Acts chapter 8, I'm going to
read verses 1 through verse 4. Acts 8, 1 through 4, because
I think that's all we're going to be able to work through tonight,
is verses 1 through 4. A significant transition from
our last contemplation with our brother Stephan. And we saw him
apprehended by the Sanhedrin. and then put to death. And so
verse one opens up this way, and Saul was consenting unto
his death. And at that time, there was a
great persecution against the church, which was at Jerusalem. And they were all scattered abroad
throughout the region of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. And devout men carried Stephen
to his burial and made a great lamentation over him, As for
Saul, he made havoc of the church, entering into every house and
hailing men and women, committed them to prison. Therefore, they that were scattered
abroad went everywhere preaching the word. Thus is the reading
of the scripture. Where are we at? We are at a
transition point in some sense. In most of your Bibles, chapter
eight, verse one, opens up with an and. In our English language,
an and is a clause that connects the present statement with the
previous statement. That's why the translators put
the word and there, but the and is not in the original language.
It's not a legitimate chi. It shouldn't actually be there,
but we are seeking to make sure we understand the relationship
between what happened to Stephan and the new subject of chapter
eight. And that's the title of our study
tonight is the tribulation of the saints, Saul, Philip and
Saul, Saul, Philip and Saul. And so what Luke is doing now
is introducing us to a new party. And that new party will be Saul.
He'll take a break from Saul here in a moment, and then he
will call our attention to Philip. And we will return again to Saul,
who will then be the main person with whom we have to deal with
from chapters nine all the way through the end of the book of
Acts. And so if we were to raise the
question, who is the primary subject of our text in front
of us, who would that be? Saul, Saul would be the primary
subject. And if you guys are learning
Greek now, you would know that a subject now is understood as
a nominative, right? A nominative. And so for those
of you who are trying to get a handle on how to structure
the verses, Saul is our subject. He is the one that Luke now under
inspiration of the spirit wants to call to our attention. This
is the first time that we are meeting Saul, right? And, uh,
there's a lot to learn about Saul who will eventually become
a very important person in our study. And, uh, but right now
the way that Luke is bringing him in is to demonstrate Saul
as actually part of the constituency called the Pharisees, the Sanhedrin. And he played a major role in
the death of Stephen for it says in verse one, he was consenting
unto his death. Do you guys see that? And Saul
was consenting unto his death. So if we were coming in on the
tail end of part one of a movie, and now we're moving to part
two, scene two, the first person we would see is Saul. And the
only thing we would know about Saul is that he would be consenting
unto his death, right? And that's what the text says.
He was consenting unto. Now his is what we would call
a what? A pronoun, right? Well, we don't
know who his is if we start at verse one of chapter eight, do
we? So this pronoun his would have to go back and find an antecedent
in the previous verse. So who is the his here? Stephan,
right? Technically Stephan. And so Saul
was consenting unto Stephan's death. consenting unto his death. And in fact, we're getting ready
to see how horrible it is to be unsaved and be given over
to a diabolical spirit of antipathy and hatred and hostility towards
God. To be unsaved and to be given
over to a diabolical spirit of antipathy. What does antipathy
means? It means the opposite of sympathetic,
the opposite of passionate, the opposite of caring, antipathetic,
antipathos. And so to be antipathetic means
to be hostile, to be adversarial, to be in disagreement with. And
the text literally says, and Saul was consenting unto his
death. Now the word consent means to
agree with. And what he was doing was agreeing with the counsel
of those who ran up on Stephen. Remember? Closing their ears,
gnashing their teeth, and putting him to death. Saul was consenting. The literal phraseology is this. And Saul took up the same pleasurable
hatred and hostility against Stephen that all the rest of
the mob did. In other words, you cannot separate
Paul or Saul from the mob. He is one with the mob. He is
in full agreement with the mob. What the mob is doing now, we'll
talk about this in a moment. Paul, or Saul rather, is in full
agreement with it. Do not separate. This is why
Luke is calling our attention to him. Now mark this now, Luke
is the human author of our text. Also mark this, that Luke is
also one who loves the apostle Paul passionately. But, but therefore
you and I must know then that as he is recalling and writing
the history of Paul's, our Saul's experience and involvement with
the people of God, he has to be very objective. He has to
be very truthful. He has to be very honest. So
he has to separate himself from his love for the apostle Paul
and say what the apostle Paul was in his unsafe state. Is that
true? And we must also understand the
theological verity in that, and that is prior to our salvation,
we are monsters. And we have to be willing to
say that. In other words, because I've heard this for years, I've
heard people say, you know, I'm not like everyone else. I know,
you know, I know I wasn't saved, but I had a kind heart and I
liked people. And I really, you know, I really
didn't have the kinds of depths of depravity that a lot of people
did. Well, the problem is, is that
you're being too kind to yourself. The reality is, is you are by
nature just as vile as the mob. If you did not oppose the mob,
if you did not protest against the mob, if you did not say the
mob was wrong, you were just like the mob. If you sit and
watch on TV, the mob, If you find your pleasure in what the
mob does, if you find your gratification in the mob's protocol, conduct,
behavior, agenda, modus operandi, you're just like the mob. You
can say people on TV are bad, crass, wicked, vile, abominable,
but if you sit up and watch that tube all day, all night long,
you're just like the mob. Ooh. Did pastor get into a fight with
somebody today or something? No. No. But Romans chapter 2
tells us that as we have this list of degrading behaviors that
go from lying to major sexual perversion, we are also warned
by Paul that those who take pleasure in those that do those things
are just like them. So sometimes we can get on our
high horse and talk about what we don't do. And I've told you
before that if you don't do it, though you observe it and you
are tacitly approving of it, you are just like them. The only
difference is, is that God hasn't given you over to it. Oh, there's
another revelation. So you actually think that you
have a moral restraint that's intrinsic to your nature. What
you don't recognize is, is that God is the one that keeps you
back. that some people do not practice certain sins because
they don't have an opportunity to. So the apostle Paul here, I'm
sorry, Saul here is actually being introduced to us by Luke
from the vantage point of being exactly like this God-hating,
Christ-hating group of bloodthirsty murderers. That's how he's opening
up Saul to us. So point number one in your outline,
this is how I put it, Saul, a symbol of what? Saul, a symbol of Satan. Now, just as the Lord Jesus Christ
works through his church to spread his gospel and communicate his
truth, and he does, doesn't he? He could work without instrumentality
and means, but he doesn't. He works through people. He always
has, always will. So the devil serves in a paradigmatic
way of doing the same thing. So Saul at this point is a servant
of whom? That's right. Without a doubt
about it. And before my conversion, I was
too. And you were too. And so there
is a sense in which the devil has a body just like Christ has
a body. That is a means by which he actually
fulfills his objectives. There's no doubt about that.
Daniel chapter seven asserts that force. And I saw the body
of the beast given over to the burning flame. Yes, there's an
ultimate day when those who are Instruments of unrighteousness,
servants of unrighteousness will have their place in the lake
of fire right along with their head, the devil, if God doesn't
intervene and change our lives. So I wanna call your attention
to three things under this proposition that Saul is a symbol of Satan
and that the manner in which Satan works with his targeted
objective of defying the Lordship of Christ is to persecute God's
people. Saul, a symbol of Satan. John
chapter 10, verse 10. You guys remember this, but let's
look there again for yourselves and you'll see it. John chapter
10, verse 10. Tell me, does this not also describe
at this point Saul of Tarsus? Our Lord Jesus Christ is describing
the relationship between the sheep and their shepherd and
the safety and providence and care that the sheep have in the
presence of their shepherd. And the gift of discernment that
sheep have in relationship to knowing the voice of their shepherd.
And he says in verses one through three, these words, verily, verily,
I say unto you, he that enters not by the door into the sheepfold,
but climbs up some other way, the same as a thief and a robber,
right? So that verse clearly teaches us the exclusivity of
faith in Christ alone for salvation. That men and women will not enter
into God's heaven through the back door, side door or windows.
that there is one door into the kingdom of God and that's faith
in Christ. Apart from which, if one would assert that they
can obtain a relationship with God, apart from Christ, they
are diabolical in their nature and they're called thieves and
robbers. And our Lord is ultimately speaking to false prophets and
false teachers. Verse two, but he that enters
in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. Who is the shepherd?
And the sheep are his elect. To him the porter opens and the
sheep does what? Hear his voice. And one of the
clear indicatives of being a child of God is the fact that we hear
his voice. One of the clear indicatives
of being born again is that God gives us ears to hear and eyes
to see. We see the glory of God and we
hear the voice of Christ, do we not? And we hear the voice
of Christ through his what? His word. That's right. And the
sheep hear his voice and he calleth his own sheep by what? So we
call this a personal relationship, do we not? Where the sheep hear
the voice of Christ in the preaching of the gospel, and the voice
of Christ speaks to the sheep personally. So that the sheep
have a relationship with the Savior on a personal level, through
the Word, as the Spirit of God resonates in their heart, the
calling of the sheep to the Savior. He goes on to say, he calls them
by name, he leads them out, and when he puts them forth, And
when he puts forth his own, he goes before them and the sheep
do what? So mark this now, there's one
shepherd who has sheep that when the shepherd calls, the sheep
hear his voice. And when the shepherd calls,
he calls them distinctly. And when he calls them, he leads
them out. And when he leads them out, they
do what? Follow him. That's right. See,
now we're describing real Christianity as opposed to churchianity. We're
talking about a relationship with the Savior who leads us
out of the pen of what we call providence into the fields of
blessing to eat and to grow and to nurture and to develop as
a sheepfold being a cared for and watched over by the good
shepherd. And it says that he also goes
before them. See that? The shepherd goes before
them. Our shepherd went before us,
did he? And the sheep follow him. Do
you understand the implication of that? It simply means that
the way in which he goes, we go. Here's another way you can
identify the sheep. If the pattern of life, which
was clearly laid out to us by Christ, our shepherd, is not
followed by a certain person, they're not his sheep. That's
another way to see it. I want you to understand that
now that because the the narrative is developing the full relationship
of the sheep and the shepherd not just Announcing the fact
that there are sheep and there is a shepherd but here's the
relationship of the sheep and the shepherd the sheep called
them and They hear his voice the I'm sorry the shepherd calls
them and they hear his voice the shepherd calls them by name
and and they hear his voice speaking to them personally. And the call
calls them out of darkness into his marvelous light. And they
come out of darkness into his marvelous light. And now they
can see the shepherd in the context of the world and they follow
the shepherd wherever he goes. Do you guys see that? Now, isn't
that the natural analogy being set forth before us? Have you
ever seen a shepherd walking and the sheep just following
behind just as comfortable as can be. That's right, because
they know his voice and they know his voice alone. Listen
to it, verse five. And a stranger will they not
what? But will what? See, so when people
get caught up with lies and errors and falsehood and call themselves
Christian and don't have the discerning capacity to know the
difference between the voice of the shepherd and the voice
of the thief, We have real good reason to question whether or
not you know the shepherd. Is that true? Yes, sir. Yes, ma'am. He says in a stranger,
they will not follow, but will flee from him. See that? Not
only do they have the discernment to know that this individual
is a stranger, but they also have the intuitive compunction
to go the other way. Sometimes you will meet Christians,
And these Christians are very sensitive to what God had called
them out of, the world that God had called them from, and the
traps and the gins and the snares that they were involved in. They're
very sensitive to what it means to live a life of darkness and
sinfulness and evil and wickedness. And whenever the proposition
or temptation to go back into those quarters are given to them,
not only do they oppose it, they run from it. That's not for me. The time of living like the Gentiles
is over with for me. I've got a short time to go.
I'm not wasting any more time. I'm making my calling and election
sure. If you still want to dilly and
dally with evil and sinfulness, you can dilly and dally with
it. But I know the voice of my shepherd. He leads me out of
darkness, not into it, out of darkness, into his light. And
light is clarity. It's called the kingdom of light.
Now I can see things as they really are. And I can make the
right choices now in terms of my life purpose. And that's what
he does. Now, notice what he says over
in verse nine and 10, because this brings me to my first point
on Saul, a symbol of Satan. Here it is. Let me start back
at verse seven. Then Jesus said unto them, truly, truly, I say
unto you, I am the door of the sheep. All that ever came before
me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. You got it. So you get to work
with yourself and ask yourself, am I a sheep or am I a goat? Verse nine, I am the door emphatic
by me. If any men enter, he shall be
what? and he shall go in and out and
find pasture." Speaking concerning the broadness of the relationship
that we have once we come to Christ. In our sinful state,
we are confined and we are constrained to nothing but a life of sin.
In our safe state, we are given an open room, a large field,
green pastures to roam in. to grow, mature, develop, and
to serve God. That's the idea. In and out,
finding pastors. The protection of the shepherd
within, the joy of the blessings without. Verse 10, the thief
comes not, but for to what? Steal, and then to what? Kill,
and to destroy. Do you see that? Is that indicative
of the character and attitude of Saul right now in our present
text? Of course it is. And we were to spend enormous
time around point A, enemies, destroyers, blasphemers, because
Paul was an enemy of the church, wasn't he? He was a destroyer
of the church, wasn't he? He was a blasphemer of the church,
was he not? All of these are adjectives that
describe the devil. Is not the devil the enemy? Is
not the devil the great destroyer, the Apollyon of the book of Revelation? He's also the blasphemer. And
so we have to really look at ourselves and say, where do I
stand in relationship to these types of characteristics and
traits? Go with me in your Bible to first Timothy chapter one,
three. I want to just make sure you understand that what Luke
is doing for us as he's helped, he's beginning to, to work towards
a major transition or shift a, a move from Jerusalem. Cause we're getting ready to
move from Jerusalem that that move from Jerusalem to Judea
and Samaria, which is where we're going, will be on the premise
of a certain condition and atmosphere to which they are now drawn. And then particular individuals
who are going to initiate that, sustain that until God's purpose
is accomplished in it. In the book of 1 Timothy, the
apostle Paul, having come to a great maturity by the time
he writes 1 and 2 Timothy, He calls himself Paul the agent.
And in our mature state, as children of God, when we grow up and get
older and we have done some time with the Lord, guess what? When
we've done some time with the Lord, we come to a place of not
really caring what people think about us. And when we've done
some time with the Lord, we also come to a point where we are
willing to tell the truth And so the apostle Paul, this is
not gonna be in first Timothy chapter one, verse three. Let
me see where this is. Let me find my outline. I think
it's chapter two. No, chapter one, verse 14, verse
15. Oh no, I'm back at verse 12.
That's where I want. That's where I want. Verse 12.
This is the apostle Paul. He says, I thank Christ Jesus,
our Lord, who enabled me. This is it. This is it. Who enabled
me for he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry,
right? who was before a blasphemer. Do you see that? And a persecutor. Do you see that? And injurious. So now see that because he talks
like this as he goes through, as we go through the book of
Acts, where the apostle Paul will be giving his testimony
to the rulers and to the church, he will always state what he
was Then what he is and when he states what he was he will
tell the truth about how viscerally hostile he was to the church
in Certain passages it was he will see this when we get back
to Acts chapter Acts chapter 8 it was he who destroyed the
church. He wreaked havoc in the church
and And the term means to just make it completely disannulled,
of non-effect, utterly destroy the church. This was the Apostle
Paul prior to his conversion. As Saul, he spent all of his
energy opposing the gospel. He was a blasphemer, he was a
persecutor, and he was injurious. Do you guys see that? He was
a mess, wasn't he? So were you, and so was I. The seeds that are in the apostle
are in you and they're in me. And it's a remarkable thing to
see. It's a remarkable thing to see. He was a blasphemer. He was a destroyer of the church.
He was an enemy of God. He was a persecutor of the church. And go back with me to Acts chapter
8 verse 1. I want us to see a few things
here too as we work this through. So in John chapter 10 we have
described the nature and character of the devil in terms of him
being a thief, of him stealing, of him killing, and him destroying.
We see these attributes being worked out in the flesh by the
leaders of the church and now Saul becoming one of them, the
text says he was consenting unto Stephan's death. And at that
time there was a great what going on? Persecution against the church. A great persecution against the
church. Again, we see then that persecution is coming through
the hands of the leadership. Persecution is coming through
Paul. He said that in first Timothy, right? I was a persecutor. I
was a persecutor of the church. And what did it do? What did
this persecution do? It scattered them. Listen to
what it says, great persecution against the church, which was
at Jerusalem. And they were all scattered abroad
throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles.
The second observation I want you to see under saw a symbol
of Satan is this, that when a person is operating for the enemy, operating
for the devil, that his primary target are going to be believers.
And it's going to be ultimately against Christ. As we will see
that you cannot persecute God's people and not ultimately be
persecuting Christ. And this is something that you,
child of God, need to get in your system. And I mean that
sometimes we think that we can kind of excise or separate the
people of God from Christ and like love the love Christ and
hate God's people. But biblical truth would tell
us that we cannot think that way nor function that way. So I'm gonna say that again just
in case you don't get it. And this is an accommodation
fundamentally in Western Christianity. In Western Christianity, individuals
really think they have so much stock in their walk with Christ
that they can basically belittle and diminish the significance
and relevance of the church and still have a vital walk with
God. In fact, some folks can actually
take on virtually all of the attributes of the devil. Still
talk about loving Christ Are you guys hearing what I'm saying?
but see what the book of Acts will teach you if you allow it
to is that it's impossible for you to think that you can have
a tolerable relationship with the Savior and that he can be
indifferent towards your Antipathy towards the people of God and
it not be towards him ultimately That's right That's right. We
get a good opportunity here to see do we have the mind of Christ? Do we think like Christ did?
And so we see that in our tax, they were scattered abroad. Is
that the work of the adversary? Does the adversary scatter? Go
with me in your Bibles to, again, John chapter 10, and let's see
what it says in John 10. I stopped you short of that because
I wanted to make sure that we, Look at our text again to see
the several things that are unfolding in Acts chapter 8 Before we go
into the movement the movement of the second subject in the
book of Acts chapter 8 in chapter 10 Here's what our master said
after that He gives us the basic resume of the devil verse 10
the thief comes not but to steal kill and destroy I am come that
they might have what I and that they might have it more abundantly,
has nothing to do with material wealth, has everything to do
with the qualitative nature of life. When a man or woman comes
out of a sinful lifestyle into the kingdom of God, what changes
qualitatively is the nature of the life. So stay with me now. In our unsafe state, our life
is poor, poverty stricken. We are so bankrupt when we are
walking in darkness. We have none of the commonwealth
of Israel by which we can adorn the gospel. Is that true? We're
beggars and paupers in our sinful condition. We are miserable wretches
in our unsaved state. We do not honor God or glorify
God at all. We can't prove to anyone the
riches of the kingdom of God so long as we are outside of
Christ. We are poor, naked, wretched, blind, having no wisdom, having
no relationship, having no ability to actually persuade people to
come to this lovely Christ, because we don't know him. But then when
once God saves us, he brings us into the riches of his grace,
the fullness of his grace. As Ephesians chapter one, verse
three, blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies.
He has blessed us with the heavenly riches by which this abundant
life is experienced. And when a man or a woman is
actually saved, what they experience is a growing richness in their
relationship with God. Listen, a growing richness in
the grace of God, a growing richness in the knowledge of God, a growing
richness in their devotion to Him. Because the love of god
is shed abroad in the heart. Am I making some sense? It's
shed abroad in house. And when the love of god is shed
abroad in heart guess what you desire to honor him with your
life Now you have tapped into by virtue of your regeneration
the infinite well of grace And and it makes a huge difference.
And this is what we mean by abundant life I would not trade one day
with christ Then for all the riches in the world Are you hearing
what I'm saying? And I have not even begun to
scratch the surface of my walk with the Savior. But what I know
about him right now, I have never one day contemplated what it
would be like to be Warren Buffett or Bill Gates or any of those
cats with those material things. Not one day. God's my witness. God's my witness that the qualitative
nature of eternal life of which I have been a partaker of now
for some 35 years has never once caused me to wonder what it would
be like to be without Christ and over in that dimension of
wealth of the multi-billionaires. I don't even see a comparison. There's no bridge from here to
there that would tip me to go in that direction. This is what
we mean by abundance. And can I actually tell you I
know I've digressed can I actually tell you what really motivates
me along those lines? It's not what I'm experiencing
now only but what he has promised me I will experience in a short
while You know what that does it produces in a child of God
a level of contentment and a level of confidence, a level of joy,
a level of expectation, a level of hope that does not make a
shame. That's what it does. This is
called the abundant life. Now watch the text. This is what
he goes on to say over in verse 11. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives his life
for the what? Now, if you want to, I can give
you the end of the story by running you back up to verse 4, where
it says, he puts forth his own, he goes before them, and his
sheep do what? Uh-huh, think that one through.
See it? Because we'll see that in our
text. That's chapter 8. Did Stephan follow him? Did Stephan
follow the Master? Did the Master lead him all the
way And he led him out the same way
he himself was led out by his father You see it's a very important
now. Listen to what verse 12 says
here it is but he that is a hireling and Not the shepherd Whose own
sheep his whose own the sheep or not. I want you to see the
characteristic now He sees the wolf coming you got it. This
is just a harling These are people that get paid to preach to you. I who have no heart commitment
to your eternal welfare, who are not qualified to be under
shepherds in any substantive sense, and therefore taking on
the responsibilities and characteristics of a shepherd. Am I making some
sense? Because see, the characteristics
of a shepherd is to love you and love you enough to tell you
the truth and don't really care about how you feel about it.
Because my objective is to make sure you go all the way out into
the presence of his glory. Is that true? All the way out into the presence
of his glory. All the way out. That journey
is a little rough. Read Psalm 23. It's a little rough. It's a little rough. So here
is what the text says. But he that is in Hyrulean, and
not the shepherd, not Christ, whose sheep, whose own the sheep
are not, sees the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep and fleeth.
They leave and flee, and the wolf catches them. Now watch
this, and does what? Scatters the sheep. Now is that
what Saul was doing? Was Saul working for the wolf
to scatter the sheep? And did the text say they were
scattered? Yes, indeed and God admonished Israel over and over
again in the book of Jeremiah chapter 23 Ezekiel 34 for scattering
the sheep upon the mountains and not going and getting them
Do you understand that the ministry of the gospel is to go get the
sheep? Do you understand that the ministry of the gospel is
to go get the sheep? That's that's the role of the
church to go get the sheep Do you see the picture? so then
Go back to our text. I got another question to ask
before we deal with the next verse. So Saul does really play
a role of typology here in his antipathy, in his hatred, hostility,
in his murderous, blasphemous, persecutory mode of wreaking
havoc on the church, as he's going to be noted for, and scattering
the people abroad. And notice what it says. They
were scattered abroad throughout the regions of what? Judea and
then what Samaria except whom? Now now now why did the Apostles
remain? Why did they remain? Can I tell
you because they were faithful They were faithful Faithful what
pastor faithful shepherds? Didn't I just read to you John
chapter 10 where it spoke concerning the wolf coming and And if one
was a hireling, they would have fled. That the apostles who remained
in Jerusalem remained in Jerusalem because they were following the
chief shepherd, the Lord Jesus himself, and that they would
have not left the sheep all alone. They stayed because they were
faithful men. They stayed because their master
was faithful. So we're seeing paradigms or
models of the faithful shepherd in the apostles. And we're seeing
the model of what it means to be unregenerate and Saul. We're
also seeing the model of a faithful sheep in Stephan, are we not?
John chapter 10 is coming to pass right before our eyes. Because
see, John chapter 10 is not saying that the sheep are not from time
to time without danger. It's clearly alluding danger.
It's clearly alluding danger, explicitly in fact, but there
is a remedy to that danger, and the remedy to that danger is
a faithful shepherd. And then the under shepherds
are to be as faithful as the chief shepherd is to be in that
context. And so we see the beginning.
This is the start. This is the start of the persecution
against the church of which there's a lot really to drink in. Um, go with me in your Bible
to Matthew chapter 28, verse 31, just to remind you again
of the strategy of the enemy when he seeks to scatter the
sheep. Not that it will ever work against God's elect. You
know better than that, right? Jesus said in John chapter six,
very plainly, all that the father gives to me will come to me and
all that come to me, I will in no wise cast out. He will never
lose one of his sheep, but there is often a battle that takes
place on a temporal level where from time to time, because we
are out of pocket, we can find ourselves scattered from the
fold. If you're not right, You can
find yourself scattered from the fold. In Matthew chapter 28, notice
what it says. Matthew 28, 31, how is that going
to be Matthew 28, 30? That's not even. Let's see, let's
try Matthew 27, 31. That might be it. No, that's not it either. I don't
know how I got, I don't know how I landed on verse 31. That's
not the one that I want. So I'm going to leave that alone
because I don't know, I don't know how I typed that in. It's
the text that our master told his disciples. I'll just share
it with you. Right before they took him to crucify him, when
all of the disciples were saying, Lord, we'll follow you even unto
death. And he says, I promise you this
night, all of you will flee from me. As it is written in the book
of Zechariah around chapter 13 or so, smite the shepherd and
the sheep shall be scattered. 26 31. Okay. That's it. There you go. Go back
a little bit Matthew chapter 26 verse 31 that will clearly
allude that so I probably saw an eight instead of a six I was
in the dark while I was typing. So Our master is teaching us
here that the goal of the enemy is to scatter And it happens
from time to time does it not So I can ask you the question
as we go back to our text except they have you ever been scattered
Has, has there ever come a time in your life? Yeah, you know,
you have to say that, say it to me personally. I just want
you to think about it because you might be God's sheep. You
might not, but if you've got cheap and you've been scattered,
you understand the stratagems that led to that, right? The
lack of discernment on your part, the carnality that got you caught
up in yourself thinking that it's all about you. And then
your head got twisted in terms of your priorities. Pride settled
in and then you found yourself complaining against God. And
if not against God, against the people of God, I'm telling the
truth. And the next thing you know, you are being separated
by the enemy because the goal of the enemy is to sift you.
This is why he told Master, the Master told Peter, Peter, the
enemy is coming after you tonight because you have a major problem
right now with self-confidence. You actually believe what you
just said. Lord, I'll follow you even under
death. And there was a sense of ascendancy and arrogance and
confidence on his part, which imply that he looked down on
the other disciples. And that's what, see, as a pastor,
I've seen this go on so many times. And we know when the enemy
is moving people into a state of isolation, because all of
these indicatives are taking place. Complaining, arguing,
gossiping, slandering, just constantly opposing, opposing, finding everything
wrong. You're on your way out. The devil
has already hogtied you like a pig and is dragging you out.
You don't even know it. You're on your way out of the
church. You're getting ready to be by yourself for a long
period of time if you ever make it back. That's right. That's right. So now watch the
text now. Watch it. It goes on to say,
because we want to begin to consider what this is. Now we know that
this is the providence of God, right? God's in this. God's in
Stephen's stoning. God's in Saul's consenting to
his death. God's in the great persecution
coming against the church. God's in the scattering of these
folks that are leaving Jerusalem now. You don't believe that?
God is in all this. God's in all of this. A second
point I want to call your attention to briefly is the seed principle. The seed principle you remember
what jesus said in the gospel of john chapter 12 Verse 23 through
26. Let's go there for a moment.
Then we'll come back and i'll show you the tie-in again with
our text Our master is headed to jerusalem This is his final
week. This is this is passion week
This is this is the the week before he actually is taken by
the rulers. This is john chapter 12 We're
going to start at verse 23. Are you there? And listen to
this, listen to this. The disciples have come to Jesus
over in verse 20 and said, there were certain Greeks among them
that came up to the feast to worship. And the same came therefore
to Philip, which was of Bethsaida and of Galilee and desired him
saying, sir, we would see whom. And Philip comes and tell Andrew
and then Andrew came and tell Jesus, The Gentiles, the Greeks
wanna see you. And here's how our master responds.
And Jesus answered them saying, the hour is come that the son
of man should be what? That's right. Now he wasn't talking
about going back to heaven. He was talking about being killed.
Okay. But I've told you before that
when you think Christianly, death is a precursor to your glorification. And Christ had such a, an overwhelming
view of his final state that death was just a moment for him
of such a nature that he called it his glorification. And I want
you to see the nature of his statement here, because this
is, this is going to give us insight into the seed principle employed
in Acts chapter eight. Here it is. Truly, truly, I say
unto you. Who is he speaking to? His disciples.
He's getting ready to educate them. Now follow this now. Except
a corn of wheat fall into the ground and what? It abides alone. See it? Except a corn of wheat
falls into the ground and die, it abides alone. But if it die,
it will be glorified. Is that what it's saying? It
will be glorified. That seed will be glorified.
What do we mean by glorification? It will come to the full culmination
for the purpose for which it was made. As a seed, it abides
all by itself. What a tragedy for us to think
that life is all about us. And in such a way that we are
a single seed that has no understanding that apart from dying, we cannot
glorify God. What a tragedy to think that
you're all right in this isolated state in your pre-glorified status
as a seed. Do you understand we can't do
nothing with a seed? Listen, you can't eat a seed
and get any nourishment out of it. It doesn't look good. I mean, who are you going to
impress by having a table full of seeds? You call people over
for dinner and you put on their plate a seed. Put five or six
seats and say, hey, this is dinner. And we go, what is that? You
know what you say? Potential. Now we got some crowded peas
there and we got some black eyed peas there and we got some lima
beans there. I mean, we got potential. But
because it did not die, it was not what? Glorified. And the
glorification of the seed becomes now the blessing of those who
are looking to quench their thirst and vanquish their hunger as
God draws them to the feast of the gospel. So here's what our
master is saying. He's saying, except it goes into
the ground and die, it cannot bring forth fruit. And then he
says in verse 25, he that loveth his life shall what? He that
hated his life in this world shall what there you go one of
those Hebrew paradigms Hebrew parables And so the the warning
is this if you love your life You're gonna be like a seed that
never ever dies bears fruit and you're gonna just go into an
endless Endless existence apart from ever knowing the glory of
God. There's a damnable state, isn't it? And actually he's teaching
his disciples to have a proper prism and interpretation of suffering
and death. Right? He's teaching them to
understand that you have to embrace suffering because it leads to
your glory. And I'm going to actually be your forerunner.
Isn't he saying that? Listen to how he develops it.
If any man serve me, let him follow me. Isn't that
what we learned in John 10? Is that what Stephan did? And
where I am, There shall also my servant be My goodness Is
stephan in the presence of christ? Did stephan follow his shepherd? Did stephan lay down his life? Did that seed go into the ground? Will that seed bear fruit? The
text is already implying that in act chapter eight The text
is already implying that in act chapter eight Let me just read
it further, and we'll go back and see. Listen to it. If any
man serve me, let him follow me. And where I am, there shall
my servant be also. If any man serve me, him will
my what honor? Do you see it? Did the father
honor Stephan? Did he open the curtains up last
week? Did he show him his glory? Did the son of man stand up? Did he usher his servant in?
Is he gonna bring to pass that seed going into the ground and
dying? Are the people of God gonna honor him? Are they go
back to your text? Let's see. Let's see There's
a lot of stuff going on in these opening verses That's why I'm
taking my time with you because there's a lot of stuff here if
I were to just kind of read it in a flat bland sort of a Singular
dimensional way and Saul was consenting unto his death and
at that time there was a great persecution against the church
which is that Jerusalem and they were all scattered abroad throughout
the region of Samaria and Judea and then accept the Apostle then
devout men carried step into his barrel made great lamentation
over and saw you know, he made havoc of the church and And then
they went everywhere scattered around priest the gospel way
too much there to not take the time and listen to Way too much
there So in our second point, the seed principle, what I am
saying to you is that chapter eight is tied structurally back
to chapter seven and yeah, chapter seven and Stephan's death. His
death now is actually beginning to bear the kind of fruit that
God wants it to bear because the church has a mission. You
know what that mission is? Go ye into all the world, right? But how are they gonna go? By
dying, by persecution, by being pushed out the same way in which
our master himself was pushed out. And by the same means, this
is the same people group that's now persecuting the church that
persecuted our master. Remember what Stephan said? You
killed that just one. You killed him. And then they
kill him. And Saul now is ahead of this
right now as we are beginning to see the church move. The church
is getting ready to move. We're in what city right now?
Jerusalem. But we're getting ready to move
from jerusalem to where judea and then we're going from judea
to where? By the time we get to samaria,
that's what we will meet up with whom philip Philip that's why
I said saw philip saw See the spirit of god knows that the
church is now about to move But it's moving in the midst of great
persecution Mother bank said it to us last night in our study
as we were closing out Our last women's theology class is next
week, but we were closing out the study and she was remarking
that Hannah was blessed and rejoicing exceedingly in 2 Samuel 2 with
great rejoicing because she had given birth. But she had given
birth because she had gone through much tribulation. The tribulation
gave way to birth on Hannah's part. And the reason why we don't
have the kind of rejoicing that we ought to because there's no
birth. And there's no birth because
there's no tribulation. We are kind of, I'm talking about
we the church aggregately as a whole, especially the Western
church is kind of like a barren woman. And we're not even agonizing
over it. We're not agonizing over lost
sinners. We're just barren, fruitless as a whole. But what we see in
Acts chapter eight is the movement of the spirit of God and the
command to go into all the world with the gospel. And he has used
superlatively stepping as that initiatory work by which the
church now leaves Jerusalem. They got to go, they've got to
leave Jerusalem. We started in Acts chapter 2, we're in Acts
chapter 8. The apostles have done a fantastic job of preaching
in Jerusalem, have they not? But don't we have to go to Judea
at some point? And then Samaria? And that's what's going on here.
Under that seed principle, we see it over in verse four. Here
it is. Watch this. Therefore, I'm sorry. Yeah, that's
what it's saying, but I don't want to deal with that. I want
to go back to verse two. I'm sorry, I want to deal with
verse two briefly. Here it is. And devout men carried Stephen
to his what? And they made great lamentation
over him. So now Luke gives us that little
piece of language, and I think it's worthy to note. There's
a few things that we want to call our attention to in that
regard. Stephan was put to death by the leadership, right? Now,
we already stated that the goal and strategy of the enemy is
to scatter the sheep. Is that true? Now, if they were
successful when they put Stephan to death, and the people were
really just utterly disbanded because they feared the leadership,
feared the Sanhedrin, would they have made such an ado when it
came to burying Stephan? No. So what we have here actually
is sort of a, uh, we actually have a collage of two entities
worth marking in the midst of the persecution coming after
the church are faithful men and women who are accepting the persecution. And in the context of their accepting
the persecution, they have recognized that a faithful man has been
killed. And in their boldness, guess
what they are doing? They are actually defying the
leadership of Israel by burying this man in a dignified fashion,
making it very clear that they did not agree with the judgment.
Because what Israel had done, what the leadership had done,
was stone Stephen to death. You know what they were saying?
You're cursed! You're cursed! Cursed as he says
the law that is stoned or hanged on a tree And they had cursed
him for blasphemy And the idea is he's not worthy to even live
He's not worthy to be a part of the commonwealth of israel
And if everybody had bought into that notion there wouldn't have
been this kind of lamentation nor burial of the man The people
of god honored him And when they honored him the way they did
with long lamentation, this was not merely the cultural lamentation.
This was a protest against the leadership. I want you to get
that. See, the gauntlet was thrown
down right here. When they killed Stephen, the
gauntlet was thrown down. The faithful church says, we
see what you did. We do not agree with what you
did. We do not consent with your judgment that this man, Stephan,
is a blasphemer, that this man is a criminal. We don't agree
with you. We publicly defy you by honoring Stephan as God the
Father honored Stephan. We honor Stephan. And because
they did, they now are the targets of a complete political-religion
persecution. Are you guys hearing me? Because
they openly said, we do not agree. See, I told you we're Jerusalem,
right? So we have two principles operating the Old Testament and
the New Testament, right? The old authority, which is not
a biblical authority, opposing the new authority, which is a
divine authority instituted in the life of the apostles, right?
So we have two kingdoms at war, don't we? And the political,
religio kingdom only knows how to kill the body. Isn't that
what our master said? Do not fear them that can kill
the body. And when all these folks took
stepping up and buried him with great lamentation, you know what
they were saying? We do not fear you. We do not fear you. Think about it a little bit.
I tried to work through in my mind the importance of a public
stance in a situation where an innocent man or an innocent woman
is abused and mistreated in the context of a noble deed that
they have engaged in. Whenever these things have occurred
throughout history, where we know the individuals have been
good persons, where we know that they have laid down their lives
for a noble cause, it has always turned out for the emboldenment
of good people, of pious people. See, what it does is it shows
you that not only can you not trust the political-religious
system that put him to death, you got to oppose it now. Are
you guys hearing what I'm saying? You actually have to oppose it,
because if you don't, they're coming after you next. In fact,
they're coming after you anyway. So you might as well take a stand
for the truth, because all they can do is kill you. This is beautiful. This is beautiful. This is beautiful. This is beautiful. So I see the
sovereignty of God. I see the providence of God and
purging the church at Jerusalem and preparing them to move out
in obedience to Acts chapter one, verse eight, go ye into
all the world. So I see the persecution as a catalyst. Doesn't suffering
sometimes move you into greater obedience? Doesn't persecution
sometimes move you into a greater devotion to Christ? Yes, it does. Sometimes suffering and persecution
drives you into a deeper knowledge of God. That's an economy that
God uses to get us off of our butts, our lazy butts, when we're
kind of just lagging in an elapsed mode. He sends trouble and that
trouble drives us to Christ and it moves us into levels of sensitivity
and obedience of which we would not have otherwise engaged in,
in our sort of casual, free, non-persecutory atmosphere. I'm just telling you how it is.
So when a brother or sister is lapsing, ask the Lord to send
some trouble. What I'm saying is, even though
you and I see the methods of the devil here, the wiles of
the devil, this is not a bad thing. What we're looking at
is not a bad thing. Now I can go back to the principle,
the seed principle, right? Except the seed going to the
ground and die, it does not bring forth much fruit. Look at the
fruit of the life of Stephan in verse 4. Here it is. Therefore,
do you see that? They that were scattered abroad
went everywhere preaching the word. Do you see that? So you remember what the rulers
had said, do not preach in his name. Do not teach in his name. Don't preach, don't teach. They
put the apostles in jail, don't preach, don't teach. They get
out, they go back, they do what? Preach and teach. They catch
up with him again, tell him, don't preach, don't teach. Remember,
Gamaliel steps in the gap for Peter and John. Hey, leave him
alone. And Peter and John says, it better
that we obey God, right? Here now, Stephen, they're telling
Stephen, don't preach and teach. Stephen is so full of the Holy
Ghost, he can't help it. So he has to die. See, there's
part of what the Master says, some of you they will kill. Right? But accept that, understand now,
understand, this is the way it goes. And so the church was not
moved by the death of Stephan in the sense that they now abandoned
their mission. They simply saw this as an act
of providence because they were scattered. That's kind of the
term is like the diaspora that we talk about. They were dispersed
abroad. But guess where they went? Watch
this now. They didn't go from Jerusalem to Libya. They didn't
go from Jerusalem to Arabia. They didn't go to Jerusalem to
Italy. They went from Jerusalem to Judea, right up the street.
I love it. They took off from Jerusalem
because the leader the text is clear in Acts chapter 8 verse
1 It's clear on that same day at that same time that they put
Stephen to death They now are starting to go after the church
So the people move from Jerusalem right up the street to Judea
and they start preaching in Judea Are you hearing me preaching
in Judea? And then they move from Judea to where? Samaria. This is where we meet up with
the other super deacon. We get ready to meet the other
super deacon there. So this is why I say in point
number three, persecution is a catalyst to preach. But it's
only a catalyst to preach if these three things are present.
First of all, the spirit of faith. Persecution is a catalyst to
preach but it's only a catalyst to preach if three things are
available. If these things are absent, you
won't preach if your life is at stake. I just want you to
get it now. You and I are human. It takes
the grace of God to preach the truth at a cost. Are you hearing
me? So the first one is in second
Corinthians chapter four, verses nine through 14. Let me show
you that. Here's my proposition. Persecution is a catalyst to
preach. when the command is to preach and that there are no
other, no other sort of a qualifying conditions or modifying conditions
by which we are not to preach. The persecution can't be like,
okay, we're being persecuted. And so we don't preach. No persecution
now becomes a catalyst to preach because the primary objective
and call to which we have been called is to what preach second
Corinthians chapter four. Watch this. Watch how the apostles
put it. I'm going to start at verse nine.
I should start at verse eight. Listen to this. We are troubled
on every side. Do you see that? Yet we are not
distressed. What we call the tension, right?
Do you know the tension? Troubled on every side externally,
but we're not distressed. We're not internally discombobulated.
We are perplexed, but we are not in despair. It's all right
to be perplexed when you know God's in control. Listen, don't
listen, don't listen, don't. You don't have to pretend you
know everything. Perplexity is not like sort of the final straw
for God's people. Sometimes perplexity simply means
we got to wait on God. He has to unravel the knots of
providence to show us what to do. But there's a difference
between being perplexed and being despaired. Yes, there is. We are in trouble when we're
despaired, are we not? Our faith is sunk so low when
we are in a despairing state. He says we are often cast down.
Do you see that? Persecuted rather, I'm sorry,
persecuted, but not what? Okay, so now that's interesting
because the persecution comes against the people of God, but
not forsaken, not forsaken by whom? That's right. Now, you
see what you have to do in the context of persecution? Because
persecution is designed to cause you mentally to be isolated.
Persecution is designed to separate you and put you in a state of
feeling as if you are by yourself. Read the Psalms. Isn't that what
David says? Lord, where are you? My enemies
are against me and they are too strong for me. What Paul says
in our text is we can be persecuted, but we are never forsaken. Is
that true? Didn't Acts chapter 7 teach us
that? Didn't Acts chapter 7 teach us that when Stephen was being
persecuted by the leadership, Christ opened the curtains and
said to Stephen, Stephen, hey, I'm with you. I'm still here,
right? Now notice what he goes on to
say. Always bearing about in the body, the dying of the Lord
Jesus. Do you guys see that? Always
bearing about in the body, the dying of the Lord Jesus. Now,
honestly, this is the apostles speaking. This is Paul speaking
for the apostles, talking about the nature of the life and ministry
of apostolic preaching and teaching. I'd love to say that all Christians
have this kind of ethic and sense of mission. That our life is
really about the constant dying of the Lord Jesus. Watch this,
always bearing about in the body, the dying of the Lord Jesus.
The apostle Paul had a sense of that. That his life was a
constant dying for Christ. That was his sense. And that
was his motto in Philippians chapter one around verse 20.
For me to live is what? Christ. So he says in Galatians
2 20 again, he says I have been crucified with Christ Nevertheless,
I live yet not I but Christ liveth in me, right? And so so the life
that I live I live in the flesh I live by the faithfulness of
the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me the Apostle
Paul saw an intrinsic Christ-like suffering or crucifixion or cross-bearing
to his life and to his ministry that he embraced. He embraced
dying that Christ might be exalted. I'm not saying that we walk around
with that ethic. I don't think we do. I'm not
saying that it's not ours in Christ, but I'll be honest with
you. I don't think we walk around glorying in suffering the way
they did. Can I be honest about it? You
know, I mean if we have a few in the house that are really
walking that close with the Lord where you know Your persecutions
and your sufferings you glory in them. Come talk to me. I need
some help Just come tell me what you do to get close to the Christ
so that every time somebody beats you down Your carnality doesn't
rise up But my point is this The apostles had that ethic because
of certain things that were present of which Paul is going to make
known here in a moment. Here's what he says. We are always
bearing in the body of the dying of the Lord that the life also
of Jesus might be manifested in our body. Amazing. Suffering produces in the life
of the believer who is yielded to God a revelation of Christ. Did you get that? So yeah, let
me see if I can help you just in case it didn't come like when
someone does something to us That is personally injurious
and we take it personally There is no revelation of Christ in
that I'm teaching a night G We're
not liking this, but I'm teaching tonight. So I want you to get
this. Please understand this. It's
true for all of us. You know how when we miss assignments?
Has anybody ever missed an assignment? An assignment where you were
to hold your peace. We talked about it last night. Hold your
peace. Let the person do what they want to do and let Christ
actually defend you. But no, we had to put our two
cents in and we completely shut the door for his witness. And if I am defending myself
all the time, I have no Savior. If I'm always defending myself,
I do not have a Savior. My life is clearly indicating
that Christ is not operating in my life. I am not conscious
of his presence. I'm not conscious of his providence.
I'm not understanding the path of persecution that leads to
an opportunity to witness. I'm not willing to bear in my
body the sufferings of Christ, which is the ethic of Christianity
according to Christ. If any man's gonna follow me,
let him take up his cross. Isn't that what he says? That's
really what he said. I'm just simply I'm sharing with
you The beauty of our text is that there was one man who did
it God's way I was stepping and because of that now the Gospels
getting ready to spread further But him doing it God's way was
that he followed Christ to death. Can y'all see that in the text?
That's very clearly there very clearly there. And so persecution
is a catalyst to preaching on your job. It's a catalyst to
preaching at school. It's a catalyst to preaching
anywhere you go in your family. You know how we have family members.
I'll be done here in a few moments. Cause I don't plan on unpacking
the Phillip account until next week, but we have family members
who are again, um, very hostile to the gospel. Um, and, and,
and, you know, we already had problems with them prior to us
being saved. But it got worse once we got
saved. And so, you know, when you have to meet with them during
holidays, it's tough. Right? Because all kind of stuff
that happened growing up and you struggle, you are internally
ambivalent because you really know, I don't want to be there.
Who's going to be there? You know, when you get the call,
you go, so now who's going to be there? In your mind, you already know
who's going to be there. And you don't really want to
be there. Is that true? He really don't want to be there.
I heard a brother. I'm not going to tell you his
name. He professed to be a Christian. I don't believe it, but he's
prominent. What he did, he gave a piece
of advice. He said, uh, now this is how you do it. You know, when
you go to the big family events and all that stuff, and you know,
there's just that uncle, that cousin, that cat, that, that
just, that rubs you the wrong way. Just say hi. And if you
have to get up and go out and go take a walk, you know, let
the time go by. And everybody know you miss it
because you out walking. Right. Everybody in the house
eating chicken and cornbread and macaroni. And where Jess
at? He out walking all by himself. Right. And everybody know the
trends of the debate because we know the knuckleheads in our
family. So this individual said, you know, go out and take a walk.
Well, if I'm going to go take a walk, Why am I there in the
first place? If I'm gonna take a walk. So
I said, ah, this guy doesn't know his Bible. He just doesn't
know his Bible. I mean, if I understand this as a mission, my job is
to prior to going to that dinner engagement is to get on my knees
and ask God for grace and actually be nicer to him than anyone else
at the party. Did you get that? That I prepare
to be nicer to him than anyone else. Hey, cuz, how you doing?
It's been a long time, man. I'm so glad to see you. Can I
get you anything? I'm getting ready to fix my place. You want
me to fix it? Let's sit down and chop it up, man. What you
been up to? I like that. I like that. And give him some
attention, even if they hard. Because it's hard to be completely
hard when a person being nice to you. Isn't that right? It's
hard to be completely hard, but we so thuggish, we so gangsterish. Aren't we thuggish and gangsterish?
Hard run against hard. You walk in the house, you're
hugging everybody, hugging, and you come to cousin, you just
look at it. You might give him a little bit of something. Sit
way on the other end of the table. You're the Christian now. Hold
on, hold on. You're the Christian. You're
the Christian way on the other end of the table with a prune
face for one person. It's 750 people in the house
and one person got you all jacked up. This is good. See, I know y'all didn't plan
on coming out and getting this, but this is for you. This is
a, see, cause our Christianity is a sham. We don't have any
Christianity. We're phony. Your Christianity
is not real just because you go to church. Listen to what
it goes on to say now watch this. I just want you to see this now
y'all still with me I said we have five minutes. I'm gonna
give me I'm gonna give myself another five. Here we go verse 12 So
then death works in us but life in you What a what a what a crystal
centric ethic of love Is that true here the Apostle Paul said
we accept the death of persecution and rejection and hatred and
animosity and contempt and scorn and ridicule, because it's a
death. We accept it if it produces in you life. Did you guys get
that? I'll bless you if you were here
last night in our women's theology class, one of my sisters, she's
working on our doctrine. And so she gave me and a couple
other editors in the class, her doctrine paper to go through.
And it has to do with effective leadership. And it was a principle
in there called the servant leader principle. which are models of
a business government that takes place in a lot of worlds today.
It hasn't always been that case because of a strong male sort
of chauvinistic ideology, but the servant leader is the person
who is more conscious to demonstrate influencing in the lives of those
that follow them by themselves actually doing the work. That's
what a servant leader is. A servant leader will train the
followers by actually doing what the followers are supposed to
do. Not just simply tell them what to do, but to actually do
it. Now that's called Christianity. Did you get that? That's called
Christianity. Because that's what our master
did. He came, he did, he showed. And it transferred to the apostles
and it's supposed to transfer to us too. And so that's what
I'm saying. We have a real gap between what we are reading in
the text and the life we're living as a church. Because many of
your leaders in your church don't have this ethic of being servant
leaders. I was so thankful that as I read
through the 70 something pages that the spirit of God didn't
beat me up too bad. Because I didn't know I was going to be reading
about leadership, right? But I'm reading about leadership
and guess what? I'm a leader. So as I had to peruse through
that and deal with the different leadership models coming across
the servant leadership model, I had to assess how have I functioned
as a leader in the church over the last 20 years serving at
grace. And I was able to say, fundamentally,
servant leader, right? Servant leader. Servant leader. So I said, okay. And then when
I got through the article, the person who actually developed
this model had derived it from the scriptures. He got it right
from Christ. He told him this is biblical. This is how you, if you want
to actually get people to perform at high efficiency rates, show
them that's exactly right. That's exactly a servant leader.
Now, let me make this even more applicable. Every time we, have
a child, we are signing up for a servant leader position. Every
mama is a servant leader. Every daddy is a servant leader.
Because you are laying down your life for that child. You spend
the first 15, 20 years of your life being a servant leader to
that child. Is that true? You give your life
to them. You model to them. You show them
everything. And that's what Christ did for
us. That's why he calls us his children. And so I'm trying to
help us understand that it's critical that if our Christianity
is going to be biblical, that we have to think these things
through and the text has to actually transfer into our life. Otherwise,
it's just church. Am I making some sense, brother?
You're just doing church. If this step doesn't get a hold
of you. So when we're hearing these profoundly mortifying examples,
and these are doctrines of mortification in the text. What? So then death
works in us, but life in you? Yes, that describes to me a parent. We work so long by the time our
kids up and out, we just about dead. I'm telling you the truth. And as a sane person, we're happy
because we know we're just about to enter into our inheritance
anyway. Right? If we've done it right. If you've done it right, and
then you hope you pass it on to your children, that they would
die, that their children would live. Here it is though. Here
it is. Here's the verse. Here is the verse I want you to mark.
We having the same spirit of what? The spirit of faith watches
we having the same spirit of faith according as it is written.
I believed and therefore I have what? We also believe in therefore
we what this is what Acts chapter 8 is saying that the people of
God are being persecuted They are suffering mortification for
Christ's sake but because of the presence of the spirit of
faith, what are they doing spreading the word? Spreading the word
spreading the word. The two other things that have
to occur in the context of persecution as a catalyst to preach, and
they have to be conceptual. I'm just going to state them.
I'm going to close here. These are conceptions in our mind.
If you don't think like this, you, you will never see the,
you will never see the opportunity to share the gospel with people.
If you're always looking for simply a favorable situation,
If you don't define God's providence the way God does, and if you
don't think evangelically like Christ did, or like the Apostle
Paul did, you won't ever see an opportunity to share the gospel. You know how some people can
see opportunities everywhere? You know what they see? Doors
opening. They see the door opening. That
requires a mindset. That brother said he was really
struggling with paying his bills. Lord, is this a door to open
up to share the gospel with him? See, some people would have missed
that. It wouldn't even dawned on them how to relate that brother
struggling to pay his bills with his need for Christ. Am I making
some sense? They wouldn't have been able
to actually see the struggle going on in the heart the vulnerability
of poverty, the vulnerability of shame, because, you know,
when we don't pay our bills, shame is about to take place. The vulnerability
of being without, losing our home, losing our car, the ramifications
that come with being broke, struggles in the home, divorces take place
frequently over what? Money. That's a door for the
Christian when the individual audibilizes, I'm struggling financially. Let me share something with you,
man. I know you need money, but actually, let me tell you what
you need. Can I share with you a few minutes
what you need to help you through this? Because what I'm going
to tell you is not going to necessarily put money in your bank account,
but it's going to help you get through the process of the struggle.
Am I making some sense? So if you are able to read into
the text after chapter eight, verse four, and they went everywhere
preaching the word, they went because they had the spirit of
faith. They went because they recognized that this was a door
opening. And thirdly, they went out of what we call the obedience
of faith. They had a clear awareness that
their job was to preach the gospel everywhere. Everywhere. Let's close in prayer. Father,
thank you for this time. Thank you for my brothers and sisters.
Thank you for this portion of scripture. Thank you for the
obedience of Stephan. Thank you for the obedience of
the church in the midst of persecution to simply share the gospel everywhere
that they go. Whatever they have, we want.
Yes, we do. We want it, oh God, we want it.
We want it not that we might go to Europe or go to Africa
or go to China, but that we might go right here in our own Jerusalem.
in our own Judea, in our own Samaria. Change our minds, change
our hearts, cause us to think your thoughts after you. Give
us the spirit of faith. Help us to see doors opening.
Give us the obedience to tell men and women about Christ. Help
us to die that they may live. Help us to be reminded that for
us to die is gain. Give us the ethic that to live
is Christ. As we go our way, give us traveling mercies. We
pray in Jesus' name. Amen, amen, amen. God bless you.