Okay, the third message through the life of
Paul, let's open with the word of prayer.
Lord, I'm not going to pretend to be
able to stand up here and talk about
this man's life with any authority or any
real knowledge, but I can ask you to
guide everything that I say.
Help me, Lord, to express things the way
they were as much as possible.
Just guide my mind into truth, Lord, and
help me through this talk this morning.
I pray that you'd make it a blessing
to Pure Life staff and to those who
are watching by video.
Thank you, Lord, in Jesus' name, amen.
Okay, we're going to be in Acts 15
and Galatians 2 this morning.
The mother church in Jerusalem is now about
16 years old, and one of the main
issues she has had to deal with has
been how to extricate herself from Judaism and
yet, at the same time, use the Jewish
scriptures and their concepts, worship and follow the
Jewish Messiah, live in the Jewish culture, and
reach out to the Jewish people.
So this was quite a challenge to be
able to do this in the face of
so much hostility that comes forth from the
Jewish people in regards to the early church.
Then you throw this man, Paul, into the
mix, and Paul is just nothing but a
thorn in the flesh to these poor Jewish
Christians in Jerusalem.
I mean, he comes in and puts so
much pressure on them, it's just exacerbating the
situation.
And I don't mean to make it sound
negative, a lot of it needed to happen,
of course, but I'm just saying from their
perspective, how much more difficult Paul tended to
make things for them.
Well, by this point, the whole issue of
what happened with Cornelius and Peter, that had
been some 10 years or more before this
now.
This has been a while.
And that all kind of got, they got
through the struggle of that, and they kind
of got on the other side of it
and continued doing their thing, and that helped
them to get a better side of where
things were headed and so on.
But nothing could have prepared them for what
was going to be thrown into the mix
because of Paul's presence in the church.
As far as Paul was concerned, he had
no patience with those who wanted to keep
the church in the quagmire of theosaical Judaism,
with all its life-draining legalism and formalism
and ritualism and all of it.
He had no patience for that.
He would not bend an inch to the
Judaizers who were causing so many problems.
You know, when you've been to the third
heavens, it's hard to be patient with people
who are just adamant that things stay locked
up in this little box of religion.
And you know, he had seen things inexplicable
and inexpressible by now.
So, you know, Paul, he's just Paul.
Okay, so let's get into the story here
in Acts 15.
Let me just get started here.
Some men came down from Judea and began
teaching the brethren, unless you are circumcised according
to the custom of Moses, you cannot be
saved.
That's what they told the people there.
And when Paul and Barnabas had great dissension
and debate with them, the brethren, meaning the
leaders of that church, determined that Paul and
Barnabas and some others of them should go
up to Jerusalem to the apostles and elders
concerning this issue.
All right, so I'm going to summarize some
of this.
I'm not going to read this all the
way through, but basically Paul and Barnabas go
to Jerusalem and it seems like they presented
their case to maybe just the elders and
the apostles who were there at first, and
then later they had this big church-wide
meeting or something.
I'm not sure exactly how that worked out,
but it does seem like something like that
happened.
And Peter gets up in that meeting and
he basically says, you know, we've already been
through this ten years ago, why are we
dealing with this again?
You know, we know that the Lord wants
to reach out to the Gentiles, so why
are you trying to lay this law on
these Gentile believers?
And so he takes a stand and, you
know, so on.
I want to read this Paul's version found
in Galatians 2, just a few verses here,
just to kind of give a sense about
how he saw things that he expressed later
on.
Galatians 2.1, then after an interval of
14 years, and I want to just stop
here for one second real quick, because probably
this 14 years is in Jewish dating, you
know, that they would count any little part
of a year as a year.
So, this could have been, for instance, November
of 37 to January of 50, let's say,
and they would count that as 14 years,
although it's really just a little over 12.
So, don't get hung up on the 14
years, because if you start looking at the
timeline, something is definitely off.
So, I'm not, you know, saying that this
isn't 14 years, but I'm saying it might
not be.
But anyway, then after an interval of 14
years, I went up again to Jerusalem with
Barnabas, taking Titus along also.
It was because of a revelation that I
went up, and I submitted to them the
gospel which I preach among the Gentiles.
But I did so in private to those
who were of reputation, for fear that I
might be running, or had run, in vain.
But not even Titus, who was with me,
though he was a freak, was compelled to
be circumcised.
But it was because of the false brethren,
and he calls these Judaizers false brethren.
So, these are not Christians, you know, and
he sees them for what they are.
They're unconverted, unsaved men who are in the
church.
Okay, but it was because of the false
brethren secretly brought in, who had sneaked in
to spy out our liberty, which we have
in Christ Jesus, and I think he's referring
to their church in Antioch, in order to
bring us into bondage.
But we did not yield in subjection to
them for even an hour, so that the
truth of the gospel would remain with you.
All right, I'll just leave that there.
So, that's kind of Paul's take on what
happened there.
And, you know, so I think that what
happens is after the big debate in front
of the whole church, I think the elders
probably got together and discussed it some more
and then brought everyone back in, something like
that, because I don't think that it happens
in the flow of this.
There's just so much Luke has to leave
out to keep a concise story line, you
know, moving along.
But anyway, before I get into that, I
want to interrupt and just say something about
James and the elders, just to get this
into the story.
You know, Pentecost must have been 33 AD
or right around there.
Could have been earlier, definitely not later, but
may have been earlier.
Anyway, the church is probably 16 years along
here.
And so, at Pentecost, it was just the
Apostles.
Now, 16 years later, we're in a transition
period, and you've got the Apostles and the
elders.
And depending on which spot you're looking at
this, in one place it says the elders
first and the Apostles second, and the other
location, I don't know where they're at right
now, but the other one is the opposite.
So, there's a transition here of leadership.
And then in chapter 21, which happens some
eight or nine years later, then it's just
the elders that Paul meets with.
So, this transition period is going on here
over this 20-year period, or whatever it
is, where the leadership is changing in the
mother church, which is, you know, a big
part of the church at large.
All right, and the other thing I want
to do is just read this account left
to us by a man named Hegesippus, who
was an ancient historian.
And he talked quite a bit about James.
He said that he was an ascetic, and
he had taken the Nazarite vow when he
was very young.
So, let me just read this quote.
He drank neither wine nor fermented liquors, and
abstained from animal food.
A razor never came upon his head.
He never anointed with oil, and never used
the bath.
Yikes.
He was in the habit of entering the
temple alone, and was often found upon his
bended knees and interceding for the forgiveness of
the people, so that his knees became as
hard as camels, in consequence of his habitual
supplication and kneeling before God.
And indeed, on account of his exceeding great
piety, he was called James the Just.
And apparently, he was highly respected, not just
by the Christian Jewish believers there in Jerusalem,
but even the non-believing Jews respected him.
Of course, later on, I don't know if
we'll mention this somewhere along the line, but
later on, tradition said that they killed him
there near the temple.
All right, let's pick up our story again.
Verse 19, Acts 15, 19.
So, James brings forth this verdict, and again,
like I said, I'm pretty sure he probably
met with the other elders privately before they
did this, because I don't think he would
just, on a whim, by himself, impulsively lay
this out.
I think they probably really hashed it out
alone.
But this is what he said.
Therefore, it is my judgment that we do
not trouble those who are turning to God
from among the Gentiles, but that we write
to them that they abstain from things contaminated
by idols, and from fornication, and from what
is strangled, and from blood.
For Moses, from ancient generations, has in every
city those who preach him, since he is
read in the synagogues every Sabbath.
Now, what he's referring to in this verse
21, he's basically giving the reason why he's
laying out these demands.
Now, fornication is obvious.
That is just downright sin.
But the other three things have more to
do with Jewish dietary laws.
And, in other words, what he's saying is,
look, Paul, you're going to be out there
preaching in all these Roman cities across the
empire, and in every one of those cities,
there's going to be Jewish congregations, and they're
going to be watching you and watching these
Gentiles.
Don't cause them to stumble unnecessarily.
Don't let your people get involved in things
that are going to unnecessarily cause division between
them and the Jews.
You know, and one of the problems was
that in those days, the best way to
get a good deal on meat was to
go to the Agora, the marketplace of whatever
city you're in, and you go in there
and there would be meat that had been
offered up to idols.
In other words, they probably did some sacrifice
in front of the Zeus, you know, altar,
and then they would take that meat and
sell it in the marketplace and you'd get
a better deal on it.
It was no big deal.
You know, that's why Paul would later tell
the Corinthians, it's no big deal if you
eat it.
You know, James is saying it from the
standpoint of, don't cause your Jewish brothers or
the Jews in your city to stumble over
what you're doing unnecessarily.
Okay, so that's most of what this is
about, these four things.
So when James gives his verdict here, this
carries a lot of weight.
In fact, I would say that as far
as the Jewish believers there in Jerusalem, James
probably had more sway and influence even than
Peter.
I mean, the two of them, definitely, but
you know, Peter, there's still some questions about
Peter, like with the Cornelius thing, but for
James, the just, to stand up and say,
this is how we're going to deal with
this.
This is how we're going to handle this.
That had to really just cut the argument
right out from under the Judaizers, at least
for the time.
So let's pick up the story again, verse
30.
They did this letter, they sent it out
with two of the elders.
So here in verse 30, so when they
were sent away, they went down to Antioch,
and having gathered the congregation together, they delivered
the letter.
When they had read it, they rejoiced because
of its encouragement.
Judas and Silas, also being prophets themselves, encouraged
and strengthened the brethren with a lengthy message.
After they had spent time there, they were
sent away from the brethren in peace to
those who had sent them out.
But it seemed good to Silas to remain
there, but Paul and Barnabas stayed in Antioch,
teaching and preaching with many others also the
word of the Lord.
So there's a big time period here.
I say big, definitely at least a number
of months goes by, okay?
And just back to life, you know, as
they had been living it.
Now let's go back to Galatians 2, and
I want to get into the second disagreement
that Paul has, this time with Peter.
Look here at Galatians 2, 11, actually Peter
and Barnabas and some of the other Jewish
believers that were there in Antioch.
But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed
him to his face because he stood condemned.
For prior to the coming of certain men
from James, he used to eat with the
Gentiles.
But when they came, he began to withdraw
and hold himself aloof, fearing the party of
the circumcision.
All right, so Peter's sinful fear of man
was causing him to align himself with the
early church's worst heresy.
You know, and I think the way that
it happened was some amount of time went
by after this big council meeting in Jerusalem,
and then these Judaizers, they're just, you know,
talking together.
And, you know, when rebels get together and
they start talking, it's pretty soon it gets
all whipped up again, and they probably went
back to Antioch again and started quietly causing
problems.
And, you know, Peter was up there, probably
visiting or whatever, and he's just enjoying the
fellowship with the Gentiles.
But these guys get there and all of
a sudden he feels this pressure.
You know, I'm a Jew and I'm supposed
to be separate from these Gentiles, and so
he breaks away from them.
And this is really upsetting to Paul, because
he's fighting for something, and what Peter is
doing is just obvious.
Not just Peter, but Barnabas too, who had
been in the battle with Paul, fighting against
these Judaizers.
Anyway, let's read a couple more verses here.
13, the rest of the Jews joined him
in hypocrisy with the result that even Barnabas
was carried away by their hypocrisy.
But when I saw that they were not
straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I
said to Cephas in the presence of all,
if you being a Jew live like the
Gentiles and not like the Jews, how is
it that you compel the Gentiles to live
like Jews?
You know, so he confronts him right in
front of everybody.
All right, now, was that the right thing
to do or what?
You know, should he have taken him aside?
It could be that he did.
You know, we don't know all the details.
So again, I don't want to too strongly
criticize Paul, but I will say that in
Matthew 18, Jesus lays out a very simple
formula about how to deal with people who
have offended you or causing problems or whatever.
Go to them in private, and if they
still don't respond, go to them with a
witness or two, and if they still don't
respond, then deal with it publicly.
All right, so I will say this, that
because Peter did what he did publicly out
in front of everyone, it had to be
dealt with in front of everyone.
But if it would have been me in
that kind of a situation, and I've been
in plenty of them, some, you know, like
that in one form or another, you go
to the person in private, and if they
respond and if they repent, then they come
forward themselves, and they, you know, get before
everyone and say, listen, I've got to publicly
repent about something I've been doing.
You know, so if it's done in public,
it's got to be dealt with in public.
But, you know, as much as possible, we
don't want to humiliate any of our brethren
or whatever or hurt them unnecessarily.
So it's, you know, it would have been
better if he would have taken Jesus's formula,
I guess.
But anyway, we don't know exactly what happened,
but that's what he had to deal with.
So he confronts Peter.
Peter repents immediately.
I'm sure he did.
You know, Peter, God bless him, he would
just, you could see it in the Gospels,
the way that he interacted with Jesus and
so on.
He would just get out of whack and
not be thinking right, which happens to all
of us at one time or another.
And, you know, he always had Jesus there
to confront him.
Well, who's going to confront Peter?
Paul will.
He's the one you can count on.
So he does confront him.
And, you know, Peter, I am absolutely positive
that he repented immediately.
So that was the second disagreement Paul had.
Now let's get into the third one, starting
here at verse 36.
After some days, Paul said to Barnabas, let
us return and visit the brethren in every
city in which we proclaim the word of
the Lord and see how they are.
Barnabas wanted to take John called Mark along
with them also, but Paul kept insisting.
So this went on for some amount of
time, this argument or disagreement.
Paul kept insisting that they should not take
him along who had deserted them in Pamphylia.
That's a very strong word, deserted them.
That's how Paul saw it, or at least
how Luke saw it, and had not gone
on with them to the work.
And there occurred such a sharp disagreement that
they separated from one another.
And Barnabas took Mark with him and sailed
away to Cyprus.
But Paul chose Silas and left being committed
by the brethren to the grace of the
Lord.
All right.
What we have here are two completely different
types of leaders.
And this is one of the really, this
is one of the strengths of having multiple
leadership.
When you have multiple leadership, like they had
in Antioch, remember there were five leaders there.
I don't know how many elders there are
in Jerusalem.
We know that there was 12 apostles, but
we don't know how many elders there were
there.
But multiple leadership, usually with one person who
has the final say-so on things, is
just the best possible way to run a
Christian operation.
It just is.
Because no one person can be trusted to
always get things right.
And there were many times when I ran
Pure Life, and I surrounded myself with people
who I did my best to make them
feel comfortable in sharing how they really thought
about things.
And there were a number of times that
I had some wild idea that I was
sure was from the Lord, and they said,
no, we're not going to do that.
And so I would back down and, you
know, go along with the crowd.
But there was a couple of times, too,
where I knew it was the Lord.
And even though there were some around me
that didn't agree, I still had to go
forward.
So I don't know what to tell you.
You just got to find your balance in
there somewhere.
But anyway, you have two different individuals here.
Paul, who had this experience with Mark, he
didn't feel like he could be trusted to
go into that setting again.
And he's looking at the overall picture, at
the good of everyone involved.
That's what Paul's mindset is.
He's a big picture sort of guy.
And so he's looking at how could it
affect those other leaders in these Galatian churches
and so on.
If they see this guy that's with us,
who's kind of being offered up as one
of the leaders, that he just up and
leaves.
And so Paul just felt like, no, I
really don't believe that Mark should go with
us.
Well, Barnabas, on the other hand, is one
of those guys that had completely invested himself
in this individual.
He sees the individual, he's not a big
picture guy, he's a people person who focuses
in on the needs of that person.
So he is defending Mark, through this whole
thing.
And that's all he can see.
And the truth is the church needs both.
I mean, we just do.
There were times that we got into situations
here at Pure Life, and I tended to
always see things on the big picture.
And there were times maybe I was a
little too quick to maybe send someone out
of here or whatever.
But there were also others in that multiple
leadership who could see the person, the individual.
And it was a good combination, you know,
because you do need both.
I don't always see things right.
No one person does.
And so, you know, that's, again, the good
thing about multiple leadership in that kind of
a setting.
Anyway, let me just read what Walvoord said.
Probably both Paul and Barnabas were right in
their assessments of Mark.
It may have been too soon for Mark
to venture out with such a pro-Gentile
apostle as Paul, but Barnabas certainly and correctly
saw good raw material in his cousin Mark.
So, you know, I think that he's right,
that he's looking at both sides of it.
But the right or wrong in this disagreement,
you know, you pretty much have to say
that Paul was right and Barnabas was wrong.
And what I mean by that is that
the way it was handled, I don't know
how Paul dealt with this disagreement.
In other words, the way he spoke to
Barnabas, my guess is he probably was a
little on the sharp-tongued side, especially when
things got a little heated or when Barnabas
stood his ground.
My guess is that Paul probably came on
a little stronger than he should have.
Maybe he could have been a lot more
gracious.
I don't know.
That's just conjecture.
But what I can look at in this
story, there's three things I can look at
and say pretty confidently that I think Paul
was right.
First of all, it's just obvious that it
was not the right thing to do.
If one of the leaders is uncomfortable with
one of the people going, then that settles
it.
You know what I mean?
Let's say Jeff and I were going to
travel somewhere and we made the mistake of
taking Nate with us and Jeff insisted and
I put my foot down and said, absolutely
not.
Well, the thing to do would be to
leave him out because if there's some disagreement
there, you know, it's just the wisest course.
Just that in and of itself should settle
it.
But not just that, but look at verses
39 and 40.
You notice how Barnabas, the way it's written,
it's almost like he just up and leaves
with Mark to go to Cyprus.
Where if you look at verse 40, Paul
and Silas are committed by the brethren to
the grace of the Lord.
In other words, it seems like Barnabas just
leaves and Paul stays and prays with the
other leaders of the church and they are
sent forth.
So that says something to me.
And like Martha Wing Robinson said, you know,
who was right and who was wrong?
She said, well, the Bible story continues on
with Paul and Barnabas is out of the
picture now.
And I'll just say this, that beware of
rising up against God's anointed.
Beware of it.
We just had that happen with Jeff just
a couple of months ago, right?
One of the brothers that just started yelling
at him, you know, beware of that because
you think that it's just something that just
blows over and well, you know, okay, we
had a little disagreement, I blew it, you
know, or something.
But that brother, as far as I know,
never really repented of that.
And it seems like to me, and this
is conjecture, Barnabas was a good brother.
He was a good man.
But I think a lot of it with
Barnabas was that he was just a very
good man by nature, you know, just a
nice man.
I don't think that he had the spiritual
strength anywhere near what Paul and the apostles
had.
But I think that what happened is he
probably held resentment towards Paul that continued on.
And you never see him again.
Now, I know that the Lord would use
him in Cyprus, him and Mark, but I
have a feeling that his days of usefulness
were pretty much over now.
When he withstood Paul like this, I'm telling
you, there is just something you do to
yourself.
You don't just rise up against God's anointed
like that and think that you're just going
to go on with life.
It doesn't happen that way.
You are giving the enemy some kind of
an avenue into your life and ministry.
And, you know, you can always repent later
and get things right to some degree, but
there are consequences.
So just be aware of that, you know,
just in a general sense with these kind
of situations.
All right.
But this is the wonderful thing about the
Lord.
He always has a way of bringing the
best out of situations.
You know, like Joseph said, what you meant
for evil, God meant for good, you know,
and that is the way the Lord is.
He just, even when we make mistakes, if
our hearts are right, he'll bring good out
of it.
So it ends up that we have two
teams now, and Barnabas and Mark go to
Cyprus, and that's good.
You know, it's kind of a small little
ministry for them.
Paul now goes forth on his second missionary
journey.
Wow, what a journey this ends up being.
We'll get into it next week, and a
little bit here, but he is going forth
to take the gospel message to Europe and,
you know, so on.
Tremendous field of opportunity lays before him.
And so, you know, the Lord knows how
to bring the best out of it.
So let me just say a word about
Silas here.
In fact, I'll just read what Walvoord said.
Paul's choice of Silas, whose Roman name was
Silvanus, was a wise one.
Number one, he was an official representative of
the Jerusalem church in taking to Antioch the
decree of the Jerusalem council.
Number two, he was a Roman citizen.
Number three, he was a prophet.
And number four, the church at Antioch knew
him well.
So both Paul and Silas were commended by
the brothers to the grace of the Lord.
So he just concisely wraps up why that
was a good choice to take Silas with
him.
And I thought it was worth reading.
So let's continue with the story with Paul
and Silas.
Verse 41, and he was traveling through Syria
and Cilicia, strengthening the churches.
So instead of going by ship now and
going, you know, obviously they weren't going to
Cyprus, but they could have taken a ship
over to Tarsus or Cilicia or something.
But they go by land and they go
up around and from Syria up around into
the regions up there of Cilicia and go
around to different churches that were there.
All right, let's continue.
Paul came also to Derbe.
So now they finally make it up into
the Galatian region and to Lystra.
And a disciple was there named Timothy, the
son of a Jewish woman who was a
believer, but his father was a Greek.
And he was well spoken of by the
brethren who were in Lystra and Iconium.
All right.
Now, what do we know about Timothy?
Paul knew his grandmother and his mother, and
at least his mother was a believer, but
probably both of them were.
He said that he, quote, he had a
sincere faith.
He had been taught the sacred writings from
childhood.
Timothy probably was about 16, 17, the first
time Paul came through and he was stoned
and all that stuff.
So he's probably 18 or 19 now, something
along those lines.
And in 2 Timothy 1, 6, Paul said
to Timothy, and this is years later, for
this reason, I remind you to kindle afresh
the gift of God, which is in you
through the laying on of my hands.
And then referring to the same thing that
happened in 1 Timothy 4, 14, he said,
do not neglect the spiritual gift within you,
which was bestowed on you through prophetic utterance
with the laying on of hands by the
presbytery.
So now this presbytery was probably in Iconium,
which was a bigger city.
Remember Lystra was just a little town.
Iconium was a bigger city.
The church there was probably much bigger.
So they probably went to Iconium and had
some kind of an ordination service for Timothy,
laid hands on him.
And while they're laying hands on him, a
tremendous word of knowledge, a word of prophecy
comes forth from one of the brothers, may
have been Paul even, and somehow spoke what
his ministry gift was going to be.
It could even be, I don't want to
take this too far, but it could be
that it was even spoken into him by
the Lord through this person, whoever it was.
Now, I just want to briefly say something
about this.
It's just a crying shame what the Charismatics
have done to ruin the whole idea of
God speaking a word from one believer to
another.
Because, you know, there are Charismatics out there
that are doing it in the flesh.
In fact, I would, my guess is probably
95% of the so-called words that
are spoken are in the flesh, and it
has nothing to do with the Spirit of
the Lord.
But I have witnessed God speaking a word
through a vessel, and it is powerful.
I mean, it just goes right through you
when it's the Lord speaking.
It is something to behold.
It is such a tremendous thing to see
occur.
And I believe that's what happened here with
Timothy.
All right, verse 3.
Paul wanted this man to go with him,
and he took him and circumcised him because
of the Jews who were in those parts,
for they all knew that his father was
a Greek.
All right, now, is Paul being flaky, or
is he being a hypocrite here?
Why is he circumcising this guy after all
the strife with the Judaizers over this issue
of circumcision?
Why is he going along with it now?
Well, let me just say that Paul didn't
have a problem with circumcision with the Jews.
That was not his issue.
His issue with the Judaizers were they were
insisting that it had to be done for
salvation.
That's not what was behind this.
Paul was just being wise because he knew
that from here on, you know, going on,
he would be going in synagogue after synagogue
preaching to Jews.
And this man's half Jewish, and it would
just be better if he circumcised so the
Jews in those cities, you know, it doesn't
cause unnecessary problems.
It's kind of the same wisdom that James
was using earlier.
And so that's all that was behind this.
All right, verse 4.
Now, while they were passing through the cities,
they were delivering the decrees which had been
decided upon by the apostles and elders.
Okay, so there's one of those places apostles
mentioned first, who were in Jerusalem for them
to observe.
So the churches were being strengthened in the
faith and were increasing in number daily.
So this is one of Luke's summary statements,
and that probably would have been the best
place to end the chapter 15.
But anyway, that's where I'm going to end
as far as that's concerned.
I want to take a few minutes here
and just talk about handling disagreements in the
church.
We see here in this story we've covered
today three conflicts that have arisen in the
early church.
And it's no surprise to me anyway that
Paul is in the middle of every one
of them.
You know, he just was that kind of
a guy, and there's not going to be
any rest or peace when he was around,
you know.
So they always were looking to send him
off on these journeys, I think.
But anyway, the first one, look at what's
said in these passages about these three conflicts.
His first conflict is with the Judaizers.
It says in Acts 15.2, and when
Paul and Barnabas had great dissension and debate
with them, all right, and then in verse
7, and there had been much debate.
So that's one of the disagreements.
Then in one with Peter in Galatians 2
.11, but when Cephas came to Antioch, I
opposed him to his face because he stood
condemned.
And then Barnabas, and there occurred such a
sharp disagreement that they separated from one another.
So we see the same thing going on
here, you know, in all three of these
situations.
I want to read something the biblical expositor
said, which is just worth noting here.
A close study of the Acts of the
Apostles dispels at once the notion men would
feign charity that the apostles and the early
Christians lived just like angels without any trace
of human passion or discord.
The apostles had their differences and misunderstandings very
like our own.
Hot tempers and subsequent coolnesses arose and produced
evil results between men entrusted with the very
highest offices and paved the way, as quarrels
always do, for fresh disturbances at some future
time.
You know, so in other words, he's saying,
listen, they have, they are men with a
like nature as ours, you know, just because
they had the Lord in a powerful way
did not mean that they didn't have to
deal with their natures.
And that is just a reality of the
church.
But this was written in the 1880s or
something like that, and I think the church
in London at that time was very strong.
I would not begin to compare the church
situation then to what we experience in the
United States now, because the kinds of problems
that we are having in the church today
are shameful.
It's just shameful.
You know, some of the um, strife and
disagreements and conflicts that go on, not just
amongst individual Christians, but denominations.
And I mean, the church, it's just like
the Corinthian church that was all divided all
up, you know, people in this band against
this group.
And I believe that I follow Cephas and
I follow Paul and I follow Apollos, just
this sign of overall general spiritual immaturity.
So we have real issues today, but that
does not release us from the obligation of
doing our utmost to live in harmony with
other believers.
And I'll just mention a couple of things
here that we need to incorporate into our
lives in able to do this, to be
able to do this properly.
Number one, I would say meekness.
We need to walk in meekness.
And I'll say it this way, knowing when
to hold your ground and knowing when to
let something go.
Because meekness is kind of like a two
-edged sword.
For instance, Moses was the meekest man on
earth, but he didn't back down one inch
when it came to the things of God
with the people who rose up against him.
You know what I mean?
Meekness is not weakness.
It's not some pretty little Christian name that
we apply to weak-willed, appeasing people.
That's not what meekness is.
Meekness is obeying God from a fear of
the Lord and not backing down from the
truth of the cross and of the gospel.
So there's a strength in meekness, but it's
also in your dealings with other people, there
is also the aspect of being willing to
be compliant, willing to be pliable, willing to
work with people and not be involved with
unnecessary disagreements and so on.
So this is one of the things that's
needed today.
Now, I hate to do this in a
sense, because Barnabas was a good man.
I got to say that again.
He was a good man full of the
Holy Spirit.
That's what Luke says about him earlier on.
But he is a perfect example of what
not to do.
He was weak when he should have been
strong with the Judaizers.
You know, in other words, he was more
afraid of their perception of him than he
was of standing up for God's gospel.
You know, he had more fear of man
than God, put it that way.
So when he should have been strong, he
folded up.
But when he should have been more compliant
in the disagreement with Paul, who was obviously
much further along spiritually than he was, in
that setting, that called for, you know, being
pliable and being humble and so on.
At that point, when he should have been
more easygoing or whatever, he digs his heels
in and refuses to budge and will not
back down.
You see what I'm saying?
I don't mean to beat up on Barnabas,
but I'm just trying to use his example
here in Scripture to show us what this
meekness should look like.
The second thing that would help us all
is to be very gracious in our dealings
with each other as best as possible.
You know, we all have a nature, we
all have our personalities and so on to
deal with, but we should always be striving
towards graciousness with other people.
And I'll say it this way, knowing that
the spirit that you're in is more important
than the issue you're arguing about.
And this has more to do with disagreements
like Paul and Barnabas had, you know, not
so much the bigger issues in regards to
that.
But in other words, the spirit we are
in is so important.
How many people have we seen that had
the truth, they were right, but their spirit
was all wrong and completely ruined their witness?
You know, I remember, well, Jeff and Rose
certainly would remember Dan, I won't say his
last name, he's passed away now.
But Dan, who came to us many years
ago, 15 years ago at least, or 20,
was a guy who came up from Nashville,
I think it was, and would get in
these screaming matches with homosexuals and abortionists, be
out there holding up these ridiculous placards and
signs.
And in front of the camera, the local
television station loved this guy because he was
a Christian representing the church, and he'd be
out there screaming at these people.
You know, how much good do you think
he did, the church, standing up for what's
right?
It's the spirit you're in that means so
much.
You know, and as Scripture says, love covers
a multitude of sins.
When you're walking in the love of the
Lord and disagreements come up, you know, there
are just a lot of times that you
just let things go.
You know what, it's just better to just
not get into the argument and just be
gracious and smile at the person and, you
know, nod your head and just don't get
into it with them.
I mean, I can give you a fresh
illustration, it's not a great one, but a
week or two ago we had to leave
the office we had in Williamstown, meaning Kathy
and me had a computer set up there,
and we didn't even have a lease agreement
or anything, so we could leave whenever.
We had paid them first and last month,
so there was no debating that.
But the landlady was very irate with me
because she didn't want us to leave.
You know, we're great tenants and we were,
you know, is income coming in?
And so she's arguing with me, trying to,
I guess, convince me that we were making
a horrible mistake in all of this.
Well, it's just, listen, we wouldn't have made
the decision lightly.
We knew it was the thing to do
and, you know, so anyway, she's just kind
of debating with me and I'm trying to
graciously just talk with her and, you know,
I just have to let her feel what
she feels and just let go with that.
There's just a time and a place that
that's what you have to do, and it
takes wisdom to know when to stand your
ground and when to just let the other
person win or think they're winning.
All right, and the other thing we need
is humility, knowing how to say you're wrong.
And I just wrote an article on the
Eternal Weight website called Six Words That Can
Change Your Destiny, I think it was, and
I started off the article, I said something
like, there are six words everyone loves to
hear and hates to say.
And I did that as kind of a
tease to get people to read the article,
but what are those six words?
I am wrong, please forgive me.
We love it when people come up to
us and say that, when there's been a
disagreement, and we hate to say those words,
you know, and man, you better get used
to saying those six words.
And I'll say this, that when you are
accustomed to living your life with God in
that mindset, Lord, I am wrong, and you
are right, and wherever I'm wrong, please forgive
me.
When you live your life with that mindset,
instead of constantly justifying yourself and blame shifting
and trying to get out from under responsibility
for wrong behavior or sinful behavior, when you're
accustomed to living your life that way with
God, it becomes very natural to be that
way with other people when there's some kind
of an issue comes up.
And the truth is, all of us, you
know, we have natures, and sometimes we just
say things that aren't right.
In fact, Ed, I think I did something
with you, like a week ago or something,
I had to turn around and apologize to
you, right?
And Ed was very gracious about it and
told me what a fool I was, but
I'm joking.
But no, I did something, yeah, that's right,
I interrupted you out there, and you know,
it was out of whack, I shouldn't have
done it.
And so I realized it, and by the
time I got home, I immediately texted him,
I think, and apologized.
But anyway, you know, you just have to
be willing to say you're wrong.
And believe me, we're wrong a lot of
the time.
And it's better to just say you're wrong
than to sit and argue with yourself and
try to convince yourself you're not.
So I'm going to close the session with
a story, a personal story.
Some of you have heard before, but still,
it's good to get it into this teaching.
This story happened 15 years ago.
And Jeff and I took a trip over
to the Middle East and spent several weeks
traveling around Israel and Jordan.
We preached, I don't know how many different
churches, like a dozen different churches or something
in Jordan, and traveled around Israel.
And, you know, there were issues that came
up traveling together.
And I remember hearing this somewhere along the
line, if you want to make an enemy,
travel with them.
And that's basically what happened.
During the course of these several weeks, we're
both very strong-natured people, you know, and
we would see things differently.
He wanted to do this, I wanted to
do that.
Or, you know, just little aggravations and irritations
and slights or perceived slights happened.
And by the time we got home, we
weren't anywhere near each other.
And then it just continued from there, like
for, I don't know, a week or two,
I think.
Something like, maybe not even that long.
But anyway, one day, I don't remember exactly
how it came about, but I knew we
have got to close this thing out.
We cannot continue like this.
So Kathy and I used to live over
in TJ's house, and we invited Jeff and
Rose over.
And we sat down, the four of us,
and Jeff and I both took a few
minutes to voice what had happened from our
perspective.
And we both handled it, you know, we
weren't vicious or trying to slam the other
person.
We just, this is how what you did
made me feel.
And like, I shared my part, he shared
his part, and we repented to each other.
And all I remember was the four of
us getting on our knees there on the
living room floor, holding hands, and with tears,
asking the Lord to forgive us, you know.
And you wonder why there is such strength
in this ministry.
It's things like that, that we have been
able to handle things that come up with
that kind of willingness to do violence to
ourselves, if that's what's necessary for the greater
good of everything.
And, you know, there are many believers in
this world who live their lives that way.
Unfortunately, I don't see a lot of that
in the American church.
There's just a lot of strife and arguing
and couples, Christian couples, that fight, and there's
just no humility between them, you know, no
coming down, no willing to say, I'm wrong.
And it's just shameful.
There's no excuse for it.
So the Lord has given us examples, like
what we have just read about here, how
to handle things and the different things that
Jesus taught us, that helps us to know
how to go forward in this Christian life
and do things right.
Amen?
And if we just will live by the
way the Lord taught us, it will make
life so much easier for us and especially
for those around us.
So praise the Lord.
That's it for this week.
Next week, we will get into the second
journey that Paul goes on.
God bless you.