Sermon Transcript
Lord Jesus, thank you for this day that we do get to come and worship you in freedom. Lord, as Pastor Dave was praying in his prayer, Lord, we can’t take that for granted. There’s many parts of the world that’s just not the case, and yet you’ve given us this freedom. So, Lord, may we honor you with this time? Please give us your Spirit now as we think about your Scripture.
Give me your Spirit as I speak. We commit this time to you in Jesus’ name. Amen. All right. So we are continuing our series through the book of Acts.
And we’re doing— the last 2 weeks, we’ve been doing a series that I’ve titled Leading the Way. Okay? And in Acts 20, we really focused on leading the way in the sense of we’re all leaders, whether formally or informally in terms of roles, but we’re influencing people. And we talked about a biblical perspective on how to lead others. Well, today, we’re talking about leading the way into or through challenging life circumstances.
Spoiler alert, you know, Paul went through some hard things, and we’re going to be considering those today. It’s a challenging message, as I’ve been thinking about it in my life, and as you undoubtedly think about it for your life. But leading the way even into or through life challenges, okay? Some of you are probably in the midst of life challenges, whether it’s God calling you into something that’s really hard, That’s uncomfortable, that you don’t know how it’s going to turn out. Or maybe it’s a challenging circumstance that is completely outside of your control, like, you know, debilitating illness or watching somebody you love close to you going through something where you’re more of in a support role.
Jesus said it this way in no uncertain terms. He said, one of the realities about the faith is whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and pick up their cross and follow me. In other words, Trouble’s going to hit us. Challenging times are coming. It’s not a matter of if, but when.
But then in the very next verse, he goes on to say the reason for it. He says, for whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. In other words, for the Christian, we don’t face challenges in life in vain. There’s a greater purpose at work, and that is for the sake of him, for the sake of the gospel, people seeing and understanding God’s love for them.
That might all sound well and good, you know, when times are normal, right? But it’s a challenge, right? And I know some of you guys are in it. But the question we want to ask of the text today, or what we see in the text, is how do we follow God faithfully in these times? Paul was finishing up his 3rd of 3 missionary journeys, and he felt the Holy Spirit leading him into Jerusalem despite hardships that were undoubtedly waiting for him there.
And so we see in Paul just this remarkable Christian resolve to go into things that, let’s be real, many of us would have been tempted to quit or go in another direction entirely. How was he able to do this? How might we do this as well, especially in light that God uses these things for a greater purpose? How can we have greater impact in life? Challenging circumstances.
So let’s go ahead and look at Acts 20:22-24 and Acts 21:1-17. It’s a good chunk of Scripture today. By the way, last week we looked at Acts 20. We didn’t really touch on the verses we’re looking at today. We saved them more to focus on today.
So let’s go ahead and look at them. Acts 20:22-24. And now, compelled by the Spirit— this is Paul talking to the Ephesian elders— compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. I only know that in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me. However, I consider my life worth nothing to me.
My only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me, the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace. Okay, let’s skip down to the— as the narrative picks up again, he’s saying goodbye to the Ephesian elders. Acts 21: After we had torn ourselves away from them, we put out to sea and sailed straight to Kos. The next day we went to Rhodes, and from there we went to Patara. We found a ship crossing over to Phoenicia, went on board, and set sail.
After sighting Cyprus and passing to the south of it, we sailed on to Syria. So we have a map here for you, and this really shows you where Paul went on his 3rd missionary journey. The last bit, the one that we just focused on today in those few verses, it starts from the southwesternmost tip of modern-day Turkey, which you can see up there in the red, green, a little bit of the yellow. He starts there, and he makes his way by boat, passed through down underneath the island of Cyprus, as he mentioned, and now down into Phoenicia, Israel, and ultimately into Jerusalem. So he’s landing on the eastern side of the Mediterranean.
When it says, we landed at Tyre, verse 3 continues, where our ship was to unload its cargo. We sought out the disciples there and stayed with them 7 days. Through the Spirit, they urged Paul not to go on to Jerusalem. When it was time to leave, we left and continued on our way. All of them, including wives and children, accompanied us out of the city, and there on the beach we knelt to pray.
After saying goodbye to each other, we went aboard the ship and they returned home. We continued our voyage from Tyre and landed at Ptolemais, where we greeted the brothers and sisters and stayed with them for a day. Leaving the next day, we reached Caesarea and stayed at the house of Philip the Evangelist, one of the 7. He had 4 unmarried daughters who prophesied. After he had been there— after we had been there for a number of days, a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea.
Coming over to us, he took Paul’s belt, tied his own hands and feet with it, and said, the Holy Spirit says, in this way the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem will bind the owner of this belt and hand him over to the Gentiles. When we heard this, we and the people there pleaded with Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. Then Paul answered, why are you weeping and breaking my heart? I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. When he would not be dissuaded, we gave up and said, the Lord’s will be done.
After this, we started on our way up to Jerusalem. Some of the disciples from Caesarea accompanied us and brought us to the home of Mnason, where he— where we were to stay. He was a man from Cyprus and one of the early disciples. When we arrived at Jerusalem, the brothers and sisters received us warmly. So what we see here in this text clearly is an emotional struggle happening between Paul and his companions.
Okay, actually between Paul and all of the believers that he runs into, including these prophets that came down. And the struggle was this: Paul felt convinced, compelled he says, that he has to go to Jerusalem despite hardship facing him there. But his friends, being friends, right, didn’t want him to go, were caring about his well-being, probably saying things like, Paul, we don’t want you to be persecuted in that way. Probably things like, Paul, and besides that, don’t you think you’d have more ministry impact if you were free and working over here? I mean, there’s people over here who need the gospel.
And yet Paul kind of brings things to a head. In verses 13 and 14, saying, why are you weeping and breaking my heart? I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. When he would not be dissuaded, we gave up and said, the Lord’s will be done. So here’s the first question: how was it Paul was able to go into the face of hardship despite knowing what was awaiting him there?
How was he able to do it even in the face, literally, of his friends trying to deter him from it? Well, it starts with the foundational relationship he has with the Lord, with God, and that is he trusted Jesus as Lord. Paul’s foundation with his relationship with God was that he trusted God, trusted Jesus as Lord. We see this a few places in the text. Again, we just read verses 13 and 14.
It happens there twice. I’m ready not only to be bound, verse 13, but also to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. Verse 14, when he would not be dissuaded, we gave up and said, the Lord’s will be done. And then if you look back at chapter 20, verse 24, my only aim, he said, is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me. Now, Lord here, in the sense that Paul is using it, means master.
Paul is saying he’s under the complete ownership and authority authority of Jesus.
And, you know, put another way, another way that he describes this foundational relationship he has with God is that he sees himself as Christ’s slave. Actually, just about every letter that he writes in the New Testament, he starts by saying, I, the apostle and servant— actually, that word is slave. I, the Apostle Paul and slave of Jesus, write to you.
In Galatians 1:10, he says it this way, am I now trying to win the approval of human beings or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were trying to please people, I would not be a slave of Christ. If we call Jesus Lord, we are saying we are his slaves. Now, when I start to say that, I’m guessing a lot of us start to feel uneasy with it, right?
The word slave, the idea of slavery. I know I feel that way. And part of that has to do with some connotations that we as modern readers probably would bring into the text that the original readers or people there wouldn’t have been thinking because of the brutal slavery that happened in the 16th and 19th centuries, and some of which is still— there’s still remnants today, right? But the slavery that Paul was describing back in that time, the Greco-Roman world, was much different. For instance, there were a lot of people who actually would sell themselves into slavery.
Now, why would you do that in that time? Well, it wasn’t based on race. It was— everybody looked the same, talked the same. And sometimes, especially when you sold yourself to a wealthy family, it was in your economic interest, best interest to do it. It improved your lifestyle.
Slaves often had better education than their masters. It was rarely, if ever, a life sentence. They almost always bought their way out of it unless they chose to stay and remain in that circumstance. So when we think about slave, we bring all these connotations to the text. Paul was meaning something entirely different.
I want to tell you a story to kind of help us understand what it is more Paul was getting at the heart of it. So it is said, and this is more apocryphal, I believe, that Abraham Lincoln went to an auction, a slave auction, to buy a slave. There was this woman slave, and he was bidding on her. And this woman, this slave gal, looked down at him and figured, you know what, here’s another white man looking to own me and mistreat me like others. And so he won the bid and was walking away with his property.
But then he stopped, turned, looked at her, and said, young lady, you are free. And she said, What does that mean? And he said, you’re free. She said, does that mean I can say whatever I want to say? And he said, yes, you can.
You’re free to say whatever you want to say. Does that mean I can do whatever I want to do? Yes, he said, you’re free to do whatever you want to do. Does that mean, she asked, that I can go wherever I want to go? And he said, yes, you’re free to go wherever you want to go.
And with tears streaming down her eyes, she said, then I want to go with you. There’s a reason that Paul and all the other Christian authors, whenever they talk about their relationship to the Lord as a slave, as him as Lord and Master, they do it with the utmost affection and love. Have you noticed that in the Scripture? That when he just— when they describe themselves as Jesus is Lord, we’re his slaves, it’s always with the utmost affection. Why is that?
That sounds a little weird, right? Well, do you remember the text we looked at last week? Chapter 20, verse 28. In describing God’s people, Paul said, God has purchased us with his own blood. Here’s the glorious irony for us as Christ followers.
God purchased us to make us free. He frees us in the blood of Jesus out of the bondage of sin and death. That’s the gospel, that the God of heaven and earth, at infinite cost to himself, costing no less than the life of his Son, his blood on the cross, loves us unconditionally. And that’s what he asks in return, that we might love him unconditionally. We’re free to go as we choose, but the reality is it goes a lot better for us when we submit to him as Lord.
Listen to how Rebecca Manley Pippert puts it, Christian writer. She says, Jesus’ ownership of our lives is not a control that manipulates us or takes away our dignity. He governs our lives the right way, by being who he is without compromise and by insisting we become all that we were meant to be. And he tells us this can only occur through following him, obeying him, and maintaining a living, passionate kinship to him. God created us for himself.
If we are living with any center other than Jesus, we will be living incompletely. He is the only one in the universe who can control us without destroying us. No one will love you like Jesus. So why is this important for us to understand as we follow him, especially into or through life’s challenges? Why is this?
What Pippard is saying is because whatever happens to us in life, if we’re his follower, God is working it out for the best, for our good. Romans 8:28, God is working all things together for the good of those who love him, including hardship. Which means because God created us, designed us, I mean, he’s kind of written the owner’s manual on us, he knows what works out for our best. It’s like if you wanted to eat pizza every day of your life. Which actually is funny.
I have a friend who literally eats pizza every day of his life. I mean, I think for the last 20 years. I’m not kidding. That’s another story. But imagine if Caleb, when he grows up, he comes to me in college and says, Dad, I’ve decided I want to eat pizza the rest of my life, every day.
You know, what am I going to say, right? I like me some pizza too, son, but you might want to reconsider that. It’s, you know, if you’re a cholesteroler, it’s going to start to come here, and, you know, you’re not going to have the energy you want to have to do all these other things, and so on and so forth. You might want to eat vegetables, and not just the vegetables that go on your pizza. Eat vegetables, variety, make, you know, you know what I’m saying?
God knows us completely, and so often he leads us into things— probably should stop with this metaphor— like vegetable He knows the best for us. He designed us. We talked about this last week, the counterintuitive thought of humility in leadership, right? We’ve talked about this. But here’s what’s amazing to me, and what we see even here in Paul’s life, as we’ll consider here in a bit, is not only is he working out for the good of us, for the good, but he’s also working out for the good of those who don’t yet know him, for the sake of him and for the sake— that is Jesus— and for the sake of the gospel, helping others come to know him.
And what a beautiful, beautiful foundation we have, calling Jesus Lord, the one who loves us unconditionally, who gave it all. How much more would he give us all things because he loves us that much? So that is the foundation for Paul’s relationship. What helped him have the resolve to go So even willing into life challenges. But how does this play out practically?
What does this look like? What do we take away from this? Well, we see at least 4 things in this text as I see it. Number one, there’s the call to obey. Okay, this is— I see this in a couple places, but Acts 20:22, he said, compelled by the Spirit, I am going.
To obey is to comply. With God’s commands in His Word unconditionally, okay? And to follow the leanings of the Spirit, provided they, too, align with God’s Word. But to follow Him unconditionally, that’s how we are to obey. Now, Paul said his task is to testify to the good news of God’s grace.
He said that in chapter 20, verse 24. This is the call of every Christ follower— Christian. Christ follower, right? We’ve been talking about that in the book of Acts since September, right? Starting in Acts 1:8, the theme verse of the whole book, Jesus said, you’re going to be my witnesses.
You be my witnesses everywhere. Wherever you go, be my witnesses. But the call within the call for Paul was he felt compelled to go to Jerusalem, even if it meant his life was at stake, and to bring the good news there. So here’s what’s really cool. About this.
I love— this is one of the few places in Scripture, it seems to me, where we actually are looking at what it is to be a good example. So often in the text, it seems to me— you correct me if I’m wrong later after this— so often in the text, what we actually see in the Old Testament Scriptures is actually what not to do. Have you noticed that? And actually, that’s so wonderful because that’s usually us, right? But we can learn from both ways, right?
A good example and then learn from the hard way. Paul, of course, here’s a good way. An example of failing to obey unconditionally in the Old Testament Scriptures is Jonah. You know the Scripture, the story of Jonah? God asked him, told him to go to Nineveh with a message of repentance.
Now, we need to understand that Nineveh were brutal enemies. I mean, we’re talking the sworn enemy of God and his people. Think modern-day ISIS and you’re probably close. And God said, I want you to take a message of repentance to them. Jonah didn’t want to do it.
He refused to do it. Why? Because he didn’t think it was in the best interest of him or his nation to do it. So what’d he do? He ran away.
Paul in a positive sense, Jonah in a negative sense. If we learn if Jesus is Master and Lord, we must obey obey even if we don’t understand the reasons why. Compelled by the Spirit, Paul said, I am going even into hardship. So here’s an evaluation question for you if you want to jot this down or ponder it later. Am I willing to obey whatever God says about the life circumstances I face no matter how I feel about it?
Number 2, the call is to submit. Chapter 21, verse 14, when he would not be dissuaded, we gave up and said, the Lord’s will be done. The Lord’s will be done. To submit is to accept whatever comes into our lives as part of God’s plan, as part of his will. An example of failing to submit to God is Job.
One of the fun things in seminary, in my preaching class, we worked through the book of Job, and it helped me get a deeper insight and understanding of the book. But if you know the story, Job faced 2 rounds of hardship, challenging life circumstances. And if you want to look at the text, I mean, we’re talking really hard circumstances, okay? But after each of these rounds, he had 2 different responses. The first one was essentially to say, you know what, God, I trust you fully.
The Lord gives, the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. But his response to the second round was different. So it was essentially this: he thought God was unfair and that nothing good could come out of his suffering. And he spends probably, you know, 30 of the 40 chapters in that book really arguing with the— excuse me, first with his friends, but then also with the Lord.
If Jesus is Master and Lord, as we see in Paul’s life, then we must submit to things that he sends. An evaluation question here is, am I willing Am I willing to thank God for whatever happens in this life circumstance, whether I understand it or not? That’s a hard question to ask ourselves. Am I willing to thank God?
By the way, this is not the same to say God is happy to send tragedy into our lives, but is rather to trust him that whatever he’s doing in our lives, the overall purpose is he’s always working wisely and redemptively. Number 3, the call is to rely.
Chapter 20, verse 22, he said, compelled by the Spirit, I’m going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. Paul didn’t know what was going to happen to him there. He’s not relying on his own knowledge. His friends didn’t know what was going to happen. You know, they had words about it.
And yet he said, you know what? I’m just— I have to— I just got to rely on God on this one. If Jesus is Master and Lord He is not simply someone we comply with, but we must depend on him wholly. He should have the title of our heart’s deepest allegiance, love, and loyalty. An example of failing to rely on God in the Scriptures is Abraham.
You know, Abraham really wanted a son, and he didn’t have a son, and he was getting quite old. And— but God gave him a son, a son of great promise. That he said would grow up and become the father of many nations, including the nation of Israel. But what happened over the course of time is Abraham began to depend and rely more fully on Isaac, his promised son, for meaning and joy in life than God himself. And if you know the story, you can look at it later in Genesis 22.
God ultimately had to test him on this.
I think the evaluation question here is, am I relying on something in this challenging life circumstance more than I’m relying on God for my hope and meaning in life? Now, I’m not saying these questions are easy, but I think that’s what the text is showing us here. Finally, the call is to expect. This one is more inferred in our text, but it starts back in Acts 19:21.
In that verse, Paul is really describing for the first time, at least in the book of Acts, he says, after I have been there, that is talking about his going to Jerusalem, I must also go on to Rome. And then a long time before actually these events happened in Acts, he wrote to the Romans saying, you know, I’m going to come to you through Jerusalem, but ultimately, actually, where I really want to go to is Spain. So what is going on when Paul’s In all of this, Paul is expecting God to do great things, even though he doesn’t understand it. And he’s even admitting here along the way, he said, look, even if I’m bound, even if I lose my life in Jerusalem, it’ll be because God has decided there’s something greater that could come of it, greater than if I were to go to Rome, greater than if I were to go to Spain.
We are to expect— an example of failing to expect in the Scriptures is Moses. When Moses was first called out of the desert by God to go deliver God’s people out of Egypt, Moses didn’t want to go. Do you remember? He didn’t want to go because he had a lisp. He felt he was incompetent.
He essentially said to God, I can’t go. I can’t communicate, Lord. Right? And his sense of incompetence prevented him from immediately embracing God’s charge. For Paul, this was a non-factor.
I think the evaluation question here is, do I think there are problems or limitations in my life that are too big for God to remove, or am I expecting him to do greater things? Just like Paul, in challenging circumstances, we too are called to obey, to submit, to rely, and ultimately to expect in the Lord. You know, I have a friend who is the son of a U.S. ambassador. Now, if you know anything about people who are related to— especially if you’re like a son to an ambassador, you know that these people are incredibly well-connected, resourced. They just have a lot of tangible power at their fingertips.
You know, especially with his overseas experience, the language ability, this guy’s He has a lot of, you know, a lot of gifts going for him is what I’m trying to say. He’s very humble about it. He never told anybody about it, but he always had this at his disposal. And yet there came a point in his life where he said, you know what, I’m feeling God calling me, a call within the call, to reach Muslims with my life. And not just reaching Muslims here in the U.S., But in a part of the world that if I were to name it, even just years ago, it’s a region that wouldn’t be safe at all, let alone for Christians, let alone for Christian missionaries.
And yet he felt the Lord tugging him to go there. You can believe that he had a lot of people at that time saying, are you kidding me? Are you crazy? You can’t go. Why would you go?
I mean, I’m talking even believers, right? The reasoning being like, why would you give that up to go to a place in the world where it’s so spiritually hard that a success story would actually be a handful of people coming to Christ? Why would you do that? And yet he figured, you know what? God’s calling me to do this.
I’ve got to do it. And along the way, he met a gal. That had also had a heart, an American gal who also had a heart for the region that they’re now in. And for the last few decades, they’ve been serving there faithfully, raising their 3 boys there, seeing some pretty fun things happen.
Here’s what I believe this text would have us ask ourselves if we are Christ followers. How do our priorities compare and contrast with those of Paul?
Now, I’m obviously not saying we’re all called to, you know, certain parts of the world to reach Muslims, right? Where is God calling you to obey, submit, rely, and expect?
Do you sense that where you are? And if you don’t, do you have your antenna up? Are you listening for it?
Here’s another question. What would you like to be able to say about yourself and your ministry at the end of your life? We just celebrated the life of Bob Brushweiler. If you didn’t know, he went to be with the Lord pretty unexpectedly a week or so ago. And on Monday we celebrated his life.
Oh, man, if you guys were there, it was a beautiful service. I mean, if there— there were a number of theme verses that came to my mind out of that time. But if there was one that kind of stuck with me, and it was even mentioned, was, Well done, good and faithful servant, because Bob lived a faithful life unto God’s calling for him. And he did it in times where things were stable or up in the air for his family. But whatever God put before him, he just said, you know what, I’m going to do— I’m going to work with this.
I’m going to use this resource myself for the Lord. And it was even shared at the end that he was doing this on the last day of his life. And what an incredible guy.
What would you like to be able to say about yourself and your ministry at the end of your life? Then what steps do you need to take now in order for that to happen? One last piece here in the text is a critical resource for us when we face challenging circumstances, and that is, of course, Christian fellowship. I mean, it’s all over this text. Pretty straightforward, but you just— but what I want you to notice are a couple things.
The first one is the various different people, the diverse group of people that came to Paul in his aid. You know, there’s a number of references to the word we. That means the author of the book, Luke, was traveling with them. Back in chapter 20, we know that there was about 9 other solid leaders at least traveling with them from different churches who are committed to Paul. Committed, and then along the way, Caesarea, Tyre, even coming down from Jerusalem, people who were just bringing him into his home, taking care of him, expressing their love for him, ministering to his needs.
What’s so interesting to me is Luke takes some time here in the text to help us understand that Paul didn’t know these people beforehand. You know, for example, in talking about some of the disciples of Caesarea, describing Mnason, he was a man from Cyprus and one of the early disciples. Cyprus was nowhere around where Paul would have ever gone, and so was these other— where these other people would have gone. Paul was spending more time in the Mediterranean. These guys were over here.
They were strangers to Paul, but they weren’t strangers to Paul in the Lord.
Now, have you ever experienced this? This is one of the coolest feelings in the world that I’ve been humbled enough, privileged enough to experience overseas or in a different culture, just getting to know people, whether it’s in a Christian service, fellowship, Bible study, people that are just completely different from you in terms of culture and language, right? And yet at the same time, through all the cumbersome translation, through all the, like, you silly hand motions, through all the smiles, you know at the end of the day that there’s a similar heart language there, that you speak the same language, that we are one in the Lord. And I think actually there’s some things here that U.S. Christians, in terms of our hospitality to others visiting us, we can learn from. Often it’s in the poorest of places, they’ll just offer up a meal, for example, that they themselves can’t afford.
And they won’t even eat with you, but they’re just watching you because that is their gift to you as we serve the same Lord.
I think what we can draw from this is in challenging times, life circumstances, of course lean on brothers and sisters in the faith. But— and here’s the thing I just see here— is expect God to provide them to you in unexpected places and unexpected times.
Here’s the other thing I want you to notice under this point is that as much as these folks were ministering to Paul, which they absolutely were, at the end of the day, Paul himself was ministering to them. Do you see that in this text?
His friends— his friends, excuse me— out of motivation of love were actually inadvertently trying to keep him from going into the place that God was saying, you got to go. It was out of love, right? But they were inadvertently tempting him away. And Paul essentially has to finally say this. Why are you weeping and breaking my heart?
You got to admit that— imagine this is hard for Paul to go through and talk about. I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. When he would not be dissuaded, we gave up and said, The Lord’s will be done. And it seems to me in that moment it was Paul ministering to his friends, helping them see the greater purpose in it.
You know, Jesus had this experience long before Paul came onto the scene, and we see this in Mark 8. Jesus was spending time with his disciples, as you know, in ministry, and there came a point where Jesus took them aside and said, look, you need to understand that I must suffer, that I’m going to be beaten, I’m going to be handed over to the authorities, and I’m going to be killed, but on the 3rd day I will rise again. What’s interesting is Peter hears this and doesn’t like any of it. And so Peter actually, it says, takes Jesus aside and began to rebuke him, which that’s an interesting place to be. Imagine him rebuking Jesus, but that’s another thing.
But he was rebuking Jesus. Why? Because he was saying, Jesus, you can’t say that. We don’t want you to go there. And by the way, you know, don’t talk about dying and stuff like that when we’re trying to get a following going, right?
And yet Jesus gets his attention, brings the other disciples to make sure they all hear it, and actually says probably the harshest words we have recorded of Jesus. Do you know what he said? Get behind me, Satan, for you do not have in mind the things of God, but merely human concerns. Here’s what this— it seems to me, and Jesus, and of course Paul in the text we’re looking at, sometimes even the closest of friends can inadvertently tempt us away from doing God’s will. But here is what is absolutely important to keep in mind in all of this.
All of this needs to be bathed in God’s love and grace.
Why do I say that? Where is that in the text? Well, from Jesus’ account, the very next verse is not, and then he found 12 more guys to work with. Right? Scratch you guys.
We’re going— no. He kept working with them, loving. And then Paul, lovingly, patiently saying, you know what, guys? I got to keep going. And all of them coming to the conclusion, you know what?
The Lord’s will be done. And ultimately, it’s interesting, you know, and I’m sure this is the intention of what Luke is doing here, but, you know, Paul is kind of shadowing what Jesus had done before in going to Jerusalem. And in both instances, for Jesus, for Paul, ultimately what they were doing is they were helping others, their companions, even those far off, understand that they are willing to obey, submit, rely, and expect in the Lord, even with their lives as they go to Jerusalem.
And the impact that that has on us— look, God calls us into things that might not always look the way we would envision them. In fact, oftentimes it’s not the way we would envision them or think or expect. But our call is the same, to follow the Lord even into hardship, trusting that he’s working greater plans out, greater for our good, greater for those around, but greater for those who don’t yet know Jesus.
You know, I mentioned— actually, I don’t know if I mentioned this in this service last week, but my cousin’s daughter recently graduated from college, and she was working at a stable. She fell off her horse. This was 2 weeks ago. Fell off her horse, hit her head, and fell face-first in the dirt. She was apparently unattended for a long time because now she’s in a coma.
Oxygen— her brain was deprived from oxygen. She’s been in a coma for 2 weeks. And if you think to be praying for them, please do. Their names— my cousin’s name is David. His wife’s name is Lisa.
It’s actually an easy way to remember their names. But their daughter’s name is Kate. So if you’d be praying for them, please be praying for them. But I wanted to read you something he posted on CaringBridge. You guys know CaringBridge?
This online website that a lot of people will use to receive either donations or just get the word out on tragic events. Lots of people are reading this. Here’s what he said. He said, we have been so very encouraged by the outreach of people, both friends and strangers. The outflowing of love and support has been incredible.
The amount of people that have reached out to show love is staggering. The bottom line is that Kate is dearly loved by many people, and we take great confidence and solace in the fact that the one who loves her most is the God who created her. He alone is our hope. And then he quotes Job, the Lord gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
Now here’s the reason I wanted to read this for you. It’s because as I read this, I realized it was I who was being ministered to. Do you follow what I’m saying? Here he is saying, wow, we’re receiving all this support, this encouragement. And what I’m saying is, as I’m reading these words, I’m the one being ministered to.
Whatever I’m facing, you know, this is something— his obedience, submission, reliance, expectation even in the Lord. You know, I haven’t had the time to talk to him for obvious reasons, but, you know, I can’t tell him how it’s ministering to him. Maybe as I read these words, it’s ministering to you. And that’s kind of the point, isn’t it? God uses things that we go through or into, sometimes willingly, to impact people that we don’t even realize God’s choosing to impact in ways that we would— we may never even know.
I mean, even as this goes out, I don’t know, right?
The deal here is we have the hope of the one who ultimately holds us in his hands.
But there’s so many people around us going through hard times or will go through hard times who don’t have that hope.
And God’s call to us, as Paul’s modeled here, is to take that to them. Now, I’m not saying that’s easy, but I’ll tell you what, the Lord sees that in you. And it is beautiful. May we be faithful toward that end. May we faithfully obey, submit, rely, and expect to the best we can.
We’re not gonna get this right. We’re not gonna do this great. But trusting that ultimately he’s not only loving us, taking care of us, not only loving those around us, but he’s helping people even see their need for him. Let’s pray.
Lord Jesus, this is obviously a very challenging text of Scripture, but we’re so thankful for a model like Paul who just had just relentless resolve to follow you even into the midst of hardship. Not even like through hardship, which we’ll see as we continue the series, of course, but even deliberately choosing to go into hardship.
Lord, we’re not going to get this right, but I’m reminded of the Scripture of when you spoke to your disciples the week that you went to the cross. You said to them, in this world you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world. Lord, that is our hope. Lord, our hope is in you, that challenges are going to come, but at the end of the day They’re just an opportunity to help people see their need for you. This life is fleeting, Lord, as we know, but people coming to know you, receiving the gospel, that’s eternal.
That’s our heart. We know that’s yours. Would you help us toward that end, serve you faithfully in this? We pray this all in Jesus’s name, the one who purchased us with his blood. Amen.
At this time, we’re going to continue our worship in song as the worship team comes forward.
