Living Waters of Grace 10.02.25

This is Living Waters of Grace, the teaching ministry of Clark

Wofford, senior pastor of Calvary Chapel of Westmoreland,

County of Greensburg, PA. Now here's Pastor Clark as he

continues teaching through God's Word.

So all the things that are wrong in the world today, we don't

like it. We want to see it corrected.

And that's a good thing. He's already overcome the world.

He's not looking at this institution that we call the

United States of America, which we all love and we're willing to

die for. His hope is not built on

America. The hope of God is built on one

foundation, and that's the death, the burial, resurrection

and soon coming of Jesus Christ. When we think of our allegiance

to the Kingdom of God, it can be difficult to remember that the

Kingdom of God takes priority over the nation we live in

currently. See, God isn't coming to make a

new Kingdom out of the nations of this current day and age.

No, God is going to make everything new again and that

means getting rid of all the man made institutions that we've

built up over centuries. Our hope must be placed in Jesus

or everything we've built up in this life will crumble to dust

and be swept away. Now here's Pastor Clark in Acts

Acts 5 · chapter mention

Chapter 5 with today's edition of Living Waters of Grace.

Stephen was one of the seven. He was not an apostle, but he

was a man of God filled with the Holy Spirit.

So God doesn't differentiate in regard to the communication of

the Word. A man of God is a man of God.

You know, the title does not make the man the man of God.

It's not the pastor or the elder or the Deacon.

It's you and me as men were either given over to serve God

and to be used by God and to use our gifts that God's given us,

or we just sit around and don't do anything right in our church.

You know, we want to see more and more men teaching the word

of God because if they're learning to teach the word of

God, they're going to help the church grow, but they're also

going to be used by the Lord in their own homes and their family

and their own sphere of influence as as well as the

church. And Wednesday night we have

other guys beside pastors that are teaching the word and

they're this is competent and gifted and a blessing to us is,

is, is the pastors. We don't hold one person up

higher than the other. It's the word of God that's

doing the work right. The word of God communicated to

the people of God is what changes the the hearts of of the

people of God. So Stephen is a man of faith.

It says here in verse 8, Stephen full of faith and power did

great wonders and signs among the people.

And then you might say, well, I thought any of the apostles

could do that. Well, back in the early church

days, God's miraculous power was being poured out through men and

women and very different kind of circumstances.

It wasn't, excuse me, only an Apostolic kind of authority that

would have the ability to do these things.

I mean, Stevens picked to be and there was no deacons at this

time. Later on, the word developed

Deacon means servant. In the book of Timothy, it tells

about the qualifications of leaders in the church.

But they weren't so much at this particular point in time

positioned as deacons. They were just servants, right.

So Steven, he's doing these ministries and he's called to

help with the widows, but he, he didn't, well, I guess I'm just

like a down and out guy and I'm, I'm not good enough to do

anything else. So I'll help these widows and

I'll, you know, no, he was a man of God.

So he had a lot of spiritual gifts.

He was able to do a lot of different things.

He wasn't just doing one thing right.

He was able to be used by the Lord.

And then in verse 9, there arose some from what is called the

synagogue of the freeman sirenians, Alexandrians and

those from Silesia and Asia disputing with Stephen.

They began to argue with him because of his evangelistic zeal

and his preaching of of Christ. Cilicia is the region where the

apostle Paul was serving with the Sanhedrin at the time.

He was called Saul of Tarsus and we'll study later on in the book

of the Acts how he became born again.

But he was a persecutor of Christians.

And so it says that and when they were not able to resist the

wisdom and the spirit by which he spoke.

So these guys are hearing what the gospel's about the person of

Jesus, the history, the biblical point by point step and he goes

into great detail. It's probably one of the

greatest historical sermons in the New Testament as to what God

started with Abraham and moved all the way through Christ when

Christ came. We'll take our time as we study

this. But so they're arguing with him.

But what was amazing was they inside weren't able to resist

the wisdom and the spirit by which he spoke.

There was an anointing on this man, and they weren't able to

ignore it. They weren't able to dispute it.

They weren't really able to find concrete evidence to disagree

with what he was saying. They didn't like what he was

saying, but they weren't able to disagree with what he was

saying. They were convicted even at the

early stage of his his preaching here.

And it says then they secretly induce men to say we have heard

him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God.

So already these guys are beginning to spread division and

lies among the multitudes of people.

They're putting him down. They're disagreeing, they're

lying about things he said. Isn't that typical of anybody

that is influential in the culture?

If they're good people and they're trying to do the right

job, how many people slander the leader or the spokesperson or

the person? You know, it could be a

politician, it could be, you know, whatever, a pastor, you

guys or your family, you know, you're sharing your faith with

someone and, and they're, they're saying, well, you know,

I wouldn't listen to him because I saw him run a red light last

week. You know, he's not a real

Christian or just goofy stuff, right?

They've come up with all kind of reasons to invalidate you as

being a follower and a servant of God, right?

So they're beginning to stir all this up.

You know, we've heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses

and God. He never did that.

But he surely told them that Jesus was better than Moses,

which he is, right? They also talked about the

authority of Christ versus all those who went before him.

He was very clear on representing the Lord as as to

who he was and what he did. And it says in verse 12.

And they stirred up the people, they got them all uptight, got

them all anxious, aggravated the elders and the scribes, and they

came upon him, seized him and brought him to the council.

So none of this stuff's true. What they're saying about this

evangelist Stephen, he's being faithful to just give the word

out there simply the history of what Christ has done.

And they get this group of people that want to arrest them

now, seize them and bring them before the authorities, the same

authorities that Christ had to go through and go before, which

is interesting. They also set up false witnesses

who said this man does not cease to speak blasphemous words

against this holy place in the law.

False witnesses, that's common in the day as well.

How many times have you heard things that are being said about

someone that aren't? That isn't true.

This is happening in the political arena right now.

Thank the Lord there's evidence to the contrary and it's brought

out to clarify that it is a lie and it's not true, but it's the

enemy always wants to bring lies and slanderous things against

the truth. It's just the way it is in in

our world, and it's the way it's been since the beginning of

time. So they set up these false

witnesses. Now, when Stephen was speaking

about what God had put on his heart, he wasn't like saying

that the temple was insignificant, but he was trying

to help them understand. You've made this into an

idolatrous institution. You've begun to worship the

structure and the artwork and the beauty of the temple and not

the one who created it. And that can happen very easily

in, in, in churches. People saw, if you've been into

that church, it's magnificent. They have the most amazing

stained glass and they have, you know, how high ceilings in the,

in the chandeliers and, and people can go on and on and on.

And they like, they go into that and then they think, well, you

know, because all that stuff's there, then there must be God

must be there somehow. And then they, they, they come

into a place like this. And where's the stained glass

man? You know, is this really a

church or is this a cult or what is this place?

You know, and I'm not negating the beauty.

I like a, a beautiful church. I go into Saint Vincent once in

a while and pray when I'm driving down the road.

I just like going in there because the sun's coming in

through that stained glass window.

It's cool. I like that.

If we could afford it, I like to do it right.

But we're never, we're probably never going to be able to do

that. So if you want that, you got to

go up there, right? Nonetheless, it's not an opinion

of this is better and this is worse.

You know, the whole idea was it was their heart.

And because of their hearts being so focused on religion and

the duty of the law, they were religious Pharisees, and they

were trying to make everybody in a legalistic way, follow their

pattern of religion. And so Stephen's telling them

about the freedom that we have in Christ and that God is not

dwelling in temples made with hands.

Jesus made that clear. It's nice.

You know, when we're together as a church, I sense God's presence

here, not because of the building, but because you're

here. You represent him.

Your life is filled with God's Spirit and and that's what makes

the place alive when whenever you guys all leave here and you

walk in here, it's just a room. It's just a room, but you still

can sense of spirit because he's with you if you're the only one

in the room. For we have heard him say that

this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and change

the customs which Moses delivered to us.

So they're really making a big deal about the building.

And whenever Jesus said this temple will be destroyed or be

raised up in three days, we all know because we went through the

Gospel studying, that he was referring to his body, right,

and his resurrection. But of course, the temple was

going to be destroyed in AD 70. And he warned them about what

was going to happen to their wonderful city and because of

their Pagan rituals and everything else that was going

on, that the Lord was going to allow that all to be eventually

destroyed. And the customs, you know, the

traditions of men make God's word of no effect.

If I or Lewis or any of us as leading the church began to make

a custom primary versus the worship of Jesus, we've lost it.

We've already gone down the wrong Rd. and all of us have

come out of different churches before we got saved.

Maybe we were in churches that preached the gospel, but every

church had a custom that I was involved in and they weren't

necessarily bad customs. But if the custom was made that

you had to do this custom in order to please God, then you

were guilt ridden. You felt like if I don't do

this, then I'm really not following the Lord.

Like, you know, we have an altar call once in a while, but I'm

not against altar calls. But I'm not really for them all

the time because they, they can become accustomed really quick.

I remember when I first started as a pastor, if everybody wasn't

at the altar before I was done preaching, I thought I failed,

right? So people would graciously come

up and there would be like two people sitting out there and

everybody else is at the altar. I mean, So what do we do?

Do we promise God this week that we're going to be better than we

were last week and we're going to do things differently?

Well, that's a nice idea to promise God, but usually your

promises are going to fail and you're going to find yourself

right back up front again under guilt again for the same thing.

You didn't get straightened out with the week before, right?

Doesn't make sense. Only the Holy Spirit can change

the heart. It's not the custom of the

altar. It's the work of God in your car

or at the home or in your backyard or playing with your

kid. God's everywhere.

In him we live, move and have our being.

So God is not positioned that man.

If if you're not at the altar today, you're, you know, you're

disobeying me and you're not following me or you're not, you

know, I mean, I don't know how many times as a young Christian,

I was on an altar and, and praying and, you know, wanting a

miracle and wanting a quick fix to protect me from as a young

man having lust of my heart, right?

God allowed less in a good way, because if men didn't have a

desire for a woman, there'd be no children.

So right, To have a desire to see someone who's attractive and

you're eventually going to get married to them, hopefully and

not sleep around with them. That's not what God wants.

But this desire that a man has for a woman, a woman has for a

man is a thing made by God. It's a good thing the marriage

bed isn't defiled, but as a young man I struggled a lot with

that. I don't know, am I the only guy

that had problems with that? Right.

And I battled that I battled. I still battle it.

Not to the degree I did when I was younger, but it's always

there, isn't it? And I wish that I could have

everything removed from my life in once one like switch and I'd

I'd be perfect. I have no more flaws.

I have no more sin. And the only one that can do

that is a Lord. When he died for us, he took

away all of our sin, didn't he? I can't negotiate with him and

promise him something that I'm bound to fail in.

I want to be more faithful. I want to be more dedicated, but

that's got to be the Lord doing that.

Because if I think I did it, then I'm going to come up here

and try to make you guys think you got to do it in your own

strength. And you can't without him, we

can't do anything. We have to come to that

realization without his help, we can do nothing.

And so he's telling them about their customs that are not doing

anything for anybody. They're, they're ridiculous.

And the customs in the Old Testament, when you read through

some of those customs that they had to go through to deal with

leprosy and all that kind of stuff, did you have problem

reading through the Bible in some of those areas?

You just sort of skip through because you said, well, this has

nothing to do with me. I don't know any lepers and I

haven't had leprosy. So I'm not really that

interested in how they dealt medically with leprosy.

But back in those days you need to know how to deal with leprosy

because there was a lot of lepers.

So they bring all these customs in, these rituals, these issues

of kosher and all these other things, and they make the gospel

and the word of God have no effect.

And so all who sat in the council looked steadfastly at

him and saw his face as a face of an Angel.

This is beautiful. Nothing was stirring this guy

up. He had the peace of God on him,

the anointing of God, the presence of God.

His face was shining like Moses face was shining when he came

down off the mountain, when he had met with God on Mount Sinai.

They're looking at him and they got to be saying, what's with

this guy? We're saying all these hateful,

all these untrue things about him, and he's not standing up

for his own rights or he's not trying to tell him they're wrong

and they're liars and I'm going to get legal counsel.

He was doing what he was doing because he loved God and he knew

what God had called him to do, and he was not bothered by

anybody's opinion or what it is they said or what it is they

thought. I want to be more like that when

my wife's mad at me and she's upset and she's probably right

about what she's upset about. I want to be able to have a

shiny face, not a mean face. What about you?

And trying to turn it around like I'm OK and she's not.

When you guys want to insult me or say something hurtful to me.

Thought that you would ever think of doing that right?

But if you did, or you might, I want to be like this snout and

loving you and not worrying about it instead of it.

Don't they realize how hard I work and how much I pray and how

much I care about them? And this isn't fair.

Lord, you know I didn't sign up for this.

Stuff that's ridiculous don't even have that discussion in

your mind about what you can't fix or do anything about.

People are going to form opinions about you whether you

like it or not. They're going to either say nice

things, they're going to say hurtful things.

And if we can get free from that, like Stephen was able to

be free from this, and this is a big time like assault on him,

it's going to cost him his life by what it is he's saying here,

that he had the presence of God, God's fullness in him.

Everything he's doing is according to the will of God.

Jesus told these guys long before he was crucified in the

world. You'll have tribulation, the

trials, difficulty, heartache, crisis.

Think you don't like things you don't think are fair in the

world, You'll have tribulation. But be of good cheer.

This guy's of good cheer here. Stephen has good cheer because

Jesus told us he's overcome the world.

So all the things that are wrong in the world today, we don't

like it. We want to see it corrected.

And that's a good thing. He's already overcome the world.

He's not looking at this institution that we call the

United States of America, which we all love and we're willing to

die for. His hope is not built on

America. The hope of God is built on one

foundation, and that's the death, the burial, resurrection,

and soon coming of Jesus Christ. And that impacts every nation

and every people group in the whole world, doesn't it?

So he's the witness. He's the faithful testimony.

He's the one who's sticking his neck out in the midst of a

culture that doesn't want to hear what it is he has to say.

And you and I are in a culture right now that people really

aren't interested in what your opinion is or what you think is

right or wrong or biblical. The majority of the culture we

live in is Pagan. They look at the percentages bar

and it's like 5545. Maybe the people that still

believe in some judeo-christian value in their hearts and in

their lives and their families. But it's never too late to pray

for God to move and bring revival.

As bad as things might look on horizon, and as messed up as

everything seems to be right now, would God turn the tides of

the hearts of the human race toward Him again, where we might

begin to move in the direction that He'll bless and not curse?

That's my hope, that's my prayer.

Just because things are going wrong and they don't look good,

it's not usually going to affect how I experience my life on a

daily basis. I have joy in my life.

I have so much to be thankful for.

I got a wonderful family and a wonderful church community to be

part of and serve and got my health.

As far as I know at this point in time, God's faithful to

provide. There's so much to be thankful

for, isn't there? And we need to focus on, as the

Bible said, whatsoever things are pure and lovely and just and

a good report. I don't need to turn on media

and get bad reports all day long and all that.

There's people making $1,000,000.

I'm making nothing. All I do is get upset when I

hear what they say. Most of the time I write.

But I'm like, you know, I don't like this.

You know, it's making me depressed.

Turn it off. It's not a good report.

And you need and I need, we need to build into each other things

that are pure lovely, Justin, a good report.

We need to build each other up. You need to build your children

up. You need to build your wives or

husbands up in the things of God.

And when you come and you worship on Sundays here,

whenever you come in the small groups, whatever you're involved

in, rejoice in the fact that you still have the ability to serve

God. No one's grabbing you and taking

you before a court of anarchist and, and, and threatening to

take your life if you don't shut up, right?

We have a time, such a time as this to be witnesses through the

airwaves, through the media, through one-on-one relationships

and conversations. Praise God, right?

I mean, he's the God of all hope, isn't he?

He's the God of all comfort. Too many Christians are walking

around. Oh.

This is terrible. What's going on?

And nothing's going to ever get better and the world's going to

hell in a handbasket and oh, Jesus is coming.

Take Me Out now so I don't have to pay my credit card debt off.

Tomorrow, right? Spend time with Him.

The more time you spend with him, the better things get.

The least amount of time you spend with him, the worse things

get. So Jesus, He's the answer.

Jesus is the only answer to every need of the human heart.

Amen. Thanks for joining us on today's

edition of Living Waters of Grace, a ministry of Calvary

Chapel, Westmoreland. Today, Pastor Clark is teaching

about the Book of Acts. As we learn more about Acts, it

becomes clear that the early church didn't miss a single

opportunity to share the gospel. In nearly every chapter, you see

apostles like Peter and Paul stepping into conversations,

crowds, and crises with boldness, ready to proclaim the

name of Jesus. Their example challenges us to

consider how we might step into gospel moments in our own lives.

What doors might God open this week for you to speak truth,

offer hope, or live out your faith in a way that points

others to Him? The story of Acts reminds us we

are part of the same mission. Today, let's live with eyes open

and hearts ready to respond. We hope you are challenged by

today's message. If you're in the Greensburg, PA

area, we'd love to see you in person this Sunday at 10:30 AM

at 400 E Pittsburgh St. Unit 6B.

For more information, visit calvarychapelonline.com.

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Once again, we're so grateful you joined us today to be

inspired by God's Word. Please tune in again for more

Living Waters of Grace.