The Macedonian Call 2

well I pointed out last week that Paul's
Macedonian call here in Acts chapter 16
was truly an epic event epic in the
sense that it was not only
dramatic because he received this
heavenly
vision but it has powerfully affected
human history ever since Macedonia you
will recall is in Greece Greece is in
Europe and here for the first time at
the prompting of the Holy
Spirit The Gospel Goes West rather than
being confined to the east Paul you will
recall wanted to preach the gospel in
the province of Asia the Holy Spirit
wouldn't let him then he wanted to
preach the gospel in the province of
bethenia the spirit of Jesus would not
allow him to and you can imagine his
confusion as he was trying to figure out
what in the world is co going on didn't
become clear until he came to traz on
the western end of what is today turkey
he has this Vision the men from
Macedonia come over and help us
and here's a very interesting point you
will recall that Greece was the epitome
of culture at that time it was a place
that prided itself in its wisdom and in
its accomplishment and catch the irony
here of a man from Macedonia reaching
out to Paul saying come over and help us
and you see how the Lord is
preparing this Greek Empire for the good
news of the gospel because though they
are stuffed with human wisdom and human
sensuality and and human uh riches and
Glory they know something is missing and
there's a very important principle here
that it helps for us to understand no
matter what the world accomplishes
outside of Jesus there will always be a
hole and that whole provides
opportunity for preaching the gospel and
so the passage concludes with the verse
that Paul once he had seen the vision
got ready at once to leave for Macedonia
concluding that God had called us to
preach the
gospel to
them and
Macedonia as I said is part of
Greece the gospel now goes to Greece
from there eventually it spreads to Rome
eventually through the missionary work
of people like St bonfice and and St
Patrick and Columbo to the Scottish
people it spreads all over Europe
eventually to Africa and of course to
North American as I said last week you
and I are here because we are the fruit
of that mission effort and what that did
and I'm just taking a few moments review
this because these principles are so
profoundly important that we need to
have them deeply rooted inside ourselves
what this did was it helped establish a
Biblical world and life view in the west
and this biblical world and life view in
the words of Dr Peter Jones is best
summed up in the phrase twoism twoism
means that God and creation are two
separate entities God is eternally
self-existent creation flows from God
God is outside of space and time that's
a hard concept to get our heads around
because time is a created thing St
Augustine by the way many many years ago
was one of the first theologians to
figure that one out that God is outside
of time and that helps explain a lot of
things about how God God knows the
future just for the record because there
is no time from God's point of view he
spans it all don't ask me how that works
we just know from scripture that it does
and so because God is the Creator and we
are
creation he has the power and the right
to
Define who we are and what is
normal and so defines that he is Creator
we are the creatures big difference
between the two he defines that
humankind is created man and woman he
defines that marriage is between a man
and a woman he defines the difference
between right and wrong and all of
creation is expected to Bow before his
authority to worship him and to serve
him that's why God's people get together
corporately like we do here because we
acknowledge that he's the source of Life
The Very breath we
breathe the tasks that we're able to
accomplish the joys that we have and
they are so many they come from the hand
of God and God wants us
to express our gratitude to him not
because you know he's got a big ego that
needs to be patted on the back because
he wants us us to understand that we
understand what the truth is he is life
and we derive our life from him that's
why in Genesis chapter 4 when the sons
of God began to develop the kingdom of
God the first thing that were told about
them and the only thing that were told
about them besides the fact that they
knew that they were
weak is that in the days of enosh they
began to call on the
well in contrast to
twoism there is this philosophy that is
known as
oneism and oneism means that God and
creation are one
entity it is classic
paganism paganism is pantheism you see
the symbol of it there once again
pantheism means God is in all and all is
in God the word pan means all theism
means god so the distinctions between
God and man the distinctions between God
and creation the distinction between men
and women the distinctions between right
and wrong the distinctions on every
level are constantly being
annihilated and creation according to
this view does not proceed from the hand
of God it comes in and of itself you
will recognize that as one of the
dominant theories of science today it is
the dominant theory of paganism from the
very beginning what you see here is the
Tree of
Life in a philosophy called oneism that
supposedly gives life to everything and
so we speak of Father sky and Mother
Earth it's no longer God out
there telling us how to live and what to
do no it is all the forces of nature and
all our own insights and all our own
thoughts tremendously appealing to the
human race because now God cannot tell
me what to do I become God
myself and so according to Romans 1 I
reject the Creator I begin to worship
creation and now
creation becomes my goal God and God
gives me over to
Darkness and the implications are
incredibly
huge because now there is no outside
authority to tell me what to do I can do
what I want to do and so we are in the
process as I said last week of
redefining
reality and Dr Peter Jones makes a very
interesting
observation that the
increase in popularity of homosexuality
in the Western World corresponds
directly with a rise of new agism or
oneism in the
1960s and he says that is not
coincidental because if everything is
one and the idea is to get rid of
distinctions then
homosexuality is part of the product of
that according to Romans chapter 1 when
God gives us over to our
sin and he makes the observation that if
you look at
paganism
historically all the way through space
history the leaders of those
organizations have been in what he calls
androgynous people androgynous means
embracing both elements of
masculinity and elements of
femininity he says the high Priests of
all those
religions are
homosexual men often dressed as women
it's fascinating
concept and that's not to point fingers
at anybody or to not sympathize with the
complexity of gender confusion
understand that but it is to say that
there is a spiritual power behind all of
this that represents the ultimate
Rebellion against
God because the ultimate Rebellion
against God is to disagree with God on
how he has created me do you understand
that if he's created me a male to say
that I'm not a male if he's created me
to be a
female and I refuse to be a female that
I'm saying to God you don't know what
you're doing I disagree with what you
have made me to be I'm given
over to
Darkness and unless we understand that
and understand where that is coming from
we will always be ringing our
hands wondering why the world is going
where it is going well it's going where
it's going because it has pushed God out
of the picture God gives us over to
Darkness and now everything becomes
confusing and our children will pay the
price because you can talk to any number
of teachers
now and this whole idea of a confused
sexuality is being foed on our children
in much of the education system and the
rejection of authority
has gone so far one of the teachers was
telling me this past week that they dare
not correct a child hardly in her school
because it isn't worth the hassle can
you imagine that nobody wants to hassle
and so how do you keep that all together
eventually of course that all uh
Cascades down into chaos and in the
final analysis what happens is that that
societies begin to fall apart and that
gives birth into tyrants historically
because how else do you keep it all
together and so we lose the very Freedom
that we think we have so here's how you
can summarize the difference between
these two
philosophies
twoism
says salvation
lies in being reconciled with our
Creator God through faith in Jesus right
oneism says salvation lies in obtaining
freedom from your
creator because to be truly
free is to be able to do what you want
to do when you want to do it try that on
your household and see how long that
lasts it becomes chaos well don't want
to be laborate other than to
say that this p
paganism was overcome in Europe to a
very large
degree by the biblical world and life
year and the tragedy of our day as I've
been trying to
illustrate is that as we lose
sight of the influence of the Gospel we
are losing the biblical world and Life
View and replacing it with a world and
Life View that is
Pagan in its Origins did you know that
George Lucas Star Wars for example is a
disciple of a man called Joseph
Campbell Joseph
Campbell had a mission in life to take
Pagan fables and to for them upon
society and you get movies like Star
Wars and I know some of you really like
them and forgive me for pointing this
out to you an a
which are prime
examples of the natural force of
Life empowering breaking down the
differences between you know God and man
a man and nature everything eventually
becomes
one and we're sucking it in and our only
antidote is to know a Biblical world and
Life View and to stand firm on it
against the spirit of the age so this
Biblical word in the Life View then uh
though it's declining today
biblically and
historically gave
birth to many of the values that we hold
dear in the Western World in the time
that remains I want to try to run you
through just a couple of those just to
give you a concrete picture
of how the gospel impacted the Western
World first of all it
surfaces in an emphasis on individual
rights and
freedoms in the Western World those are
some of our highest values are they not
so much so that in Canada we have the
charter of Human Rights and
Freedoms and we pride ourselves in being
free to be our own persons free to do
what we want to do go where we want to
go associate with whomever the only
restriction being that somehow or
another uh we don't impact too badly the
freedom of other people what we
forget is that this notion of individual
freedom and rights is deeply rooted in a
Biblical world and life here it's it's
rooted in the fact that God is Creator
we are his creation and we are made in
His
image and he has a plan and purpose for
the lives of each of us regardless of
who we are or where we have been
born the great Malcolm
muger the famous Russian
writer and Christian put it this way he
said we must not forget yet that our
human rights are derived from the
Christian faith in Christian terms every
single human being whoever he or she may
be sick or well clever or foolish
beautiful or ugly every human being is
loved by his creator who as the gospels
tell us counted the
hairs of his
head that's also why the US declaration
of independence
penned originally by Thomas Jefferson
and then Modified by some committees put
it this way he says we hold these truths
to be
self-evident that all men are created
equal that they are endowed by their
creator with certain
unalienable rights sometimes the word is
inalienable uh the two words are used
interchangeably uh that among these are
life Li
liberty and the
pursuit of happiness life liberty and
the pursuit of happiness here's a good
geography question for you or social
studies anybody know what the
Canadian equivalent of that phrase
is you find it originally in the British
North America Act it's now called the uh
Constitution Act of
186 7 and the Canadian words are
peace
order and good government we're not as
interested in being happy as we are
interested in being
orderly it might explain why the
Canadian policy uh until recently at
least was always viewed in terms of
keeping peace among nations of the world
it's a value that ran deeply in this
particular country and still does now
this of course all stands in sharp
contrast to ancient
societies because in ancient Society
individual Freedom was often a function
of social
economic or political uh matters uh not
to mention gender in fact in ancient
societies your individual Freedom was
typic typically a function was typically
subordinate to the well-being of the
state and you can understand that
because the challenge was always how do
you keep a society
together and in order to keep a society
together you can't have everybody doing
what they want to do
individually and that's why in my
judgment and that's all it is
democracy really only works in places
where there is truly a deep world and
Life View embedded in God's people so
that subject to God's Authority we can
have the self-control and the discipline
that we need to place the interests of
the community ahead of our own see only
Christianity can make that happen from
the inside out which is why States
always have to resort to power to try to
hold everybody together
and that I think is why it's rather
foolish to try to impose democracy on
countries that are tribal by
Nature because if you don't have a
is living a Biblical world and life here
and ready to put somebody else's
interests ahead of their
own you're always going to have chaos
and you always always need the power of
some powerful tribal leader to keep this
all together so the biblical world and
Life View has led to an emphasis in
individual freedoms and rights rights
and freedoms that were losing rapidly by
the way as we give
up our Biblical world and Life View but
secondly it has produced an emphasis on
equality before the law and emphasis on
equality before the law and again one of
the main principles of our Western
Judicial System is that everybody is
equal before the law the same law
applies to everyone rich or poor we're
all innocent supposedly until proven
guilty and we all have the right
to do process we don't always practice
it perhaps mistakes are made but as a
society coming up through many many
historical developments in Britain
particularly those are the
values that drive our Judicial System we
would
rather set nine guilty people
free then convict one innocent person
and that again derives from a Biblical
world and life here God determines what
is right and wrong he entrusts the state
with carrying it out and he demands that
due
process and Justice be applied
regardless of where people find
themselves and of course that is rooted
already in the Old Testament Mosaic law
When God Says through Moses do not show
partiality and judging here both small
and great alike do not be afraid of any
man for judgment belongs to
God and that is why
historically uh Lady
Justice is often pictured as having a
blindfold the concept of Lady Justice
goes back all the way to ancient Egypt
it was adopted by Greece it was adopted
by the Romans and even today uh many
cour houses or many places of law you
will see Lady Justice with the balance
scale in one hand sometimes the left
more often the right sword in the other
blindfolded most commonly because
Justice is blind and again while we
don't always practice that and the rich
sometimes get away with things that the
poor wouldn't get away with at least we
are philosophically committed to
fairness in the judicial process and we
hold
even the powerful people in our society
accountable for how they manage money
and how they live their lives and how
they abuse their power and authority now
compare that
with cultures around the
world that have not bought into a
Biblical word of life yet I mean we've
all heard the stories of Isis over these
past number of
months uh I listen to the
testimony of a young Iraqi
soldier who had been included in the
Roundup of about
250 young men who were all forced to lie
on the ground and who were uh shot
through the head one after the other and
somehow the bullets only grazed
him and when night fell he was able to
get up and eventually find himself uh a
place of getting his his his wounds
attended to and live to tell the
story and we've all heard stories of the
beheadings that take place if you if you
listen to to you know the the war in
Gaza how
Hamas uh took what they believed were
collaborators with Israel and without
due trial or process just shot them dead
in the
street and then you understand what a
precious gift Justice is
because what's going to stop anybody
from getting caught up in that kind of a
system I have a number of friends who
have been extensively involved over the
years in Aid work in Africa and they've
been telling me some of the challenges
that they faced and I have one book that
I have started to read
called Dead Aid why Aid is not working
and how there is a better way for Africa
by uh Dem bissa moyo who herself uh is a
native of Africa and she makes the
observation that over the years
a trillion dollar dollars worth of Aid
has been poured into the African
continent and generally speaking the
more Aid countries have received the
worse off they have been and countries
in fact that have refused Aid by and
large have done
better and my friend uh went on to
explain why some of these things are
there are many many reasons but one of
course is graft and Corruption we know
that much of the aid uh that is being
sent to Africa ends up in the pockets of
the rulers and their tribes and you and
I we look at that through our Western
eyes and we say what a travesty of
Justice how can these people be so
crooked what we don't understand is that
it flows out of their world and Life
View because in their world and Life
View you have an obligation to your
tribe and if you succeed and you get
material Goods then you're obligated to
share it with your tribe and so what we
think is
crookedness from their perspective is
Smarts and
wisdom and so you understand that unless
you change that world and Life
View nothing is going to
change and that's why moving some of
those societies forward is so
incredibly
difficult because these values are so
deeply rooted and most of the time those
of us from the West who come into these
countries can get our heads around how
this works my my friend tells me the
story he works with world R new by the
way and he went to
Indonesia after the tsunami a number of
years ago to rebuild those
cities and part of their culture is to
honor their elders and so when it came
to
rebuilding uh the significant people in
the
community got the first choice at where
they wanted to build their house well
they all decided to build their house on
the edge of the town that had been
destroyed on the prime
properties the end result was now listen
to this by the time all those houses
were built it was an enclosed
space and they couldn't get any machines
into the interior of that property to
houses you and I we look at that and we
say how stupid can you
be but understand that I'm not making
fun of them it is the fruit of cultural
values and unless you can identify those
cultural values and cause them to be
transformed into biblical values you're
always going to wonder how come this is
not
working and for my friend it was an
incredible
eyeopener
why giving Aid to third world countries
can so often be so difficult and so
counterproductive all right just want to
can and that is the
fact that a Biblical world and Life
View has also given us an
emphasis on
universal education now you and I we
take it for granted that our children
should go to school get an
education and hopefully find a
career what we fail to understand is
that
historically that has not always been
true historically those advantages when
to the rich and the
powerful the common people did not have
of that
opportunity but the emphasis on
universal
education was an
outflow of a Biblical world and Life
View that said God's out there he
reveals himself through nature not only
but he especially reveals himself in his
word and so we have a vested interest in
our children being able to read the word
and thereby acquire a Biblical world and
lifea and so in the Western World the
earliest schools were typically
associated with Cathedrals and with
churches going back all the way to uh
the F to
ad500 out of that came the European
University system a system by the way
that was unique to the Western
World and out of that came event
uh day school education in much of the
western world and here's an interesting
little tidbit uh that I ran across just
this past week doing some research when
the Puritans came to North America they
of course wanted their children to learn
how to read because knowing the Bible
was their protection against the
delusion of Satan and so in the state of
Massachusetts in 1647 they passed what
is known as the old deluder Satan act
which I thought was kind of an original
name and the deluder Satan act
legislated that if a given Community had
more than 50 families they were
obligated to establish a school and hire
a teacher to teach their children to
read so that they would know the Bible
and they wouldn't be deluded by the
devil can you imagine passing a deluder
Satan act today how times have changed
my
land and so throughout the course of
history to this very present day where
missionaries go literacy
follows because Christians have always
valued and educated people as opposed to
some societies that would like to keep
their people in the dark so that they
are not a danger
while we could go on science in the
western world is often pictured as being
at odds with the Christian faith the
reality is that most of the early
scientists were deeply devout Christians
you know why because they believed God
was rational and created a rational
universe and
therefore by studying nature
they could
learn how
God through his word was revealing
himself to all his
people and the conflict between science
and
Faith uh has arisen in
part because the further science moves
away from submitting to biblical
Authority the more God's people have had
to question is God in this or not but in
a day and
age
where new age and all of its
manifestations is trying to redefine
life the kingdom comes not by big
campaigns not by big
legislation the kingdom comes by IND
individual Christians being points of
light as we submit to the Lord and his
authority and live by his
values because eventually that's what
breaks Satan's power and that's what
ushers in the coming of God's kingdom
it's very easy to be in
despair because of the way darkness is
descending but all it takes is one
little light to expel the darkness never
forget the influence of an individual
Christian let alone a Christian
Community if we let our light shine and
embrace a Biblical world and Life View
through to the core of our being that's
what God calls us to be to do and that's
why he has given us the Lord Jesus Jesus
who is the light of the world and in
together