SUNDAY - MARCH 22, 2026 "Witnesses of God's Kingdom"

Welcome to DeSoto Hills Baptist Church.

Our Sunday morning services are weekly at 9 and 10 30 a.m.

You're listening to an audio recast of this past week's service.

We hope you enjoy.

God bless.

Favorite Bibles this morning will be in Acts chapter 19.

Acts 19 · chapter mention

We're going to be looking at the first 10 verses of Acts chapter 19.

Acts 19 · chapter mention

This year is a year of anniversaries.

If you didn't didn't know that a big anniversary, DeSota Hills in October.

We'll be celebrating our 20-year anniversary in October.

Absolutely.

That is a great thing.

Keep your ears open.

We're going to have some things to go along with that.

We might have a speaker that y'all love better than me up here that Sunday morning.

So anyway, there's going to be some things.

Amen.

There's going to be some things happening, so keep your ears open for that.

Also, this is the 250-year anniversary for the United States of America.

So July the 4th, we'll be celebrating that.

And you know, as I was thinking through the smatches and you're looking at that, I got to thinking through this week about that.

And, you know, while we signed the that our founding fathers signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776, as that happened, and that kind of began our country, that wasn't it.

It wasn't over at that point.

After they signed the Declaration of Independence and declared our independent independence, it began the arduous and tedious process of forming a government.

There were some things that had to happen in that.

It wasn't until almost 11 years later, in 1787, that the first constitutional convention met in May of that year.

And they began the process.

And while they came together, there were some delegates at the convention who all they really wanted to do was that we had a founding document that was kind of a governing document called the Articles of Confederation.

And some of the delegates just really they wanted to take those articles and fix them a little bit.

But some of the delegates believed that the Articles of Confederation didn't do nearly enough to establish our country, so they just wanted to throw them out and really begin with something new, which one how we got our Constitution from that.

But you can imagine during that debate and during that time when those delegates met together, there were some strenuous times.

There were some times of temper, if you can imagine, times of argument, times of heated debate, things that were going on, but there was, history kind of tells us there was one man, one delegate in the convention that when he spoke, everybody just kind of stopped what they were doing and listening.

His name was Benjamin Franklin.

Benjamin Franklin, he was the oldest delegate at the convention.

But when when arguments and tensions seemed to flare up too much that impeded the process of forming this government, governing document, when he would stand up and speak, he would speak of humility, he would speak of unity, he would do it in such a way that that carried the authority of his position that people would just stop.

They would listen.

He wasn't the loudest, he wasn't the most vocal.

But when he spoke, people listened.

Shows us if we would if we address people and speak with people with authority but with humility, with passion, people tend to listen.

Today, as we come to our passage, Paul, we find him in Ephesus reasoning.

Reasoning once again.

We've talked for the past several weeks of how Paul has gone and reasoned with people about the gospel of Jesus Christ.

He reasoned and persuaded about the kingdom of God.

Today we find him in Ephesus doing that very thing yet again.

And for us, as we see this and hear the words and hear his reasoning, what we can see is that citizens of this kingdom of God that he reasoned about, citizens of this kingdom, they have marks that let people know that they are part of this kingdom.

That they're a part of the kingdom of God.

So our challenge for us is to live as citizens of that kingdom.

So we seek to answer the question this morning of well, what did Paul teach about the kingdom of God?

What are these marks of citizens of the kingdom of God?

So this morning I invite you, if you are able, to stand with us as we read God's word together.

We're going to be in Acts again, Acts 19, start in verse 1.

And it happened that while Apollos was in Corinth, Paul passed through the inland country and came to Ephesus.

There he found some disciples.

And he said to them, Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?

And they said, No.

We have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.

And he said, Then into what then were you baptized?

And they said, into John's baptism.

Paul said, John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is Jesus.

On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.

And when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying.

There were about twelve men in all.

And he entered the synagogue, and for three months he spoke boldly, reasoning and persuading them about the kingdom of God.

But when some became stubborn and continued in unbelief, speaking evil of the way before the congregation, he withdrew from them and took the disciples with him, reasoning daily in the hall of Tyrannus.

This continued for two years, so that all the residents of Asia heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks.

Let's pray together.

God, we thank you for today.

We thank you for this opportunity that we have this morning to open your word.

God, and as you have revealed yourself to us, God, help us to see you this morning.

Open the eyes of our hearts that we may see you.

God, we love you.

Jesus, it's in your wonderful name that we pray these things.

Amen.

You may be seated.

So let's let's remember kind of where we are in the story of Acts.

If you remember last week we saw Paul and he passed through Ephesus on his way to Jerusalem.

Back in chapter 18, if you go back to verses 19, it says, and they came to Ephesus, and he left them there.

But he himself went into the synagogue and reasoned with the Jews.

When they asked him to stay for a longer period, he declined.

But on taking leave of them, he said, I will return to you if God wills.

And he set sail from Ephesus.

So he was only there a short time.

He did go into the synagogue and he did reason with them for just a little while, but he didn't stay long.

Remember, we talked last week how he had to get on to Jerusalem.

So he didn't stay, but he said, I will return if God wills.

And then last week we saw that Paul began his third missionary journey and he traveled over a thousand miles into Galatia and into Pyrgia, and now he has come back to Ephesus.

So he has returned.

He is there.

And he is going to begin to even more, even further persuade them, even further reason with them about the kingdom of God.

So we come to our question then again, what did he teach about the kingdom of God?

What did he teach about citizens of the kingdom of God?

Well, the first thing I think that we see here is Paul taught that in order to be a citizen of the kingdom of God, you must believe in the Lord Jesus.

Look at what happened when he first came back and he met some disciples there.

He came to them and he said, Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed in the Lord Jesus?

Now we're going to get to receiving the Holy Spirit in just a moment, but first we have to get through believe in the Lord Jesus.

The disciples said, No, we didn't even know there was a Holy Spirit.

And so Paul begins to speak to them about baptism, but and the conversation isn't about baptism.

Remember, we have talked extensively lately what baptism is.

Baptism is an opportunity for us to participate in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus.

It is a picture of what he has done in our lives.

When we baptize, we baptize people in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.

And we say this: buried with him in baptism, raised to walk in newness of life.

Baptism is a picture of what has happened.

Baptism is a picture, hear this, of what we believe.

So while he's talking about baptism, he is really pointing to, what do you believe?

So they say, we were baptized of the baptism of John.

And so he clarifies what that means that they believed.

John said, he says, John baptized baptism of repentance, pointing to one who was or who is to come, who was going to come.

So John's baptism was a baptism of repentance.

It was a baptism of people turning away from the hypocrisy of the religion of that that Israel had come, the Jewish religion that had come at that point, it was a baptism of repentance, of moving away from that into a relationship with God while believing a Messiah was going to come.

So Paul said, This is what you were baptized into.

Jesus is that one who was to come.

And so they were then baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus because they believed in him.

So let's unpack for just a moment, though, what it means to believe in the Lord Jesus.

Three things I want us to see here.

First, to believe, it means that we have faith.

That we place our faith in.

We place our faith in this, that we are sinners, that they were sinners who needed salvation.

And Jesus Christ, the Son of God, came and walked upon this earth, lived a perfect life, died a horrible death on the cross.

His death on the cross was taking the punishment for the sin that He, not that He had committed, but that we had committed, that they had committed.

His death took the punishment for that sin.

He died, he was buried, he arose, and through the resurrection, he now gives us his righteousness and his life so that we live.

Not I, but Christ who lives in me.

And we place our faith in that.

To believe means that we place our whole life.

To place our faith in means we place our whole life in that.

No, can't do that.

To place your faith in Jesus means you place your whole life in his death, burial, and resurrection, and that is the only way to the Father.

We believe, we place our faith in that.

Belief also means repentance.

Well, for John's disciples, it was turning away from the hypocrisy that the Jewish religion had become.

For us, repentance is turning away from the hypocrisy that we don't need a Savior.

We do.

We are sinners.

And when we repent, we are repenting of, we are renouncing that sin and turning to God in faith.

It's not a two-step program, though.

It's not a two-step process.

Faith and repentance are simultaneous actions in our lives.

When we repent, we place faith.

When we place faith in God, we repent.

It happens at the same time.

So what he is saying is to, in order for us to be citizens, we must believe in Jesus.

But there's something that we need to believe.

Here's what he tells them.

Here's what it says about them.

It says they believed in the Lord Jesus.

You know, we don't use that word Lord very much today.

But you you understand the implications of the word.

It means he becomes our ruler.

In the kingdom of heaven, there is a king.

His name is Jesus.

And in order for us to be citizens, we place not only our faith in Jesus as our Savior, we place our faith in Jesus as our Lord.

We place our faith, we believe in Jesus the King.

And we live our lives under His rule.

He is the Lord.

And Paul teaches these disciples that in order to be citizens in the kingdom of God, they must believe in the Lord Jesus.

Secondly, he tells them that in order to be citizens in the kingdom of God, they must be filled with the Holy Spirit.

He asked them, back in verse 2, did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?

And they said, we didn't even know there was such a thing.

What are you talking about?

So as he goes and explains to them about believing in the Lord Jesus, then it says they were baptized.

And then look what happens in verse 6.

When Paul laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them.

See, the Holy Spirit, just as believing in the Lord Jesus is a mark of a citizen of the kingdom of heaven.

Having the Holy Spirit is a mark of being citizens of the kingdom of heaven.

Later, when Paul is in prison in Rome, he writes a letter back to the church at Ephesus.

We have that letter in our Bible, Ephesians.

And in Ephesians chapter 1, verses 13 and 14, Paul reminds them of this mark of the Holy Spirit that is on their life.

Ephesians 1:13

Here's what he says.

In him, that's in Christ, you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, when you believed in the Lord Jesus, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.

Now, imagine with me for a moment, if you will, as Paul is writing this letter.

We don't write letters much anymore, but maybe you send a text.

When you do that and you think about the person that you're texting and you remember things.

As Paul was writing this letter, I'm sure he was thinking back to all of the people in Ephesus that he had encountered.

Surely he thought of these 12 disciples that he met first thing in Ephesus.

And he remembers the seal of the promised Holy Spirit coming up on them.

Surely he had them in mind.

That the Holy Spirit, when we believe in him, we are guaranteed.

The Holy Spirit and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is a mark of a citizen of the kingdom of heaven.

Paul even writes to the church at Rome, in Rome, Romans chapter 8, verses 9 and 11.

Romans 8:9

9 through 11, here's what he says to them.

You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit.

Who is the you he's talking about?

Those who have believed in the Lord Jesus.

Those who have believed in the Lord Jesus, you, however, are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if in fact the spirit of God dwells in you.

Anyone who does not have the spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness.

If the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you.

When we believe, we receive the Holy Spirit.

He is the guarantee of our salvation.

He is the guarantee of the inheritance that is to come when Christ comes back.

As believers, we have the Holy Spirit.

But how do we know?

How do we know that we have the Holy Spirit?

Well, if you go back to Acts, they knew pretty immediately what happened to them.

Paul laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit comes upon them, and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying.

It was a pretty outward experience that the Holy Spirit had come upon them.

But as we look in the book of Acts and as we we read this, listen, we when we find the Holy Spirit coming upon people and them speaking in tongues and prophesying, it seems to be more exceptions than the norm.

Think about all the people that have come to Christ in these 19 chapters that we look at, and there's more that we don't even know about from Scripture.

In those, remember when Peter preached that first sermon on the day of Pentecost?

The day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit comes upon the disciples in the room, remember, and they began to speak in some kind of tongues, in some kind of language.

Not everybody did, but Peter then he stood up and he preached.

It doesn't tell us they all spoke in tongues.

It doesn't tell us that they all prophesied.

Actually, when we see that happening in the book of Acts, when we see that happening, it's when it makes a, it marks a major change in what is going on, showing, I believe it is showing authority given to the disciples or given to those who are speaking that this change is taking place and they can believe it.

Think about it.

Pentecost.

It happened again later when Philip was in Samaria and witnessed to the Samaritans.

The Holy Spirit came upon the Samaritans there and they spoke in tongues.

You see it later with Cornelius.

And so he's marking that, hey, salvation has come.

This Holy Spirit has come at Pentecost.

Then the Holy Spirit has come to the Samaritans.

Then the Holy Spirit has come to the Gentiles.

And this is just another marker of authoritatively, these people are speaking the truth and they are speaking the word of God.

But we don't have to have that authority of that change.

Now listen, I'm not one to say that God can't do something.

He is God and He can do whatever He wants to.

I even hesitate to say God doesn't do something.

He is God and He can do whatever He wants to.

But it seems to me as we study Scripture and as we look at this, we don't have to have authority given through tongues and through prophesying.

We don't have to have that because we have authority, a full authority.

That has been given to us in the Word of God.

This is the full authority that we need.

We don't need to say, hey, you can trust me.

I'm speaking in tongues.

You can trust me.

We don't need that because we have his word given to us.

We don't have to say, hey, you can trust me.

I'm prophesying.

We have his full word right here before us.

We don't have to have those things.

We have the authority here.

So if we are not seeing these things, if we are not guaranteed and we don't know the Holy Spirit comes upon us through these manifestations of these signs, how do we know that?

How do I know that I have the Holy Spirit?

How do you know that?

Well, let's go back to John.

When Jesus is talking to the disciples about the Holy Spirit coming.

In the Gospel of John chapter 16, verses 8 through 11, Jesus tells the disciples what the Holy Spirit is going to do.

John 16:8–11

Here's what he says.

And when he's talking about the Holy Spirit, when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment.

Concerning sin because they did not believe in me.

Concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father and you will see me no longer.

Concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.

How do we know that we have the Holy Spirit?

One, because Scripture tells us it is our authority.

Two, because we were convicted of our sins to believe in Jesus.

Listen, you're not going to become a believer.

You're not going to believe in the Lord Jesus unless you are convicted of your sins first.

If you don't realize you need a Savior, why would you call out for salvation?

The Holy Spirit is going to convict us.

And if we have been convicted of our sins, hear me, that is the Holy Spirit.

And then, as we, as believers, if we are convicted to live out the righteousness that we have been given through Jesus Christ, that is the Holy Spirit working in us, convicting us to lead that righteous life that we have been given, because in and of ourselves we won't choose that.

That is the Holy Spirit moving in our lives to convict us.

How can we know that we have the Holy Spirit?

Because Scripture tells us that He comes when we believe.

And because we have believed, because we were convicted of our sins.

And because now we are convicted to live the life that we have been given.

That's how we know that we have the Holy Spirit, and He is a mark of a citizen of the kingdom of heaven.

So we see the first marker is to believe in the Lord Jesus.

The second is to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

The third is this: to be witnesses of the kingdom of God.

See what Paul does.

In verse 8, it says he entered the synagogue, and for three months he spoke boldly, reasoning and persuading them about the kingdom of God.

Paul went in and he spoke boldly.

Now hear me.

We've talked about this again.

We've talked about it today.

We'll say it again.

Reasoning and persuading is not him standing on a street corner pre-calling out.

Sometimes that is needed.

I'm not saying it's not, but what I'm saying is that doesn't, to proclaim boldly does not mean that you have to stand before a big crowd and preach.

Proclaiming boldly can be you're going to sit down and reason and persuade people about the kingdom of God.

He spoke boldly.

He reasoned and persuaded that Jesus is the Christ that they had been awaiting.

But then when they, when some became stubborn and continued in unbelief, speaking evil of the way before the congregation, he quit.

He gave up.

No, he didn't.

Look at what he did.

It says, when some in verse 9, but when some became stubborn and continued in unbelief, speaking evil of the way before the congregation, he just withdrew from them.

Took the disciples with him and reasoned daily in the hall of Tyrannus.

He just went to somewhere else.

He didn't quit.

He just went somewhere else and reasoned and persuaded about the kingdom of God.

Now some translations will say, just a little aside note, some translations or some old, some manuscripts, not translations, some manuscripts added that he reasoned daily in the hall of Tyranus between the 5th and the 11th hour.

That would have been from about 11 a.m.

to 4 p.m., which would make sense.

Paul was a tent maker.

In the mornings when it was cool, he would make tents.

Then in the heat of the day, when it was hot and people took breaks, he would go to the hall of Tyrannus.

And daily he would reason and persuade and speak boldly about the kingdom of God.

And see what happened at that in verse 10.

This continued for two years so that all the residents of Asia heard the word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks.

How do we know this happened?

Well, you know, in our Bible, we have lots of letters that Paul wrote.

One of those is a letter to the church at Colossae.

Do you know Paul never visited Colossae?

Never went there.

Wrote a letter to him because there was a church there.

Why was there a church?

Many people believe that the church at Colossae was started because of Paul's witness in Ephesus.

Colossae was in Asia.

So somebody would have come and heard this message of Paul and gone back to Colossae and started a church.

Even at the end of our Bible in the book of the Revelation.

Paul or John writes churches to seven letters.

Some of those churches we know how they were started, Ephesus being one of those.

Some of those letters we know that Paul went to in those places, but some of them we don't.

How were they started?

Why were they started?

Many believe that they were started from people who came and heard Paul speak boldly of the kingdom of God in Ephesus.

Took that message back to their town.

And a church began.

So what does this mean for us?

What do we do with this message?

Well, first of all, we have to do this.

We have to understand that to be a citizen of the kingdom of God, you must believe in the Lord Jesus and receive the Holy Spirit.

Listen, if you have not done that, oh, I pray that today will be the day of salvation for you.

That you will recognize that you are a sinner.

We all are.

We've all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

And we need someone to save us from that.

And Jesus came and he died on the cross to take the punishment for that for us.

He arose to give us his life and his righteousness.

He is our king.

And in his resurrection, he founded himself upon the throne as king.

We must believe in the Lord Jesus.

Listen, if you are not a citizen of the kingdom, I pray that today, today is the day of salvation for you.

And you will believe in the Lord Jesus.

If you are, if you've been marked as a citizen by your belief in the Lord Jesus, if you've been marked as a citizen of the kingdom because of the Holy Spirit that has come upon you when you believed, I pray that now you will go and speak boldly about the kingdom of God.

I'm not saying you have to stand up here and preach.

But I'm saying you need to speak.

I told you Benjamin Franklin wasn't the loudest in the room.

But when he spoke, he spoke with authority, he spoke with power and conviction, and people listened.

You say, Grant, but I don't have authority.

Yes, you do.

We have been given the word of God, which is authoritative, and it is sufficient for all we need for salvation and life.

You have authority.

Speak it.

You may say, but Grant, I don't have power like Benjamin Franklin did.

Oh, yes, you do.

But you will receive power after the Holy Spirit has come upon you.

And you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth.

Oh, hear me.

Oh, hear me, citizen of the kingdom.

We must be speaking boldly the name of Jesus.

We can do it tomorrow when we go to work.

We can do it today at lunch with our families.

We can do it when we go to school.

We can do it on the golf course, hanging out with our friends.

Wherever we go, whatever we do.

Let's be witnesses to the kingdom of God because the king has called us to do it.

Let's pray.

God, you are so good.

Thank you for today, and I thank you for this opportunity that we have now to respond to your word.

God, I pray that you will give us the faith that we need to answer your call.

God, I pray that you will help us move in our lives.

Jesus, it's in your name that we pray.

Amen.

Thanks for listening to this week's sermon.

If you have any questions for our pastor, feel free to reach out at DeSoto Hills.com.