The crowd in Lystra goes from hailing Paul as a god one day to trying to stone him to death the next. We’ll look at what causes such dramatic changes in people’s attitudes toward the Gospel, and why it is God’s plan that we go through trials in this life.
Transcription (automatically-generated):
Well, Paul and Barnabas are on the first major missionary journey in church history. Having been expelled from Pisidian Antioch by the civic authorities, they journeyed to Iconium, and there they learned of a plot by their enemies to stone them to death the following day. So they wisely led to the surrounding countryside and ministered in smaller provincial towns like Lustra. And there, in the middle of his public sermon, the Holy Spirit empowered Paul to heal a lame man. The crowd responded by declaring Paul and Barnabas to be God, visiting them in human form, Hermes and Zeus, and sought to worship them and offer them sacrifices.
Appalled by their blasphemous words and actions, Paul and Barnabas persuaded the crowd to stop. But we ended our previous study in verse 18 where we read even though they said these things, they barely stopped the crowds from sacrificing to them. We're going to jump back in in Acts 14, verse 19, as our story continues, it says some Jews came from Pisidian, Antioch and Iconium, and when they won over the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city thinking he was dead. So some of the Jews, religious leaders who had arranged to have Paul and Barnabas thrown out of Pisidian Antioch, and who hatched the unsuccessful plot to stone him to death in Iconium, hated the Gospel so much that they made the journey to Lystra to persecute them there. And this time, they didn't hatch a plot to be executed the following day.
They worked those men of the city into a religious frenzy and created a mob that grabbed Paul that very day and stoned him to the point where they believed him to be dead and dragged his limp, unconscious body out of the city. We don't know if they focused solely on Paul because he was the public speaker, or if Barnabas was running an errand at the time or something like that. Suffice it to say, it is serious to be assaulted to the point where your attackers believe you to be dead. It is believed that Paul was pointing about the scars left by this attack when he told the Galatians, I bear on my body the marks of Jesus. This insane turn of events raises glaring questions like how in the world does the crowd in Lustra go from worshipping Paul as a god to trying to stone him to death?
How were the traveling Jewish religious leaders able to change the minds and attitudes toward Paul so quickly and so dramatically? I suggest that to find an answer, we take a detour to chapter four of the Gospel of Luke. So if you would just stick your bulletins in Acts chapter 14 and then turn back to Luke chapter four, verse 14. Luke, chapter four, verse 14. We read, Then Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread throughout the entire vicinity.
He was teaching in their synagogues, being praised by everyone. This was early on in Jesus's ministry, and he was just beginning to speak publicly. Pretty much everybody recognized Him as a rabbi, a legitimate Jewish religious teacher. Accordingly, he was offered the opportunity to read from the Scriptures and comment on them at any Sabbath service, at any synagogue. It goes on and says he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up as usual.
He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up to read the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. So Jesus requests to read from the book of the prophet Isaiah, and he's about to read a messianic prophecy, a prophecy recorded by Isaiah hundreds of years earlier, that speaks about what the Messiah would do during his ministry and unrolling the scroll. He found the place where it was written those Spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down.
And the eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fixed on Him. And the reason everyone is staring at Him and there's this awkward silence, is because he left this messianic prophecy incomplete. In fact, he stopped at a comma. The next line that comes after that comma reads and the day of our God's vengeance. You see, Jesus stopped at that comes because it divides the work that Jesus did in his first Coming from the work that he will do at His Second Coming.
And Isaiah 61 continues and details more that the Lord will do at His Second Coming. But the Jews at the time didn't have any concept of a first and a second loving, even though it's all over Old Testament prophecies. They believed the Messiah would come once, take care of their sins, and more importantly in the Jewish mind at that time, vanquish Israel's enemies, restore her political independence, and give her the highest place of prominence among the nations of the earth. So they're puzzled when Jesus stops and sits down, indicating that he's finished reading from the Scriptures, loving this prophecy incomplete. Then we read he.
Jesus began. So he's beginning his comments on the Scripture now by saying to them today, as you listen, this Scripture has been fulfilled. Jesus was saying, Isaiah 61 is about me. The Spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.
And we keep reading in verse 22 that now underline this they were all speaking well of Him and were amazed by the gracious words that came from his mouth, yet they said, Wait a minute, wait a minute. Isn't this Joseph's son? So even though God is doing something amazing, even though he's stirring their hearts, and as Jesus is saying, literally, I am the Messiah, and their spirits are resonating in them, yes, this is true. Even as God is doing all that, they talk themselves out of committing to following Him by saying, but he's just one of us. He's just Joseph's boy.
He's just a redneck, blue collar guy like the rest of us. He doesn't come from a prestigious family. He's not a military commander. There is zero chance that he is capable of overthrowing the Romans. He can't be the messiah.
The Holy Spirit reveals to Jesus what they're thinking and what they're saying. And so Jesus says to them, no doubt you will quote this proverb to me, Doctor, heal yourself. What we've heard that took place in Capernaum do Hebrew in your hometown also, so Jesus can read their minds, because the Holy Spirit reveals what they're thinking to him. And Jesus tells them, I know you're about to demand that I do some miracles to prove myself to you, but I'm not a circus monkey who does tricks on command. The Holy Spirit is telling you that I'm the Messiah.
I know he's doing that. He knows they've been given enough revelation by the Spirit to believe, but they've talked themselves out of it because they don't want to believe. They don't want to believe in the kind of Messiah He is. They already have made their mind up about the kind of Messiah they want, and they're not interested in anything else, even if it comes from God. He also said, Truly, I tell you, no prophet is accepted in his hometown.
But I say to you, there were certainly many widows in Israel in Elijah's days, when the sky was shut up for three years and six months while a great famine came over all the land. Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, except a widow at Zarephath in Sidon. And the prophet Elisha's time. There were many in Israel who had leprosy, and yet not one of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian. So here's what Jesus is saying.
He's saying no legit prophet of God is accepted in his hometown. In fact, no legit prophet of God is even accepted by his own people. For example, two of the greatest prophets in Israel's history, Elijah and Elisha, and then Jesus alludes to two stories that everyone there would have been familiar with. And he points out that the common denominator in both of those miracles, both of those stories, is that the prophet of God performed miracles for Gentiles because no one in Israel had faith in God at that time. And so Jesus is saying, like Elijah, like Elisha, I am a legit prophet.
And like all legit prophets, I'm not accepted in my hometown. Or by my own people. So like those other legit prophets, I will have to go to the Gentiles to find faith. It was a stinging rebuke that warned the people, you are repeating the mistakes of your ancestors when they heard this. Now underline this in contrast to what I just had you underline a second ago, when they heard this, everyone in the synagogue was enraged.
They got up, drove him out of town, brought him to the edge of the hill that their town was built on, and it underlined this intending to hurl him over the cliff, but he passed right through the crowd and went on his way. Jesus miraculously and supernatural supernaturally just walks away, walks through the crowd. They're all stirred up in such a frenzy, nobody notices them because God blinds their eyes to him, and he just walks away from this crowd that literally wanted to murder Him. In verse 22, we read they were all speaking well of him and were amazed by the gracious words that came from his mouth. Six verses later, we read everyone in the synagogue was enraged.
They got up, drove him out of town, and brought him to the edge of the hill that their town was built on, intending to hurl him over the cliff. It's the same kind of insane, 180-degree change in attitude that we just saw in the citizens of Lystra regarding their treatment of Paul. And what was the cause in both cases? Well, I suggest that the cause is almost always the same when we see someone who has initial enthusiasm toward God, but it quickly turns not only to apathy, but all the way over to disdain and hatred. The cause is almost always unfulfilled expectations and unexpected costs.
Write this down and we'll talk about it. Unfulfilled expectations and unexpected costs cause people to turn against the Gospel. Unfulfilled expectations and unexpected costs. The former are those who decide what God should be like before they even meet Him. They create a God in their own image, a God who will do what they want God to do and allow them to live their lives however they want to live.
And if they meet the living God and he doesn't meet the profile they're created, they get upset and reject Him. You can't be the Messiah Jesus, because I already know what the Messiah is going to be like. I've made a list of his qualities. Oh, Jesus. Can't be God.
I've already decided what God is going to be like. He's very much like me.
Probably not an important point. The latter, those who walk away because of unexpected costs are interested in the living God until they learn the cost involved in following him. They're excited until they learn what the Lord Jesus asks of those who are his. And they're not ready to get off the throne of their loves just yet. The Jews in Nazareth had already decided what the Messiah should be like.
And Jesus didn't fit the bill. They had already decided that the Messiah would free them from the Romans and only benefit the Jews. So Jesus talking about Gentiles enraged them. The Jewish religious leaders who traveled to Lystra likely won over the crowds by pointing out all the things that they would have to give up if they followed this God Paul was preaching about. You won't get to have your pagan celebrations anymore, I could tell you that.
Did you know Christians don't even have temple prostitutes? So you can forget about your weekly worship trips to the temple. They'll expect you to give up all your religious traditions. Those are part of your culture. You don't want to lose your culture, do you?
This Christian guy is trying to erase your traditions. Did you know they don't even let you worship idols? Not even, like, little ones. Unfulfilled expectations and unexpected costs reveal who genuinely desires the light of truth and who in reality desires to avoid it at all costs. If you've been following Jesus for a while, then sadly, you've seen this happen.
You've seen people who claim to be Christians but then walk away because they thought it was supposed to make everything in their life easier. They thought all their relationships would suddenly improve. They'd get a promotion at work. Miraculously, though, the closest spots at Costco would be vacant. When they rose down the aisle, and when their expectations weren't met, they were done.
You've seen people who profess to love Jesus, but when they learn about some unexpected costs, they walk away angry. What do you mean? Jesus commands us not to do that. What do you mean? Jesus says I have to do that?
I'm not doing that. I'm not giving that up. I'm out of here. I'm done. And here's the thing about truth.
The truth does not care about your opinion. In fact, the truth is not affected in any way by what I think of it. I know that's shocking for some of us, the truth doesn't go, yes, this is objective reality, but what do you think about it? Should I change the truth? Doesn't Caleb about your opinion, our mine at all?
Even if it offends you, even if it offends the culture, not one time does the truth say, okay, those is the truth, but I'd like to take a vote and then I'll revise it based on what you guys think. The truth remains the truth. You can be offended by it, you can reject it, you can bury it, you can censor it, you can protest against it, you can do whatever you want, and yet the truth remains the truth.
And I point that out to make this point. If you sincerely want to know the truth, you cannot place any preconditions upon it. In other words, you cannot say, oh, I want the truth unless it's this, unless it's that, unless it doesn't meet my criteria, if you place any preconditions on the truth, you are automatically disqualified from finding it. If you place preconditions on the truth, then the words of the American philosopher Jacques Nicolson will apply to you. You can't handle the truth.
I always like the slight delay as people put two and two together there on what I did. Jack Nicholson. Oh, I get it. Okay, so write this down. Those who desire to know the truth cannot place any preconditions upon it.
Those who desire to know the truth cannot place any preconditions upon it. The good news of the gospel is not that the truth will meet your expectations. The good news of the gospel is that the truth is so much better and so much more glorious than your expectations. What God wants to do in you and what God has prepared for you is so much greater than you could possibly imagine. Who would expect a God who lacks nothing to love us?
And not in a distant, everything is love generic kind of way, but in a personal I care about every single detail of your life kind of way, a I am with you and will never leave you kind of way. The truth is so much better than you could imagine or expect. But to find it, you must place no preconditions upon it. Let's return to Acts 14, verse 20, where the townsmen have dragged Paul's assumed to be lifeless body outside the city and left it. It says, after the disciples gathered around him.
Now, we don't know if they were coming to take his body away for burial, to pray for him, or to protect his body from desecration, but among these disciples may have been Timothy, who would later become Paul's protege. And so they gather around his body, and then this happens. He got up. Against all odds, Paul was still alive, beaten, bloodied, bruised, unquestionably, with multiple broken loves.
Whoever you are, you will sometimes find yourself beaten within an inch of your life by life, spiritually, emotionally, mentally, sometimes even physically. And when that happens, one of the most helpful and powerful things that we can experience is the disciples of Jesus, our brothers and sisters, gathering around us. And as they grieve with us, as they comfort us, as they remind us of God's promises, as they pray with us and for us, we find that through them, God has imparted to us the strength to get up and keep loving. We may be beaten up, bloodied and scarred, but by the grace of God, we have the strength to persevere. In difficult times, I find myself increasingly wanting and seeking a brother or some brothers to simply gather around me, lay hands on me and pray for me.
Because God ministers to us through his people. We need each other. We need each other. So do that for your brothers and sisters. And if you're a disciple of Jesus and you've been knocked down, open up and share that with some of God's people.
Don't miss out on an incredible source of strength that God has made available to you. Do not suffer in secret. Remember what the Word says god resists the proud, but he gives grace to the humble. A church family is a grace given by God to those who love Him that they might experience his grace through their brothers and sisters.
Well, after Paul gets up he does the most Paul thing ever. We read he got up and went into the town. Of course he did. Of course he did. He went back into the city completely undeterred.
Paul genuinely did not fear any man. He was absolutely relentless. I suspect Paul would have liked to stay and continue ministering in the city but was probably talked out of it by some of the other disciples and likely Barnabas. They're like, I know you'd love to stay and minister Paul, but we feel like this might be a sign from the Lord that it's time to move on. So we read that the next day he left with Barnabas for Derbe.
Let's throw up our map again to give you an idea of where Derbe was located. It was about 60 miles our 97 km southeast of Lustra. And Paul undertook that journey just a day after being beaten within an inch of his life. He simply was not going to stop doing God's work until he was dead. Then we read in verse 21 after they had preached the Gospel in that town in Derbe and made many disciples to underline this, they returned to Lustra, to Iconium and to Pisidian, Antioch.
So they went back to the cities where they had been beaten within an inch of their lives, had a plot to murder them, hatched and been expelled by their civic authorities. Now why would they do that, given the risk to their lives? We'll find out in the next verse that they simply considered their purpose more important than their lives. What was the purpose of these return visits? Well, in verse 22 we read it was to strengthen the disciples.
Underline that strengthening the disciples so they circle back to those cities out of love and concern for these new believers and the young churches that they had left there. They wanted to strengthen them in their newfound faith in Jesus. And I want us to notice that their goal in ministering was not simply converts. Their goal was not to rack up as many professions of faith as possible or to get as many people as possible to raise their hands after hearing the Gospel. Their goal was the great commission Jesus gave his disciples.
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations. Baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Teaching them everyone misses this part of the Great Commission, teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. They were out to make disciples of Jesus. Now, what does a disciple of Jesus do?
They follow Jesus by obeying the commands of Jesus. Write this down. Disciples of Jesus follow Jesus by obeying the Romans of Jesus. And I have to stay on track. I can't sidebar because of time limitations today, but my goodness, the number of people who profess to be Christianity, who have no concept even of the fact that being a disciple of Jesus means one simple thing above all others.
You obey Jesus. You obey Jesus. There's no such thing as a Christian who says, OK, I see in the Word what Jesus wants me to do, I'm just not going to do it. That's not a thing in the Bible.
I'll obey Jesus in this area. This area. I know what he wants me to do in this area of my life. I see it in his word. I'm just not going to do it.
That's not a thing in the Bible. There's Christians and there's non believers. What do Christians do? They obey Jesus. If you disagree, you are not a Christian.
Christians desire to obey Jesus. If you disagree, you're arguing something along the lines of, can I still eat meat and belong to PETA? Whoa, whoa, whoa. Don't be so judgy. Just because I like steak doesn't mean I can't be a member of PETA.
Yes, it does. That's not what they do. Whoa. Just because I don't obey Jesus doesn't mean I can't be a Christian. Yes, it does, because this is what Christianity do.
We obey Jesus. So a person who doesn't even want to obey Jesus is not a Christian. End of.
That's a British slang phrase which means end of discussion. I just realized most people won't know that. It's one of my absolute favorite slang phrases. End of like end of discussion. It's so good you can just work it into obnoxious, everyday arguments that you get into.
He's working on me, he's patient with me. Okay? And we are told how Paul and Barnabas strengthened these new saints. So really, tune in here. This is how they strengthened these young saints in the Lord underline all of this by encouraging them to continue in the faith and by telling them it is necessary to go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God.
So the thrust, the gist of their encouragement of these new believers was firstly, to continue in the faith. We talked about that extensively two weeks ago, continuing in the grace of God. Paul's last letter, his final epistle, was written to his protege Timothy. And in it, what makes it so precious is that Paul knows he's about to die. And so he's telling Timothy the most important things he wants Timothy to remember.
It was Paul saying, when I'm gone, do not forget these truths because they are essential. And if you remember those things, Timothy, you will live a fruitful, faithful and profitable life. And Paul wrote, you have followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love and endurance, along with the persecutions and sufferings that came to me in Antioch, Iconium and Lystra. The civic authorities expelled Paul in Pisidian, Antioch. They plotted to murder him.
In Iconium, he was almost stoned to death in Lystra. What persecutions I endured. And yet the Lord rescued me from them all. In fact, now underline this, it's on your outlines all. What's the fascinating thing about that Greek word all?
In English, it means all. All who want to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, evil people and impostors will become worse, deceiving and being deceived. But as for you, underline this, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed. You know those who taught you, and you know that from infancy you have known the sacred Scriptures, which are able to give you wisdom for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
And you can hear in Paul's words how desperately he wants Timothy to understand how vital the Word of God is. He says, Timothy, the wisdom and the training that you need, it's in the Scriptures. And so if we're going to be those who continue in the faith, those who persevere, who endure, we have to be people of the Word. We're going to have to adjust our perspective from God's word is good to God's Word is essential. I must have it.
I desperately need it. If you're not a reader, you're going to have to become one. If you are limited by some disability, you're going to have to learn how to listen to the Word with something by an audio Bible. Whatever you have to do to get God's Word into you, you have to do it. This is Paul writing to Timothy.
Okay. One legend writing to another legend, and their discussion is about how desperately men of God like them, need the Word of God. Reality check you are no Paul. I am no Timothy. So we need the word of God.
Paul and Barnabas encouraged the new believers to continue in the faith and told them it is necessary to go through many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God. I'm going to share one thing here that for some of you, will change your perspective on this issue forever from this moment, as in other places in the New Testament, the original Greek word that's translated in your Bibles there as something like necessary is the word day, D-E-I. And it refers to the divine plan, god's plan for our lives. Here's what I want you to understand. In other words, Paul and Barnabas were telling the new believers it is God's plan that we go through many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God.
Not that these are undesired obstacles, on the way. It is God's plan that we go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God. Now, why would that be God's plan? Because, like me, you're like, why couldn't it be God's plan that it was super comfy and, like, wearing sweatpants at home to go into the kingdom of God? Why couldn't we do that instead?
Well, I suggest our brother James gives us the answer when he writes, consider it a great joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you experience various trials. Why? Because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance from two weeks ago. How do we learn to persevere? How do we learn to endure?
How do we learn to continue in the faith? Where does that come from? That battle hardened, can take anything kind of faith in God. How do we get that through trials? First, let me say this before, too.
God is working through our trials. Scripture says that he will not test us beyond what we can stand. So even the trials that we experience are tailor made for where we are right now in our spiritual maturity, but they are tailor made to increase our spiritual maturity. Firstly, trials reveal how we're really loving with trusting God. Trials are a reality check of our faith.
They cut through all the words we say, all the verses we post on social media. The old saying is true that like a tube of toothpaste. When the squeeze is on, whatever is on the inside comes out.
We're able very often to delude ourselves and fool others. But when the pressure is on, when we're in the trial, the truth of what we believe comes out and it's revealed. And our level of spiritual maturity is revealed. It's put on display. And that provides opportunities for us to learn, to grow, to be lovingly corrected and taught by more mature believers.
Also opportunities to repent and chosen to trust God in a greater way going forward.
You know, when it comes to speaking doubt, you're in a trial, those is it. I'm going to die. Might as well just go to bed and not wake up. There's no way out of this. We're doomed.
You're doomed. This ship is going down. We're all going to die. God is dead. Now, the way that God works through trials is that we're eventually supposed to get tired of putting our foot in our mouths.
Do you know that? Like, we're actually supposed to reach the point where we have the epiphany. It just dawned on me. He's always been faithful. Always.
Without exception. I don't know if I'm the first person to notice this, but he also promises in his word that he will always be faithful.
So hang with me here.
What if he's faithful? What if he's just faithful and I should actually notice that and stop speaking doubt in every trial that comes into my life and actually graduate to a greater level of faith. By noticing what he's been screaming at me my whole life, which is that he's with me. He's good and he's faithful. What if I just listened and believed and learned from observable reality?
So that's what trials do. They're a reality check. Doesn't matter what lies we tell ourselves about our spiritual maturity, doesn't matter how good we are at speaking the lingo and the jargon and fooling others. When the squeeze is on, it reveals where we're really at. And that's an invitation to grow from there to a place of greater faith.
Secondly, why would trials be God's plan? Because they bring us closer to him. Because when we're in the middle of a storm, we cling to Jesus like never before. Like never before. And that is where we learn what it means to abide in Christ.
That's where we learn to view Him as our only hope. It's true that you will never learn. Jesus is all you need until Jesus is all you have. Where was the one place Shadrach, Meschech and Abednego fellowshipped with Jesus face to face is in the fire where they had been cast to die for refusing to bow to the statue of King Nebuchadnezzar. Then King Nebuchadnezzar jumped up in alarm and he said to his advisors, didn't we throw three men bound into the fire?
Yes, of course, Your Majesty. They replied to the King. He exclaimed, Look, I see our men not tied, walking around in the fire unharmed. And the fourth looks like a son of the gods. And when they were called out of those fire, Jesus remained in it, because that's where he is.
He's in the fire. He's in the darkness of the valley of the shadow of death. He's in the storm. He's in the trial, waiting to meet us there. And the sad truth is that comfort breeds apathy.
I wish that I grew when my life was easy. I wish that when it was smooth sailing, my reaction was just like, oh, loved, just another good day where everything is taken care of. And I just want to acknowledge you're just so good and I love you so much. I wish that was my reaction. You know what my reaction really is?
Oh, man, sleeping in was sweet. I did not get much done today. I coast when my life is easy, put it in cruise control, put my feet up on the dash, put the seat back, take a nap. I grow when I'm placed under stress and tension. But God's desire is not for us to be stressed and tense.
His desire is that we encounter Him in the trial, draw near to him and receive his peace and have fellowship with Him. And there is nothing like his peace is what Paul was writing about when he told the Philippians don't worry about anything. Don't worry about anything, but in everything. Through prayer and petition with thanksgiving present your request to God. What is Paul saying?
He's saying, as you present your request to God, give Him thanks for what? For who he is, for what you've already seen Him do, for who you know he will be tomorrow and the day after that. So Paul instructs the Philippians. Even as you're asking God and sharing your burdens, be thanking Him in faith for who he is. There's power in that.
If you don't know this yet, when you pray even more than just asking, pray in faith and thank the Lord. Lord, thank you that you see. Thank you that you know thank you that you're with me. Thank you that you know what I need and you promise to meet it. Thank you.
That you're good. And so here's my prayer. Lord, help me to seek first the kingdom of God. I don't need to pray. I like to say this.
Stop asking God for things he's already promised. You in his word. Stop asking like it's 50 50 whether he'll do it or not. Lord, please see. Please care about me.
Stop that. Lord, thank you that you see. Thank you that you care. Thank you that you're with me. I don't need to pray to God and ask Him to be anything my prayer needs to be.
Lord. Lord, help me to walk with you. Help me to hear from you. Get my mind right. Lord, help me to take every thought captive.
Thank you for your promises. God's not the issue. He's not the One that needs to change. He's promised to be good. All I want is, Lord, fill me with faith.
Help me to go through this trial in a way that honors you. And then Paul says, hey, if you do that, then the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Paul is saying, Listen, the peace of God doesn't have anything to do with your circumstances. It's from heaven. It's divine, it transcends your circumstances, and it'll guard your heart and mind so that people will say, why aren't you freaking out in this?
Because the Lord is with me. He's given me his peace. Paul says, that's what's available to you if you will bring these things to God in faith. David wrote, the Lord is near to the broken hearted. He saves those crushed in spirit.
So why are trials part of the divine plan? Write this down trials draw us closer to God and teach us how to abide in Christ. They draw us closer to God and teach us how to abide in Christ. If you are going through a trial, let me exhort you to reflect on what the trial is revealing about your faith right now. Reflect on what it is revealing about your spiritual maturity, what you really believe about God, whether you really trust his promises, and then go to His Word.
And if the trial is revealing that you don't actually believe what's in His Word, then repent, change your mind, believe in the faithfulness of God. Why? Because he is faithful. He is faithful. And if the trial is revealing that you do trust God and that you are spiritually matured, rejoice, take heart at the work the Lord has done in your life.
You are being sanctified. You are not who you were. And above all, remember that the Lord is near to you. He's available. So cling to him.
Hold fast to him. Ask for his peace, and receive it by faith. He will not fail you. He will not fail you.
We read in verse 23 underline this when they had appointed elders for them in every church and prayed with fasting, they committed them to the loved in whom they had believed. So these groups of new believers had been meeting together since they heard the Gospel. And as Paul and Barnabas journey back through the towns and the cities where these people had turned to Jesus, they established churches by appointing elders. We noticed that they didn't just say, Everybody loves Jesus, so we don't need leaders or structure or anything like that. Let's just be led by the Spirit.
They appointed elders, plural. This means they appointed multiple elders in every church. Tasked with leading the church together and sharing authority, these men met the requirements for elders that Paul would later define in 1 Timothy 3, and Titus, chapter one, Paul and Barnabas did not appoint lone lead pastors. They appointed multiple elders to share authority in every church. This is the only church leadership model we see in the Bible.
The only one. Therefore, I believe we can safely assume it is the one Jesus desires for his church. Now, had I known and understood this when I planted New Hope Church, I would never have planted the church alone. I believe it was a sin of ignorance, but that doesn't make it right, and it's a large part of why Gospel City Church was formed. The Lord revealed this in his word to me and through my relationship with BJ, and I wanted to obey.
We both wanted to obey. And then the Lord made a way for us to obey by New Hope Church and God Rock Church joining together, creating a plurality of elders, even with two. And so we continue to work on developing future deacons and future elders that we can add to our church leadership to become even more biblical. We desire to have enough elders that the Lord could call some of them to go out one day and plant a church. We would love to have a healthy enough congregation and eldership that we can send them out with at least two of them together, so that their church can have a plurality of elders from day one.
And then any congregants who feel led by the Spirit to join them can go. We'd love to see the Lord do that. We don't have any desire to be a church of a thousand people we desire to see, people called and sent out to do the work of the Lord. Now, if you're wondering how in the world Paul and Barnabas could appoint elders so quickly from a group of new believers, I should explain this that pretty much every elder they appointed would have been Jewish. They would have been a man who had spent his whole life learning the Old Testament Scriptures, knew them inside and out, had lived and practiced the discipline of honoring God's commands, and had years of reputation as a man of Godly character.
And they were now following Jesus because they recognized him as the Messiah prophesied by the Old Testament Scriptures. These were not typical new converts. These were not Greek pagans and then church elders one day later. They were Jewish men who recognized that Jesus was the prophesied Messiah and then continued following him as the Messiah in the continuation of their Judaism becoming part of the Church. Their spiritual maturity was nowhere near that of a brand new pagan believer.
They prayed and fasted to seek the Lord's guidance in selecting these elders. They blessed them, and then it says, they committed them to the Lord. They had no idea when or if they would ever see them again. Paul and Barnabas's approach and attitude show they understood the reality that the Lord Jesus is the head of the Church, she belongs to Him, and he is able to care for her. Verse 24.
They passed through Pisidian. Antioch came to Pamphylia. After they had spoken the word in Perga, they went down to Attalia. Paul and Barnabas had apparently not preached in Perga when they first passed through it, so they did that now on their return journey. Attalia is just the port of Perga.
It's just a couple of hours away. It's too close to even show on the map. Then it says from there they sailed back home to Antioch. This would be Syrian Antioch, where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work they had now completed. Let's throw up our map one last time for this first missionary journey, and we can see the entire journey now.
So they basically went all the way to Derbe and then backtracked all the way back to their home base of Syrian Antioch. They just bypassed the island of Cyprus on the way homes. Verse 27 after they arrived and gathered the Church together, they reported everything underlying God. They reported everything God had done with them and that he had opened the door of faith to the Gentiles. Unlike the Jewish religious leaders who opposed Jesus and the early church in Jerusalem and Paul and Barnabas in Galatia, the apostles of Jesus delight in directing glory to Him rather than themselves.
We see that as they joyfully share everything God did during their journey, and that's how a servant of Jesus thinks and views their life. Anything good that happens is because of the grace of God and he deserves the praise and glory for it. Verse 28. And they spent a considerable time with the disciples, paul and Barnabas must have been, I mean, just think emotionally, physically, mentally, spiritually drained after such an eventful and dramatic journey. And yet I noticed that it doesn't say and they drew away from their church to recharge their batteries.
It doesn't say and they went away on vacation because they had earned some me time. It doesn't say and they stopped serving and meeting with their brothers and sisters because they were tired. It doesn't say that, no. Paul and Barnabas were refreshed, recharged and healed in part by spending time with the disciples, other men and women who sincerely loved the Lord Jesus. I'm sure they rested, I'm sure they needed to.
But for them and for any genuine believer being around other people who sincerely love the Lord and follow Him as Lord is rest, it is refreshment, it is healing, because God has wired us to be an encouragement to one another. And every genuine believer loves the bride of Christ, which is the church. I don't know where so many modern Christians get the idea that being around their brothers and sisters is unrest. Because if you find being around people who genuinely love Jesus to be draining, there's only a few explanations.
First possibility you're not saved, and so you don't have God's spirit in you stirring up love for his people. First possibility. Second possibility you're not in a church where people are genuinely saved. That would be a problem. Third possibility you're disobeying Jesus and you need to repent.
You need to ask Him to fill you with his love for his people and his bride, the church, and you need to ask Him to allow you to understand how much you need them. Sometimes we don't have a desire, but we recognize we should. And the prayer in those moments is, Lord, change my desires, because right now I don't have that affection. But I recognize that's not good, that's not right. And I've just become entrenched in my self absorption and that needs to change.
So Jesus, please change my heart. That's a good thing to pray, but it's as simple as this. The Word says many times those who love the Lord will love his people. There is no real Christian who doesn't love the church. There just isn't.
Jesus said, this is my command. Love one another as I have loved you. It's pretty simple. And by this everyone will know that you are my disciples if you love one another.
So I just encourage you, man, this is kindergarten level Christianity, and I share this because I love you. But it grieves me and it grieves BJ when we see professing believers say, oh, I haven't been to church for a while because I'm just dealing with a lot right now. It grieves us because firstly, you haven't made the connection that when you're in a trial, you need Jesus more than anything else. You haven't even figured that out yet. You haven't figured out that you need the disciples to gather around you and pray with you and pray for you and strengthen you.
You haven't figured out that you need to be in the presence of God as the saints lift up his name and worship as His Word is spoken over you. You haven't figured that out yet. And so when you get in a trial, you just pull away from the things you need most, because you want to sit in a hole in the dark instead and think that that's what's going to help you. And I lovingly need to exhort you. Stop it.
Grow up. Grow up. Act with some spiritual maturity. Drag yourself to church if you have to, because you recognize you need it. It pains us so much to see this is the oldest tactic of Satan in the world.
Oh, you're going through a hard time. How can I exploit this? Step one, isolate you every time. I just need to get you away from all the people who can speak the truth of God into your life with grace and power and hope. Right now, I got to get you alone so that you don't get any of that.
I got to get you to isolate yourselves away from people, away from fellowship, away from the encouragement of the saints. Step two, got to get you away from the word of God. Isolate you, isolate you, isolate you. And the number of people who I see going, yeah, I'm good with that. Just grieves me.
Because we love you and we want good for you. And I see Christians do it over and over and over and over again, playing right into the enemy's hands in love. Grow up. Grow up and recognize your need for Jesus, your desperate need for him. Desperate need for him.
Now, it's just an interesting side note that it's also believed that during this season of recuperation in Syrian Antioch, Paul wrote his Epistle to the Galatians. So if you have some spare time this week and want to dig into that now, you know the context that the churches there were founded in. And if you read his Epistle to them, you can see the challenges that came up in their first few years of existing. And so with that, I'm going to ask the worship team to come up. I'm going to share just a few key points to conclude today.
Whatever. It lots to follow Jesus, he's worth it. Whatever it costs, he's worth it. Remember, if you want to know the truth, you cannot place any preconditions on the truth. I want the truth, whatever it is.
Disciples of Jesus, follow Jesus. By obeying Jesus, trials reveal the true status of our faith and spiritual maturity. And trials draw us closer to God because they teach us how to abide in Christ and Jesus will give you his peace if you will come to Him in your trial in faith, believing he's good, he's with you, he cares about you. He will guard your mind and your heart with this supernatural peace. So let's come to the Lord in prayer.
Would you bow your head and close our eyes? Lord Jesus, thank you so much for Your word and thank you for the brothers that went before us, men like Paul and men like Barnabas, who were just relentless with the Gospel. And Lord, I just pray first of all for us, Lord, just give us a fraction of their boldness that we would be fearless with the gospel, with no concern for the cost to ourselves, just absolutely sold out for Your glory and Your fame. Loved, speak to us by Your spirit with clarity and help us, help us not to complicate things or talk ourselves our of it, but to willingly, full of Your boldness in faith, speak the truth. So we pray for that, and we ask for that, Lord.
And then, Jesus, I pray if any of us are disobeying you in an area of our lives right now, reveal it to us, Lord, because as Your disciples we desire to obey you. So we invite you to reveal those things to us, Lord, that we might repent and walk in obedience to you. And then, Jesus, I ask that where you need to, you would change our perspective on trials, because we understand it is part of Your divine plan and that you are doing good things in us. You are making us more like Jesus through these things, preparing us to rule and reign with you in the ages to come. So have your way loved.
Do that, we welcome it. But Lord, I want to pray for anyone who is going through a trial right now and is feeling overwhelmed. Jesus, I pray by Your spirit you would remind them of what they know to be true, that you are faithful. You always have been and you always will be. So I ask in Jesus name for the gift of faith to be imparted to them in their trial, not so that they can get through it, but so that they can honor you in it, speaking only honorable things about you, speaking only praiseworthy things about your character and about Your goodness in faith.
Jesus and Father, I pray that you would enable those going through a trial right now to cast their cares upon you, to come to you and just say, lord, help feel like I'm drowning here right now. And then we thank you in faith, Lord Jesus, that you are near to the broken hearted and you save those who are crushed in spirit. And we thank you in faith that you will touch their mind and their thoughts, and you will bring peace upon them. You will touch their soul and their emotions and their heart, and you will bring peace there. Not because the circumstances change, but because you are with them.
And they suddenly sense that, and they feel that and they perceive that, and you do a supernatural work guarding their minds and hearts in Christ Jesus. So, Lord, we do where we are overwhelmed with anxiety, overwhelmed with restlessness, we give that to you. And we believe in faith, even if we don't know what that means or how to do that or what that looks like. We just believe you could take it. And so we thank you in faith for doing that.
Lord, I pray that no one would leave here without accepting that invitation if they are carrying any kind of anxiety or unrest. Lord, touch Your people in Your grace and in Your power that Your name might be glorified and honored, because you're faithful only, ever and always, Jesus, and we love you. In Your precious name we pray. Amen.