May I please the Lords to help
us as we continue our meditation in the Acts of the Apostles,
and we'll read tonight the last part of chapter 17, and that's
reading from verse 29. We'll read together. For as much then as we are the
offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is
like unto gold or silver, or stone graven by art and man's
device, in the times of this ignorance God winked at, but
now commandeth all men everywhere to repent, because he hath appointed
a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by
that man whom he hath ordained, whereof he hath given assurance
unto all men in that he hath raised him from the dead. And
when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked. Others said, we will hear thee
again of this matter. So Paul departed from among them. Howbeit, certain men clave unto
him, and believed among the witch was Dionysius, the Areopagite,
and a woman named Damaris, and others with them. Well, we've followed Paul as
he's come to Athens and the things that he's been able to say and
do. And now we come towards the end
of that. position, and we read these words,
for as much then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not
to think that the Godhead is like unto gold or silver or stones
graven by art and man's image. Now remember, he was in Athens,
most of the people were Gentiles, there were Jews there, but most
of them, Jews and Gentiles, were for the most part unbelieving.
And so he comes and addresses them in this way and speaks and
says, for as much then as we are the offspring of God, and
because of that, he says, we ought not to think that the Godhead
is like under gold or silver or stone graven by art and man's
devices. Very clearly, that was just the
position which had occurred and was occurring in Athens, as you
remember, as the Apostle passed through and saw that idol, that
altar with the inscription to the unknown God. And he addressed
them and said, whom therefore you ignorantly worship, him declare
I unto you. So there were many who worshipped
the unknown God and they bowed down to these idols, which were
of gold or of silver and stone, graven by art in man's devices. And of course we live in a day
in our country, not perhaps quite like that in a physical way,
but there are so many idols in people's lives today. And of
course we all perhaps possess an idol, the great idol of self. and how important it is that
God gives us grace to not bow down to self, not bow down to
that idol, but to indeed be concerned to be found bowing down before
our God, and not worshipping ourself, but worshipping the
Lord God. So although there were of course
these idols then, there are still idols today, and we need to be
very aware of it in our own lives, the devil will be very happy
and pleased if we were found bowing down to idols, the idol
of self. And so may we take heed to such
statements as this. And then the apostle says, and
the times of this ignorance God winked at. That means he really
passed it by. All those scenes and all those
idolatry worshipping, he was passing by. And he says, in the
times of this ignorance, God winked at, but now commandeth
all men everywhere to repent. Well, I hope you'll realize that
there is a great need for repentance. Because without repentance, there
will be no entry into glory. No unrepentant sinner will enter
into glory. But we also realise that in and
of ourselves we are unable to actually produce repentance because
it is the gift of God. And the Apostle Paul tells us
something which is very important when he wrote to the Church of
Rome. In the second chapter of that epistle, in the fourth verse,
he says this, Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness and
forbearance and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness
of God leadeth thee to repentance. Now we observe there that it
is God's goodness to us that when we recognise God's goodness
to us, God's favour to us, it's that which really then leads
us to and produces true repentance in our heart. Now we can, I'm
sure, immediately recognise, therefore there are many people
who do not recognise, do not want to recognise the goodness
of God, and therefore there is no leading them to repentance.
They are not sorry. for the things that they are
doing, they are not repentant. They carry on in their mad career
satisfied with the things of this world. But here we have
this great statement, that the goodness of God leadeth thee
to repentance. Well, what a blessing that would
be if in our lives we're amongst those who hear this gracious
command of God to repent. And we are able to do that as
the Spirit of God leads us and shows us his great goodness toward
us. It's his Spirit that moves our
heart, it's his work in our heart to grant us this great blessing
of repentance. And so may we be able to find
in our hearts, we do have the evidence of repenting of our
sins, of those things which we do wrong and we've been led to
that because of God's goodness and his favour toward us. Well
what a blessing then in our lives if we can recognise the truth
of God's work within us and to hear his gracious command. You
see this command is ignored by people because they have no desire
to obey and yet you see The truth is that unless we repent, there
will be no life, we shall be lost, we shall be ruined, and
we shall never see the glory of Emmanuel's land. And we read
together in that chapter about the hardness of man's heart,
and how very true it is, isn't it? Our heart, you see, is hard. It's rebellious. It won't bow
down before Almighty God. It won't hear his commands. It
ignores his commands. And we find ourselves following
our own ways and our own inclination. And so the Apostle writes and
he says, Wherefore, as the Holy Ghost saith today, if ye will
hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation,
in the day of temptation, in the wilderness, when your fathers
tempted me, proved me, and saw my work forty years whereof.
Wherefore, I was grieved with that generation, and said, They
do always err in their heart, and they have not known my ways.
they rebelled against the Lord's teaching and the Lord's direction
and their hearts were hardened. Well, what a blessing for us
if our hearts are not hardened, if the Lord gives us that soft
heart, that new heart, that heart which seeks after God and that
heart then which desires to follow his gracious commands and to
be blessed with this gift of repentance. And so, but now commandeth
all men everywhere to repent. No one is really excluded because,
and this is the reason, because he hath appointed a day in the
which he would judge the world in righteousness by that man
who he hath ordained. Well, we should recognize that
there will be that great day of judgment. when everyone that
has ever been born will come and stand before the judgment
seat of this man, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will be the great
judge, and he will judge the world in righteousness. It will
be a very pure judgment. There will be no room for any
maneuver. And as there are those who have
ignored the word of God and turned away from it, they will find
no covering, they will find no shelter when they stand before
that great white throne on that day of judgment. And so how needful
it is therefore to be blessed with this grace of repentance. It is a grace and a wonderful
mercy if it is, because you see we don't like to repent, do we? What it means is Naturally that
we've we confess we've done wrong things and it's very hard for
our nature to to come really and be sorrowful for wrong things. We don't do that naturally. We
can bless God if he gives us that grace then to come and to
repent of these things, all those sins which we may have committed,
realising that there is that great day approaching when we
must stand before Almighty God, who will come and who will judge
all mankind. None will be omitted. none will be able to hide, none
will escape, and we will all be found on one side or the other,
either clothed with the righteousness of Christ or trying to cover
ourselves with our own rags. But Lord, a blessing it is to
know that we are blessed with this righteousness of Christ.
And so the Apostle goes on, wherefore he hath given assurance unto
all men in that he hath raised him from the dead. If Christ
was not risen, you see, our preaching would be in vain, and there would
be no point in believing. But, bless God tonight, we know
we have a risen Saviour. A Saviour who today is seated
in glory, interceding for us in our prayers, and as we've
gathered here tonight, to think that without that intercession,
our prayers would not enter into the holy place. just like it
was in Old Testament times. Without that shedding of blood,
without intercession, there was no acceptance. There was no way
into the holy place without that shedding of blood, and there's
no way into the holy place of glory, but through the shed blood
of the Saviour, through his great and mighty and glorious work. And so this statement is so true,
in that he has raised him from the dead. Just like it was then,
so it is today. And when they heard of the resurrection
of the dead, some mocked, and others said, we will hear thee
again of this matter. Probably those who mocked were
the Epicureans, who believed that everything just happened,
and that man would just die, and there would actually be no,
therefore, afterlife. And then the others who said,
we will hear thee again, may have been the Stoics that we
read of again earlier in this chapter, who believed as it were
so far, but wouldn't really follow the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. So we see there were many who
walked in that way. Paul having pointed to Christ
again and the risen Christ, this was of course his theme, wasn't
it? Right through his preaching. It needs to be the theme of every
preacher, to preach Christ crucified, yea, he who is risen again. I conquer over sin, death, hell,
and the grave. And so having made these great
statements, And having had this answer, many of them responding
in this way, we read, so Paul departed from among them. Sad, isn't it, to think that
many really rejected the great words that were preached to them,
how privileged they were, and yet they rejected the great word
of God. My friends, the same today, how
many people reject the truth of God's word and turn their
back upon it. They will not bow down. They
say, we will not have this man to reign over us. But then we
read, howbeit certain men claim unto him and believe. What a
blessing there are a few. And we read here, among the witch
was Dionysius the Areopagite. And as we spoke earlier in this
chapter, the Areopagites were really the judges of the nation. They were important people. And
so here was one, Dionysius, who was one of the judges. And he
was one of those who believed. And as we read in 1 Corinthians,
not many noble, not many mighty are called, but there were some.
And we're thankful for that. And here we have evidence of
that occurring here. This man Dionysius, among those
who believed, who was an eminent person and Areopagite. And then we read, and a woman
named Damaris. We don't know anything more about
her, but she's worthy of being named. May have been an important
person, but nonetheless, she's named and she was one who believed. and then finally and others with
them. It would seem, not many, the
Apostle had gone to Athens, he'd preached in the synagogues, he'd
reasoned in the marketplace, he'd preached on Mars Hill, probably
preached in many other places, and thankfully he didn't preach
in vain. But it would appear there weren't
very many, received the word. Now what an amazing blessing
isn't it for us today as we think of the vast millions even in
our country and to think there are a few who have believed. And what a blessing if you and
I can count ourselves amongst the number who have believed. Those who have received the grace
of God to believe those who have received the grace of God to
repent of our sins and to seek unto the Saviour for that great
and glorious salvation and be blessed with a little anticipation
of the glory that is prepared for all those whom the Lord has
brought out of nature's darkness into the marvellous light of
the everlasting gospel and to view, by faith, the Lord Jesus
Christ as their all-sufficient Saviour. Well, we'll leave it
here. May God bless his word. Amen.