If you turn in your Bibles back
to Acts, we haven't been in Acts for a while and I don't want
us to lose sight of where we're heading in Acts. Acts 19 is a
description of the beginning of the church in Ephesus. After
Paul had preached there in the synagogue for three months, they
went through the normal process where the religious people can't
cope with the gospel of free and sovereign grace of God. Let's get some context for us,
because back in verse 24, in a certain Jew named Apollos,
born in Alexandria, Acts 18, 24, an eloquent man, mighty in
the Scriptures, came to Ephesus. This man was instructed in the
way of the Lord, being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught
diligently the things of the Lord, knowing only the baptism
of John. And he began to speak boldly
in the synagogue. whom when Aquila and Priscilla
had heard, they took him unto them, and expounded unto him
the way of God more perfectly. And when he was disposed to pass
into a chair, the brethren wrote, exhorting the disciples to receive
him, who, when he was come, helped them much which had believed
through grace. For he mightily convinced the
Jews, and that publicly, showing by the Scriptures that Jesus
was Christ. And it came to pass that while
Apollos was at Corinth, Paul having passed through the upper
coast, came to Ephesus. And finding certain disciples,
he said unto them, Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed?
And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether
there be any Holy Ghost. And he said unto them, Unto what
then were ye baptised? And they said, Unto John's baptism.
Then said Paul, John verily baptized with the baptism of repentance,
saying unto the people that they should believe on him which had
come after him, that is, on Christ Jesus. And when they heard this,
they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. And when Paul
had laid hands upon them, the Holy Ghost came upon them, and
they spake with tongues and prophesied. And all the men were about twelve. So here we have this remarkable
journey of our great God gathering his people to himself and we
have in these events here and a little bit in Acts chapter
18, the beginning of the church in Ephesus. This passage comes
with Apollos arriving in Ephesus, being taught by Aquila and Priscilla,
and then being now equipped, he goes to Corinth, where we
know from the Corinthian letter that he had quite a remarkable
ministry. And it's just remarkable, isn't
it? I think one of the wonderful things about our God is He says,
I'll build my church. I'll build my church, He says,
and the gates of Hades won't prevail against it. Don't ever
be in any doubt, brothers and sisters, about the health of
God's church. We've seen what the Lord does in gathering His
people from our story of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10. He
takes His people off that broad road and He takes them to an
inn, and in that inn He cares for them and He takes responsibility
for everything that happens to them there. And that's exactly
what he's been doing ever since the fall of our father Adam. And he'll do it until he comes
home. Let's not, let's not rob our
great glorious God and Saviour of His glory in ruling all things
for the good of His people. and for the glory of his holy
name. And so when Paul leads Corinth, God prepares another
man to go there and pastor the church in Corinth. And before
he prepares him, he makes sure that he's well equipped and trained
for that task. And he's not going to cause the
people in Corinth to be tossed about. I love what it says in
verse 27. And when he was disposed to pass
into a chair, the brethren wrote, exhorting the disciples to receive
him, who when he was come, and this is a description of Apollos'
ministry in Corinth, he helped them much which had bleed through
grace. The grace of God is conveyed
by means, isn't it? The grace of God comes upon people
by a sovereign hand of our God and it's conveyed by means, it's
conveyed by the preaching of the Gospel. But the wonderful
thing is, isn't it, He comes there And he reveals the fact
that like everywhere else in the scriptures, anyone who's
ever been a recipient of grace, anyone who's ever been a mercy
beggar, anyone who's ever found grace and mercy in our Lord Jesus
Christ revealed to them, always needs more. Do you see? He helped
them much which had believed through grace. The grace of God
doesn't make you independent, it makes you interdependent.
And the grace of God which comes to save sinners is a grace that
comes again and again and again as he grows his body together
and he causes his body, his true church, to be a witness to the
Lord Jesus Christ in this hostile world. We need each other. I love how he describes what
happens in believers in the beginning of 2nd Corinthians, in chapter
1. Remarkable description. He says
in verse 3, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comforts.
This is what grace and peace brings, it says in the previous
verse. Who comfort us in all our tribulation, that we may
be able to comfort them which are in any trouble. Are you troubled,
brothers and sisters? If you're not troubled, there's
something wrong with you. If you're not troubled in this
world, you're dead. Through many trials you'll enter
into the kingdom of God, who comforts us. This is our God's
activity, and he does it in the church, he does it through his
people. He comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may
be able to comfort them which are in any trouble by the comfort
wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. If God comforts you,
you'll be a comforted person. For as the sufferings of Christ
abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ. We're consoling people, consoling
fellow sinners on the way to glory. He helped them much. It means
to bring them together. He'd bring them together, those
that had believed through grace. Saving grace is always effective
grace. The true saving grace and true
saving faith doesn't flourish and doesn't grow in the natural
heart and mind. It's always nurtured and fed
from above. I do keep repeating the story
in Pilgrim's Progress of the man, Christian, going into the
interpreter's house and there's a fire and this devil is continually
pouring water on the fire and trying to put the fire out. And
Christian wonders, why, how's the fire still going with all
this being poured upon it all the time? And he takes him around
behind the wall and there's the oil of God the Holy Spirit being
poured on all the time. So we're continually in that
situation, aren't we, brothers and sisters? I believe through
grace there is an almighty spiritual activity of God to bring you
to a place where you are taken and given something which is
not natural to us. To love God as He really is,
is not a natural thing in the heart of Adam's children. It
requires a new creation, created in righteousness and true holiness. It is a sovereign work of God
in which he gets all the glory and his people get all the good
all the time. So, Apollos goes there and he comforts
these people. He helps them much which had
believed through grace. Because for, verse 28, he mightily
convinced the Jews, and that publicly, showing by the Scriptures
that Jesus was the Christ. Now Paul's had that time in Corinth
and we don't read of the same sort of opposition. It seems
as if he left in peace and maybe with Paul out of the road in
Corinth the Jews were stirred up again. And Apollos comes and
he mightily convinced the Jews. He powerfully convinced the Jews.
He defeated them in public debate. It actually means that he argued
down to the finish. You cannot, you cannot have the
scriptures in your hand and deny that the Lord Jesus Christ is
God and deny that he's perfectly successful in all that he ever
came to do. The last word from God is always
going to be the Lord Jesus Christ. the writer to the Hebrews began,
isn't it? God at sundry times and in diverse
manners spoke in time past unto the fathers by the prophets,
hath in these last days spoken unto us by sun, it really says. It's his last word. He doesn't
have to say anymore. Jesus Christ is the last word of God. And
so those that deny him will be left like these Jews were. He argued down to the finish
and he set forth for all to see. He's showing that Jesus was Christ
or Jesus is Christ. Paul gave that lovely description
of his ministry. In Galatians 3, he says, before
whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified
among you. Paul wasn't a witness to it,
but he preached the Lord Jesus Christ out of the Old Testament
and out of the history of the New. And he preached him in such
a way that you could see him hanging on that tree and shedding
his life's blood. but also he preached how that
Christ died. He preached from the scriptures
that the Lord Jesus Christ bore the sins of his own people in
his body on the tree, and God the Father, seeing the Lord Jesus
Christ owning the sins of his people on that cursed tree, in
righteousness and holiness and justice, punished his son to
the full extent of his justice. Paul publicly showed evidently
set forth the Lord Jesus crucified among you." They just had one
message, didn't they? Jesus Christ and Him crucified. When Apollos goes there, now
well taught, having been under the care of Aquila and Priscilla,
he goes there and he does exactly what Paul had left doing. Paul
had done it. He set forth for all to see that
Jesus was the Christ. It is remarkable, isn't it? You
would think that the best thing you could do for that church
in Corinth was to leave Paul there as long as possible. having
spent all that time there, and you would think that the best
thing that the Lord could do was use Paul in mighty ways for
a long time. Where does Paul spend most of
the rest of his ministry? He has three years in Ephesus
that we'll encounter now. The rest of the time, where is
he? He's in jail, thank you very much. He's in jail. What did we say earlier? I will
build my church. I will build my church and I'll
use my chosen instruments. You do well to honour them."
But here in Ephesus, Apollos has come and been taught And
Paul meets these people. So Paul has gone on this remarkable
journey. He's gone from Corinth down to Cypria. He's gone back
to Ephesus. He spent that very short time
in Ephesus. Then he goes all the way back
down the Mediterranean to Caesarea and goes up to Jerusalem, spends
some time in Jerusalem and to Antioch. And then he goes all
the way through Turkey again, but this time he goes up to northern
Turkey, and those places that in Acts 16 God had said, you
cannot go there, you're on your way to Philippi, because I have
a lady there who I've loved from all eternity, and her name's
Lydia. And I have a jailer there in Philippi. You're going across
to Macedonia, Paul. And he wasn't allowed to go there,
but now, this time in Acts 19, we have the fact that he did
go through, he passed through those upper coasts. And he came
to Ephesus. Now Ephesus becomes this incredibly
significant church, doesn't it? It is the church which is in
some ways the leading church in a whole region of Western
Turkey when it comes to the letters in the book of Revelation to
the church as Ephesus is the first. And we have this remarkable
letter to the Ephesians. So as we're looking at the work
of the God in Ephesus, it would be good for you to spend a little
bit of time, if the Lord allows, in the book of Ephesians so that
you can see the things that are so clearly laid out here become
more and more significant. So here we are, Paul in Ephesus,
where he'll spend three years. It's now AD 52, roughly. But as with the polis, we find
these other people that are there. and he came and he finding certain
disciples, in verse two, he said unto them, have you received
the Holy Ghost since you believed? Now Paul must have had a reason
to ask that question, and obviously we're not given that reason,
but one of the remarkable things about Apollos and these 12 when
they're put side by side in the Scriptures is that Apollos was
mighty in the Scriptures, and he was fervent in spirit, and
he was instructed in the way of the Lord, But he still had
some things that he needed to learn, and Apollos was like these
men. You see, that word disciples
means learner. Learner. And God's children never
cease to be learners. Never cease to be learners. But
these men obviously had caused Paul, they had been brought there
by a sovereign hand of God. Paul had been brought there,
they had been brought there, and it's very evident that they
hadn't been there during the ministry of Apollos in Ephesus
and they hadn't met Priscilla and Aquila. The timing of God
is always perfect, brothers and sisters. He'll put you in a place
where the things that you need to be taught to be used of God
in the future will come together and come to pass. But it's interesting,
isn't it, how now 20 years post the resurrection of the Lord
Jesus Christ, and with all of what we read in Acts, we still
find these scattered groups of people, and people like Apollos,
and it just shows you how diverse and possibly how small the believers
were, and how few there were that were taught, and how little
was disseminated, and how isolated these people were. So let's read
about these men. And he said, verse two, have
you received the Holy Ghost since you believed? And they said unto
him, we have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost. Now I don't think that Paul would
be calling them disciples, the Holy Spirit would be declaring
them disciples and them not knowing that there was any Holy Ghost. John's ministry was a ministry
of declaring that behold the Lamb of God who takes away the
sin of the world. He says, He must increase and
I must decrease. When they heard John, as we saw
last week in John chapter 1, they heard John and they followed
the Lord Jesus and He declared of Him, He will baptise you with
the Holy Ghost. And He spoke of the declaration
of God in John's Gospel. When the Holy Ghost comes down
on this particular man, you will know that he's Messiah. John
didn't know who he was until he was revealed to him of God.
But John's message was the message of the Messiah, was the message
of the Lamb of God, and was the message of the Spirit of God.
John was filled with the Spirit from his mother's womb, and he
spoke of the Lord Jesus Christ, who was baptised with the Spirit,
and he was preached of the Holy Spirit. So the question is, what
did they not know? I don't think, I think the story
is, seeing they were still disciples of John, these men had not heard
of the events of Pentecost, and they hadn't heard of the massive
outpouring of the Holy Spirit. You can't know the Scriptures
and not see the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament and the promises
to be fulfilled in Joel chapter 2, for example, of the Spirit
coming. And John, priest of the Lord
Jesus Christ, So these men come there to be
used at the beginning of this church and the first thing they
do is they meet Paul. And he asks that question and
they answer. And like others in the New Testament
and others in the book of Acts, we find these people that have
an interest like Cornelius in the things of God. And then an
apostle comes along. And then you have those people
in Acts chapter 8 down in Samaria where Philip had gone there and
he'd baptised all of these people. And then the apostles come and
they lay hands on them and they receive the gifts of the Holy
Spirit. And I think it's more accurate
to think that that was the case here. One of the original texts says
that we had not, we had only heard that there is a Holy Ghost. So Paul asked the question in
9 verse 3. And to what then were you baptised? And they said,
John's baptism. See, Paul assumes that these
people were baptised. In all the New Testament, the
believers were baptised believers. And John's baptism follows John's
doctrine, as I said, in the teaching of the Lord. See, John didn't
baptise in his own name. He said, behold the Lamb of God
who takes away the sin of the world. And I think the best way
for us to understand what can be a difficult passage when you
look at it is to look at it in light of what Paul then says
to these people. So they say, we haven't heard
that there is a Holy Ghost. And he said unto them, unto them,
what will you baptise? And they said, John's baptism.
And in verse 4, Paul gives a description of, and verse 5, he gives a description
of what happened at John's baptism. Then said Paul, John verily baptized
with a baptism of repentance, saying unto the people that they
should believe on him who should come after him, that is, on Christ
Jesus. John the Baptist was pointing
to the Lord Jesus Christ in everything he did. You should believe on him that
comes after you, after me. And when they heard this, when
these people heard this, they were baptised in the name of
the Lord Jesus Christ. And I think it's right and proper
for us to see that Paul is actually giving a description of what
happened. When they heard John's preaching of the Lord Jesus Christ,
they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. There's
no mention of Paul baptizing these people at all. Luke doesn't
say that these people were baptized by Paul. So in Acts 19, four
and five, we have Luke describing what Paul said. And in 19, verse
six, we have a description of what
Paul actually did. And when Paul had laid his hands
upon them, the Holy Ghost came upon them, and they spoke with tongues and
prophesied. So the question in this verse
is used by those who want to re-baptise people. But there
is no one of John's baptism rebaptised in all of the New Testament.
Apollos was obviously ignorant of things, fundamental things,
and he was taught by some tent makers. The fundamental word
in all of this is that they were disciples, they were learners.
Apollos was a learner. He was willing to be taught by
tent makers, willing to be helped in his teaching by a woman, Priscilla. So when we come When we come
to a passage of scripture that baffles us, it's really good
to go back and ponder some fundamental principles of it. There's no
other recorded incident of this again. Apollos wasn't re-baptised,
none of the apostles were re-baptised. John's baptism was the baptism
of the Lord Jesus Christ. It was equivalent to the baptism
that was going on. There were two groups baptising
on the Jordan. John and his disciples were baptising
and Jesus and his disciples were baptising. You read about it
in John chapter 1. And both of them were baptising the same
baptism, and none of them had to be re-baptised. There's not
an incident of it in the New Testament. And so if we find
something like this, which is contrary to the teaching and
contrary to the pictures we have in the New Testament, we have
to say, well, do I need to understand this more clearly? And I think
where we're at is the best way to understand it. Because Paul
would be saying, if he re-baptised these people, that John's baptism
wasn't an adequate baptism. and everyone and all of the scriptures
say that it was. You see when When there is no
Old Testament or New Testament precept or type to indicate that
there's a need for it, then we just go back and say, what was
really going on here? See, all that God does is revealed,
and any change God makes to the way he does things is always
heralded in word and type. So, for example, there was this
time of the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ when the law is
fulfilled. And it's pictured in so many
ways, isn't it? Moses didn't enter the Promised
Land. It was Joshua, the Lord Jesus,
pictured, that took the people into the Promised Land. You don't
get into the new creation, you don't get into heaven, by works. There is, as Jeremiah 31 and
many other places talk about a time of change coming, and
when Joel speaks of this time coming, we are herald of these
things and we see them in type and pictures. We see the gathering
of the Gentiles in Acts. But we are promised about the
gathering of the Gentiles in Genesis 12 when God promises
to Abraham and all through the Old Testament. And Paul would
have had a stack of verses that he brought out to show that the
work of God is a work that goes way, way beyond the Jewish people.
It's the world of John chapter 3. So if you discover something
new in the scriptures that no one else has ever seen and you
can't see it anywhere else, throw it away. And I asked the Lord,
I love what Spurgeon said, he said, the difficulties in scripture
are just prayer skills to go and wait on the Lord. See, these people weren't ignorant
of John's fame or preeminence. They were just ignorant of what
happened on the day of Pentecost and what had happened otherwise.
And people lived in very isolated communities, and John the Baptist
commanded and demanded because of the wonder of who he was.
He demanded, he didn't command it, but people out of love for
him and care for him remained his disciples for a long, long
time. And so we have these two incidents that are placed side
by side, Apollos and these 12. And so we have these beautiful
pictures of the beginning of this church in Ephesus. These
people are disciples and these twelve are going to have a significant
role in the Ephesian church. And they are going to be gathered
in and they are going to sit there together with Paul for
that three months and then they are going to be kicked out of
that synagogue And now we're going to join with Priscilla
and Aquila at the beginning of their church. And the great comforting
verse that I keep delighting in is the fact that God promises
again and again in John 6 and Jeremiah 31 and Hebrews. He says,
they'll all be taught of God. And if they're taught of God,
they come to me. And if they're taught of God
and they come to me, then great is their peace. The reality is
they're all things that we are ignorant of. And they're always
things. They're always things that we
need to be taught. God's people are always learners. And the wonderful thing in the
providence of God is that he sets a limit to the ignorance
of his people. He brings them to a place where
they will be humbled and taught. Like these men, we don't know
where they came from, but in the providence of God he brought
those twelve there at precisely the same time he sent Paul there.
And he said, Apollos away, before Paul came. So Paul begins his
three years in Ephesus. He begins by a demonstration
with these twelve men. They were baptised in the name
that when Paul laid his hands on them the Holy Ghost came upon
them and they spoke with tongues and prophesied. A couple of things
that are really important. Obviously the tongues there are
other languages. They were in Acts chapter 2,
they were in Acts chapter 10 and 11. Tongues are known languages. And it's like me being given
the ability to speak in any language and the Tamil people I was with
understanding everything I was, everything I said. And anyone
who speaks in tongues according to Acts chapter 2, they're going
to speak of the wonderful works of God. What do they hear? We hear them speak in our own
tongues the wonderful works of God. If you're not hearing wonderful
works of God, if you're hearing wonderful works of man, these
people haven't been. They haven't had this gift of
tongues. The other thing that's so evident,
of course, is that the apostles were able to give these particular
gifts and no one else in all of the New Testament ever gave
them. No one ever gave them. You can
read in Acts chapter 8 where Philip had gone down and no doubt
the people there in Samaria had heard the gospel clearly from
Philip and they were baptised. But it was when the apostles
came, the apostles laid hands on them. They laid hands on them and they
received the Holy Spirit, they received the Holy Ghost. So nowhere
in the scriptures do we see these gifts that are spoken of in Corinth
being given by men other than apostles to men. So it necessarily
means that the entire charismatic and Pentecostal movement has
always been false. And there is no justification.
It's false on account of what it says about the Lord Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. It's false in what it says about
man and his fall. It's also a force in what it
claims that it can do and bring. And I have seen enormous damage
done to people that I love by being caught up in that nonsense.
I pray it doesn't happen to you. Paul comes there and begins this
ministry. He begins this ministry which
will result in all sorts of things, as we'll see, that are extraordinary
demonstrations of the remarkable work of God in his life and through
him. But he begins with these people,
these twelve, who are taught, they are learners, they now receive
the Holy Ghost in a manifest way and they speak in tongues. They were set right. I love what
Paul says in Ephesians 4.14, that we all come, verse 13, to
we all come in the unity of the faith and in the knowledge of
the Son of God, under the perfect man, under the measure of the
stature of the fullness of Christ, that henceforth, that we henceforth
be no more children tossed to and fro and carried about with
every wind of doctrine and by the slight of men and the cunning
craftiness whereby they lay. lie in wait to deceive. But speaking the truth in love
may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ,
from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted
by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working
in the measure of every part, making increase of the body unto
the edifying of itself in love. Paul set these men who were going
to be used in Ephesus on a foundation of the Lord Jesus Christ and
him crucified. And if you want to know what he preached to them,
and if you want to know what they preached, you just read
the opening chapter of Ephesians, you'll have absolutely no doubt
about what he preached to them. God's people are in need of teaching
and God will bring in the building of his church and he will gather
them together and they will no longer be ignorant. They will,
in the words of Ephesians, be made 13. In Him you trusted after you
heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. In
Him also after that you believed, you were sealed with that Holy
Spirit of the Christ. The church of Ephesus has such
a significant place and it's lovely to see how God in His
sovereign mercy brought Paul and these twelve together. And I'll finish with Romans 8.32. This church is well supplied. He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also
freely give us all things? He's purchased the Church with
His own blood, brothers and sisters, and no harm is going to come
to His Church. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father,
we pray that You'd cause us to be wise in our discernment and
understanding of Your Word, Heavenly Father, and may we look to You
to be our teacher and guide. And you'll guide our feet into
the way of peace. You'll guide our feet to the
foot of the cross in the will of Jesus Christ. And you'll cause
us, Heavenly Father, by the circumstances of our lives, for us to be learners,
for us to be continually looking to Him, to see His shed blood. And may that wine and that oil
of the grace of the Holy Spirit be applied to our hearts in recovery. Grant us simply the grace to
trust Your Son. Trust Him for what He has done
and trust Him for what He is doing and trust Him because of
who He is, our Father. Grant us the grace to simply
believe and be strengthened in that belief, our Father. For
we pray in Jesus' name and for His glory. Amen. you