Introduction
The year is about 50 AD. We left
off last week in the middle of this second journey, this second great journey
undertaken by Paul. Initially, Paul and his companion Silas we saw them work
their way from Antioch all the way up northwest across Turkey (they didn’t call
it Turkey back then). Along the way they were encouraging the Christian
communities that were there, he was making new friends. He picked up Timothy
and doctor Luke along the way and brought them along as part of their traveling
group. They finally ended up at Troas where God sent them across the Aegean Sea
over to Philippi where they planted a new church before being arrested, beaten
severely, thrown in prison and then released the next morning and they were
begged to leave town. That’s where we left off last week. Luke tells us,
Paul
and Silas then traveled through the towns of Amphipolis and Apollonia
Remember,
Luke stayed behind in Philippi. Timothy is with them though, although he
doesn’t always get mentioned, and he always seems to get out of the beatings
too, I don’t know why that is. They travelled west through these two different
towns.
and
came to Thessalonica, where there was a Jewish synagogue.
They
travel west along this great Roman road called the Via Ignacia. There are still
parts of it in existence today. There were about 30 miles between Amphipolis,
Apollonia, and Philippi. They travelled about 60 miles. Remember, this was the
morning after they had been beaten severely. They probably had broken multiple
ribs, you can imagine there were some cracked vertebrae in there, there back
would have been a shade of deep, dark purple, all the way around, wrapping
around the sides. Plus, wherever else they were hit with these rods. They
weren’t exactly in the mood to put on a backpack that next day. It’s possible
they would have had horses that could have carried their stuff and ridden on,
which would have meant they could have made it to each city in a day. But they
didn’t stop in either of those towns. It doesn’t say why. Maybe there wasn’t a
synagogue there, maybe there were other reasons, maybe they wanted a little
more distance from Philippi.
Thessalonica
They come
then another 30 miles, about 90 miles total, to a city called Thessalonica.
There is a modern-day town of Thessaloniki and you can see Mt. Olympus. The
famous mountain where the Greek Gods were supposed to dwell. It was the capitol
city of that whole district of Macedonia back them, the most populous city in
the region. We don’t have a ton of information about it because archeology has
only been able to dig in very limited regions because this is the second
biggest city in Greece today. There are people living there and that makes it
harder to dig up the foundation of their house. We haven’t found a ton of
archeology, there are writing about Thessalonica, it was a very important town
back then, and it is a very important town today as well. Paul seemed to
gravitate towards the major cities, and this was one of them. When they got to
town the first thing they would have done, they would have had to find a place
to stay, and we find that when they were in Thessalonica, they got some money
from Philippi. A couple of different messages arrived with gifts from Lydia and
others in Philippi. But Paul got a job and, probably, so did Silas and Timothy
as well. He writes about this in his letters to the Thessalonians,
We were
not idle when we were with you. We never accepted food from anyone without
paying for it. We worked hard day and night so we would not be a burden to any
of you. (2 Thessalonians 3:7-8)
Paul, for
some reason, in Thessalonica, there were accusations of wandering, travelling
teachers that were just in it for the money. He felt like it was important here
that he worked. Between that and what they got from Philippi they paid their
own way. They would offer people money, even to the Christians, for the food
they got because they wanted to be above reproach. Paul was a tentmaker, he
made tents. Jewish rabbis would have had to learn a trade in addition to the
rest of their training, his was tentmaking. This is actually the first time in
scripture where it talks about Paul going out and getting a job. He does this
in other cites as well. This is also where we get the notion of tentmaking.
Missionaries will go to a city and instead of raising support from where they
came from, they will get a job. It is called tentmaking, named after what Paul
did. They worked hard while they were at Thessalonica. We also learn,
As was
Paul’s custom, he went to the synagogue service,
He would
go here first, where the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles would gather.
and for
three Sabbaths in a row he used the Scriptures to reason with the people.
This is
something that we are going to see Paul doing a lot, reasoning with the people.
This would have been him presenting his material from the scriptures as well as
allowing for dialogue, discussion as well. It would have included both of those
things.
He
explained the prophecies and proved that the Messiah must suffer and rise from
the dead.
The Jews
gathering at a synagogue, anyone showing up there would have had some respect
for the scriptures, the Jews would have had great respect for the scriptures.
Paul digs into the scriptures and he opens them up. You can imagine, he is
maybe wincing with pain as he does so because he is still recovering from
Philippi, and yet he rolls out prophecy after prophecy about this Messiah, the
savior, the Greek word for Messiah is ‘the Christ.’ The Old Testament
scriptures predicted that a savior would come, a great king, they were waiting
for this Messiah. Paul says that they were wrong about the Messiah, we missed
something, it was there the whole time, but we missed it. He says that the
Messiah is going to come in two parts. The second time he comes as the great
King to rule the world, to eradicate evil, but the first time he comes as a
humble suffering servant who must suffer and die and rise from the dead to pay
for sins. And so, he rolled out passage after passage showing, arguing the
case, for a dying and rising and suffering Messiah. A king who dies for his
people. And then,
He
said, “This Jesus I’m telling you about is the Messiah.”
Step one
is to prove that the Messiah, according to the scriptures, had to suffer and
die. Step two is to show that this guy Jesus of Nazareth, that he did all of
these things that the Messiah was supposed to do. He is going to come back some
day and do the rest of the things that the Messiah was supposed to do. He
taught a lot at Thessalonica about the end time and about the return of Christ
as well. If the Messiah had to suffer and rise from the dead, and Jesus did all
those things the Messiah is supposed to do, therefore, Jesus is the Messiah.
God has sent his King.
Some of
the Jews who listened were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with many
God-fearing Greek men and quite a few prominent women.
People
from all kinds of backgrounds start coming to Christ, Jews, God-fearers,
Greeks, and even some of the powerful women in this city. They start listening
to this message, getting convinced, and telling more people. A movement starts
to sweep through this city. What this shows is the importance of using the
scriptures when we tell people about Christ. We can come up with our own
arguments but there is nothing like the scriptures, the power of God’s living
word to pierce through our defenses, our hearts, and to open up our eyes. There
is only so far you can take things; you need to be able and willing to present
the scriptures. I bet there are a lot of people in this room who could talk
about how predictive prophecy, Old Testament predictions of the future, were a
key factor in you coming to Christ. For a lot of others of us, myself included,
they were a key factor in strengthening our faith, making me more of a
convinced believer. We need to know the scriptures and we need to know how to
use the scriptures, especially the prophecies when we talk to people about
Christ. We don’t bypass people’s minds, but we persuade the mind, and when we
do that, real change can happen when people get convinced.
People are
coming to Christ. One guy named Aristarchus who comes to Christ who goes on to
become a leader in the Thessalonian church, who goes on to become a lifelong
friend of Paul, a guy we are going to see several more times in the book of
Acts. He will also be at the center of a riot in Jerusalem later on in this
book. Another guy is a guy named Jason who welcomes Paul into his home.
Although Paul and his buddies paid Jason room and board. This community starts
to form. They were here probably a month or two. It says three sabbaths, but
they must have been here longer than that to get multiple gifts from Philippi.
They were probably there a couple of months. We see Paul talks about this event
where he says,
When we
brought you the Good News, it was not only with words but also with power,
for the
Holy Spirit gave you full assurance that what we said was true. (1
Thessalonians 1:5)
Paul says
he was up there, very gingerly laying out the scriptures and yet God’s Spirit
was taking the word and driving it home into their hearts. He gave them
assurance and conviction that this was true. Paul says it wasn’t his doing, but
it was God’s doing. He is the one who opens the eyes of our hearts, just like
with Lydia at Philippi. As they got convinced, they started to see real change
in their lives. He says later in 1 Thessalonians,
You
turned away from idols to serve the living and true God. And you are looking
forward to the coming of God’s Son from heaven. (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10)
Imagine
living your life in the shadow of Mt. Olympus, knowing that these are the idols
they used to worship, it’s always looking down and you could always go back to
that life, but you are convinced that there is a real God who is living and
true and these idols are false. God is the God who does something, not
fashioned from human hands. Paul saw these lives changing right before him.
They had their eyes fixed on eternity, on this king who would come back and who
would put an end to this present age. It’s a big topic in Paul’s letters to
them. As he saw them change, as he spent time with these people, he formed a
deep bond of love with the Thessalonians that he writes about,
Just as
a nursing mother cares for her children, so we cared for you. Because we loved
you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but
our lives as well. (1 Thessalonians 2:7-8)
So gentle
and tender. Paul was not holding people at a distance, like some tough guy. But
he allowed himself to care, he really loved people. He got into their lives, he
sacrificed for them. He also was vulnerable with his own needs, his own
thoughts. This bond is forming and there is a closeness here with the
Thessalonians after just a few months. It’s amazing how when someone comes to
Christ, the bond that you can form and how quickly you can do it, and it’s real
because it’s based in Jesus Christ. However, after just a few months at
Thessalonica, trouble arose.
But
some of the Jews were jealous, so they gathered some troublemakers from the
marketplace to form a mob and start a riot.
They went
and gathered up the unemployed riffraff hanging around the marketplace, bribed
them, to get a mob going. They weren’t doing anything and were like, hey, what
the heck. The jealousy of the Jewish leaders who are seeing their followers
turn to Paul instead, and turn to Christ. They get angry. So, they strike back.
They
attacked the home of Jason, searching for Paul and Silas so they could drag
them out to the crowd.
“Where is
he, we know he is in here”
Not
finding them there, they dragged out Jason and some of the other believers
instead and took them before the city council. [politarches]
I can’t
resist this point here from Clinton Arnold on the politarches, the rulers at
Thessalonica.
Earlier
generations of critical scholars argued that the choice of this term by the
author of Acts demonstrates his unreliability as a historian. They observed
that politarchai does not appear in the Greek inscriptions of the first century
(or before), whereas it does appear in second century and later literary documents.
This is taken as evidence that “Luke” is writing well into the second century
and using terminology familiar to him from his own setting. Archaeology has
dramatically vindicated Luke’s reliability on this issue. A total of seventy
inscriptions have now been discovered that make use of this term. Over three
quarters of these are from Macedonia and over half of those are from the city
of Thessalonica. Some of these inscriptions date to the first century and a few
date as early as the third century B.C.
Clinton
E. Arnold, Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary: John, Acts.,
vol. 2 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2002), 382.
Luke knows
what the rulers are called in Philippi, he knows that this is the term for the
rulers of Thessalonica. He was either there, as in Philippi, or he had
firsthand testimony from Paul. Once again, we see the historicity of Acts. They
drag him before the politarchai.
“Paul
and Silas have caused trouble all over the world,” they shouted, “and now they
are here disturbing our city, too.
They had
heard rumors about them ‘turning the world upside down’ as other translations
read.
And
Jason has welcomed them into his home. They are all guilty of treason against
Caesar, for they profess allegiance to another king, named Jesus.”
Well, they
were turning away from idols. This was a big area of emperor worship. They were
saying that there is a king named Jesus who is going to come some day and their
loyalty was to him. Not Caesar as Lord, but Jesus as Lord. So, you can see
where they were getting this from.
The
people of the city, as well as the city council, were thrown into turmoil by
these reports. So the officials forced Jason and the other believers to post
bond, and then they released them.
Apparently,
they cut a deal where they said they had to get Paul out of there, and they had
to put forward something significant otherwise they were going to go after them
even harder. They had to guarantee that they were going to get Paul out of
there and that is exactly what they did. That very night Paul and Silas had to
leave. In his letter to them he talks about how painful it was to be suddenly
ripped away from these people.
Dear
brothers and sisters, after we were ripped away from you for a little while
(though our hearts never left you), we tried very hard to come back because of
our intense longing to see you again. We wanted very much to come to you, and
I, Paul, tried again and again, but Satan prevented us. (1 Thessalonians
2:17-18)
This is exactly
what we see in the pages of Acts. They couldn’t go back to Thessalonica, there
was a ban on Paul in Thessalonica. Paul and other believers would get in big
trouble if they ever headed back there.
Berea
So, they
leave and,
That very night the believers sent
Paul and Silas to Berea.
Another 50
miles west of there. Not on that Via Ignatia (that big road they were on) this
was more off the beaten path, still a significant and influential town.
When
they arrived there, they went to the Jewish synagogue.
Again,
Berea, there is a modern-day city sitting on it so we can’t excavate too much.
We do know there was a Jewish synagogue there. Here’s what he says about the
people of Berea,
And the
people of Berea were more open-minded [or noble-minded] than those in
Thessalonica, and they listened eagerly to Paul’s message. They searched the
Scriptures day after day to see if Paul and Silas were teaching the truth.
I love
this description of the Bereans. They were noble minded, open minded. Today
open mindedness means apathetic. It’s like, ‘I’m open minded, whatever is true
for you is true for you, I don’t care.’ They don’t want to hear anything, they
don’t want to listen to anything, that is not what these guys were. You can
imagine Paul rolling out his arguments, they are writing things down, they are
opening the scrolls, they are looking through the scriptures. They were seeing
if it was really true, that was the thing that mattered to them, was this true.
If it’s true, well there are very significant implications for our lives. They
had the intellectual integrity to investigate. I wonder, do you have the same
intellectual integrity? Have you closed your mind? Or are you open minded? Are
you truly noble minded like the Bereans, open enough to investigate the
evidence? They were. And again, you see Paul persuading from the scriptures,
you see Paul appealing to the mind and you start to see response.
As a
result, many Jews believed, as did many of the prominent Greek women and men.
Again, we
have a multi-cultural group of believers here.
But
when some Jews in Thessalonica learned that Paul was preaching the word of God
in Berea, they went there and stirred up trouble.
They
travel the 50 miles. They had seen this before…
The
believers acted at once, sending Paul on to the coast, while Silas and Timothy
remained behind.
They could
still do some work there, Paul was the ringleader, he was the guy on the wanted
posters.
Athens
Those escorting Paul went with him all
the way to Athens; then they returned to Berea with instructions for
Silas and Timothy to hurry and join him.
He gets an
escort from some Bereans to Athens, probably by ship. He is there in Athens,
just waiting and wants Silas and Timothy down there and soon as possible. He
doesn’t like to be alone and here he is alone for the first time that we have
seen on these journeys. Alone in Athens.
Athens, is
there a more magnificent, famous, renowned city in all of the ancient world?
It’s hard to think of one. This was the home of Socrates, Aristotle, Plato, and
a whole academy of the leading thinkers that provided the very foundations of
much of western thought. When he came into this city, you have the very
prominent Parthenon on top of the acropolis as well as a number of other
temples, idols, various buildings, it was just magnificent. In Paul’s day it
was not what it was in its golden year, but it was still renowned and very
famous and impressive. Even today you can see the acropolis and the various
ruins that have been uncovered and preserved for people to see. It’s
remarkable, the city of Athens.
While
Paul was waiting for them in Athens,
It doesn’t
even look like Paul was intending on doing any preaching here. It looks like
this was really just a waiting place until they could move on to the next stop.
And yet, while he is in Athens, something starts to happen in his soul. It
says,
he was
deeply troubled by all the idols he saw everywhere in the city.
It really
stared to bother him, deeply troubled is a pretty strong word. It was vexed, it
was very worked up in his soul as he looked around and saw what was going on.
“All the idols he saw everywhere” is all one word in the Greek.
The
adjective Luke uses (kateidōlos) occurs nowhere else in the New Testament and
has not been found in any other Greek literature.
It appears
that Luke made this word up to describe the pervasiveness of idols in Athens.
Although
most English versions render it ‘full of idols’, the idea conveyed seems to be
that the city was ‘under’ them. We might say that it was ‘smothered with idols’
or ‘swamped’ by them… ‘a veritable forest of idols’… In consequence, ‘there
were more gods in Athens than in all the rest of the country, and the Roman
satirist hardly exaggerates when he says that it was easier to find a god there
than a man’.
John R.
W. Stott, The Message of Acts: The Spirit, the Church & the World, The
Bible Speaks Today (Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press,
1994), 277.
This is
what the ancient world thought of Athens. Paul had heard of Athens, he had read
the different thinkers that had come out of Athens, and now he is here seeing
it, maybe for the first time. What’s really breaking in on him is the sadness
of how lost these people were. That they are making something out of stone and
then bowing down and worshipping it. Paul is thinking that these people are
wrong and lost and they are miserable, and they are looking for God and they
are looking in all the wrong places. So, what does he do?
He went
to the synagogue to reason with the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles,
So there
was a synagogue here, it doesn’t seem like it was very vibrant, it doesn’t seem
like there is much of a respond because it says next,
and he
spoke daily in the public square to all who happened to be there.
He
goes from the synagogue out to the streets of the Agora talking with people,
dialoguing with people, sharing Christ with people, trying to reason with them.
He drew some attention from some of the more powerful guilds of philosophers
there in that city.
He also
had a debate with some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers.
Two
different philosophical schools, what did these guys teach? I’ll give you the
short version.
The
Epicureans… considered the gods to be so remote as to take no interest in, and
have no influence on, human affairs.
Like a
deist view of God.
The
world was due to chance, a random concourse of atoms, and there would be no
survival of death, and no judgment.
They were
essentially materialists, the physical is all there is, the gods are not
involved and there is no life after death.
So
human beings should pursue pleasure, especially the serene enjoyment of a life
detached from pain, passion and fear.
John R.
W. Stott, The Message of Acts: The Spirit, the Church & the World, The
Bible Speaks Today (Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press,
1994), 280-81.
“Let us
eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we die,” they said.
“Nothing
to fear in God; Nothing to feel in death” (Diogenes, AD 200)
That’s how
some of us here are living our lives. It’s a hopeless philosophy. What about
the Stoics?
The
Stoics, however… acknowledged the supreme god but in a pantheistic way,
confusing him with the ‘world soul’.
It’s like
he is one from the creation, not distinct from it.
The
world was determined by fate, and human beings must pursue their duty… however
painful this might be and develop their own self-sufficiency.
John R.
W. Stott, The Message of Acts: The Spirit, the Church & the World, The
Bible Speaks Today (Leicester, England; Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press,
1994), 280-81.
Even
today, if someone is described as stoic, they are kind of autonomous,
self-contained, holding everyone at a distance, not affected by the things
around them, very rational. Paul is taking on both of these guys at the same
time, both of these groups.
When he
told them about Jesus and his resurrection,
The
resurrection is often a deal-stopper in the speeches in Acts.
they
said, “What’s this babbler trying to say with these strange ideas he’s
picked up?”
That’s a
negative term, in case you can’t tell.
Others
said, “He seems to be preaching about some foreign gods.”
This was
one of the charges leveled against Socrates many centuries earlier when he was
executed for his teachings. This is not a friendly audience, this not a group
of seekers, this is a hostile audience.
Then
they took him to the high council of the city. [“the Areopagus” aka
“Mars Hill”]
This is a
two-word phrase. Other translation render this as the Areopagus or Mars Hill.
Mars Hill was originally a place, then it was the council that met at that
place. These would have been the elite of Athens. Mars Hill today is a rock
outcrop northwest of the Acropolis. If you look down from the Acropolis you can
see down on top of this hill. It’s a tourist attraction today. If you stand on
Mars Hill and you look up at the Acropolis you also see the Parthenon. All the
events that follow here take place in the shadow of this great temple where
there were more gods than people, more idols that you could count.
“Come
and tell us about this new teaching,” they said. “You are saying some rather
strange things, and we want to know what it’s all about.”
You need
to answer, here. Luke tell us by the way,
(It
should be explained that all the Athenians as well as the foreigners in Athens
seemed to spend all their time discussing the latest ideas.)
He didn’t
really have a high view of the Athenians.
So
Paul, standing before the council, addressed them as follows: “Men of Athens, I
notice that you are very religious in every way,
It’s hard
to tell if this is a compliment or not. It can also mean that they are too
superstitious. The word can go either direction and it’s not clear if he is
confronting or trying to butter up his audience. It is possible to be very
religious and not be open minded, you can be very religious and very wrong,
like these guys were. And yet they did have something that drew them to God.
They knew something more was out there. He says,
for as
I was walking along, I saw your many shrines. And one of your altars had this
inscription on it: ‘To an Unknown God.’
Out of all
the different temples and statues and idols and names, and you come along this
one and there is no name on it, and it just says, ‘To an Unknow God.’ Where
does this come from? If you want the background on this, you would have to go
to Diogenes Laertius.
In the
sixth century BC (500 years before Paul arrives in Athens) a plague breaks out
in the city. The people, they are sacrificing to all their different gods, the
plague is not subsiding, they send this dude named Nicias up to the Oracle at
Delphi asking what to do. The priestess says, ‘You need to make a sacrifice to
the God’ and he’s like, ‘We’ve done our sacrifices to all our gods.’ She says
that there is one god that they haven’t sacrificed too, you have missed one.
Nicias comes back and said that they missed one, they asked what to do, she had
told them to send a messenger to Crete and to find a man there named
Epimenides. They get Epimenides and they bring him back to Athens. He tells them
that they need to set up alters to these unknown gods. They set up a series of
different alters, they offer their sacrifices, and low and behold the plague
subsites. These alters just sat there for centuries until Paul walks into
Athens and finds them.
See
Diogenes Laertius, The Lives of Eminent Philosophers, vol 1, p. 110 (3rd
c. AD)
&
Don Richardson, Eternity in Their Hearts, ch. 1
These
people knew there was something more out there, they knew there was something
they were missing. They had almost and infinite number of gods and they knew it
still wasn’t enough, there was something they were missing, and Paul tells them
that he knows what they are missing. He is appealing to that sense that they
had, that there is more.
This
God, whom you worship without knowing, is the one I’m telling you about. He is
the God who made the world and everything in it.
Stoicism
is wrong, he is not one with the world, he is not part of the world, he made
the world. He is distinct from the creation and rules over it.
Since
he is Lord of heaven and earth, he doesn’t live in man-made temples, and
human hands can’t serve his needs—for he has no needs.
That was
the whole concept behind paganism, offering sacrifices to the gods to feed the
gods, to try and get something from them. I scratch your back, you scratch
mine. Paul says that paganism is wrong, your whole system with your idols and
your temples, you’re wrong.
He
himself gives life and breath to everything, and he satisfies every need.
You’re
still alive today because of His goodness towards you.
From
one man he created all the nations throughout the whole earth.
The bible
calls him Adam, his wife Eve, the common descent of the entire human race. Not
just creatures, spiritual beings made in the image of God. We are not here by
chance, we are not highly evolved monkeys, we are much more than that.
He
decided beforehand when they [nations] should rise and fall, and he determined
their boundaries.
He is
sovereign over history.
His
purpose was for the nations to seek after God
Why did
God create you? Paul says, ‘to live, and to seek God.’ That is your purpose,
you are looking for meaning in your life, this is where it is. This is what you
were designed for.
and
perhaps feel their way toward him and find him—though he is not far from any
one of us.
On the one
hand we are blind, it’s like we are groping about in the dark. He calls this
general revelation in Romans 1. He says that we can look at the creation and we
can see certain things about God. We talked about this in his speech at Lystra.
And yet, so many of you here, he says, are groping about blindly in the dark.
He says, he isn’t far from any of us. He says Epicureans are wrong. God is not
distant, uninvolved, far away. No, he is right there. You can turn to him at
any time, you can have a relationship with God. Do you believe that?
For in
him we live and move and exist. As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are
his offspring.’
He is
getting poetic here. He is quoting two different ancient Greek writers, this
first one, I’ll give you the whole stanza because I think it is pretty
interesting. This is 6th century BC (500 years beforehand). This
guy, he writes,
They
fashioned a tomb for thee, O holy and high one—
The
Cretans, always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies! —
Paul
quotes that part in Titus 1, to Titus who is in Crete.
But thou
art not dead; thou livest and abidest forever,
For in
thee we live and move and have our being.
—Epimenides,
6th c. BC
Written by
the Cretan poet Epimenides, the same guy who came to Athens and helped them set
up the statue to the God Unknown. They would have known this story, they would
have known Epimenides, he is quoting their own stuff to them.
He says,
as some of your own poets have said, ‘we are his offspring.’ Who is he quoting
here? A Stoic philosopher, 3rd century BC, so Paul is a Stoic to the
Stoics. He is not saying that the Stoics or Epimenides were right, he is saying
that they have been groping around you’ve declared, you’ve concluded, you have
discovered some things that are true. You are not completely wrong in all
respects, but it is incomplete. We need to take it the rest of the way and he
is there to explain to them the rest of the story. God has sent Paul there to
do that. We are made in the image of God, that is what Paul is saying there.
There is something special about humans.
And
since this is true, we shouldn’t think of God as an idol designed by
craftsmen from gold or silver or stone.
Paganism
is wrong, idols are wrong.
God
overlooked people’s ignorance about these things in earlier times,
The times
of ignorance are over. You don’t know, but now you do.
but now
he commands everyone everywhere to repent and turn to him.
Are you a
Stoic? Repent and turn to God. Are you and Epicurean? Repent and turn to God.
Are you a plain old country pagan? Repent and turn to God. Whatever your world
view, whether you are in first century Athens, or 21st century
America, you need to turn to God. The times of ignorance are over for everyone
here in this room, you have seen the truth, you can’t plead ignorance anymore.
God has revealed something incredible to you. And, you better hurry up because,
For he
has set a day for judging the world with justice by the man he has
appointed, and he proved to everyone who this is by raising him from the dead.”
What does
Paul say? He says paganism, and Stoicism, and Epicureanism are all wrong and
that he is there to tell them the trust as declared in the scriptures, as
partially discovered even by their own thinkers. That longing you have in your
heart, that you have missed something, that your sacrifices and your religions
are not enough, it’s because they are not. Because there really is a God and
you need to turn to him. And he has made this possible by the man he has
appointed, the man who will judge the world and put and end to all evil, the
man he raised from the dead after his death on the cross for your sins, Jesus
Christ.
When
they heard Paul speak about the resurrection of the dead, some laughed in
contempt,
The
resurrection was a little too much for them to take. Who is this guy? This
babbler? Look at him go on and on again.
but
others said, “We want to hear more about this later.”
I don’t
know if that was genuine or just a nice way to end the speech.
That
ended Paul’s discussion with them,
That’s the
last we hear of his time in Athens. Not a really receptive city. There were a
few.
but
some joined him and became believers. Among them were Dionysius, a member of
the council, a woman named Damaris, and others with them.
One of the
people who were there on the council of the Areopagus became a believer and so
did this woman, there were others. It wasn’t totally fruitless, but we learn in
1 Corinthians 1 that he didn’t baptize anyone there. There doesn’t appear to have
been a Christian community started there, there is no letter to the Christians
at Athens like we have the Corinthians and the Ephesians and the Colossians.
Then
Paul left Athens…
But Paul
had said his piece and he moved on. He wasn’t wanted there, they may have
forced him out of town, it’s not clear. He does join back up with Timothy and
with Silas and he moves on.
Conclusions
Let’s try
and draw some conclusion from Paul’s speech at Mars Hill and his time with the
Thessalonians. What have we seen here tonight?
Paul knew
the scriptures; he knew how to use them to tell people about Jesus. We need to
learn the scriptures and learn how to use them as well. Both leading people to
Christ as well as nurturing people in their faith. We cannot bypass the mind
people must become convinced and that takes time. The scriptures are the
fastest path to building convictions. Secondly, Paul knew the culture. We see
here, he is quoting the book of Isaiah just like he is quoting the book of
Epimenides and the poets from the 6th century and this other author
from the 3rd century BC, guys that they knew. He didn’t just tell
them that they were wrong, he told them why they were wrong, he told them where
they went wrong, he told them how close they got, and he connected the dots the
rest of the way to Jesus Christ and the biblical worldview. We need to be
students, not just of the scriptures, but of culture. We need to think
critically about what we are hearing in the culture because we can be conformed
to the world or we can be students of the world that are used by God to
transform. We see that Paul allowed himself to care and to love. What was it
that he talked about with the Thessalonians? His deep love for them and how he
hated to be ripped away from them, he was not hold people at arm’s length. We
see him in Athens, and he is so upset by the fate of these people that he can’t
keep his mouth shut, it’s like a fire welling up inside of them. He was in with
people, he cared about people, and that flowed right into his ministry and his
effectiveness in people’s lives. You have to let yourself care. Love is at the
heart of Christianity. Without that, ‘we are a clanging gong, we are a noisy
symbol,’ Paul tells the Corinthians. And finally, Paul trusted God to play his
role. Obviously, he is using scripture, he is trusting God’s word to have a
mighty effect in people’s lives. He did what he could there, but then when he
was ripped away, he prayed for them, he did his best, but ultimately, he had to
entrust them to God. Same thing at Athens, he did his best, he did his part,
but he knew that only God could bring conviction into people’s lives. He is
saying the same things in Athens that he did in Thessalonica, and for some
reason at Thessalonica it landed with power and conviction of the Holy Spirit.
He left
maybe a little dejected leaving his speech at Mars Hill. Rejected by the
academy, and yet his speech, thought ineffective at the time, has become,
perhaps, probably one of the greatest and most famous speeches ever delivered
at Athens. How could Paul know that 2000 years later his speech would be
inscribed on a plaque attached to the side of Mars Hill that millions of people
would stream through every year reading about the creator God who created us to
live and to seek him.