Acts chapter 20. Paul kept back nothing that was profitable to the church. No matter how mad it made everyone
else. And it's going to make some mad. Some mad, some sad,
and some glad. It'll have its effect. The gospel
will have its effect. A good husband is one that provides
for the family. He's one that keeps back nothing
that is profitable for the family. A good wife, mother, is one that
keeps back nothing. She said, well, I'm going to
keep this. This is for me. I'll keep this for me. You know, my
mother, I look back, and she does it to this day. We go over
to her house and eat. She's the last one to sit down.
You can't get her to sit down. She keeps back nothing that's
possible for the family until the whole family is sitting there
eating. Then she sits down. And that's what Paul's saying.
He said he kept back nothing. He didn't sit down. He wore himself
out. Paul wore himself out preaching
the gospel. Traveling all over the place. Walking. Going by ship. That was a tough journey. Tough
journey. And I have no doubt here that
when he sent these on by ship, There in verse 13, he went before
to his ship, sailed to Assos, there intending to take in Paul,
for so he had appointed, minding himself to go afoot. Paul wanted
to walk this time. You know, I have no doubt he
probably wanted to preach the gospel, but I think he probably
wanted to be alone, some time to think, to meditate. You know, sometimes you've got
to get away from the crowd so you can think and meditate. And
as he thought upon these things and meditated upon these things,
he was impressed to go to Ephesus and call the elders there, the
pastors. And he wanted to be very honest
with them. This is the last time they were going to see his face.
Every time we stand in the pulpit, my honest, be honest with the
people. Be honest with the people and
keep back nothing that's profitable. Paul never feared losing the
crowd because of his message. As we have gone through the book
of Acts, he never toned it down, did he? He didn't take the edge
off from it. He never tried to appease anyone. He laid it out because God saves
men By the gospel, not another gospel.
I mean the truth. Not something close to it. But the gospel. The truth. He doesn't save them any other
way. And then our first priority in
preaching is this. To glorify God. Teaching this
morning. Preaching now. Our first priority
is to glorify God. God's business is to save sinners. Now, I don't know where in the
past it became the preacher's business to try to get people
saved. I'm not trying to get anyone
saved. I'm trying to preach the gospel, to declare the truth. God will save when the truth
is preached and the gospel comes in power. God will save, but
it's my responsibility to glorify God. And in doing so, sinners
will be saved. Sinners will be saved. I can't
save no one. I can't talk someone into salvation.
I can talk you into a profession, but you can't talk someone into
being saved. God saves. It's Him who saves. And we are to preach, and we
stand to preach, all the counsel of God as it is revealed in the
Scriptures. We do not go through the Scriptures
and pick and choose what we want to preach. That's why it's so
good to go verse by verse. If we go verse by verse, we will
accomplish this purpose in preaching all the counsel of God. It's not for us to pick and choose
it. It's not for us to pick and choose what we think is profitable.
You know, for someone to go through here and pick and choose what
he thinks is profitable has completely missed the Scriptures because
it's all profitable. From Genesis to Revelation, every portion
of this book is profitable for our learning. It's profitable.
That's what Paul told Timothy. It's all profitable. But what
so many do is pick what is profitable for them. What's profitable for
men? The wolves feed themselves. The wolves fleece the sheep.
That's what they do. And Paul gives warning to this
in this chapter. He gives warning as we go down
through this. But now let's look back here
at verse 19 and go verse by verse. I looked at this and there were
several verses that I wanted to just pick and preach from.
And maybe we'll go back and do that. But I think this morning
we need to just look at the rest of this chapter. Now Paul points
out to these pastors his serving the Lord, his attitude in it. He says here in verse 19 that
he served the Lord with all humility of mind and with many tears and
many temptations. Now he's not bragging on his
humility. There wouldn't be humility, would it? That wouldn't be humility
to stand and brag about your humility. But Paul was telling
them this. He stated this fact because he's
saying to these pastors, this is how we serve the Lord in all
humility and lowliness of mind. Remember, you don't have to come
and listen to me. You don't have to come here and
listen. You can go somewhere else and listen to somebody else.
You know, people, it's easy, this is why Paul told Timothy
not to put a novice in the pulpit, lest they be lifted up with pride.
Paul's in the same snare as the devil. It's easy to get lifted
up with pride here. People start to listen to you,
they want to hear you, and the next thing you know, you think
you can preach. I don't think a man can preach
until he learns he can't. Until he learns he cannot preach.
then maybe God will enable him to preach. But Paul said he served
with all humility of mind. His service in the ministry was
not with pride of grace. It was not with pride of race
or pride of place, but with humbleness of mind. Who am I? David said,
Who am I and what is my house? Who am I that God would choose
me and call me and equip me and enable me to feed the church
of God which He purchased with His own blood? That ought to
be very humbling. It ought to be. And it is to
those whom God calls and uses. God broke Paul. He made him know
that he was nothing. There was a time that Paul thought
he was something, but God taught him he was nothing. And I believe
God teaches that to every one of His children. Without me,
Christ said, you can do nothing. Nothing. At one time, He gave
Paul a thorn in the flesh to keep him, listen, to keep him
humble, lest he be lifted up with pride through the abundance
of revelations. He knows how to keep us humble.
He knows how to do that. And Paul said he served with
humbleness of mind and tears. Weeping. Weeping over his own sinfulness,
his own weakness. And weeping over the sins of
others. You know, it broke his heart. And there's nothing...
I've heard Henry say this in time gone by. There's nothing
more breaking to the heart than to watch someone who has professed
a gospel fall away. Or to watch someone stumble and
fall, get caught up in something. And Paul said that with tears.
With tears. Demuth hath forsaken me, having
loved this present world. You think that didn't have an
effect on him? He said he's done it with tears.
He's a pattern for all who minister the gospel. He's a pattern. And
he said, and I've kept back nothing that was profitable to you. Paul wanted the best for the
churches. When he went and preached, he
poured out his heart. We just read it last week in
this chapter. That young man fell out the window
because Paul was so long in preaching. He preached all night. When that
young man fell out of the window, you'd have thought the service
would have ended after he woke up, after he was revived. You'd have thought, well, we'd
better go home. It's late. You know what they
did? They went back upstairs and preached
to the breaking of day. Because he wasn't going to see
them anymore. And he wanted them to know, he wanted that church
to know the Lord Jesus Christ. and to be established in Him.
I kept back nothing that's profitable for you. No matter what it cost
me. It cost Paul everything. It cost
him everything. But he kept back nothing that
was profitable. What he did and what he preached, he said he
did it publicly and from house to house. Not privately, not
afraid of retribution. He said, I did it publicly and
I went house to house preaching the gospel. laid out my life
to the preaching of the gospel. I called Todd yesterday. I asked
him, I said, Todd, have you ever taught this in a preacher school
down in Mexico? I said, man, I've been reading
this. I said, what an outline for the preacher school. Todd
said, yeah, I've already done that. I figured he had. But I read that, and I thought,
man, what an outline for a preacher school. And this is really, I
started the title, it's a preacher school. That's who he's talking
to here, these pastors, and he's instructing them in ministering
to God's people. And then he says here in verse
21, he gets to the heart of the message. He said that he had
preached, testifying both to the Jews and also to the Greeks,
the same message, repentance toward God and faith toward our
Lord Jesus Christ. When we preach Christ and Him
crucified, these two things are always called for. Repentance
toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Faith toward the
Lord Jesus Christ. Why? Why do we do this? Well, first of all, repentance
toward God is because God is the one we sinned against. We
have offended God's law, although we may sin against each
other, it's God whom we sin against. Really, our sin is against God.
David said this after putting Uriah, the Hittite, to death
by Sheba's husband and then having committed adultery with her.
He said, Against thee and thee only have I sinned and done this
evil in thy sight. But it comes right down to us.
Even though we may sin against each other and do things against
each other we ought not do. Our sin ultimately is against
God. It's against God. God who is holy, who is light,
who is good, who is love, says God is love. God who gives us
our breath, God who gives us our daily bread. God who gives
us our strength. God who gives us our intelligence
to even do what we do. He's the one we've sinned against. He's the one we have rebelled
against. He's the one we have taken our fist and shaken in
His face. Wishing by nature now, every
one of us this way by nature, wishing there was no God. Well, you know, men are such
natural idiots. If there was no God, there wouldn't
be you. There wouldn't be anything that
exists. Everything exists because of Him. He made all things. Everything you and I will enjoy
this day, God made. He's given us all things to enjoy
in their proper place. He's the one we've rebelled against.
Adam. Adam. In a perfect garden. In a perfect place. Everything
about the Garden of Eden, everything about it was absolutely perfect. And he sinned against God. He
rebelled against God. That's why he taught repentance
toward God. Now, I know there are many so-called
repentants that's not toward God. They're
passed off as being toward God, but they're
not. There's a repentance caused by shame that's not toward God. A person gets caught with his
hand in the cookie jar or some other worse thing, and they're
ashamed. They are ashamed. If they hadn't
gotten caught, they would remain the same. Their
hand would still be in the cookie jar if they hadn't gotten caught.
Then there's repentance caused by grief. Sin causes pain, doesn't it?
It causes pain or sickness. But once the pain is over, Yeah,
I've seen this. Once the pain is gone, the dog
returns to his vomit. Then there's a repentance caused
by fear of punishment. The thief is caught. I told you this before. Mom dished out most of the, we
call them whippings. Today, it's not politically correct
to say that, but we got whippings. And we got good ones, too. But
she would do that, and I was just dancing around while she
was whipping me, telling her I wouldn't do it anymore. She should have
whipped me for lying, because I did it again. But I wasn't
going to do it anymore. I said, I won't do it no more.
I won't do it no more. I remember saying that, just trying to get her to stop. That was a false repentance,
wasn't it? That was a false repentance because
I did it again. And there's people who have that
fear of punishment. Preachers stand in a pulpit.
You're going to hell. You're going to go to hell if
you don't change your ways. You're going to go to hell if you do
change your ways. The only way you're not going
to go to hell is if God changed your heart. If God Almighty does something
in you as well as for you. That's what I need. That's subtle,
isn't it? Subtle. They tell people if you
accept Jesus as your personal Savior and change your ways and
make peace with God. I can't make peace with God.
Christ is our peace. He made the peace. He's our peace. That's what we have to point
out to sinners is Christ is our peace with God. It's not me making
peace. And that's a false repentance.
There's no salvation. There's no repentance in that.
That's nothing but worldly sorrow. And then there's a repentance
that comes from our upbringing. Train a child up in the way of
You have to go and not depart from it? A guilt. You know, some people
have this. They have a guilt for offending
their parents. You know, they're raised up and
they go off and they do some things and they just feel guilty
about it because they were not raised to be like that. So they
make a repentance. They say they're sorry. They
feel sorry for their actions. You know, he'd make a profession.
But that's not repentance. Listen, Paul said it right. It's repentance toward God. It's not repentance. It's repentance
toward God. I've offended God. I've broke His law. I've hated
Him. hated Him. Every person outside
of Christ hates God. Now, they hate God. Now, they
say, well, no, I don't really hate Him. No, you hate God. Outside
of Christ, you hate Him. You're born with a nature of
enmity. It's against God. It's repentance toward God. It's
a true conviction of sin and not just over acts of sin. It's
a real conviction of wretchedness. O wretched man that I am." That's
what it is. It's repentance that has to do
with offending God. That's what it has to do with.
Like that psalmist was saying, who's been so good to me. You
know, it's the goodness of God, the Scripture says, that leads
to repentance. It's not scaring someone. It's
not hellfire brimstone. It's God's goodness. That leads
to true repentance. at least a true repentance. It
has to do with what I am. Not just some things I've done.
It's what I am. I can straighten up, but I'll
still be the same thing. Still be the same person. Still have
the same old heart. True repentance is toward God.
And listen. And it always involves this.
True repentance always involves this. Faith. in the Lord Jesus
Christ. You cannot have one and not have
the other. You can't do it. You cannot have
repentance toward God and not faith in Christ because that's
not true repentance. When you see, he said this, they
shall mourn when? When they look on him whom they
have They shall mourn when they look on him whom they have pierced."
That's when you'll have true repentance, when you see him,
when you look to him. That's when you'll experience
true repentance. Now, we know that faith is a
gift of God, and repentance is a gift of God, because they come
together. I'm not going to say which one comes first. Someone
said to me one time, which came first, the chicken or the egg?
I said the chicken did. God made it. But I can't tell
you this one. I'll tell you what Paul put in
this order, repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Faith always follows repentance. Always. And it's always, now
listen, towards the Lord Jesus Christ. We trust Him as our mediator. We trust Him as our sacrifice.
We trust Him to wash us from our sins through His blood. We trust Him for all righteousness. Before I heard Henry preaching
the gospel, I never thought anything about the righteousness of Christ
or my need of it. The only thing I thought of,
you repent and you just live right and you accept Jesus as your
personal Savior and you go to church. I need His righteousness. I need
His righteousness. And we trust Him for it. We look
to Christ. We don't look to these things
separated from Christ. We look to Him as our all in
all. He's our wisdom, He's our righteousness. He didn't just provide wisdom,
He is our wisdom. He didn't just provide righteousness,
He is our righteousness. He is these things to us. He's our all in all. And we take
Him at His word, don't we? Faith takes Him at His word and follows Him. Faith and repentance, as I said,
can't be separated. It's like this sheet of paper.
You can't have one side without the other. You just can't have
it. And that's what Paul told these
elders. He said, this is my message. This is what I preach. Repentance
toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. And then he
says, and now, behold, I go bound in spirit to Jerusalem, not knowing
the things there that shall befall me. He knew there was going to
be trouble. And where he went there was trouble.
Except that the Holy Ghost witnesses in every city saying that bonds
and afflictions abide me. Trouble is waiting on you, Paul.
Trouble is going to follow the gospel. Satan is always close
by. He's like a dog on the chain
that's always barking. Always barking. Always wanting
in. He wants the sheep. He loves
sheep food. He doesn't like what the sheep
eat, but he likes to eat the sheep. Like the wolves, they're easy
prey. Easy prey. Not much fighting
sheep, really. That's why he wants the sheep. And Paul, he knew that there
was going to be trouble following him because of the gospel. But
none of these things... Now listen to this. He's telling
these men this. These pastors. He said, none of these things
move me, scare me, frighten me off. Neither count I my life
dear unto myself. Whatever you count dear to yourself,
you'll hold back. You'll keep it. You'll keep it. You'll hide it. Whatever it takes,
you'll keep it. But if you don't count your life
dear to you, then you won't count anything else. Nothing else will
rival the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, I count not, neither
count I my life dear to myself, and here's the reason why, so
that I might finish my course. I might finish it with joy in the ministry which
I have received of the Lord Jesus. Every believer, every believer,
needs to come to this place. Not just the pastor. Definitely
the pastor, but not just the pastor. Every believer needs
to come to this place. I count not my life dear to me. This place is not just for missionaries
and evangelists. It's for all of us. All of us. And he said that I might finish
my course with joy. And the minister would say, which
I have received of the Lord Jesus." Many men, many men have turned
back, have gone AWOL because the cost was too great. They
said, well, I didn't know it was going to cost my life. I
thought I was going to make a good living out of this. They've gone back. Many men have
held back things that was profitable for the people, but too costly
for them. Or at least they've counted it
that way. And they've held back. And Paul says don't hold back
anything. He's giving himself here as a pattern to these pastors.
Don't count your life a deal. Don't count these things above
Christ. Not at all. I thought last night As I was
going over this, I thought, we all like to think that they would
be martyrs. We all like to think we'd be
a martyr, don't we? When in reality, we find it hard to sacrifice
time. Really, we find it hard enough to sacrifice time, let
alone life. My life. That's what I thought when I
read that. I thought, man, we grovel over time. Sacrificing
some time. Paul said, I count not my life
dear. I've sacrificed my life. And here's his ministry. To testify
the Gospel of the grace of God. You know, everywhere Paul went
preaching the Gospel, when he went there the first time, nobody
liked him. There was no one in town looking
for him. There was no one in town saying, Paul, come over
here. and preach the gospel of grace to us. Paul said, God's given me a message.
It's a message of grace. Grace for the guilty. To preach
the unsearchable riches of Christ to sinners. Ungodly, God-hating
sinners. Paul, you gave everything up
for that? To go preach to a bunch of people that don't want it? Yes. To testify the gospel of
the grace of God. You know why? Because he was
one of those people at one time who didn't want it. Despised
Jesus Christ. Hated the church of God. Wasted
it, he said. Wasted it. And now he says here in verse
25, And now, behold, I know that
you all among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of God
shall see my face no more. You will not see me again. And
this caused great sadness. I can imagine being there what
sadness it caused. It caused great sadness. Now
he says here, wherefore I take you directly this day
That I am pure from the blood of all men. I kept back nothing.
That which God revealed to me, I preached to you. I told you
everything God gave me to tell you. I didn't hold back any of
it. For I have not shunned to declare
unto you all the counsel of God. Has God revealed it? You know,
there's much about the counsel of God we don't know. But there's
a lot revealed here in the Scriptures. Paul said, I have not shunned
I have not shunned to declare to you all the counsel of God. Now take heed, you pastors, you
elders. Take heed, therefore, to yourselves.
Study the word of God. Be careful. Don't get caught
up. Don't get caught up in divisions and this and that. Don't get
caught up in that genealogies, you know, all of that stuff.
Don't get caught up in that. Take heed, therefore, to yourself
and to all the flock. over the which the Holy Ghost
hath made you overseers." You know, Paul laid his hands on
these men, but the Holy Spirit made them overseers. The Holy
Spirit is the one who places the pastor in the church. He's
the one who gives the pastor. To feed the church of God, feed
of what? Knowledge. That's what it says
over in Ezekiel. Feed them with knowledge. Knowledge
of Christ. Knowledge of God. Knowledge of
the counsel of God that's found in the Word of God. Feed them.
Don't just fulfill a service. Don't just conduct a service. Feed the people. If I invited
you to my house for dinner, and you came over, and we just went
down and watched TV. We watched a food program. Turn
on the food network and say, listen, I didn't feel like cooking
today, but they got a good meal going on TV. Really, that's what most
of them are doing. And they're preaching. They're
not feeding the church of God. He says, you study and you pray,
and when you stand in that pulpit, you feed the flock. Feed my sheep. Feed my lambs. Which He hath purchased. Boy,
here's the weight of it. Here's the responsibility of
it. Which He hath purchased with His own blood. Purchased people. You are a purchased people. You who believe God. Christ died
on the cross. He shed His blood for you. He
purchased you. And He's telling these elders,
you feed that church which God has purchased with His own blood.
And Paul says, he gives them warning here, I know this, that
after my departing, shall grievous wolves, not tame, not calm, grievous
wolves are going to enter in among you, not sparing the flock.
You know, Satan doesn't know what mercy is. I
can't imagine, you can't even imagine this, that something
is so evil that there's never even a spark of mercy. I try
to just, sometimes I try to comprehend this, but with Satan, he never thinks one good thing. There's never a, you know, we
can, even naturally speaking, we, and this is This is no doubt
sovereign constraint. But men will show mercy to men,
won't they? They will even show it to their
family. But Satan knows nothing of mercy. He knows nothing of
grace. He knows nothing of goodness. Love doesn't even exist. These
things don't even exist in his nature. Nothing but pure, unadulterated
evil. And these who come in are his
followers. These are his false prophets.
And they're not going to spare the flock. Not until they destroy
every one of them. Also of your own selves shall
men arise. Here's the sad part. Here's the
toughest part. Among your own selves. You wouldn't
think that, would you? Among your own selves men arise.
Speaking perverse things. Things that are not so. Things
that are not according to the gospel. That's what they're going
to do. Drawing away disciples after
themselves. Therefore, watch and remember. Always be on guard. Always be on the wall. The watchman
should always be on the wall watching. And remember that by
the space of three years, I cease not to warn everyone night and
day with tears. He's sitting here. I'm a fatter.
He's not doing this in a bragging way, but he's saying, for three
years, night and day, he said, I've warned and I've wept and
I've prayed over this. Now brethren, I commend you to
God. I commend you to God. He's the
one who can keep you. He's the one who can keep you.
I can't keep you. I cannot keep you. But He can. Because I'm not going to be here
anymore, he said. There'll come a time I won't be here. We all have
to leave sooner or later. But I commend you to God and to the Word of His grace,
the Gospel, which is able to build you up and give you an
inheritance among all them which are sanctified. Paul says, I've
coveted no man's silver or gold or peril. This has been my conduct
and attitude in the ministry. I've done it with humility, with
tears, and I have not coveted what the people have. I've not
coveted their possessions. I've coveted them. I want you,
he says, I want you to know Christ. I want you to know Him. He says, Yourselves know that
these hands have ministered to my necessities and to them that
were with me. I have showed you all things.
How that's so laboring? You ought to support the weak
and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, it is
more blessed to give than to receive. That's opposite of the
world, isn't it? Total opposite of this world.
But that's God. That's God. It's more blessed
to give than to receive. And when he had thus spoken,
when he had thus ended the class, He kneeled down and he prayed
with them all. And they all wept sore and fell
on Paul's neck and kissed him. Because he said, you're not going
to see my face no more. He's going to go to Jerusalem
and he's going to end up in Rome and he's going to end up in prison
until he dies. He's executed. But what instructions? Not just
for the pastors and elders, but for the whole church. When we
read this, what instructions? This is the way a ministry is
to be conducted.