ACTS 17

Good morning and welcome to the 5 minute challenge. The 5MC is a challenge to read God’s Word for 5 minutes every day for 30 days. It’s simple to try, every morning set a timer for 5 minutes, read God’s Word and when the timer is up, stop! Mark your place so you can continue on the next day. The challenge is to keep it up for 30 days in a row. If you want to journal or take notes that’s highly recommended but not by any means required. What you’re reading here, I started 90 days ago as I came along side a young adult group in Destin, Florida to encourage them on their 5MC. I hope you accept the challenge and play along, time spent in God’s Word is time well spent indeed!

The rain moved out of Fort Worth yesterday, but it still looked very threatening at times. Marge & I did manage to get our morning walk in without getting wet. We continue to strive for the daily ‘big 4’ which is a daily routine of spiritual and physical fitness. The four are: spiritual – your daily 5MC, then the physical – proper amount of sleep and consistent sleep times, exercise – we walk 2 miles every day, diet – making good food choices. I have found that by practicing these 4 daily, it will keep you happy & healthy both spiritually and physically and prepare you to better be able to do God’s work.

Well, this morning we continue on in Acts. Yesterday we were in chapter 16, so today we simply move onto chapter 17. By the way, if today is the day you decide to start the 5MC, you can start along with me in Acts or you can simply start in the Book of Matthew, the first book in the New Testament. For simplicity I recommend whatever book you start, read it all the way through during the challenge. Skipping around a lot can be really confusing.

Paul is continuing his second mission trip and he starts out in Thessonalica. As usual Paul starts out preaching in the synagogues on the death and resurrection of Jesus and then moves into the city centers. Just like our world today, different cities have a different social, spiritual and demographic makeups and will accept the gospel with different levels of acceptance or hostility. Paul would sometimes be accepted, sometimes rejected and sometimes beaten or imprisoned. In Thessonalica, some of the Jews believed and a great many Greek Gentiles believed but the ones that did not believe rejected him with ferocity. Acts 17:5, “But the Jews were jealous and taking some wicked men of the rabble, they formed a mob, set the city in an uproar and attacked the house of Jason, seeking to bring them out to the crowd.” Human nature never changes, this sounds like something you would see on the news today.

Paul and Silas escape by night to Berea and don’t miss a beat, but just keep on preaching. It tells us in Acts 17:11 that Berea was quite a different city. “Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessonalica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the scriptures daily to see if these things were so.” I love it. They heard Paul and then sought to understand the gospel more deeply by studying the scriptures daily. (man, talk about a plug for the 5MC!) The importance of being in God’s Word daily! But the peace didn’t last in Berea. Acts 17:13, “But when the Jews from Thessalonica learned that the Word of God was proclaimed by Paul at Berea also, they came up there too, agitating and stirring up the crowds.” Man, you gotta love trouble makers huh? There’s a lesson here about people in general. Some are just put on this planet to “stir up crowds, agitate, form mobs and set cities in uproars.” It happened in 49 AD and it happens in 2018. Some have the gift to sow harmony and some create division. It all flows from the condition of the heart.

Paul and the brothers flee the mob once again and end up in Athens. Athens was the cultural center of the world and home to many great philosophers of the day. Philosophizing and pondering life was the purpose in Athens and we’re told in Acts 17:21 that they basically just stood around all day and gave speeches on the new ideas they could think up. “Now all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing except telling or hearing something new.” This place was full of “intelligent” men who loved to speak of how intelligent they were. It was also full of something else, idols.

Upon entering Athens Paul immediately notes the abundance of idols. (Acts 17:16) You see great intelligence or a deep philosophical mind cannot explain or understand God any easier than a simple mind can. God is God and cannot ever be fully understood by the limited mind of man. The Athenians in an effort to understand and explain God had basically “covered every base” and made an idol to every God they could imagine. Paul even opened his sermon to them by mentioning the idol they had “To the unknown God” he saw among the many on his walk through town. An unknown God? Why an altar with this inscription? It could be one of two things. An attempt to be broad minded; they didn’t want to leave anyone out. If a foreigner came to town and said where’s the altar to my God, BAM, gotcha covered. OR, it could be that they realized there was a God they did not yet understand so again, BAM, gotcha covered. They in essence were such deep thinkers that they had thought right through and around how God really exists.

They invite Paul up to the top of the mountain where the Parthenon stands, the Areopagus, to speak to them about "his God." What a scenic setting this must have been! Here Paul really shifts gears. He is in the presence of these high minded guys and if he wants to relate to them he must be relatable. Paul gives an amazing sermon and presents facts about the one true God that rocks their foundations. Some mocked him, some believed in Jesus and the ones on the fence agreed to “hear him again on this.” You know we still have these same 3 groups today wherever the gospel is shared. Some will hear it with tender, fertile hearts and believe. Some will hear it with hard hearts and they will reject it. And others will hear but not commit either way. They will continue to ‘think about it’ and ride the fence. By the way, the fence riders are derided by Jesus as He says they are luke warm and neither hot nor cold, so He will spew them out.” (Rev 3:16) The fence riders are just as bad off as the ones that fully reject Jesus.

As Paul continues this missionary journey we see amazing examples of how little our society has changed in 1,969 years. Human nature doesn’t change. Attitudes and beliefs don’t change. People back then didn’t know they were in ‘Bible times” they were just regular old ordinary people just like us. The same rejection and acceptance of Jesus goes on all around us even today.

The world still desperately needs to hear about Jesus today, the mission is not done.

Bless someone today by showing them the love of Jesus in your life.

VBS at Lahaina Baptist on Maui...Jesus loves these little children and so do we!