A Power Encounter

SERMON: 2013-09-08--ac13106--a-power-encounter-part-2 SOURCE DURATION: 00:36:18.000 PROPOSED CUTS: 1 CONFIDENCE: 1.00 APPROVED: false REASON: The recording begins with the speaker posing a question to guide the discussion ('So here's the question...') and concludes with theological exposition and application of principles related to authority and calling. Both edges are clearly part of the main sermon content. ACOUSTIC EVIDENCE: available ACOUSTIC MUSIC INTERVALS: none ACOUSTIC SPEECH OVERLAP: no ACOUSTIC BOUNDARIES APPLIED: none Inline CUT markers identify each proposed audio boundary after the relevant word. --- ORIGINAL TRANSCRIPT WITH PROPOSED CUTS MARKED --- So here's the question that we want to try to consider this morning. Why is it that the Apostle Paul, in taking on Elimus, the false prophet, treats him in the way that he does? Because I think you will agree with me that his treatment of Elimus is not exactly a treatment of kid gloves. He calls him a son of the devil. He calls down God's judgment on him, strikes him blind, at least for a season. And Elimus is left staggering with his blindness, trying to find out how to get out of that room fast enough. Not exactly turning the other cheek, which is what you might expect from a follower of the Lord Jesus. In fact, somebody's made the observation that this is the only recorded time in the New Testament where the Apostle Paul uses his divine power in a judgmental fashion. Why this severe treatment of Elimus, the prophet? I can think of three reasons. Let me try to walk you through that as quickly as we can this morning. The first reason is that in this story, at stake is the integrity of the gospel. At stake is the integrity of the gospel. Elimus, you will recall, sees himself as a prophet. And a prophet is one who speaks for God, and a prophet is one who is supposed to lead people to God. But the scripture tells us he is, in fact, a false prophet. He is a Jewish false prophet. And false prophets lead people astray. Listen again to how Paul addresses it in verse 10 of this particular chapter. He says, "You are a child of the devil and an enemy of everything that is right. You are full of all kinds of deceit and trickery. Will you never stop perverting the right ways of the Lord?" Each phrase in there is significant. He says, "You are a child or a son of the devil." He pictured himself as Bar-Jesus, the son of Jesus. He professes to be a prophet of God, but he is not. He is in league with the devil. More than that, he is an enemy of everything that is right. If you ally yourself with Satan, you are automatically an enemy of God. Then he is full of all kinds of deceit and trickery. See, nobody listens to a false prophet if they think the false prophet is going to lead them down the garden path. And so false prophets always operate with the notion of trickery, ways of leading people astray. The apostle Paul, writing to the Ephesians, puts it this way. He says, "Let no one deceive you with empty words for because of such things, God's wrath comes on those who are disobedient." Then Paul says, "You pervert the right ways of God." Interesting phrase because to pervert means to twist. That's one thing to try to lead people astray, obviously. But what false prophets do is they deviate from truth in ever so minor a fashion. And you know just as well as I do that if truth is this straight line and I deviate only a fraction of a degree, the further down the line I get, the greater is my deviation from the truth. And when Paul says here, "You are perverting," the right way, the right way of God here is the way of salvation. The way of salvation, as you know, is summarized very clearly in Ephesians chapter 2 verse 9, "It is by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves. It is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast." It's also summarized in 2 Corinthians 521, "God made him, that is Jesus, who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." Leave that diagram up for just a moment and let me just point out once again that the heart of the gospel is the fact that we are sinners separated from God. God is holy and he is righteous, and there is no way our sins can be addressed but through the cross of Jesus. And so you can tell truth from error, falsehood from the core truth of the gospel by how it addresses the issue of our sin and the need for the righteousness of Jesus. Any preacher that tries to minimize sin, any teaching that tries to minimize sin, any teaching that tries to get us acceptable by God short of the amazing grace of God in the person of Jesus Christ at heart is false and will eventually lead you astray because it is a perversion of the gospel. Now just to show you this morning how tricky that is, let me tell you about a recent development in the Presbyterian Church USA. The Presbyterian Church USA is the third largest mainline church in the United States of America and they are in the process of putting out a new hymn book. The hymn book is called "Glory to God" and one song that they had wanted to add to that hymn book is the currently popular song "By the Gettys in Christ Alone." Most of us know it, we've sung it here many times, it's become a very popular staple in worshiping communities across the board and around the world. It's a great song. But in the process of choosing this song to include it in their hymn book, they applied to the Gettys for permission, listen carefully, to change one line in the hymn and the line they wanted to change is this line, "Till on that cross as Jesus died, the wrath of God was satisfied." And they wanted to change it to this, "Till on that cross as Jesus died, the love of God was magnified." Keep that slide up for a moment. Look at those two lines and tell me what is the problem. Because when they applied to the Gettys for permission to change that line, the Gettys said no. Now understand that when music editors put hymn books together, they change lyrics all the time. If you look at the version of hymns in our hymn book, which you don't have in front of you so you can't do it, but trust me, I've done it. If you listen to them on great hymns of the faith as opposed to the versions that we sing, you will very quickly catch all kinds of words have been changed because people try to fine tune hymns theologically. Why the resistance to changing this one line, the wrath of God was satisfied, to the love of God was magnified, I thought it was quite a clever little fitting together. Well, at stake, in case you can't catch it, is the doctrine of substitutionary atonement. The Presbyterian Church, USA, for many, many years has been moving away from the fact that we are sinners under the wrathful judgment of God that Christ bore for us on the cross and they have exchanged it for a doctrine of "God loves everybody." Can you see how that gets to the core of the gospel? There's nothing wrong in saying the love of God was magnified, but there's a lot wrong with saying the wrath and not wanting to say the wrath of God was satisfied. Do you understand where I'm going with this? This is how you tell truth from error. Because you see, if we're not under judgment and Christ didn't die for our sins, if God loves everybody, regardless of whether or not they have repented or believed, then you are gutting the very core of the gospel and Jesus died for nothing because he wouldn't have had to die if it wasn't for the condition of our sin and God's wrath directed at a humanity that is in rebellion. Now listen carefully. It is for that reason the Apostle Paul in the New Testament never gets as angry as he does about people who pervert the integrity of the gospel. It's a very interesting thing. He takes on all kinds of sin, he addresses all kinds of sinners, but nothing is more serious than that slight twisting of the gospel that ultimately ends up making the sacrifice of Jesus to no avail. So listen to these words by the Apostle Paul, Galatians 1, 8 and 9, "If we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preach to you, let him be eternally condemned." The next verse, same thing, "As we have already said, so now I say," this is just in case they didn't hear it the first time around and you wonder why preachers repeat themselves. It's so that we get it and don't lose sight of it. "As we have already said, so now I say again, if anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned." The word in Greek is the word anathema, and to anathema or to anathematize means to put somebody under a curse and to consign them to hell. So what he is saying is that if anybody, including Jesus myself, if I preach a gospel that is off by only a fraction of a degree, I am perverting the heart of the gospel message. The Galatians, you will recall, were struggling with the question of, "Are we saved by keeping the law or are we saved by grace?" And they had started out believing the gospel of grace, but then people came along and they said, "It isn't good enough just to believe in Jesus. You must also be circumcised and you must obey the Old Testament ceremonial law." And there is nothing that makes Paul more incensed than that perversion of the gospel of grace, and he repeats it again a little bit later on in Galatians 5, 10, and 12. He says to those who want people to be circumcised, "The one who is throwing you into confusion will pay the penalty, whoever he may be. As for those agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate themselves." And without getting into too much detail, he is saying, "I hope the knife slips and does a really thorough job to destroy their manhood." That's how serious it is. So when elements tries to pervert the gospel of grace, Paul is furious because he is defending the integrity of the gospel. And this isn't just talking about crossing every T and dotting every I, and this doesn't mean that there isn't room in the Christian community for many varied opinions and very many subjects, but the heart of the gospel that we are saved by grace, through faith in Jesus, not because of anything that we do, is simply the absolute, unnegotiable essence of all that is truth. And anybody that stands against it needs to be pushed out of the way so that the message of the gospel will not be compromised. So at stake is the integrity of the gospel. But more than that, at stake is the progress of the gospel. Because elements is not only a false prophet, but he is using his influence to do what? He is trying to keep the proconsul from coming to faith. Listen again to verse 8, "Elements the sorcerer," for that is what his name means, "oppose them and try to turn the proconsul from the faith." Now listen again carefully. There are few things in scripture more serious than trying to turn a seeker away from Gaumont. And whatever elements' motivation is, undoubtedly he is running the risk of losing his influence. He wants to keep this proconsul from coming to faith, and that again attacks the very heart of the gospel message, because why did Jesus come into the world? To seek and to save the lost. So God puts into motion this whole program of redemption where Jesus is born and lives our life and dies our death and get raised from the dead, why? So that people can be saved from sin and hell and be restored to fellowship with God. And to try to make a child stumble is serious business. Listen to these words of Jesus, "If anyone causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a large millstone tied around his neck." See, even Jesus, meek and mild as he is often pictured, gets incensed if somebody raises obstacles to faith for a little one. So that leads me to two very practical implications, and the first implication of that is this. We must never, ever place an obstacle in the way of a seeker or by extension, a young person. Here's the thing that I've often seen happen in the life of Christian community. Some parent will be unhappy with the church, perhaps they're unhappy with church leadership, perhaps they're unhappy with other hypocrites in the church, and instead of finding safe places to vent and to process, they do their venting around the kitchen or the dinner table with their children present. What do you think that does for children? What that does for children is it feeds in them a sinful desire not to obey God, not to be part of community, and they will take up their parents' banner, and they will almost inevitably be lost not only to the church, but they will also be lost to faith because you have placed poison in their lives better. To have a millstone tied around you, says Jesus, and to be thrown into the sea than to cause one of these little ones to stumble. When Jesus talks about stumbling, he is talking about stumbling in such a way that that person falls away from the faith. That's to put it negatively, to put it positively, I would put it this way, always remove as many obstacles to faith as possible. So negatively don't place obstacles in the way of a seeker or a young person, but positively make sure that you remove as many obstacles as possible. And there is a profound example of that. A couple of chapters later on in Acts chapter 15, Acts chapter 15, the issue of circumcision and keeping the law of Moses has become the divisive issue in the early church between Judaizers and Gentiles, and so the church calls its first church-wide council in Jerusalem. They get together the apostles, they get together the elders, and they have a discussion. What do we do? Do Gentiles need to be circumcised? Do they need to keep the law of Moses? And you can read about that conversation in Acts chapter 15, and it's a very interesting conversation because eventually they come to a consensus, and they write that consensus in a letter to the Gentile believers, and this is what they say. And I love how this is worded. It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements. You are to abstain from food sacrifice to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals, and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid those things. Very interesting comment, and later on, Lord willing, when we get to Acts chapter 15, we'll see why it is that they focus on these four general principles, but the point is you don't need to be circumcised, you don't need to keep the law of Moses, avoid these generalities that we are laying before you, or stay away from those particular types of behaviors, and other than that, we are saved by grace through faith. Very interesting lesson there in not making our own codes the norm for other people. There may be many things that you and I believe we should do or that Christians ought not to do, but Paul says move everything out of the way so that no cultural issues get in the way of a seeker or a young person coming to faith, and Paul practiced what he preached because in 1 Corinthians chapter 9, he puts it this way, and I love this passage too, "Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone to win as many as possible." And then he goes on in that passage to say, "To the Jews I became like a Jew, to the Gentiles I became like a Gentile, to the weak I became like the weak," and then he concludes that with verse 22, "I have become all things to all men, so that by all possible means I might save some." The stronger you are in the Lord, the more mature you are in the Lord, the more the onus of responsibility is on you to lay down your rights, your privileges, your preferences, so that those who are seeking after God will not be hindered in their spiritual journeys. One final verse on that before we carry on, Romans chapter 15, 1 and 2, "We who are strong ought to bear with the failings of the weak and not to please ourselves. Each of us should please his neighbor for his good, to build him up, for even Christ did not please himself." How different a place the church would be if all of God's people were able to put those principles in practice and say, "I will lay aside my preferences," whether that is in worship or whether that is in ministry positions or in what I do from day to day, so that no other person will stumble and that other people can in fact come to faith and grow in the grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus. So Paul takes on elements because at stake is the integrity of the gospel, at stake is the progress of the gospel, let nothing stand in the way of these Roman government officials coming to faith, and then thirdly, at stake is the mercy of the gospel. The mercy of the gospel. When elements in this story is struck blind for a season, what earlier story in the book of Acts does that remind you of? Paul's own journey, you will recall, he was on the way to Damascus, ready to persecute the church, Jesus appears to him in Revelation. He gets struck blind for a season until a disciple by the name of Ananias comes to him at the word of the Lord, lays hands on him, and prays that he might regain his sight and he not only regains his sight physically, but more importantly, he regains his sight spiritually. Years later, towards the end of his life, when Paul is describing that journey in writing to Timothy, he put it this way. He said, "I thank Christ Jesus, our Lord, who has given me strength, that he considered me faithful, appointing me to his service. Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief. And I've often said, and you've heard me say it, God is incredibly gracious when out of ignorance and unbelief, out of not knowing better, we don't listen to him, we disobey, we might even fight him. God is much less patient when out of stubbornness and rebellion and knowing better, we flaunt his authority and his power." And Paul says, "God was gracious to me despite the horrible things I did to the church. Why? Because I acted ignorantly out of unbelief." And he said, "God gave me a second chance." Now, you know, God could have struck Elam as dead, like he did for Ananias and Sapphira, could have struck him with permanent blindness, does none of those things, why? Because God doesn't wish that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. And God wants to give Elamis still an opportunity, having experienced the power of God, to repent of his sin and to come to faith. And the question is, did he or did he not? We don't really know, all we know is that two early church fathers, man by the name of Origen and another man by the name of Chrysostom, both declare an ancient Christian tradition that Elamis repented of his sin and became a Christian. We don't know whether that was maybe just wishful thinking or whether that is rooted historically in what really happened. What we do know is how Peter summarizes it in 2 Peter 3 verse 9 when he says, "Concerning the delay of the coming of the Lord Jesus, the Lord is not slow in keeping his promise. To some understand slowness, he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance." At stake is the integrity of the gospel, at stake is the progress of the gospel, and at stake is the mercy of the gospel. Don't ever underestimate how anxious God is to bring people to salvation and don't ever quit praying until the Lord makes it clear that you should no longer pray because there is a sin that leads to death. And it does happen in people's lives that when they knowingly and deliberately turn away from God, there comes a point where God gives them over to their sin. They no longer have a desire to repent. They no longer have an ability to repent. They just steadfastly continue on the road to destruction until judgment overtakes them, if not in time, then certainly in eternity. Sobering thoughts and things that we need to really take to heart for our children, for our grandchildren, for our friends, and for our neighbors. Because while God is incredibly gracious, there are limits to his graciousness if people turn away from him again and again and again. And on the day of judgment, nobody's going to be able to fault God because God's righteous judgment will be revealed in that final day. Let's leave it at that this morning. Can I have four more minutes? I just want to introduce before we quit a third practical outcome or I'm just trying to remember how I phrased it before. We're looking at three practical steps, lessons that we need to learn out of this whole past age. And the first lesson was that if we're caught up in the purposes of God, we need to expect opposition. The second lesson was that in expecting opposition, we need to walk closely with the Lord because we need to be filled with the spirit to know what God is doing and what his strategy is. And we've just been talking about that. But there's a third lesson that I want to just introduce to you for one moment and then we'll come back to it, Lord willing, next time. And that is the fact that we need to know and exercise spiritual authority. We need to know and exercise our authority in Christ. I don't know if you've ever tried moving mountains by speaking to them. Anybody ever tried that? If you have, then I think you will agree with me that it's a lot more difficult than meets the eye. Mountains are amazingly stubborn and they just don't want to go. And that despite the fact that Jesus makes it sound so simple when he says in Matthew chapter 17 verse 20, "I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move. And nothing will be impossible for you." And that's what Paul is doing. Elemis is the mountain to the progress of the gospel. Compromises the integrity of the gospel, compromises the progress of the gospel. It just stands in the way of this man coming to faith. And so Paul isn't standing there praying, "Lord, do something about this." He isn't wringing his hands wondering, "You know, how am I going to get around this one? They didn't teach me this in seminary when I went there. How do I shut this guy up?" He takes authority and he speaks to the mountain and he tells him the judgment of God and amazingly what he says comes true and God does it. So here's the question, why for Paul and why is that so difficult for us? Well, that's the kind of stuff we want to look at in more detail next time. Paul has an apostolic ministry. He has an apostolic anointing. And you and I may not share in an apostolic anointing, but we all have our places of calling and the anointing that goes along with it. And in whatever our calling is and whatever our anointing is, in that place we have authority. And in that place we can speak to the mountain and God will move the mountain for the coming [PROPOSED CUT 1 START at 00:36:16.480; remove through 00:36:18.000] of his kingdom. [CUT] [CUT] [PROPOSED CUT 1 END at 00:36:18.000; resume after this marked segment]