Dethroning the "gods"

to you this morning. We're in chapter 19 of the book of Acts, so please open your Bibles with me

to Acts chapter 19, verses 21 to 41. Acts chapter 19, verses 21 to 41.

Acts 19:21–41 Acts 19:21–41

If there's any of you who's unfamiliar with the Bible, Acts is in the New Testament after the

Gospel of John before the book of Romans. Let me pray for the reading and preaching of God's Word.

Father, I tremble before your Word.

Lord, what a staggering privilege it is to be a mouthpiece for your Word, and I pray

that you help me to say only what you would have me say.

And I pray that your Word is read and preached, that it would have its intended effect on us

as your people, that Christ would be exalted, that our minds would be renewed,

that we would leave this place with a fresh sense of wonder and worship before you, our mighty God.

Address us now.

We are listening, Lord.

In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

Acts chapter 19, verses 21 to 41.

Acts 19:21–41

Now after these events, Paul resolved in the Spirit to pass through Macedonia and Achaia and go to Jerusalem,

saying, after I have been there, I must also see Rome.

And having sent into Macedonia two of his helpers, Timothy and Erastus, he himself stayed in Asia for a while.

About that time, there arose no little disturbance concerning the way.

For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith who made silver shrines of Artemis,

brought no little business to the craftsmen.

These he gathered together with the workmen in similar trades and said,

Men, you know that from this business we have our wealth.

And you see and hear that not only in Ephesus, but in almost all of Asia,

this Paul has persuaded and turned away a great many people,

saying that gods made with hands are not gods.

And there is danger not only that this trade of ours may come into disrepute,

but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis may be counted as nothing,

and that she may even be deposed from her magnificence,

she whom all Asia and the world worship.

When they heard this, they were enraged and were crying out,

Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!

So the city was filled with the confusion,

and they rushed together into the theater, dragging with them Gaius and Aristarchus.

Macedonians were Paul's companions in travel.

But when Paul wished to go in among the crowd,

the disciples would not let him.

And even some of the Asiarchs, who were friends of his,

sent to him and were urging him not to venture into the theater.

Now some cried out one thing, some another,

for the assembly was in confusion,

and most of them did not know why they had come together.

Some of the crowd prompted Alexander, whom the Jews had put forward.

And Alexander, motioning with his hand, wanted to make a defense to the crowd.

But when they recognized that he was a Jew,

for about two hours they all cried out with one voice,

Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!

And when the town clerk had quieted the crowd, he said,

Men of Ephesus, who is there who does not know

that the city of the Ephesians is temple keeper of the great Artemis,

and of the sacred stone that fell from the sky?

Seeing then that these things cannot be denied,

you ought to be quiet and do nothing rash.

For you have brought these men here,

who are neither sacrilegious nor blasphemers of our goddess.

If therefore Demetrius and the craftsmen with him have a complaint against anyone,

the courts are open, and there are proconsuls.

Let them bring charges against one another.

But if you seek anything further,

you shall be settled in the regular assembly.

For we really are in danger of being charged with rioting today,

since there is no cause that we can give to justify this commotion.

And when he has said these things, he dismissed the assembly.

This is God's holy and authoritative word.

This passage teaches us mainly that the way of Christ,

which is the way that's mentioned here in verse 23,

that no little disturbance concerning the way,

the way of Christ disrupts society by deposing the gods of this world.

And we're going to look at two contrasts that Luke intentionally draws here in this passage.

First is the contrast between the spirit-driven Paul and the prophet-driven Demetrius.

And secondly, the disorderly assembly versus the peaceable church.

And so we're going to look at this in turn.

Let's look at first the spirit-driven Paul versus the prophet-driven Demetrius.

It says in verses 21 to 22,

Now after these events, Paul resolved in the spirit to pass through Macedonia and Achaia and go to Jerusalem saying,

After I've been there, I must also see Rome.

So this verse serves as an outline for the rest of the book of Acts.

Paul does indeed pass through Macedonia and Achaia in chapter 20.

That included cities like Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, and Corinth.

And then he goes to Jerusalem in chapter 21.

And finally, he ends up in Rome in chapter 28.

And for those of you who are familiar with the book,

know that Paul's missionary journeys were not walks in the park.

He was not a man who had caught a travel bug

and visited various cities to see landmarks and enjoy the local cuisine.

Paul recounts in 2 Corinthians 11, 23 to 27,

that during his missionary travels, he was imprisoned,

beaten countless times, and often to the point of death,

stoned, thrice shipwrecked, having spent the night and the day adrift at sea.

He had to cross treacherous rivers, brave roads frequented by robbers.

He endured many a sleepless night, he says,

in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure.

That raises the question,

why would a sensible human being do something like that?

Why would a sensible person endure such pains and labors?

Verse 21 tells us Paul resolved in the Spirit to do these things.

Paul had decided, he had resolved in his heart and mind to revisit these regions,

to care for the churches that had been established there.

It's similar to a resolution that Jonathan Edwards,

an 18th century American pastor made on January 12, 1723.

He said,

Paul had resolved, never henceforward till I die,

to act as if I were any way my own, but entirely and altogether God's.

Paul had resolved, as he tells us in Romans 15, 18 to 20,

to fulfill the ministry of the gospel of Christ.

To preach the gospel where Christ had not yet been named.

And because there were places in the world where Christ was not worshipped,

until every tongue confessed the name of Jesus,

and until every knee bowed before Jesus,

Paul made it his lifelong ambition to preach the gospel.

But this is not a testament to mere human willpower.

This is Paul resolved in the Spirit.

In other words, Paul's resolution was directed by and driven by the Spirit of God.

Paul was a man whose life was controlled by the Spirit.

And Luke has been very explicit up to this point in the book

about how the Holy Spirit is the one who directs the mission of the church.

In Acts 16, the Holy Spirit forbade Paul from going into Asia for a time

and then redirected him to Europe,

and then finally opened the door for him to preach the gospel in Asia,

which is where he is now.

Paul is not the person that's sitting on the executive chair in the command center,

in the headquarters, charting the course.

It's the Spirit of God who is directing the mission of the church.

And that's the pattern that holds here in this passage also.

And because the direction comes not from man but from God,

no one with a worldly perspective,

no one whose purposes and priorities are informed by the sinful world

can plot the trajectory of Paul's life and ministry.

Because Paul is a man who is born of the Spirit.

John 3, 8 says,

It's what Paul's like.

That's why he's going to these places.

You can't predict it unless you put the Spirit of God into the equation.

This reminds me of some of you who joined the church plant initially about five or six years ago,

even though you're from Pennsylvania or New Jersey,

and all your family is there.

Or some of you who came to serve this church more recently,

moved up here to be part of the church from Maryland.

I also think of those of you who are preparing now to leave for midterm or long-term foreign missions.

It makes no worldly sense.

Why would people leave jobs, houses, families, and all that is comfortable and familiar?

They wouldn't do it if they were complacent or noncommittal.

It only makes sense because they are resolved, surrendered, submitted to the move of the Holy Spirit.

They are men and women born of the Spirit.

And Paul wasn't the only one.

There were also two other helpers, Timothy and Erastus, whom Paul sent into Macedonia ahead of him to minister there.

And then we find two other companions later as well, Gaius and Aristarchus.

And so contrast these Spirit-driven brothers with the prophet-driven Demetrius in the following verses.

It says in verses 23-24,

About that time there arose no little disturbance concerning the way.

For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the craftsmen.

Note the contrast between, note the parallel rather, between those two phrases.

No little disturbance, no little business.

Both are examples of the literary device, Lytites,

Which is an ironic understatement that states a negative in order to affirm the opposite, to affirm a positive.

So the sale of miniature replicas of Artemis' shrine brought no little business to the craftsmen,

Which means it brought, brings trucks worth of money to them.

Remember the preceding passage in verse 9,

With the new converts in Ephesus,

When the new converts to Christianity renounced their pagan magical practices,

And burned all their magical books,

The sum of it came to the U.S. equivalent of 6 million dollars.

This is a very lucrative business.

You bet something like that would have had a disruptive effect on the economy,

And affect people's pocketbooks.

So when the infiltration of the gospel in Ephesus started to transform people,

It subverted the religious and the related political and economic structures of the city.

And people with the financial stake in preserving the status quo,

Guarding the idolatries of the city,

Were up in arms.

So the phrase no little business parallels no little disturbance,

Because the business connected to the idolatry was massive,

The disturbance consequently caused by the gospel was similarly massive.

The more deeply rooted a weed is,

The more it disrupts the soil around it when you pull it out.

Demetrius the silversmith gathered around the other craftsmen of similar trades,

And said in verses 25 to 27,

Men, you know that from this business we have our wealth.

And you see in here that not only in Ephesus,

But in almost all of Asia,

This Paul has persuaded and turned away a great many people,

Saying that gods made with hands are not gods.

And there's danger,

Not only that this trade of ours may come into disrepute,

But also that the temple of great goddess Artemis may be counted as nothing,

And that she may even be deposed from her magnificence,

She whom all Asia and the world worship.

So Demetrius stirs up two specific fears in order to rile up his fellow craftsmen,

And the first is that their trade might become disreputable,

And the second is that their goddess Artemis might be deposed.

He warns that the temple of the great Artemis may be counted as nothing.

That's a significant concern for the Ephesians.

The temple of Artemis in Ephesus in modern day Turkey is almost completely destroyed now.

There's almost nothing left.

But it was considered one of the seven wonders of the world by ancient people.

Pliny, a first century AD Roman philosopher and naturalist,

Describes the temple as 115 meters long and 55 meters wide,

Or 377 feet long and 180 feet wide.

For those of you, some of you, but that probably means nothing to you,

Because that's the way it is for me.

I hear those numbers and I have no idea how big that is.

That's basically the size of a football field, American football field.

A little bit bigger in width and length.

That's a huge temple.

You could play football in it.

It was made almost entirely of marble.

And it was supported by 127 columns, each of which was about 60 feet high.

Second century BC Greek poet named Antipater of Sidon singled out the temple of Artemis

As the most impressive of the seven wonders.

He says,

For these reasons, the temple of Artemis was a source of grace.

Great civic pride for the Ephesians.

And people did, indeed, come from all over the world to worship Artemis in Ephesus.

Who is Artemis?

The Greek gods worshipped Artemis as a goddess of the wild.

The Roman equivalent being Diana.

Wonder woman, right?

She was often depicted as a huntress with a bow and an arrow.

Often pictured with a stag, a male deer by her side, representing her unbounded freedom.

She was a maiden, sworn never to marry.

She was worshipped as the goddess of virginity.

So this, too, represented her wildness and her freedom.

She was sexually free, unentangled by relationships, not subject to anyone else's authority.

A master of herself.

That's the ideal that Artemis embodied.

The cult of Artemis, in this sense, is not all that different from the idolatry of the modern self in our day and age.

People in our day don't see themselves as people created in the image of God,

who should strive to be more and more conformed to him and his image.

They see themselves as masters of their own lives.

Free to define their existence and their own identity however they wish or feel.

Some people call this, quote, expressive individualism.

That's what some sociologists call it.

It's captured by slogans like,

Find yourself.

Be true to yourself.

Follow your heart.

Do what makes you feel good.

You do you.

Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor defines this expressive individualism as the belief

that each one of us has his, her own way of realizing our humanity

and that it is important to find and live out one's own

as against surrendering to conformity with a model imposed on us from outside

by society or the previous generation or religious or political authority.

If you think about it, you will see that this characterizes much of and explains much of our culture.

Instead of the Christian value of humble submission to authority

and conformity to the truths and laws of God,

there is in our culture a suspicion and a rejection of authority.

An Artemis-like deification of individual autonomy and self-expression.

Instead of letting God define us,

our culture teaches every individual to embark on a journey of self-discovery

and maximal self-expression.

The final authority is my own feelings.

But this is nothing less than an idolatry of the self.

We need to dethrone the self so that God might be enthroned in our lives.

God has already revealed His will for us in His Word.

We're not whoever we want to be,

but what God has designed us to be.

Artemis was merely a projection of humanity's desire for independence

and their rebellion against the true God.

She was no God at all.

This is why she can't fend for herself

and her followers are worried about her being deposed from her magnificence.

Magnificence because she is powerless to do anything about it.

But this is not even their ultimate concern.

Their ultimate concern was not that the cult of Artemis might be neglected.

They were concerned about that prospect

mainly because that would mean the loss of revenue.

They also worshiped the god of money, mammon.

We can infer this from the fact that Demetrius did not gather a group of ardent Ephesian worshippers of Artemis.

No, he starts with the craftsmen

who also benefited like he did from this business

of making miniature replicas of Artemis' temple.

He began the speech by saying,

Man, you know that from this business we have our wealth.

Preserving their wealth was their ultimate concern.

And as we saw in Acts 17,

Paul did preach that gods made with hands are not gods.

His logic was that since we have been created by God,

that the objects of our creation,

the idols, cannot be God.

The idols' statues of gold and silver and stone

are products of the human imagination

and human craftsmanship,

and therefore they cannot possibly be God.

And so Paul exhorted the people in Athens there in chapter 17

to worship the god who made the world

rather than the gods that they have made.

The economic implications of this are obvious.

Demetrius and his fellow craftsmen became wealthy

by making these replicas and selling them.

And their sales numbers are directly dependent

on the number of people who worship Artemis

and the number of people who believe

that their miniature replicas are actual,

that have actual cultic power.

I mean, their self-interest is pretty obvious, right?

It's kind of like the,

imagine like the creators of the Impossible Burger.

Have you guys had that?

I've never had it,

but it's apparently a plant-based substitute to beef?

Is that right?

And imagine the people,

the creators of the Impossible Burger,

assembling everyone in the plant-based

alternative foods industry

and then protesting the inhumane treatment of livestock

or claiming that eating meat is harmful to health.

Maybe, but I mean,

they definitely can't claim to not be biased.

So these manufacturers of Artemis shrines were biased,

but they were also exploitative

of the ignorance of the population.

Imagine some con man buying a giant jug

of the cheapest oil,

vegetable oil, canola oil from the grocery store,

pouring it into a whole bunch of little vials

and then selling it at exorbitant prices

as holy oil.

It'll heal all your diseases.

He knows better than that.

He knows that it's not going to heal anyone.

Why?

Because he made it.

He knows where the oil came from.

He knows how much he paid for it,

all five dollars.

Similarly, these craftsmen knew exactly

how those miniature replicas

of the Temple of Artemis came to be.

They knew where the silver came from,

and they're the ones who cut it

and hammered it into shape,

and yet they then turn around

to sell them to people

as religious objects

with mysterious cultic power.

This is the futility of worshiping idols

fashioned with our own hands.

Luke includes this account in Acts

not only to expose the futility of idolatry,

but also to show us

that the application of the gospel

and obedience to the scriptures

profoundly affects changes of culture

and that it has economic

as well as social political implications.

Can you imagine

what if so many people became Christians

and were transformed by the gospel

that casinos and porn sites

went out of business?

What if the sale of cheap beer,

gin, and whiskey,

which are designed not to

delight those with refined taste,

but rather designed to promote drunkenness

and market it to heavy drinkers,

what if those sales plummeted

because too many people were Christians?

What if Christians stopped using social media

or started using them more responsibly

in a disciplined and edifying way

rather than in a vain, self-promoting,

and gluttonous way,

refusing to go into rabbit trails,

stray into inappropriate or unhelpful

or misinformed content

so that the software engineers

were forced to alter their algorithms

or to swap out their product altogether?

What if so many people became Christians

and put their hope

not on the uncertainty of riches,

but on the Lord,

who certainly provides,

and started stewarding their finances responsibly

so that lottery tickets became unprofitable?

And convenience stores stopped selling them.

Because lottery tickets also prey on the poor.

What if so many people became Christians

who are loving and respectful

toward their respective spouses

in a lifelong covenant of faithful marriage

that divorce coaches and lawyers,

divorce lawyers,

had to find another line of work?

When the gospel of Jesus

takes hold of people's hearts,

it has a profound effect.

And this also means

that Christians are likely to face opposition

from those whose trades depend

on the idols of our culture.

That brings me to my second and last point.

The contrast that Luke draws

between the disorderly assembly

and the peaceful church.

Let me read verses 28 to 34.

Please follow along with me.

When they heard this,

they were enraged and were crying out,

great is Artemis of the Ephesians.

So the city was filled with the confusion,

and they rushed together into the theater,

dragging with them Gaius and Aristarchus,

Macedonians who were Paul's companions in travel.

But when Paul wished to go in among the crowd,

the disciples would not let him.

And even some of the Asiarchs,

who were friends of his,

sent to him and were urging him

not to venture into the theater.

Now some cried out one thing,

some another,

for the assembly was in confusion.

And most of them did not know

why they had come together.

Some of the crowd prompted Alexander,

whom the Jews had put forward,

and Alexander, motioning with his hand,

wanted to make a defense to the crowd.

But when they recognized that he was a Jew,

for about two hours,

they all cried out with one voice,

great is Artemis of the Ephesians.

So Demetrius and the other silversmiths

managed to rouse an angry mob

who are chanting,

great is Artemis of the Ephesians.

They storm into the theater in Ephesus,

which at the time could seat up to 24,000 people.

And they drag Paul's two ministry companions

there in Ephesus into the theater,

Gaius and Aristarchus.

Twice, Luke tells us that the crowd

was characterized by confusion.

Most of them didn't know why they were there.

Classic mob psychology.

Just follow the crowd.

Let's see if something exciting is happening.

They don't know what's going on.

And they're not willing to listen.

When a Jew named Alexander

sought to make a defense to the crowd,

they shouted him down,

drowned him out by continuing to chant,

great is Artemis of the Ephesians.

They did that for two straight hours.

No wonder that other Christians

didn't let Paul go into the theater.

They feared for his life,

his violent mob.

Even the Asiarchs,

who are the magistrates

who are charged with the city theater,

didn't think that Paul should go in.

Only after a couple hours

of that chanting and shouting,

the town's clerk is finally able

to quiet the crowd.

And then as he's dismissing the crowd,

he says this in verses 35 to 40.

Men of Ephesus,

who is there who does not know

that the city of the Ephesians

is temple keeper of the great Artemis

and of the sacred stone

that fell from the sky?

Seeing then that these things

cannot be denied,

you ought to be quiet

and do nothing rash.

For you have brought these men here

who are neither sacrilegious

nor blasphemers of our goddess.

If therefore Demetrius

and the craftsmen with him

have a complaint against anyone,

the courts are open

and there are proconsuls.

Let them bring charges

against one another.

But if you seek anything further,

it shall be settled

in the regular assembly.

For we really are in danger

of being charged with rioting today

since there is no cause

that we can give

to justify this commotion.

Paul and his fellow Christian laborers

are vindicated

by the town's clerk's summary,

his judgment of the situation.

Though they have indeed said,

Paul and the other ministers,

they did say that the idols

made by human hands

are not God's at all,

but they haven't been

unnecessarily confrontational

or controversial.

Even though Paul was greatly provoked

by the idolatry,

he didn't go around

smashing idols,

vandalizing the temple of Artemis,

toppling statues of Artemis.

They've simply and faithfully

proclaimed the good news

of Jesus Christ.

It's not Christians

who are guilty of throwing the city

into commotion.

It's Demetrius and his fellow craftsmen,

the worshipers of Artemis,

who are responsible for the commotion.

Look at verse 26.

Demetrius admits that Paul,

all Paul was doing

was persuading people

to turn away from idols.

Luke repeatedly tells us

in the book of Acts

that it was Paul's practice

whenever he entered the new city

that he would reason

with the people that are there.

He reasoned with them

about Jesus,

the lordship of Christ,

his life,

death,

and resurrection.

The Christians,

throughout the book of Acts,

have been eminently reasonable.

It's the angry mobs

that oppose them

that cause commotion.

And that contrast

is highlighted by

the repeated use

of the word assembly.

Twice,

Luke uses that word

to describe the mob

in verse 32 and verse 41,

but this is,

that use of that word

is actually quite ironic

because it's the word

that's used to describe

the regular,

orderly,

legal assembly

of Roman people.

The regular assembly

mentioned in verse 39.

This was no such

orderly assembly.

This was an angry mob.

And it's also ironic

because the word assembly

is the word that,

the same Greek word

that is most often used

in the book of Acts

dozens of times

up to this point

to refer to the church.

church.

The church

is the assembly

of God's saints.

It's a congregation

of believers.

And so there's

an implicit contrast

here between

the disorderly assembly

of the Artemis

worshipers

and the peaceable

assembly

of Christ

worshipers.

the early Christians

were repeatedly

falsely accused

of creating

civil disorder

and violating

Roman laws.

That was not the case.

It's the persecutors

of the church,

rather.

They were the ones

creating civil disorder.

The gospel

was disruptive,

but it was the gospel

itself that did

all the disrupting

and the Christians

themselves were

actually quite

undisrupted.

Demetrius and

the other silversmiths

had legal recourse

if Paul had committed

any crimes,

but he hadn't

committed any crimes,

which is why

they resorted

to mob action.

I think Luke

is trying to drive

a point here to us

about what Christian

witness should look like.

He says in James

James 3:17

chapter 3,

verse 17,

that the wisdom

that comes down

from above

is first pure,

then peaceable,

gentle,

open to reason,

full of mercy

and good fruits,

impartial and sincere.

1 Peter 3,

15 to 16,

says this,

always be prepared

to make a defense

to anyone

who asks you

for a reason

for the hope

that is in you,

yet do it

with gentleness

and respect,

having a good conscience

so that when you

are slandered,

those who revile

your good behavior

in Christ

may be put to shame.

What's Luke telling us?

Christian witness

should not be angry

or abrasive,

but winsome

and courteous.

Christians should always

be open to reason.

We should practice

active,

attentive listening

rather than shouting

down people

who disagree with us.

Our witness

should be characterized

by gentleness,

not violent mob action.

When we depose

the gods of this world

by proclaiming

the crucified

and risen Christ,

his gospel

will disrupt society,

its economy,

and its policy.

verse 35

mentions

the sacred stone

that fell from the sky

that the Ephesians

worshipped.

It's likely a reference

to a meteor

that fell

maybe into Ephesus

that people considered

a gift from the gods.

Just think about

how sad

and ridiculous

that is.

People created

the image of God

literally worshipping

and bowing down

before a rock.

But that's

really how foolish

all of our idolatries are.

Rather than stone

that fell from the sky,

we have the sun

who came down

from heaven.

Jesus who reconciled

us to God the Father

by absorbing

the penalty

for our sins

and averting

the just wrath

of the Holy Father.

And because of Jesus

revealed God's will

definitively to us,

because we have

the risen

and ascended Christ,

we don't have to

grope about in the dark

seeking,

grasping for anything

to worship,

any sign of

the divine,

even turning to

idols,

rocks.

We have

the Lord Jesus

to proclaim.

And because

He has all authority

in heaven and on earth,

we don't need to

clamor and fight

for power.

As Christians,

in the meekness

of wisdom,

in the power

of the Holy Spirit,

let's proclaim

the good news

of Jesus Christ

and then watch

God work.

Behold the work

of God.

Let's pray together.

Amen.

God, please,

fill us with love

for our neighbors

that we might

be compassionate,

provoked by,

grieved,

aggrieved by

the idols

that lead them astray

and keep them

shackled

to their sin.

Lord,

make us

men and women

who are resolved

in the Spirit

to do your will

and fill us

with faith

in your power

and authority

so that we might

be able to

proclaim the gospel

faithfully,

even in hostile

environments,

knowing that you

will act,

knowing that you

will save.

In Jesus' name

we pray.

Amen.