Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Welcome to the Karma Chaj podcast.
[00:00:07] Okay, Bible, 16 minutes. Fantastic.
[00:00:13] The great thing about reading through a book of the Bible we've been going through, Acts, as I've been saying, is you can't miss the hard bits, okay? Because there are great bits in the Bible and there are hard bits in the Bible. And I wish I could tell you this morning that walking with Jesus will all be glory. That wherever your feet tread, he'll give you the ground. That everyone's going to love you as he loves you. That you're never going to feel weak and you're always going to be soaring on wings like eagles, and it's just going to be constant glory every single day.
[00:00:50] But it isn't always like that. There are trials. The Bible talks a lot about trials. And you know, when we sign up for Jesus, we don't only join his people, we join his army.
[00:01:02] And so armies go to war. Jesus says this. From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been subjected to violence and violent people have been raiding it. You see, when you choose Jesus, you become part of his family, but you also enter a spiritual battle. And we are contending for the lives of men and women. Look, if heaven is real, so is hell. So the gospel we preach calls men and women from unbelief and destruction into faith and hope. So what I want to do is pick up the story of Paul and Barnabas. And we're in Iconium now. So if you got your Bible, find Acts, chapter 14. Where are we going to read from? Verse 1. Why don't you stand as we read? This is the word of the Lord. Now, it happened in Iconium that they went together to the synagogue of the Jews and spoke. And so spoke that a great multitude, both of the Jews and of the Greeks believed. But the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the brethren. Therefore they stayed there a long time, speaking boldly in the Lord, who was bearing witness to the word of his grace, granting signs and wonders to be done by their hands. But the multitude of the city was divided. Part sided with the Jews and part with the apostles. And when a violent attempt was made by both the Gentiles and the Jews with their rulers to abuse and stone them, they became aware of it and fled to Lystra and Derbe, cities of Lycaonia, and to the surrounding region. And they were preaching the Gospel there.
[00:02:49] Amen. Take a seat.
[00:02:52] We'll try and get through the story. We probably won't get through the whole story, but you can read the rest. So what we've seen now in this section of Acts are the battle lines are starting to be drawn, okay? And the battle is over belief or unbelief in the saving power of Jesus Christ. Okay?
[00:03:15] That's where the battle is drawn. And what I want to say to you, Unbelief poisons minds.
[00:03:22] It's easy to live in unbelief, but it's not easy to live in faith. You see, people will try and move you from faith in God to unbelief because they don't want to be alone in their unbelief.
[00:03:37] But believing would mean they need to change their life.
[00:03:42] So they become preachers of unbelief, and there is a demonic hold on their hearts. You see, faith is trusting that God has the victory, even when our circumstances say otherwise.
[00:03:56] And what we see in this story is that amidst the trial, there is glory. There are signs and wonders. And when we preach the gospel, we're calling people to pick up their cross and follow Jesus. So we're calling them to the glory, but we're also calling them through the trials. And so that's a little bit of what I want to talk about this morning. First, the glory. So Jesus is granting them signs and wonders by their hands. And the next verse, verse eight, in Lystra, they're moving on because of the persecution. A crippled man is healed and leaps up.
[00:04:44] And the people love them. In fact, if you read the story, they say, the gods have walked amongst us. So this was such a powerful miracle.
[00:04:53] And so Barnabas, they call Zeus and Paul, Hermes. And I've got four lessons if we get there. Lesson one, don't touch the glory. Okay? The glory isn't ours. Paul says, we are just men like you, and we preach to you, you should turn from these useless things. What useless things? Is he talking about worshipping people?
[00:05:16] Okay. He's saying, don't worship people. Worship God. He says to the living God who made heaven, the earth, the sea, and all the that are in them, the creation. And as we talked last week about the creation, Paul is going to call the Gentiles from worship in the creation to worshiping the Creator. He's moving our eyes to heaven. And when the favor of God is upon you, everything starts to open up, everything starts to go well. And so when we're in those seasons, it's really important to walk humbly before the Lord and don't touch the glory. You know, when he's in the room, we take a step Back he gets the glory. It's not about us. It's all about Jesus. And when you're in one of these glory seasons, enjoy it.
[00:06:06] Enjoy all the favor that the Lord brings into your life. But remember where the favor comes from.
[00:06:15] You see, the church doesn't need superstars. We don't need to parade them on the stage. The church needs the power of God. The church needs his rescuing power, not superstars.
[00:06:29] And here we're in a wonderful season. People are coming to Christ. People are being healed. The church is growing. There is life in the worship. But it's all because of his presence, not our works. It's His Holy Spirit. It's him in our midst that is doing this.
[00:06:51] Okay, the trials.
[00:06:54] But what we see is among the glory there are trials.
[00:07:01] And the unbelief we just talked about now becomes self righteous violence.
[00:07:10] Self is right, therefore I can destroy. Unbelief justifies all its actions for the cause.
[00:07:21] Okay, so lesson number two. If you're justifying your lifestyle or actions that are contrary to scripture, you are in unbelief. There is unbelief in your life. You know, an example. Let me give you an example from my own life. You know, the scriptures tell us not to judge other Christians.
[00:07:43] If you're speaking badly of a brother, even if you think you have a right, you are probably in unbelief somewhere in your life.
[00:07:53] Back in 1982, a man called John Wimber came to the UK. He was an American. He was doing signs and wonders and I was a youth leader. I was probably 18 or 19 years old. And lots of people said, have you heard this guy's coming? Have you heard this guy's coming? I go, oh, he's American, you don't want to touch him. He's probably a TV evangelist. Keep well away from him. And for two years I managed to keep them away from him, okay? Little did I know he was going to change my life.
[00:08:25] And my life was full of unbelief. The funny thing is that same group now would say the same about me.
[00:08:36] You see, I'm reaping what I've sown.
[00:08:40] But Jesus will redeem as I endure the trial while trusting in him.
[00:08:47] Okay, so verse 19. The Jews from Antioch and Iconium came there to Lystra, and having persuaded the multitudes, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing him to be dead. Think about this.
[00:09:05] Paul has gone from glory where they want to worship him to now where they hate him so much that they've Stoned him, thrown him out of the city and left him for dead. This is the power of unbelief when it poisons people's minds.
[00:09:21] This is what happened. The violence that unbelief has stirred up has left his lifeless body outside the city. And it's all justified in the sense of we have a cause. That's what unbelief does. You see, if Paul had been Zeus or Hermes, they would have loved him, they would have worshipped him. But because he was a servant of Jesus Christ, he's stoned.
[00:09:48] And what I want to say to you is there is no greater honor than to suffer for Jesus.
[00:09:55] I know we don't always tell you that when you walk forward and give your life to Jesus, come and step in the glory, get your sins forgiven.
[00:10:03] But I want you to know we get to share in his sufferings.
[00:10:09] And if you go all out for Jesus, there will be times in your life when you're either left for dead or you feel like you're left for dead.
[00:10:19] I mean when I was a young guy I was doing some outreach in Liverpool with a church there and we were out on the streets one evening, it was early evening, about 7 o'clock at night and there was a drunk on the streets and he got himself into a mess and we were just clearing him up and telling him about Jesus and telling him how he loved him. Anyway, these two big Scousers walked by, which would be typical in Liverpool since that's where they live and they walk by and as they walk by he starts shouting at them and yelling at them. So they turned around and they said, was that you? I'm going, no, it was him. Anyway, they grabbed me, picked me up and it was a department store window and tried to throw me through the window. Now I don't know if it was good or bad. The window didn't break, I just hit it and I slid down the window, it really hurt.
[00:11:23] My head hit the window, my body hit the window and my pride was down here. I felt stupid, you know when my friends, they kind of, the guys just went off and laughing and they were you alright? Yeah, I'm alright. Just where were the 12 foot angels when they're needed?
[00:11:45] You know I was leading church in Southend and I remember, I mean you should be okay in church, right?
[00:11:52] I'm in church, this guy comes up and he headbutts me. He mistook me for the devil.
[00:12:00] I'm one of the nicest people I know and I remember it hit me and I'm like Knocked backwards, and my head is spinning and I can feel my face swelling. And the next morning, I'm at a pastor's meeting. I've got this black eye. I mean, they're all joking about it and, oh, this is what happens when Steve preaches and all that. But again, I felt so stupid.
[00:12:30] It didn't feel like a badge of honor.
[00:12:34] I remember when we got married, you know, and Joel quickly came along and we were starting a family and Juliet was pregnant again. And we got to about 16 or so weeks and her waters broke, but the baby didn't die.
[00:12:56] And so the doctor said, well, we need to abort the baby. And we said, we can't do that. We don't have that choice.
[00:13:05] Only God. God gives life and God takes away life, and we are his servants. And so Juliet carried our son for another four weeks before he died and then gave birth to a stillborn baby. That happened twice while we were leading church.
[00:13:30] And people would say to me, does this not knock your faith? And we go, no, you don't understand.
[00:13:37] He's here. Jesus is here in the sufferings.
[00:13:41] And you know, we. So we, you know, some of you will have been through some of these things. We have two children we've never met in heaven, Jesse and Jake, that we will be reunited with one day.
[00:13:55] But in amongst the trial is his presence.
[00:14:00] I've been thrown out of three churches. That's really hard to believe, right?
[00:14:06] First one, when I was 20, and do you know what? Each time it's because of one of two things, salvation or worship.
[00:14:15] And the first one was people were getting saved, but they weren't going along church. They said, well, if they're not going to come to church, we don't want you saving them. I'm like, duh.
[00:14:25] And so they asked us to leave. It was very painful. The next time, I'm in my early 20s and we'd seen hundreds of young people saved, but the worship and the movement of the Holy Spirit was just outside the church. And they said, we don't want this kind of stuff here. You have to leave. And it was like leaving my babies and get out. You're not allowed to be in here anymore. Very painful.
[00:14:50] And then when I'm 50, the same thing happens. We don't want this.
[00:14:56] And pushed out. And you know what? Sometimes we go through trials, but right there in the trial, the Lord is with us.
[00:15:07] But let me tell you something. I am a blessed man. I have a blessed family. I believe and trust in the Lord. So in the midst of the trial. I live in the glory and I live in his presence. Look, I want you to know something. Jesus can rescue you from every sin, but he can't save you from unbelief.
[00:15:32] Saul is a king who doesn't trust God.
[00:15:36] David is a king who gets into all sorts of trouble, all sorts of messes, but he trusts the Lord. He's a man who does everything the Lord tells him to do. Why? Because he believes in the Lord. And it's David's throne that endures forever, not Saul's. Look, we got to move really quick. But I want to read Psalm 31. I just want to read this to you because I think it will help some of you.
[00:16:04] Let me find it. I put my marker in. This is David speaking. And we're not sure whether this was David with Saul when Saul is trying to kill him, or whether Absalom is trying to kill him. I mean, there were lots of times where David was in trouble. Okay? And this is what David says. Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I am in trouble. My eye wastes away with grief, yes, my soul and my body, for my life is spent with grief and my years with sighing. My strength fails because of my iniquity, and my bones waste away. I am a reproach amongst my enemies, but especially among my neighbours. I am repulsive to my acquaintances. Those who see me outside flee from me. I am forgotten, like a dead man, out of mind. I am like a broken vessel, for I hear the slander of many. Fear is on every side. While they take counsel together against me, they scheme to take away my life. And remember I said there's two words that often the Bible uses but God.
[00:17:07] And here we are. He says this, but as for me, I will trust in you, O Lord. I say you are my God. My times are in your hand. Deliver me from the hand of my enemies and from those who persecute me. Make your face shine upon your servants. Save me for your mercy's sake. Do not let me be ashamed, O Lord, for I have called upon you.
[00:17:31] And then he goes to verse 19. How great is your goodness. That's what you were doing in worship this morning, which you have laid up for those that fear you, which you have prepared for those that trust in you in the presence of the Son of Man. And then my favorite verse, verse 20. You shall hide them in the secret place of your presence.
[00:17:54] Look, lesson three. I want you to understand that sometimes you will feel like you're on your own. Paul frequently talks about being deserted. You know where were all the brothers? Where were his friends when he's thrown outside the city? They've been. They've deserted him again. You are never on your own when you put your trust in the Lord.
[00:18:17] But then In Acts chapter 20 we read. However, when the disciples gather around him, he rose up and went into the city. And the next day he departed with Barnabas to Derbe. The language here is not clear of what exactly happened. Was Paul raised from the dead or was he strengthened so he could stand? It's unclear. Could mean either. Okay. The truth is, who cares what I want you to know through the lowest points. Throughout the years of walking with Jesus, the Lord has always brought brothers of faith that come around us in those times.
[00:18:50] But I want you to know it's him who raises us up, not them.
[00:18:55] It's the spirit of God that raises us up from being dead on the ground in a trial. Not the people. Otherwise you look into the people again. He just brings the people. So you're not allowed alone.
[00:19:07] You may feel alone, but when the disciples and the trainees gather around you and they see you rise up, faith is stirred in their hearts. Because in verse 22, we see them strengthening the souls of the disciples, exhorting them to continue in the faith and saying, we must go through many tribulations to enter the kingdom of God. Lesson number four.
[00:19:30] The way we face our trials causes those around us to believe.
[00:19:39] They see the face of Jesus shining upon us, faith is released in their hearts and they are saved.
[00:19:48] And guess what? Men and women of faith are raised up in the church. The reason I told you the baby story is that we have children in this church that would not be alive today if they'd been aborted. But their parents had faith and they're healthy and thriving.
[00:20:04] There will be. Yeah, it's time for the church to have some faith.
[00:20:10] There will be people of whom will in the future be assisted to die if this bill goes through whom the Lord wants to raise up and transform their life, he doesn't give us the option to just die. He says, no, I'm going to come into your life. You're going to be forgiven of your sin and you're going to have eternal life.
[00:20:33] This is the plan of God. You see? What am I saying? I'm saying I want you always to walk in glory, but don't touch it. If you're just number two. If you're justifying your lifestyle or actions that are contrary to the scripture, you're in unbelief. You need to repent Even through our trials, you are never on your own. In fact, it is through the trials where the presence of the Lord manifests even more.
[00:21:07] And the way we face our trials causes those around us to believe.
[00:21:13] When Paul was on the floor, either dead or left for dead, and the Lord shines his face upon him, don't you think Paul was thinking about Stephen, who he'd had stoned earlier?
[00:21:32] Don't you think he's thinking, I'm reaping what I've sown.
[00:21:37] I deserve this. Maybe it's my time to go. But the Lord takes him by the hand and says, paul, stand up.
[00:21:46] And because of the way Paul stands up through the trials the brothers believe, faith is released. And what he had sown all those years earlier is redeemed for a miracle that produces faith in the church and the gospel goes forward. You know, there are many reasons that the Lord takes us through trials, but sometimes we need to show people how to stand up in a trial, how to trust God and allow them to see his deliverance in our life so that they can believe and have faith. Because that is what cuts through unbelief. And their lives are forever changed. And that's the story of Paul and Barnabas. And that's as the battle lines are drawn. That's what we see, and that's how we see the Christians in the New Testament live. Thanks for listening to the Cromer Church Podcast. If you enjoyed this message, you can like and subscribe. You can also join us in person or online every Sunday at Cromer Church. For more information about us, including our ministries, events, worship, and how to donate, visit our website at Cromer Church.
