Paul's Message

Q: What does the Bible say about redemption in Christ?

The Bible teaches that Christ must suffer, die, and rise again for our redemption, fulfilling the Old Testament Scriptures. The Apostle Paul emphasized to the Thessalonians that redemption through Christ is a fulfillment of Old Testament prophecies. According to Acts 17:3, he opened the Scriptures to demonstrate that the Christ must suffer and rise from the dead. This teaching underscores the necessity of Christ’s atoning work as the promised Messiah, affirming that the prophecies concerning His suffering and resurrection are integral to the Gospel message. As Paul reasoned with the Jews in the synagogue, he linked Jesus' suffering directly to God's redemptive plan, highlighting that this Jesus is indeed the Christ foretold in the Scriptures.

Q: How do we know the resurrection of Christ is true?

The truth of Christ's resurrection is affirmed by God's assurance given to all men as stated by Paul in Acts 17:31. Paul’s assertion in Acts 17:31 provides profound proof of Christ's resurrection as it is tied to God’s judgment. He stated that God has appointed a day to judge the world in righteousness by the man He has ordained—referring to Christ. The resurrection of Jesus serves as the divine assurance that validates His identity and mission. It signifies that God approved of Jesus’ claims, and through the resurrection, He assures all humanity of the coming judgment. This belief is central to sovereign grace theology, which affirms Christ's resurrection as a cornerstone of faith and confirms the truth of everything He taught and accomplished.

Q: Why is the concept of God's sovereignty important for Christians?

God's sovereignty is crucial because it affirms His ultimate authority and control over all creation, including salvation. The concept of God's sovereignty is foundational to the Christian faith, particularly in historic Reformed theology. As Paul preached in Acts 17, he proclaimed that God is the Creator who is sovereign over heaven and earth, as stated in verse 24. Recognizing God's sovereignty allows Christians to understand that He governs the universe according to His divine purposes and that nothing happens outside of His will. This includes the election of individuals for salvation—a comforting doctrine that assures believers that their faith is not a result of chance but of God's eternal decree. Thus, a firm grasp of God’s sovereignty leads to greater trust and peace in a believer’s life, knowing that God orchestrates all events for His glory and the good of His people.

Q: What does the Bible say about the relationship between God and idols?

The Bible teaches that God does not dwell in man-made idols, which are powerless compared to the living God. In Acts 17:24-29, Paul passionately declares that the true God does not dwell in temples made by human hands nor is He represented by any form of idol. This teaching highlights the futility of idolatry, as idols are lifeless and cannot embody the true essence of God. Paul pointed out that human beings, created in God's image, should not equate Him with gold, silver, or stone. These verses remind Christians that true worship must come from a heart transformed by God's Spirit and cannot be confined to rituals or physical representations. Believers are called to worship God in spirit and truth, recognizing Him as the living God who desires a personal relationship with His creation, rather than through lifeless idols that cannot save.

Let's open our Bibles this morning
to the book of Acts. I want us to look at chapter
17. Chapter 17 of the book of Acts. Now this is the Apostle Paul
who is preaching in Thessalonica. It says in verse 1, Now, when they were passed through
Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, and there
was a synagogue there of the Jews. And Paul, as his manner
was, as his custom was, went in to the synagogue, and three
Sabbath days He reasoned with them out of the Scriptures. He
preached out of the Scriptures. I'm going to talk about that
tonight, the Scriptures. Paul reasoned out of the Scriptures,
that is, the Old Testament Scriptures, the things about Christ, the
Messiah, the Redeemer. He took these Jews back to the
writings of Moses. At this particular time, the
New Testament wasn't written. Paul was reasoning out of the
Scriptures concerning redemption by Christ the Messiah. Verse
3, opening and alleging that Christ must needs have suffered. They look for the Christ to reign,
not to suffer. They look for him to restore
the kingdom to Israel, not a spiritual kingdom. They look for him to
come as a conqueror, not as a lamb. And what Paul was reasoning out
of the Scriptures is that the Christ, the Christ, he's not
saying here that Jesus had to suffer. They agreed with that.
They thought he ought to be put to death. But he reasoned that
the Christ who was promised and prophesied and patterned in the
Old Testament, that Christ must suffer, and Jesus is that Christ. That's why he suffered. The Christ
must suffer. and rise again, must needs have
suffered, and risen again from the dead, and that this Jesus,
whom I preach to you, is the Christ." That was his message
to these Jews. He wasn't just condemning Moses.
He was saying that Christ fulfilled Moses. Paul wasn't condemning
their Sabbath days and holy days and feast days and ceremonies
and sacrifices. He was saying that the Christ
fulfilled them. That's what he's saying. that the Christ, the
Messiah, must suffer. He must die. He must be buried
and rise again. That's what the Scriptures teach.
And this Jesus is that Christ. That's what it says. Well, some
of them believe. And they consorted with Paul
and Silas, and of the devout Greeks, a great multitude. Of
the chief women, not a few. Some people believe the gospel. Always, every time, if God sends
a messenger, then there'll be results from the message. God
never sends His Word in vain. He said, My Word will not return
unto me void. It shall accomplish that whereunto
I have sent it. So where it's preached. I know
a lot of our preaching leaves a lot to be desired. And a lot of preaching is meaningless
and worthless. I know that. I've done a lot
of it. But where the gospel, the true gospel, in the proper
motive, manner, sent from God, it accomplished God's purpose.
And some will believe. Some may not, but some will.
But this is what happened there in Thessalonica. But the Jews,
which believed not, the religious leaders, moved with envy, took
unto them certain lewd fellows of the basest sort. They stirred
up some some fellows, rough fellows, and gathered a
company and set the whole city in an uproar and assaulted the
house of Jason and sought to bring them out to the people.
They just literally ran Paul out of town. And they ran him out of town
because he was preaching Christ. They ran him out of town because
he was preaching that Jesus is the Christ. He's the Messiah. They ran him out of town because
he preached the gospel. That's all right. He left there
and went to Berea. Look at verse 10. And the brethren
immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea, who
coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews. Now, he
did it again. When he went to Berea, he looked
up where the people were meeting in the name of God. They were.
The Jews believed in God. They were zealous. Paul said
in Romans 10 that He bore them record. They had
a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. They were going
through their ceremonies and their Sabbath days and their
worship not knowing what these things meant, what the table
meant, what the sacrifices meant. In fact, he said they read the
prophets every Sabbath day concerning Christ And in condemning him,
they fulfilled the very things they were reading. He came unto
his own, and his own received him not. And here we go again
in Berea. Verse 11, But these in Berea
were more noble than those in Thessalonica. Why were they more
noble? I'll tell you why. In that they
received the Word with readiness of mind. They listened. And they
went home and searched the Scriptures daily whether these things were
so. Oh my, what a wonderful response that is. Now that's all a preacher
can hope for. As long as he stands to preach
as I am this morning, and will it be the Lord willing again
tonight, that people will give me a hearing. Just give me a
hearing. If you were up here speaking
on the thing that you do best, and no best. I'd give you a hearing.
John, if you want to come up here and tell us about how to
run a meat market and a store, I'll listen to you because you've
been doing it a long, long time, successfully. If you want to
come up here and one of your teachers want to tell us how
to teach, I'll listen. I'm not going to say a word.
I'm going to sit right there and listen. I've never taught. I've never been
a teacher. I've never done a thing in public
school but sit and listen to somebody else. I don't know anything
about it. I know something about this." And these people, with
a readiness of mind, listened to this man. They listened to
him with readiness of mind, and they took the Scriptures and
went home and searched them to see if he was telling the truth. Isn't that good? They went home
and searched the Scriptures. And therefore, verse 12, many
of them believed. Many of them said, well, he's
telling the truth. This is what Scripture is saying.
This is what Moses is saying. This is what David is saying.
This is what Isaiah is saying. Just exactly what that man is
saying is what it is saying. No problem, is it? And they believed
also of the honorable women, which were Greeks, and of men,
not a few. Verse 13, but when the Jews,
uh-oh, here come these fellows again. These are religious leaders. Now listen to me. These are men
who profit by religion. These are men who are professional
religionists. These are men who get their honors
and their money and their applause from their religious organizations.
Paul is a threat to them. Christ is a threat to them. See,
they control people. These religious leaders control
people and use people and keep people in bondage to them. That's
going on today. You saw that out in Waco, Texas.
Here's a man holding people in bondage to him. And it's true, that's an extreme
case, but it's true in many cases in church organizations where
religious leaders dominate, dictate, lord over God's people. They have them in jail with a
tithe. That's right. They've got people with having
attacks of conscience because they don't pay that strict tie,
they keep that Sabbath day, or do what that preacher says, or
dress like he says, walk like he says, do what he says. He's
got them in bondage. And if a fellow comes along and
preaches the freedom of the soul, and the freedom and liberty of
Christ, And where a person looks to Christ and Christ alone, believes
in Christ, receives Christ, loves Christ and finds his life and
victory, rest and peace in Christ, not in a religious leader, he's
in danger. They start questioning what he
preaches. They start questioning what he demands. They start questioning
what he requires. They start questioning who gave
you this authority. to reign over us and exercise
lordship over us and dictate and dominate even our home life.
Who gave you that? Well, these Jews are stirred
up here. And they came down to Berea. They had knowledge that
the Word of God was preached to Paul at Berea. So they followed
him down there too and stirred up the people. And then immediately
the brethren sent away Paul to go, as it were, to the sea. Silas and Timothy stayed there. And verse 15, and they that conducted
Paul brought him to Athens. All right, here's the third stop.
Here's the third stop. He keeps moving just ahead of
these fellas, these religious hucksters, merchandisers
of souls. You know the greatest enemies
of the gospel? They're not the people, the preachers. That's exactly right. Somebody said one time, said,
I listened to you preach, and I went and asked my preacher
what he thought about it, and he didn't like it. I'm not surprised. He
doesn't want to lose a tither. That's harsh, isn't it? I'm sorry, but it's so. That's
so. Envy, covetousness, greedy. The man that stands here ought
to be primarily interested in two things, the glory of God,
the truth, and the good of the people. Whatever happens to him,
that's immaterial what happens to him. If what happens to him
can result in their good, so be it. God ordered it. But so many are not that way.
So Paul came to Athens. All right, verse 16. While Paul
waited for them at Athens, waiting on Silas and Timothy, his spirit
was stirred in him when he saw the city wholly given to idolatry. While he waited for Silas and
Timothy in Athens, he looked around and saw all the religious
shrines, temples, cathedrals. The city was full of idols. That's
what it says, wholly given to idolatry, just full of idols. Full of idols. Therefore disputed
he in the synagogue, had a synagogue there too in Athens, and he went
down to the synagogue and disputed with the Jews, with the devout
persons, even went to the marketplace daily with them that met with
him. He preached in the synagogue
and went down to the marketplace and preached, preaching the gospel
of Christ, the liberty in Christ, the joy of Christ. Well, then
certain philosophers of the Epicureans, And the historics encountered
him. They wouldn't have met him in
the synagogue. They met him in the marketplace, probably. They
were philosophers. The Epicureans were followers
of Epicurus 300 B.C., when he lived, 300 B.C. What did these
fellows believe? Well, they believed in God, but
they didn't believe God created the world. They believed that
the world came together, just happened to be, and that God
didn't rule the world. That was beneath God to have
anything to do with the world. He didn't rule the world. The
world just ruled itself. And the chief happiness, these
fellows taught, the chief happiness is in pleasure. Just pleasure,
wherever you found pleasure, but especially the pleasure of
the mind. They were philosophers and they
believed that the greatest pleasure was the pleasure of the mind.
And then the Stoics, they were people who followed a fellow
named Zeno. They believed God made the world.
But they believed the world is governed by fate. And happiness to them was in
virtue. Virtue. A wise man, they said,
is destitute of passion. He's joyful and virtuous in pain
or pleasure. He's destitute of passion. He
has no emotional self. He's just cold and calculating,
and found his joy, whether pain or pleasure, he found his joy
in virtue. Well, these fellas heard Paul,
verse 18. These fellas encountered him.
They ran into him, heard him preach, and some said, what will
this babbler say? What will this bass fella, babbler's
a bass fella, what's he gonna say? Others some, he seems to
be a setter forth of strange gods. Now listen, Paul was preaching
God the Creator, the Covenant God, the God of Christ, God and
Father of Christ, the God of Moses, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,
the God of purpose and glory and redemption, plenteous in
mercy. That's what he was preaching. These fellows, they were religious. That's a strange idea. But they
said, this is a base fellow. And he's a babbler. And let's
see what he has to say. And he seems to be setting forth
some strange God because he preached unto them Jesus. Jesus Christ
and the resurrection. So they took him. I don't think
they took him by force. I think they just... That wouldn't
be their way. They were philosophers. They
were mind-bogglers. They were debaters and discussers. They loved new things. Anything
new came along, they grabbed at it, you know, and they heard
him and they thought, well, let's take him up to the Mars Hill,
where all the philosophers and so-called wise men and religious
people met and argued all the time. So, he says they took him
and brought him unto Areopagus. Areopagus was a place where they
met and discussed things and it was a court. It was a place
a court where the wise men and philosophers gathered to debate
and discuss philosophy and matters of religion. That's where they
took him, Areopagus. It's Mars Hill. They said, May
we know what this new doctrine whereof thou speakest is? Let's
hear you. For you bring, verse 20, you
bring certain strange things to our ears. We've never heard
this. We would know, therefore, what these things mean. I had
a couple come here one time, and they were in their 40s, I guess, at that time, early
40s. After the service, I shook hands
with them at the door, and had been here two or three times.
This was the 34th time. Anyway, she looked at me and
said, that's the first sermon I've ever heard. First sermon
I've ever heard, I said, I thought you went to church all your life.
She said, I did. I said, how is that the first
sermon you've ever heard? She said, I never heard one.
I've never paid any attention. I've just come, went to where
I went to church and went through Sunday school and the intermission
and the morning service and I never heard anything. And this is the
thing, people won't be disturbed and they won't be convicted,
and they won't be troubled, and they won't be converted if you
just follow the mainstream of religion. Just talk religion. And that's what these fellows
were saying to Paul. They listened to him, and there were other
speakers everywhere. He said something. And they said,
we never heard that before. That's what this lady was saying
to me. I never heard that before. I never heard that before. If
you just stay in the building and stay in the mainstream and
stay with the common, ordinary clichÃ©s and religious terms,
praise God, hallelujah, the Lord heals, Jesus is same yesterday,
today and forever, whoopee, you know, nobody's going to hear
that. And they said, you bring strange things to our ears. We
want to know. For all the Athenians, verse 21, and strangers, which
were there, spent their time in nothing else but either to
tell or hear some new thing. And Paul had a new thing. I've
got a new message to this generation. It's a new covenant. That's the
reason our books are going everywhere and our tapes are going everywhere,
not because I'm any Anything to speak of, not, but it's what
I'm saying. I'm saying some things nobody
else is saying, and people are listening. People in California,
we got what, seven or eight letters this week in California ordering
tapes, and they get the television program out there, and they're
saying, hey, we want to hear some more of this. We haven't
heard this. Okay, verse 22, so Paul stood in the midst of Mars
Hill. He stood up in the middle of
them. He said, ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things
you are too superstitious. What's that? I perceive in all
things that you are more religious than most people. Now you check
and see if I'm not interpreting that right. That's what he said.
You're more religious than many people. The city was full of
idols. He said, I passed by and beheld
your devotions, your gods that you worship. The city was full
of idols, religion, religious shrines and statues and symbols
and all these things. Somebody said in the days of
Nero there were 30,000 public statues in Athens. 30,000, not counting the ones
in people's homes. They had a god for everything.
Well, let me ask you, isn't America pretty much the same way? This is a religious country.
Religious. You can go to a bar game, some
guy's got a religious signed up, you know, with funny looking
hair, you know, you've seen here, man. at a goth mass. You see,
there's religion everywhere. We have cults and sects and denominations. We have festivals, feasts, and
revivals. We have holy days and holidays.
We have cathedrals. We have temples. We have churches.
We have chapels. We have synagogues. We have altars.
We have steeples. We have statues. We have crosses.
We have programs. We're more religious than any
country on the face of the earth has ever been. We've got whole
TV stations devoted to nothing but religion. We have radio programs. You get in your car and turn
it on, there's a preacher all the way across the dial, you
know. There's religion everywhere. Paul said to Athens, you are
more religious than anybody else. And that's exactly what I say
to my day. They're more religious than anybody
else. Yet, he said, look at verse 23, I beheld your gods you worship,
and I found an altar with this inscription. capitalized to the
unknown God. He was going through town. He
saw all these shrines and holy places and religious symbols
and statues. We have crosses. He found to
the unknown God. Now he said, Whom therefore you
ignorantly worship, Him declare unto you. Now wait a minute. These people had created all
sorts of gods. Listen to me a moment. All of
these gods were their gods, gods of their imagination. An image
comes from the word imagination, image. This is what they thought
God ought to be, so they made him one. That ring a bell? This is the way they thought
God ought to be. God said, I thought as I was
altogether such a one as thyself, Psalm 50. You thought I was altogether
such a one as yourself. That's the reason a man doesn't
hesitate on the movie screen to play the part of Jesus Christ.
You reckon all the money in the world would influence me to play
God? Come on now, would you play God? But they have no hesitation because
God is like them. They've made Him. These gods,
they knew all about them. You listen to the average preacher,
he's on familiar terms with God. I heard one last night, God told
him certain things, God speaks to him, God appeared to him.
He and God have got the buddy system really fixed up, big brother
system or something. But he and God, see that's where
these people were, they knew all about their gods because
they made them. They were just like them. They knew their origin.
They knew their attributes. They knew their limitations.
They knew their powers. They were just what they let
them be. That's what the Baptist preachers say. God will be whatever
you let Him be. You want to let Him in your heart? He'll come
in. If you don't, He won't. If you want to let Him have His
way, He will. But if you don't, He won't. He's got His limitations. You set them. These people knew
their gods. They talked to their gods. They
sacrificed to their gods. They gave, listen to me, they
gave their gods credit for the good that happened to them, and
blamed somebody else for the bad. That's right. And so just in
case they had all these gods, and just in case they'd missed
a god, somewhere along the line, they erected an altar to the
unknown god, just in case they missed one. They served their gods, but to
keep from offending whoever this god they didn't know happened
to be, they raised a devotion to him. Paul said to them, all these
gods you claim to know are not gods at all. The real god is
the one you don't know. Let me ask you a question. I used to have a school teacher. Mrs. Rice, if she wanted us to
really get a hold of something, she said, would you just slip
your thinking cap on for a minute? Just slip it on. Just for a minute. Why do you suppose that these
people erected an altar to an unknown God? They had gods. They had gods in whom they believed. They prayed to these gods, sacrificed
to these gods, and talk to these gods. But here they erected an altar
to an unknown god. Why would they do that? You know
why? Fear and uncertainty. They had no real confidence in
their gods. They had no real confidence of
peace or rest in these idols. And so to keep from offending
any God that might happen to be, they built an altar to the
unknown God. You want me to tell you that
many, why the reason why many men and women in religion today,
I'm talking about strong religious leaders. I'm talking about men
who have been in their denominations or their so-called Gospels a
long time. You know why they're so tolerant?
Why are they so tolerant toward all religious beliefs and religious
practices, even opposite from theirs? You know why? It's not kindness. It's fear and uncertainty. If
they really believed their gospel, they wouldn't tolerate a false
gospel. A man who really knows in his
heart knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that God Almighty is
sovereign. He won't tolerate or put up with
or listen to or promote or support someone who is saying
differently. He won't do it. He doesn't have
any fear. A man who believes that God did elect a people and
He will save them, that God does all He does on purpose, I know
that. I know that. I don't have a doubt in my mind
that God reigns and rules over all things. Providentially, He
brings everything to pass. George Barker's wreck on Route
52, turning towards the airport, that car didn't just happen to
be there, it was there on purpose. I don't know why, I don't know
what God will bring to pass, I just know God did it. The Lord
giveth and the Lord taketh away. God said, I kill, I make alive. I wound and I heal. Is anything
too hard for God? You believe that? Well, then
you certainly wouldn't cooperate with and encourage someone who
denied it, would you? A man said at a funeral recently
of one of our congregations, a member of the family, A young
man was killed in an automobile wreck and the preacher got up
and said, God didn't do this. He said that to the congregation.
God didn't do this. Well, I want to know who did
it. Where is the power that is greater than God? Where is the
one who can act without His permission in His direction? Who did it? Well, that preacher will compromise
with any religion because his God is not God. Do you see what
I'm saying? People have no confidence, they
have no rest, they have no peace in what they believe or in their
God, so they accept, well, any God. I mean, it's like, why do you
have to burn a candle for me? What I'm doing is not working.
Isn't that right? Now, if I have some confidence
and some peace, And what God says, I'm not going to... He said if any man preach any
other gospel than the gospel I preach, let him be accursed.
Even if it's an angel from heaven. Now that's confidence. That's rest. That's God. And this is what led the martyrs
to die. and the religious people to compromise.
What has gotten the church in the position it's in today of
just a blanket that covers anything? You know, it's compromising preachers
who are uncertain about what they believe or whom they believe,
and they just, well, it's all right, just do it. And that's
the way these people were. So Paul stood and he said, I'm
going to tell you about this true God. Now listen to verse
24. God that made the worlds and all things therein, seeing
that He's Lord of heaven, He's sovereign, He's Lord of heaven
and Lord of the earth. He doesn't dwell in temples made
with hands. We call this God's house. Well,
not in the sense that He dwells here. St. Solomon built the temple. He
said, am I building God a house? I'm just building a house where
we're going to sacrifice to God and worship God. That's all. Because the heaven of heavens
won't contain Him. He doesn't dwell in a building
made with hands. In verse 25, He's not worshipped
with men's hands as though He needed anything. Somebody says,
God has no hands but your hands. Yes, He does too. God is spirit,
they that worship Him, worship Him in spirit and truth. He,
verse 25, God's not worshiped with our hands, clapping or raising
them or whatever, or serving, as though He needed anything.
See, He gives us breath, life, He gives us life, breath, and
everything we have. He gave us. He gave us. You see, true worship
is internal, not external. It's in the heart, not the hand.
It's the spirit, not the flesh. I don't know where we're headed, and I don't know where it's going
to stop, if it does. But I'll tell you, folks, this
emotionalism in religious circles and in the name of God, this
wild and woolly wildfire is not honoring to God. It's not worship. Be still and know that I'm God.
God is in His holy temple. Let all the earth be silent.
He said in Ecclesiastes, when you go into the house of God,
let your words be few. If you bow about it before God,
don't defer to pain. Worship is from the heart. Worship
is contemplation and consideration. It's devotion. It's meditation.
It's thinking upon God. It's faith, it's commitment to
God, it's a personal thing. It's not a hoop-de-doo like we're
having a rock concert. Trying to get everybody happy.
I'm not happy right now, I'm sad. Aren't you? I lost a dear
friend yesterday. I don't feel like throwing song
books. I feel like crying. I feel like praying, don't you? I feel like calling on God. Now,
you want to call us a dead church because we feel like calling
on God? That's one of the false preachers' things. They say it's
dry and dead. I wonder if we couldn't just...
What if we just came here and sat for 30 minutes and prayed?
Would that be dead? It would probably be the best
thing we've ever done. And nobody said anything. Nobody. God is not worshipped. Verse 26, He's made of one blood,
all men. We divide them into nations and
colors and classes and denominations and high and low and rich and
poor and learned and ignorant. They all came from one root,
Adam. One blood, all nations of men that dwell on the face
of the earth. And He has determined the times before appointed and
the bounds of their habitation. God Almighty has allotted my
period of time on this earth. He's fixed my boundaries, my
habitation, my land, my abode. Thank God, my gospel. Thank God,
my gospel. That they should seek the Lord.
Don't seek the right doctrine. Seek the Lord. If you find the
Lord, you'll have the right doctrine. That's right. Seek the Lord. that they should seek the Lord. Don't seek the right church.
If you find Him, you'll find Him in His church. That's right. You will. You'll find that church
worshiping Him. You find Him in His gospel, you
found His church. Don't seek the right form of
worship. Worship is not a form. It's an experience. It's a nature. And when you find people worshipping
God, find God, you'll find people worshipping God. You see, when
you find people to whom God has revealed Himself, you'll find
them worshipping. Don't seek heaven. You find Him,
you've got heaven. You see what I'm saying? Don't
seek the gifts. Don't you dare seek the gifts.
You find Him, He's the gift. You have Him, you have anything
and everything He wants you to have. Don't seek the gifts. Seek
the Lord. Paul is telling them the truth.
Seek Him. And listen, if happy you might
feel after Him, experience Him, find Him, though He is not far
from every one of us. You don't go to church to find
God. You don't come to the front to find salvation. God is out
yonder. Everywhere you go, He is there. When Maurice Montgomery
left home to go to the army in the Korean War, his old daddy
put his arm around him and said, son, God goes everywhere. God goes everywhere. Man doesn't
have to be here to find God. In fact, if he identifies God
with a place, he's not going to find God. Does that make sense
what I'm saying? If his conception, his concept
of God, is identified with a place, then he's mystic. Because God
is the Lord of heaven and earth. He's not far from all of us.
Look at verse 28. Let me move quickly. For in Him
we live and move and have our being. Paul said, if certain
of your own poets said, we're God's offspring, God created
us, we're God's offspring. Now, look at verse 29. For as
much then as we are the offspring of God, am I the offspring of
God? Am I the offspring of God? Well,
yes. Then we ought not think that
God is like gold or silver or stone. I'm not like gold or silver
or stone. If we're His offspring, why would
we, listen, why would we think that God is worshipped? I go
in those cathedrals down in Mexico and see these statues. And I
see the gold up there and the gold crowns and the cross. God's
not a crown or a cross or gold or silver. I'm a person. I have a spirit. I have a will. I have love. I have life. I have a spirit. Statues, houses,
and altars have one thing, dead. They're dead. I don't have anything
up here because all those things are dead. God is light and life,
as we are. We are a poor image of God. We're
created in the image of God, but we've deteriorated. But we
have retained enough to know that if we're His offspring,
then we don't come to a marble statue. Well, that's so, is it not? Now listen, verse 30, and the
times of this ignorance God winked at, or God put up with, God in
His long-suffering. Let me ask you to turn to one
verse, chapter 14 of the book of Acts, verse 16. Now listen to this. Chapter 14,
verse 16. The book of Acts. Let me read verse 15. And he
said, Sirs, why do you these things? Why do you worship men? We also are men of like passions
with you, and we preach unto you, you should turn from these
vanities to the living God, which made heaven and earth and the
sea and all things that are therein, who in time past suffered all
nations to walk in their own way. There was a time when God
put up with this. and suffered them to walk in
their own ways. Now back to Acts 17, 30. Paul told these people, listen
to it, in the times of this ignorance of worshipping idols, God put
up with it. But now he commands all men everywhere
to repent. Change your mind, change your
manners, change your masters, Because, here's the sum, God
has appointed a day, and that day's out there, in which he's
going to judge this world in righteousness. In righteousness. His righteousness. By that man
which he hath ordained. What proof do we have of it?
Whereof he hath given assurance unto all men in that he raised
him from the dead. There's coming a time and a day
when God's going to judge this world. Every human being, stand
before God, going to judge them in righteousness by Christ, by
the obedience and by the blood and by the death of His Son.
And He told this whole world that what Christ said was true. He raised Him from the dead.
What Christ did, God approved of. He raised Him from the dead.
What Christ claimed to be, He is. God raised Him from the dead.
That's it. Now, what was the result? And
when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked. Some
are not going to hear it. They mocked. But others, thank
God, others said, we'll be back to hear you again. We'll be back to hear you again. I hope you will.

Paul's Message

What does the Bible say about redemption in Christ?

How do we know the resurrection of Christ is true?

Why is the concept of God's sovereignty important for Christians?

What does the Bible say about the relationship between God and idols?

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Paul's Message

What does the Bible say about redemption in Christ?

How do we know the resurrection of Christ is true?

Why is the concept of God's sovereignty important for Christians?

What does the Bible say about the relationship between God and idols?

Sermon Transcript

About Henry Mahan

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