in the Taurus Mountains because that’s the only real treacherous journey that we’re talked about, that we’re told about in biblical scripture. But nevertheless they arrive and it’s all just simply passed by in scripture. But it should tell us about the kind of heroism that I think many of us as Christians today would have had the not the faintiest idea about the journey for Christ. Self assessment. You take what journey for Christ? And how treacherous is that journey? Think about this.

Oh, I never thought about that. What do you give up? What do you give up? Okay, going on to verse 14 at the end. Verse 14 says this. And when they came to Antioch, they went into the synagogue, I mean a synagogue, and on the seventh day and sat down. Now this became the pattern of Paul. Remember, every time he went to a new location, the first place he would go would be the synagogue to talk to the Jews. And then out of that he would then go to the Gentiles. That’s done in respect, guys, for the church.

That’s done in respect for Jesus Christ because he was a Jew. The sizable Jewish population that had scattered around the world had resulted in little synagogues and being raised up in every city. That is important to understand in Acts because that is what was established in Ezekiel. God scattered his people never to come back to a nation until he called them at the time before the great Tribulation. See, in Ezekiel you’ll study that the future point of regathering is in the great Tribulation. And they haven’t regathered yet. See, the state of Israel is not the nation of Israel.

The state of Israel is owned and operated by the head of the snake, the Rothschilds. So some of them were even large synagogues. And Paul would go into a town and invariably would go immediately to the synagogue for several reasons. Now I’m going to try to identify those reasons for you because it’s important to understand the authority structure of the church. Number one, I think Paul went to synagogues because it was a ready made audience. That’s the easy out. It’s a ready made audience. You have people already gathered it. You don’t have to go create the need to bring a crowd together.

It was already established. Where else would you find a crowd of people interested in religious things just from that standpoint alone? Plus the fact that there was customary in a synagogue for visiting people to have the right to speak. It was a setup deal. You had an audience, you didn’t have to go gather anything. The second reason I think you went to the synagogue was because they were receptive, being qualified in the Old Testament, Ezekiel being qualified in the Old Testament. There was some fertile ground for what he wanted to say. In other words, he could assume certain things and use certain things as a departure point.

And he knew that they would be receptive initially to what he had to say. In other words, he would get a hearing. Okay, if he stood up in front of a bunch of Gentiles and started to talk, they might have shut him off really fast. But this way he would be heard, at least until he introduced Christ. Interesting point. The Jews had rejected Christ. Remember, Stephen? They had rejected Christ. Well, that happened in Ezekiel. Ezekiel prophesied that the Jewish people would reject Christ. And that’s the reason why they were judged in Ezekiel and they were scattered in Ezekiel, never to come back until he called a regathering.

So what you have here is the condition of worldly society set up by the Old Testament, waiting for Paul to come there. Think about the planning of this. That’s the reason why I brought. Think about the planning of this before the foundation of the world. The details that God went through to get us to the point in time in our history as we’re at today. Now, the third reason, I think, and it’s way, way deep down in his heart, maybe the primary reason that he went to the synagogue was because he loved Israel and he’d wanted Israel to be saved.

Well, we know that’s true because in Romans 10:1, he says, My heart desires and pray for Israel is that they may be saved. And that was his prayer. And I think that part of the reason he went, if not the deep underlying reason, was just that he loved Jews, respected the Jews, and he knew that the church started in Jerusalem by Jews, and he was paying homage. He was being respectful. But you might say, well, I thought the Jews are set aside. Yes, they were as a nation, but not individually. Difference between Ephesians and Acts. See, they were set aside as a nation that were set aside as a church.

They were not set aside as an individual. As a. In Ephesians, if the Jews wanted to become saved when they were set aside, they must come through the process of the Gentile church. Just like if someone wanted to follow the law and be protected by God in the Old Testament, they had to go the way of the Jew. Okay, and Paul was a Jew. Paul was a Jew. Yes. All right. So Paul says, as God set aside Israel, whom he foreknew, God forbid. And then he goes on to talk about the election of grace. In every age, there’s always a remnant of believing Jew.

Salvation is still offered to Israel on an individual basis, just as to any man. Everybody can be saved. God excludes no one. But his nation will not be saved until the end time. But a Jew inside that nation can be saved along the way the church. So there he goes with Barnabas. And they sit down, it’s the Sabbath day. Then we find a little sequence of what went on on the Sabbath day in verse 15, after the reading of the law and the prophets. You’re talking about Jews, Old Testament still. After the reading of the law and prophets, the rulers of the synagogue sent unto them saying they sent a messenger down the aisle there.

And he speaks, you men and brethren, if you have any word of exhortation for the people, say on. Well, you talk about opportunity. I mean, you know. Well, I don’t know really. We just sort of arrived from our out of town, you know, what an opportunity. So what was going on was. When you look at the history of this, you find the Jews are set in a particular authority of the church, synagogue, Jewish or so what happened was, is out of respect. Paul set through the reading of the law and the prophet. And in that respect he was given the right to speak.

He didn’t just come into the synagogue and start rattling his mouth. He came into the synagogue. I’m going to make a point out of this. He came into the synagogue in respect of the process and he eased them in from the process because he was a Jew, knowing the law, he eased them into the process of getting to Christ by relating to them on their level. And then he migrated into Christ’s teachings. Negotiations, business negotiations, art of war. What’s the first thing you do in anything? Number one, you got to have respect for your opponent, whatever that might be.

Individual, company, nation, whatever. You got to have respect. Second thing you got to do is you got to listen to them. Third thing you got to do is you got to find some level of agreement in what they said before you can migrate into your negotiating point. The church. The fundamentals of business life is predicated on the structure of the church, little background. It’s interesting, the synagogue today, if you were to attend an Orthodox Jewish synagogue, you would find it would follow much the same pattern as this old one did. It gives us one a few places in the Scriptures we have the order of what to do.

The first thing that happened in the synagogue when they meet together, and this is even true today, it’s the re. It is the reciting of the Shema S H e M A that is Deuteronomy 6:4 to 9. If you want to know what it is, that’s the verses of Deuteronomy 6:4, 9. The Lord our God is one, Lord, hero, Israel. That’s the shimmer. And so that is the first thing that is done. Immediately following that prayers are offered. Then immediately following the prayer, scripture is read. And scripture that is read is always a portion of the Pentateuch.

And it’s set out over a seven year period so that they read through the Pentateuch every seven years after reading of the law. That’s the pentate and the prophets. Reading of the prophets is also called the Haftar H A F T A R A H and it is also prescribed over a seven year period and that the passage is usually kind of coincide together. Together. That was then and that’s also today. Think the church has changed? No. So in every synagogue there’s the reading of those passages following the prayers, following Mima, that is the Orthodox synagogue.

Then immediately following that there would be instruction and teaching. And if there was a competent visiting guest because he paid respect to the church, he is invited to do the speaking. And just so happened that Paul and Barnabas were there and Paul was competent. Deing noticed his Jewish character. However, in fact it may have been well known who this guy was. He’s a Jewish, okay, Paul was known, okay, because he’s part of the St. Henry, he’s part of the Jewish leadership. So. But whatever the reason, they were aware of the fact that this man was a valuable man, that he was a teacher and that he was respected.

Now as I said, he was a former member of Sanhedrin and somehow they had word on this. But we don’t know exactly how that word came kind because it’s hundreds and hundreds of miles between Jerusalem and Antioch. So they said, men and brethren, if you have any word of exhortation for the people, say on. See, it’s exciting to me just to see again how the Spirit of God rules in the moving out of the to church of Antioch. The Spirit of God was moving in the Jewish synagogue even though they didn’t believe in the Messiah. Oh, think about that.

The Spirit moves in every situation, but it lives in your heart. And we talk about this biologically. See, the Spirit is the air you breathe. It’s the energy source. So even in areas of conflict, even in areas that do not believe, the Spirit is still working. Why remember that little thing that the Spirit and a small voice continues to talk, continues to talk. And remember, at the center of every human life is a metabolic light. It’s that connection energy source that is talked to. There’s no advanced man, in other words, there’s no PR team coming into this saying oh, here comes Paul and whatnot and get, get Everybody jacked up and hyper about having Paul there.

It’s just there they go and there they wonder in who knows that they’re even coming. Well, that’s the Spirit, right? Remember, the Spirit gets them ready to receive Paul and Barnabas and then all of a sudden they walk in and sit down. And then the Spirit of God speaks and he says, that’s the man. And he speaks to who? The rulers of the synagogue. That’s the man. The rulers get all organized and pick him up out of the crowd. How do they do that? Because the Spirit is telling them to do that. Spirit of God was so superintending the life of the church in its early years that I think that’s what the Spirit of God wants to do today.

Well, I think he does it today when we understand how it works. See, they understood it then, we didn’t. Because that was a separation that Satan made in the church. See, in the Old Testament God was present. Think about that. God was present until the last 430 years between Malachi and Matthew because they had so defiled God that he says, I’m done with you. Now in the New Testament God was not present. His son was present. And in him God was present in man. See? And Satan had to go from battling God in a present in a presence.

They had ongoing battle in the presence. Remember, God ward against the sa satanic communities. He ward and killed all the giants. All right? So God was not only judge, but he was also general in the Old Testament. Now in the New Testament because the shift of control was from a presence of God physically into the spirit of God in man. And in that shift, Lucifer had to do something in order to have the ability to battle against the church. So he battles with man today. And God still is in the battle because he’s inside of us, but he’s not outside.

He’s not, he’s not may being made present like he was in the Old Testament because they didn’t have the spirit of God inside of them, but it was all outside. See, it’s all outside. We have the outside energy source and the inside protection of being sealed. And that’s why I think the same thing that happened in the Old Testament in the early church is exactly what’s happening today. The best er and the best advanced work every done is done by the Holy Spirit. You can’t do it now. A lot of times, especially in business, we use a lot of sophisticated means and we get, we get an outcome of what we’re trying to do.

If we’re Trying to attract a lot of people. We promote an event. If we’re trying to get people to buy a product, we promote the product. Well, that’s the same thing that happens when God prepares the people to receive who’s coming to speak. The Holy Spirit is not drawing people, the Holy Spirit techniques, or to bring the people together, awaiting anticipating that event to happen when the messenger comes. I think it’s wrong to substitute the work of the Holy Spirit to put all your eggs in that basket rather than to spend your time waiting on the Spirit of God.

You see, we get ahead of you. We’re in. We’re an instantaneous society. We’re not willing to wait. And in waiting, we not only get more blessing in the weight, but we can we have the time to see what he’s doing. See, God wants to show you himself, but he can’t show you himself in the way that he did in the Old Testament because he lives inside of you. He wants to show you, you what he’s doing in preparation for you to go do what he’s called you to do. And you can see it, guys. You can see it.

I think so many times we create monsters with publicity. If we just let the spirit do his quiet work, we would accomplish what he wants instead of what we think he wants. Do you understand the difference? If we allow him to accomplish what he wants, we get all the blessings. If we accomplish what we think he wants, who knows what you get? See, that’s the difference in church life, I think sometimes. And I’m not discounting all kinds of things, but I’ll never forget my. My growth pattern in this journey. And in this pattern, in. In this journey, a lot of the things that I had personally in my life, I had to change.

That was in the struggle of me trying to understand why I was so angry. See, I was going through so many spiritual issues at the time, but my focus was trying to figure out how to get out of being angry because I was a bear. And when it finally came down to a gentleman talking to me, I’ll never forget this. I was overseas. I just walked through the ruins in Tibet. I sat down on a stone, I quiet myself, okay? And I. In the quiet of your mind, you could hear the swords. Now, gentlemen, you can imagine the person in that area, of course.

And we had a conversation. We had a cup of coffee conversation. And he began to lay out for me the things that were holding me back. And I’ll never forget in those years what took place to hear his testimony. And for him to change mine. The messenger. You never know where it’s going to come from. See, the Spirit sets it all up. We’re going to stop here for time. But in verse 44 it says, and the next Sabbath day came, almost the whole city together to hear the word of God. Now, nothing I’ve ever seen can work that well.

You start in the synagogue. Christ says you start at the church. Right. You’re in church. This whole world starts at the church. And allow the Holy Spirit to take shape. By the end of your journey, the church moves the whole city. If we’re going to take back this world, if we have a shot at taking back this world, it’s got to happen by the church. And it’s got to happen in a way that allows the church and we have access to the power, but it allows the church to source the power in order to make the change.

We as individuals will never change this world, but we as the church, just like the power that Christ gave apostles, have the ability to change this world, but it has to start with the church. And we’re going to stop right there. Comments, questions, points, anything you might want to add? Yeah, Mar, I just have a question and a comment. Okay. You were referring sometime, I think this. I don’t know which day it was. You said there’s no J in Hebrew, Right? Okay. How did you get from. How did they start calling the Hebrew people Jews? They were not.

They were not Jews. Add a Y where the J was and now pronounce pronounced the right name use. So where did the J come from? It came in about. It came about 500 years ago. So, yes, Yeshua is issue. Yeah, well, issuer. So the J came. But. But who, who put that in there? Like it was a bad matter of fact. That’s a good story. I’ll just give you the short, short thing of the rabbit hole. It was a man that was crazy that thought he was reading the. The wise, but he pronounced it with the J.

He was dyslectic and he basically created the jet. That’s how it happened. It was about 500 years ago. You can actually go study that. Wow. Wow. Yeah. Thank you. Now, my only comment is, is when you said that we have to wait on the Holy Spirit and the. The scripture that came to mind was James 1:4, but let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect entire wanting nothing. And it’s, it’s true that I don’t know that that’s, you know, that’s. That’s an interesting passage that you bring Up. Because you have to now define the word perfect.

And if you go and define the word perfect, you’re going to find that it has a lot of meanings of process. From Ephesians 3, 4, Ephesians 4, 5 and 6. See, God put God us. God put us here and. And told Adam to do what? Be perfect in the sight of God. What? That. You know, it’s also what he told Abraham. Okay, but Adam is perfect. Was not perfect. Adam was not perfect. If he was perfect, he wouldn’t train, skin, sky. No, I’m just saying before the fall. Oh, yeah. Now, Adam. Adam. I think about this.

We’ve talked about this many times, and Scripture backs it up. Adam was the first incarnation of God that would actually provide the system, the base system for the second incarnation of God called the second Adam to come, to play, to close the system. So, yeah, Adam before transgression was perfect. Yeah, that’s what I meant. That’s what I meant. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Anything else, guys? Yeah, S. We good? You sure? All right, let’s pray. Father, thank you again for a great morning. And thank you again for bringing this family together. Father, you know the love that we have for.

For them and you know the love we have for each other. And it all comes down to one thing. It’s because that you’ve given us the love to share. We want to thank you for that. We want to thank you for giving us understanding of your grace and your mercy and understanding how the church fits into our lives. We want to thank you for given us the ability of taking the individual that you’ve made us to be into a collective whole. The church you want us to become. Father, we just give you all the grace and glory in this.

We ask the deal with us the rest of the week. Give us peace and joy and understanding. Near in total control of all things. Continue to work with those who are healing. We know these bodies are basically corrupt and sinful and it takes some time sometimes to heal properly. And we just want to give you the praise and glory of working with us in healing us in all different types of states. Thank you for your son. Thank you for the death on the cross. Thank you for the salvation received for in his resurrection. Ask all these things in your Son’s name.
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