God's Heart For The Lost | Acts 11:19 - 30 (Mar 13) Mike Armstrong

Hello and welcome to the Redemption Church Podcast.

We're a church in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada that exists to glorify God through the fulfillment of the Great Commission and the spirit of the Great Commandment.

Thanks for joining us today.

Well, good morning, Redemption.

It is great to be with you all here today in an opportunity to open up God's Word and continue to praise the name of Jesus Christ.

And before we get our Bibles and get situated there, two quick things that I want to remind you of.

The first one, men's and women's, starting up uh real soon here, March 24th and 26th, respectively, men's and women's.

That's a Thursday for the guys in the morning, 6 a.m.

That's a Saturday morning, 8 a.m.

for the ladies.

And just a reminder to sign up.

Go into your church center app and you can register there.

You can order the book on Amazon.

And this is going to be so huge and so important for us.

This is this book, Gentle and Lowly, is probably my favorite book of all time.

For sure, the best book I've read in at least 15 years.

It's been so good to see the heart of Christ for sinners and sufferers.

It is a paradigm shifting, a game changer, and uh trust it'll be a blessing for you as well.

So don't miss that.

Register, sign up, get ready for that.

And then the next thing, of course, is uh the church in Ukraine.

Remember, we've been praying for them for a while.

We got Vertical Church in Kiev, Ukraine, and obviously they're right in the thick of the conflict over there.

And we announced to you just last week uh that we are uh giving uh an offering to them.

We're pooling it together with a whole bunch of GCC churches, and some of that money has already made its way over there.

Uh but we want to give you another week or so if you want to give to this.

Our elders are are setting aside a portion uh already, uh, but we want to give you the opportunity.

So if that is something that resonates with your heart, uh a couple of ways that you can do that.

E-transfer, you see the the email address right there.

Get it uh right, uh letter for letter, word for word, uh, and just make sure you make it really clear that it's for Ukraine, or you can use the blue envelope, which is in the box right behind the last row there.

You can grab a blue envelope, stick your check in there or whatever, and just make sure, again, Ukraine, and uh again, we'll give you another week uh or so to give to that, and then we want to make sure we get the funds there as soon as possible uh and be praying for the Terasov family as they uh minister there in times that, like I was thinking about on the way to church today, is I have no concept of the challenges of all of that, and I don't think uh many of us do here.

Uh so I want to pray for them and pray for our time in God's Word this morning as well today.

So let's uh let's gather our hearts here and uh lift these things to the Lord.

God, we come before you and we are um expectant of you to do great things in our in our midst here this morning, Lord.

Uh we know that when your church gathers, uh, you will meet us here by your Holy Spirit.

And so we pray that that would happen in great power today.

Show us uh something awesome about yourself, Lord, something amazing about your heart, your love for us, and your love for the nations.

Uh, and God help us to rally around these things, to unify together uh around the common purpose of making your name known.

So, God, would you uh uh bless us and teach us and transform us as we open up uh our uh your word in just a moment here, Lord.

And we want to also pray uh for uh the Terasov family uh specific, uh specifically, and uh the people that they are ministering to right in Kiev.

Uh God, give them mercy, Lord, give them wisdom, give them courage, uh, give them uh just an ability to proclaim the gospel and care for needs, Lord.

There's so many needs as this country is war-torn at the moment, Lord.

Uh protect uh people physically, spiritually, uh mentally, emotionally, all of it.

God, we pray that you would protect them and do a wonderful, wonderful work there as you have been doing.

Uh God, I pray that we continue to lift them up in prayer.

And as we think about giving, Lord, would you use it uh in the way that you see fit over there uh with this church?

So again, Lord, we thank you for today and that we're all here.

Bless us, whether we're here or we're watching online, um, encourage us.

We we pray all of these things to your glory.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, Acts chapter 11 uh is where we are at this morning, uh, finishing off the chapter that we started uh just last week.

Acts 11 · chapter mention

And so you can get your Bibles there already.

If you don't, grab a pen, if you've got you know a you know, a journal or notepaper, or you like to take notes, written on a tablet, whatever, we encourage all of that uh in a big way.

Um now I know I've I've said this before, uh, but but Angela and I, we got our start in ministry uh working at Camp of the Woods.

Okay, Camp of the Woods is a is a large family camp and kind of like this Christian resort.

If you're familiar with NBC, think MBC on steroids, okay?

It was it was it was kind of like that.

Uh upstate New York in the Outer Rondacks, wonderful place.

And uh one of the many cool things that this camp would do during their summer ministry uh is they would bring in uh former pro athletes to come in and teach uh and run their sports camps.

Okay, so every week there would be like a different sports emphasis.

One week you'd have basketball or volleyball or or baseball.

Well, for the hockey emphasis week, which which you can imagine uh got my attention, um, they would always bring in this guy named Troy Loney.

Now, I don't know if if that's uh a name that rings a bell for you.

He's not exactly a household name, but he was uh a member of the the 91 and 92 uh Stanley Cup winning Pittsburgh Penguins.

Okay, so he played on the team, he was kind of a role player, but it was of the same team as as Lemieux and Jahrger and Paul Coffey and like legends, right?

These Hall of Famers, uh, he was on the team.

And him and his wife and their kids, they love Jesus.

And they would they would come and they would run a ball hockey camp and teach drills and all kinds of stuff to whoever the kids were of the families that were there uh that week.

And being that Troy and I were like the only two Canadians for like a hundred miles, uh I think we kind of bonded over this a little bit as kids, were teenagers, they were in the youth program uh that I happened to run, and so I got connected with them and spent a little bit of time with them, got to know them.

They were just an amazing uh and really great uh family.

And uh in our conversations, uh one of the things I'll never forget uh uh was him talking about uh the mindset that those great penguins teams had.

And I and I I remember him saying, I think about it all the time, that he was talking about it and just recalling, and he and he said, and we were so good, okay, and he wasn't saying it like arrogantly or cocky or anything like that, that we were so good that we just knew we were gonna win.

Like we just we just knew it.

We had that quiet confidence about us.

Like everyone in that dressing room, they would just they would just look around and see the legends in this room, and given all the skill and the experience and and and the leadership and all of it, you know, for two straight seasons, okay, they were able to rally together as a unit around the common purpose of winning a cup.

And of course, they did it twice, which is no easy feat.

You just described that that that special confidence and that belief that they had that allowed them to really unify and come together and overcome the various challenges of playoff hockey, right?

And then, of course, succeed in the ultimate way.

Now, now, personally, uh myself, I've always been fascinated by group dynamics.

I remember learning about this in a class I took in in Bible college.

You know, whether it's the whether it's the mindset or attitude of a team, right?

Or maybe it's how uh a company staff comes together, right?

Isn't it interesting how everyone just kind of falls into place?

They they kind of play their role based on the different personalities and strengths and and weaknesses at play.

It's true, or it happens in a marriage, right?

Or or or at family functions, you get your extended family together.

We all know, and some of us would kind of laugh and maybe even shudder at the dynamics that are in play and that are there.

Okay, I've always been fascinated by this, but not just this.

I also I also think a lot about the dynamics of a church, right?

And and think about, of course, us and our church.

You know, are we unified?

Are we rowing in the same direction, you know, all of us together?

Are we rallying around a common purpose?

And really believing that God will do what he promises to do, and that he will do that through us.

Okay, well, the rest of Acts chapter 11 here is this really cool example of a church doing those very things.

Acts 11 · chapter mention

Right?

They're doing it, and it just so happens to be the church in Antioch.

Okay, so we're gonna go through this verse by verse here.

I've already prayed, we're just gonna jump straight in.

Three things here.

Okay, it says, when a church rallies around a common purpose, challenging trials become incredible opportunities.

It's true, it really is true.

And we see this starting in verse 19.

It says, Now those who were, look at it with me, those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen.

Okay, now you remember him, right?

You remember Stephen back from Acts chapter 6 and 7.

Acts 6 · chapter mention

He was he was ministering, he was bold, he was proclaiming the gospel, and it was the Jews, right, the Judaizers, who did not like it.

And so they persecuted him and they hounded him and they harassed him to the point of actually killing him.

Right?

They stoned him.

And what happened after that?

Well, well, the believers in Jerusalem, many of them, they scattered, it says, and they spread out to the regions and areas around them, and and and they were fleeing uh for fear of their life.

Okay, so just imagine with me here uh for a second yourself as one of those Christians back when all of this was going on.

Okay, obviously, an extremely challenging trial for the fledgling church to face so early on in their existence.

Again, so many people forced to flee their homes and their livelihoods out of the fear of death.

If it happened to Stephen, maybe it'll happen to me as well.

And I'm sure there would have been concerns by the church at large over the stability of the church, the sustainability of the church.

Everyone's spreading out, everyone's leaving.

Now it's more vulnerable than ever.

They would have felt that way.

It would have felt like, well, if we were all tight and we were close and we didn't leave, there's kind of a certain strength and and safety in that.

And they would have been, they would have wondered how do we communicate now with people?

It's not like we've got email, but how do we do that effectively?

How do we care for people?

Again, lots of challenges.

I'm just mentioning a few of the broad strokes here.

But this was very much a major, major trial these Christians were facing.

Extremely difficult.

Okay, but notice here where the story goes next and how this challenging trial becomes an incredible opportunity for ministry.

And I think it's so important for us to see this and for us to understand, it's so critical that we realize that when we're faced with trials in our own lives that appear to us to be nothing but bad, nothing but but hard, and it's problem after problem, and maybe to the point of despair, hopelessness.

It's important for us to try and see that just maybe, okay, just maybe the Lord actually has an abundance of good in store for us here if we would just learn to look at our trials through his eyes, right?

And see the opportunities that are right there in front of us to grab hold of.

Okay, that's what these believers do.

We're gonna see it here still in verse 19.

Take a look, it says that those who are scattered because of the persecution travel as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch.

Okay, Antioch is where the rest of this story uh takes place.

Okay, but at this point, it says that they were speaking the word, see it, speaking the word or ministering to no one except Jews.

Okay, so at this point they're still leaving the Gentiles out, which is starting to draw your mind back to just the last couple of weeks that we've looked at uh with with Peter and Cornelius and that whole scene and them ministering uh to Gentiles in many ways for the first time.

Okay, but look at verse 20 now.

It says, But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who on coming to Antioch spoke to the Hellenists also, preaching the Lord Jesus.

Okay, now let's let's understand what's happening here.

It's easy to get a little bit confused, but let's let's understand, starting with that word Hellenists.

Okay, Hellenists, what's that all about?

Who were they?

What were they?

Okay, well, depending on the context in which the word is used in the New Testament, it can actually be referring to two different groups of people.

Okay, sometimes Hellenists uh means Greek-speaking Jews.

Okay, so understand that.

Greek-speaking Jews, whereas other times, depending on the context again, it can simply mean Greeks, okay, or Gentiles.

Alright?

Now, this is where it can get confusing, but here we actually have both groups referenced.

Okay, both groups referenced.

First, there are the men of Cyprus and Cyrene, it tells us.

Okay, they were some of the people that had been ministered to by those believers who were scattered.

Remember we talked about that?

Scattered after Stephen's death, and again, that we just mentioned.

Okay, so the men of Cyprus and Cyrene were the Greek-speaking Jew type of Hellenist.

Jews that had relocated to this region long before Stephen's death, and they put down roots and they had adopted some of the Greek customs and learned the language, right?

And then eventually got saved again when those scattered Jews came and ministered the gospel to them right after Stephen was martyred.

Okay, now the Hellenists that it says that these men spoke to, those were the Greek or the Greek or Gentile type of Hellenists.

Okay, so you've got these newly saved Jewish Hellenists witnessing to unsaved Gentile Hellenists, okay, all of them living kind of together in this Greek, these Greek populated regions uh outside of Jerusalem, okay, which again is where where the church headquarters had its base.

Remember that?

Okay, so all of this to say the ministry had expanded as it was doing, as we've been looking at, it was now happening outside of the bubble of Jerusalem where it all began.

Okay, which is of course exciting.

The church is growing, it's uh you know things are happening.

Okay, but it also just meant that it was growing beyond the Jerusalem apostles' ability to do it all themselves.

Okay?

Other people were very much involved in this now, and and and those other people were Hellenists, okay, influenced greatly by by Greek culture.

They they spoke Greek and they were ministering to Greeks and Gentiles, right?

Something that was just becoming kind of accepted uh uh you know as this new thing.

Again, back to Peter and Cornelius, that whole thing.

Okay, so one of the questions, I think for us, that should be lurking somewhere in our minds is you know, how's the Jerusalem church, how how are the kind of the core group leaders of this of this new movement, this new church, you know, how are they gonna respond to this?

Like how are they gonna handle it?

Are they gonna be happy?

Are they gonna be thrilled that ministry is happening?

Or or are they gonna be insecure?

Look at God using these other people.

That makes me feel like maybe I'm not as important.

And and and and are is that gonna that kind of thing gonna happen?

Are they gonna try and shut it down to controlling all of that type of thing?

Those are some questions maybe that were kind of floating in our minds, but for certain for sure back in the minds of all these people.

Well, we're gonna see their response here, the the Jewish, sorry, the Jerusalem leaders' response, a little later on as we go, but uh but for now take a look at verse 21 and what the Lord is is actually doing through these men of of Cyprus and Cyrene.

It says there, verse 21, and the hand of the Lord was with them.

And a great number who believed turned to the Lord.

Okay, so obviously you and I read that, we're like, awesome, right?

This is this is this is amazing.

People are getting saved in in great numbers, it tells us.

I mean, incredible.

That's how that's how we look at it for sure.

Now, if you and I, if we kind of zoom out a little bit from all of this and kind of think big picture here for a second, what we have here is what happens when Christians and and churches rally around a common purpose.

Right?

That's what we're seeing.

That common purpose being advance the gospel, right?

Proclaim Christ, evangelize, disciple, right?

All of the above.

Okay, so that the challenging trial of the persecution and the scattering that happened when Stephen was murdered, okay, and all the all the fears and and the unknowns and the awfulness of all of that is now understood not as the destruction of the church, but God's wise plan to actually grow it.

Right?

We see so much good happen.

Okay, that the the scattering of these believers was to mobilize them, right?

To to use them to witness to their new neighbors.

Right?

The their fleeing and their exit plan out of Jerusalem didn't stop God's plan, it was God's plan.

Right?

It's what he was doing.

And we can see now, of course, in hindsight, which is such a benefit to us, that it was this incredible opportunity for the church to carry out and fulfill uh the work of Jesus Christ.

And really his words that we see in Acts 1, verse 8, which we come back to time and time again, because Acts 1.8 is really the thesis for the book of Acts, right?

Acts 1:8

Where Jesus says, You will be my witnesses, where?

In Jerusalem, first of all, we've been seeing that happening, and then in all Judea and Samaria, okay, which is which is where we are in this passage.

Phoenicia, it says Cyprus, Cyrene, Antioch, right?

And then he says, and the ends of the earth, which we will see later on through the rest of the book of Acts.

Okay, so again, as you and I take all of this in, okay, it provides us with an excellent opportunity to just kind of hit the pause button here for a second and consider the trials that we might be facing here in this very moment.

You know, maybe for you, what comes to mind are the personal troubles that you are currently facing, yourself as an individual, maybe it's something within your family, uh at work, whatever it might be.

I mean, we all face that type of thing.

I'm sure all of us can point to something, even right now, a trial that we're in.

Okay, but also keep in mind here that in the context of this passage, it's focusing on the trials and and the challenges faced by the church as a whole, okay?

Church as a whole, as they obeyed the Lord and followed his lead into the unknown.

Okay, so so as we have and and are and will face challenging trials as a church and and and maybe as the various ministries that you're involved in here at the church, it could be your small group, it could be as you think about just ministering to your neighbors and co-workers and the unsaved and you know all of that, really think about your responsibility or your your response, okay, whenever those whenever those kinds of difficulties come as we as we experience them.

Okay, what is your response to that?

Whatever it might be, are you looking at those trials?

Are you looking at those challenges, you know, purely from a negative and and maybe even fatalistic uh type of angle?

Is that how you're looking at it right now?

I mean that that's if we're honest, that's our that's our gut level reaction, right?

That's for many of us our first response.

Something bad happens, we're like, oh no, the sky's falling.

Right?

And we get that you know it's the fear and it's the anxiety, it's that stress that that hits us.

Is that how you are looking at your trial now, or the trial that we might be, the trials that we might be going through as a church or will go through?

Like, does your attitude typically go down that line of thinking where you're like, this is gonna be the death of me?

This is gonna be the death of us.

Someone left the ministry, someone, someone stepped away or or or went to a different ministry to serve elsewhere.

What are we gonna do?

Right?

You panic about that maybe sometimes.

Maybe you're just thinking there's there's no coming back from this.

These setbacks, these problems.

The Lord must not care about me or about what's happening and what I'm passionate about.

Maybe for you you're just left feeling discouraged, and it's those those emotions and feelings of defeat.

And maybe for you it's you're you're so down and discouraged about it, you just kind of feel dead inside or raw or numb.

Well, I would just try and try and encourage us here that by God's grace we try and try and really apply what God's word is showing us here this morning.

And start by recognizing that the Lord is encouraging you and I to rally around the common purpose.

Okay, what common purpose?

Well, the common purpose, generally speaking, of knowing him and making him known.

Right?

Or even think about our church's mission statement.

I'd love to do a test and like see how many of you have that memorized.

I see some shaking heads.

No, don't do that to me.

I won't.

We got it on the screen for you, okay?

Let's get this up here because this is our purpose statement, right?

To glorify God.

To the fulfillment of the Great Commission in the spirit of the Great Commandment.

Right?

That's our common purpose.

You want to whittle it right down, you want to boil it right down.

That is the purpose God has called every believer to, every church to.

We want to bring him glory by fulfilling the great commission, which is, which is literally what Acts is all about, which Acts 1.8 is that's Jesus telling them, you're gonna go and you're gonna be my witnesses all over the world.

Right?

That's what he tells his disciples to do.

It's what he tells us to do.

We want to do that in the spirit of the great commandment.

That's from Matthew 22, where our heart, the attitude, the mindset, the spirit that we have as we minister to people is to love God and love neighbor.

Right?

That's it.

That is our purpose.

The Lord is encouraging us today to rally around that together, not just a bunch of individuals, but but unify around this.

All the other purposes that you and I have in life as good and as important and as necessary as they are, whether it's to work or or or or lead our families or or whatever, all of them are to ultimately be viewed through this lens.

Okay, all of them are.

And as you and I rally together again around the purpose that God has given us, okay, know that when, not if, okay, but but when trials and challenges arise, right?

And it feels like everything is kind of falling apart here, and there's cracks in the armor, and the ship is sinking.

It can feel like that sometimes for us.

Know that in God's kingdom, trials are not fatal.

Rather, they are incredible opportunities for the Lord to come through in wild and wonderful ways.

In ways that we can't see.

We can't even imagine from our current vantage point because we are limited creatures.

Right?

We're finite creatures.

We can't see what's going to happen tomorrow.

We can't see exactly everything that God is doing.

And so we have to have faith to believe that he will do what he promises to do.

And we have to lean back into the experiences that we have had as Christians.

The older we get, the longer we've been believers, the more we should have this track record of God's faithfulness in the rearview mirror that we can say, wow, okay, the trials that I went through, there he came through.

Right?

He was faithful.

And it allows us to rally again and see that God wants to do great things now and well into the future.

Okay, so take our church, whatever it might be that we are facing, you are facing.

Maybe it's trying to find more servants and volunteers for uh whatever ministry needs it.

It's all of them.

Okay, or or maybe you're you're one who tracks the finances, and you're like, man, it's been a couple of bad weeks of giving, and you know, how's how's that all gonna go?

Okay, or some of us, it's like we don't own our own building.

Oh no.

Right?

Maybe it's that for you, or the restrictions that have been placed on us for years, the last two years now, whatever it might be.

Okay, we have the choice.

Let's understand that.

Okay, we have the choice to get all negative and to get all stressed out and to give in to all of that, or we can see the opportunities that these challenges present.

Right?

And believe that God has us right where he wants us.

Okay, and is primed to do incredible things as these trials humble us.

Right?

That's that's the purpose.

Our trials humble us, our trials give us a better awareness of our neediness before God.

It makes us pray harder, it makes us lean into him more desperately.

I feel like I could just go on and on and say a lot more things.

I know a lot more things could be said, but let's just kind of keep this thing moving here.

Okay, second thing, when a church rallies around a common purpose, incredible opportunities, which we've just looked at, become fruitful endeavors.

Fruitful endeavors.

Take a look at verse 22.

It says, the report of this, okay, that the report that the Gentiles, the people there, are getting saved in Antioch.

Okay, as the report of this came to the ears of the church in Jerusalem, so again, headquarters, or it came to them in Jerusalem, and it says, and they sent Barnabas to Antioch.

When he came and saw the grace of God, he was glad.

Phew, he was glad, he was excited about this, and he exhorted or encouraged and urged them all to remain faithful to the Lord with steadfast purpose.

Okay, there's our word, purpose.

Now, verse 24, for he was a good man, this is Barnabas, a good man full of the Holy Spirit and of faith.

He believed, he could see what the Lord was doing.

Then a great many people were added to the Lord.

So even more people are getting saved as Barnabas shows up on the scene.

Awesome.

Verse 25.

So Barnabas went to Tarsus to look for Saul.

Okay, so remember Saul, we saw, you know, he was presiding over Stephen's murder back in chapter 6, 7, and then he gets saved dramatically.

We see that in in chapter 9, and his name eventually turns to Paul.

It isn't there yet, but but but Barnabas goes to Tarsus where where Saul was, and verse 26, and when he found him, he brought him to Antioch.

For a whole year, think about that.

For a whole year, they together met with the church and taught a great many people.

And in Antioch, the disciples were first called Christians.

How cool is that?

For a year there, they they they they stay with the people, they they disciple, they teach.

It's fruitful endeavors.

That's what you see here.

It's where they were first called Christians, which is which is kind of interesting, isn't it?

Like Christians became like their nickname.

You guys are Jesus followers, you're Christ followers, we're gonna we're gonna give you the nickname of Christians.

Now it was also used as a bit of a derogatory term, and they just kind of embraced it.

Right?

I was it's kind of ridiculous that my mind went here this week, but I was thinking of uh like Justin Bieber fans.

Right?

You know the term that is used for Justin Bieber fans.

It's beliebers, right, which is souling.

But if you think about it, it's kind of similar to this.

Right?

They were called believers, right?

Justin Bieber fans are called believers, and it was something that they embraced, like, ah, that's what we are.

But it was also used by people who don't like Justin Bieber as a mock and as a ridicule.

Same thing here for the term Christians.

I apologize for that illustration, that's terrible.

Okay, but you see there, right, that the progression that that happens when a church rallies around a common purpose, right?

You see it.

First, we're we're met with trials and and and all kinds of challenges that are actually, again, these these opportunities, incredible ones, for God to further his plans to use us in the process.

And then as we grab hold of those things and we see them and we put our hand to the plow and we do the work that God has has called us to, those opportunities become fruitful.

They bear fruit, right?

Fruitful endeavors.

You see the Lord scattering his persecuted church, not to crush them, right, not to demoralize them, but to give them more opportunities to preach Christ so that people would receive Christ and then get discipled into becoming mature followers of Christ.

That is what's happening here.

Okay, Saul and Barnabas, they stick around for an entire year, right, teaching and discipling them.

What was once simply an opportunity to do these things was now taking root.

It was becoming fruitful, it was becoming this amazing, amazing thing as people grew and as Christ's name was proclaimed.

If you and I can learn to look beyond those difficulties and challenges when we're in them, and to see the opportunities that God's giving us, and then even beyond that, to just picturing the fruit that is possible to bear, right?

The effective discipleship that is in store for us in the future, like what was happening here in Antioch.

Okay, when we do that, I think it just becomes wind in our sails.

Right?

We see what the possibilities are and we see what God wants to accomplish, and it's like, all right, let's let's go, because we get a vision now.

We're not just like caught up in the problems, and that's all we see.

No, we see beyond it.

We see what God wants to do.

We have vision to see a bigger sense of the plan.

And it's exciting, it is encouraging, it is it is motivating.

Again, when we grasp this, it becomes sweet to us.

And I think it it encourages us to encourages us to rally to this together, to encourage and motivate others towards what God is doing here and calling us to as a church.

Now, all that being said, I want to be really clear about something before we move on here.

I I don't think that fruitful endeavors are only a future reality for our church.

Right?

As though we've never seen fruit in the seven years of our existence.

I don't want to say that, not at all.

We've seen tons of transformation happen here.

You know, I I've seen I've seen change happen in you.

I get the opportunity to connect with you and hear and see, and over the years it's amazing to think like where you once were, maybe, and and and how far you have come.

I see that in myself as well.

You know, I've seen you work through challenging trials in your own life.

I've seen you grab hold of opportunities to grow, to serve, to lead, seeing you bear fruit, I've seen you grow in maturity.

That's all something that has happened.

Something that is happening in real time as the Lord is working in us.

And we of course know it must continue to happen by God's grace as we all rally to this task.

Now, all of this really brings us to this last thing here, which is which is really cool whenever it happens in a in a local body of believers.

It's this when a church rallies around a common purpose, fruitful endeavors, again, that's what we were just covering, become unifying experiences.

But how sweet is it when that happens?

Verse 27 is where we see it happening.

It says, Now in these days, prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch.

Okay, so you've got members of like the original church, the OG church, right, in Jerusalem, coming down to check out this new work that's happening in Antioch.

And because ministering to Gentiles was still this kind of new thing, it was still so fresh, I think the question still kind of hung in the air a little bit.

Like, like, how is this gonna go?

We got Jewish leaders and members coming, or Jerusalem leaders and members coming, and what are they gonna think?

And are we gonna be on the same page?

And how is this gonna go?

Will they be supportive?

Will they be critical?

Like, well, 28, verse 28 gives us our answer.

It says, and one of them named Agbus stood up and foretold by the Spirit that there would be a great famine over all the world, or over all the Roman Empire.

Okay, that was considered really the entire world.

Kind of like how Toronto and Ontario view themselves as Canada, like we are Canada.

Like that's kind of how it was here.

Lots of lame illustrations for you today.

Okay?

It says that this took place in the days of Claudius.

Okay, Claudius.

Okay, now there's there's actually no record of there being like this great famine in the days of Claudius, but the historian Seutonius did say that there were many frequent famines in Claudius' day, which works as a fulfillment of this prophecy, I believe, for sure.

Okay, now verse 29, take a look.

So the disciples, okay, that's that's the that's the Antioch disciples, it's referring to specifically, the disciples determined every one of them, because of this prophecy that famine's coming, according to his ability, to send relief to the brothers living in Judea.

Okay, so think about Judea now as the greater Jerusalem area.

We got greater Toronto area.

Okay, so the greater Jerusalem area.

So the Antioch disciples are like, we're gonna send relief here to them to support and help them.

Okay, verse 30 it says, and they did so, sending it to the elders, so the elders in the Jerusalem church, by the hand of Barnabas and Saul.

Okay, so they they they sent out a famine's on the way, then the prophecy that this was gonna happen, which causes the Antioch church, the disciples there, to mobilize and send relief to the churches in Judea as they were able to do so.

Okay, but notice how they did it.

They did it by sending supplies with Barnabas, with with Saul, who then connected with the Jerusalem elders, it says, and let them kind of game plan and strategize how we were gonna get this relief, this support, out to the people in need, right?

Because they would know better than the Antioch disciples how to do that specifically in that context, in that area.

Okay, so all of this to say you see the kind of the big sea church, if you could call it that, like all the Christians around this entire area, they're rallying together and having this awesome unifying experience as a result.

Right?

You see it happening.

There was zero sense of like, no, hold on here, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Like we we we we think this should be done our way.

You know, or we have a better plan, and we think that that you you guys are new rookies to this, and so let us take over and sidelining them.

Like there's none of that happening.

Agabus didn't do that, the Jerusalem elders didn't do that, they didn't try to halt the operation or try to take over because they have way more experience in these things, and we don't really know you yet, or or trust you, or know what you're up to.

No, the the church in Antioch was bearing fruit.

Right?

Everybody could see that.

The evidence of which is just seen how well they care for the needs of other believers outside of their walls in other areas.

And because they humbly got the Jerusalem church involved and connected them to the campaign and relied on their local knowledge, it all again, it all becomes this unifying moment, doesn't it?

This unifying experience that is nothing but but serve to strengthen all of the churches involved in all of this in their resolve to rally even more around their common purpose of spreading the gospel and making Jesus known.

Right?

This is incredible.

And glory to God for this.

Right?

We're not giving glory to these men here.

We're giving glory to God for what he is doing.

This is his mission unfolding, and he's using people to do it.

And as I was reading this, looking at this this week, it got me thinking just about our own context here and our own church and the different ways that we have been blessed by other local churches here in Newmarket and also uh beyond.

I thought about, and some of you were involved in this, how Crossland Church, right?

They they gave us, they lent us their building for a couple of summers to run kids' day camps.

There's like, come on in, and there's like just a gift to us.

We didn't even have to pay them for it.

And we were able to host this and get the gospel out into the community and the neighbors around here.

And many of you invited friends and family and people that needed, you know, needed to know the gospel, need to know Jesus Christ.

We were blessed by that church.

I think about Valley View.

Valley View Alliance blessed us as well in the early days, right?

But before we were able to do baptisms at Newmarket High, they wouldn't let us do it over there because they were afraid it was gonna leak and make a huge mess.

Right?

And so we got a hold of Valley View, and they're like, oh yeah, come on in.

Come on in.

You can use our church and you can use our baptistry and you can baptize uh people here.

And so we did that a couple of times on Sunday evenings.

I mean, it's kindness, right?

It's it's churches rallying together.

I think of various financial gifts that we've been given that probably you don't even know about over the years by a couple of GCC churches just simply to bless us.

Just comes with a no, like, hey, we just love you.

Here you go, here's the blessing.

God's been good to us, we want to pay it forward, we want to bless you.

Think of Harvest Berry buying us this thing, this pulpit.

Right?

We've been here for a couple of years, and all of a sudden they realize, wait a sec, we never gave you like a like an o like a welcoming, you know, opening gift or whatever you want to call it.

And they're like, I'm like, they're like, what do you need?

I'm like, well, I kind of need a pulpit.

And they're and and like three days later it showed up.

Right?

Cool that they did that.

Again, they didn't have to.

I think of Redemption Durham and how they gave us all their branding for nothing.

When we relaunched, we went from harvest to redemption.

That saved us thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars.

Again, purely from the heart of God has been generous to us.

We want to be generous to you as well.

All the times Hope Markham or Oakville has have sent us people to do ministry training with us.

We just had this a couple of weeks ago.

We had some some guys from Markham come in and train up our production team at the back and help us kind of fine-tune some things and train new people who are onboarding onto this ministry.

I mean, churches helping other churches.

I think it's amazing.

I think of all the the preachers that came in from other churches when I was on sabbatical.

You think about, oh no, we got to fill three months worth of Sundays for preaching.

It was done like that.

Churches just stepped in, here you go, you can have this guy, you can have that guy.

We don't even really like them.

We'd love to give them to you.

Wasn't that attitude at all?

They just wanted to help us.

They wanted to help us.

But at the same time, okay, we we have been blessed.

We've been blessed to pay it forward to other churches.

Right?

We've been able to help other ministries as well.

I think of the Life Center here in town.

Many, many times at Christmas, we take an offering and we give a portion of that offering to the Life Center here in town that is working with young women who find themselves pregnant and coaching and counseling and support and care and saving lives and they're very much fighting against abortion and all of that, supporting people.

That's awesome.

Right?

That's what they're doing.

We're able to help with that.

We're able to support and give to Hope Toronto North as they were launching a few years ago.

You remember Pastor Marv?

He planted there, he's preached here a number of times.

Some of the financial help we were able to give to uh Harvest Corfu in Haiti, right?

Dave Locke and I went down there and and and we were able to connect with them and kind of start this partnership with our church and help them redo this massive driveway that they had.

Everyone walks to church there, right?

And it was like you needed crampons and climbing rope to get up this driveway.

It's like ruts and like it was crazy.

And you've got ladies trying to like carry their babies and stuff, and they're like, we need to redo this.

And so we actually helped them redo all of that, this driveway, so people could come and hear Christ without breaking their ankles.

Of course, the offering that we're doing right now, right, for Ukraine and the church and the believers there, again, it's not to puff up our chest.

Look how awesome we are.

It's not that.

It's whether we're the ones receiving relief, or whether we're the ones able to give it.

It becomes this sweet, unifying experience for all the churches involved.

I'm sure even hearing that, how we've been blessed, how we've been able to bless by God's grace, other people you're like, sweet, like it gives you a sense of what's really going on.

It's bigger than us and God's mission moving forward.

Other churches are connected and involved.

This is awesome.

It motivates me, it fires me up.

Like, let's go, let's do more.

Let's see God do even more to his glory.

You see, here in Acts Acts 11, it just strengthens everyone.

And they're all together around this common purpose of loving the Lord and caring for their neighbor.

Okay, so know this today, church.

If the 91 and 92 penguins can can rally together, okay, because deep down they knew they were gonna win.

Like we know it.

You know, how much more so can you and I, can we rally around God's mission, right?

God's purpose for us.

Because through Christ, we win.

Right?

We we know it.

It's not just a hope and I think it's gonna happen.

No, we we know the end of the story.

Right?

We know that we win.

We know that Jesus wins and he's invited us into that victory, meaning nothing is going to stop the Lord.

Nothing is going to get in the way of his mission and the and his progress.

His purposes are guaranteed to prevail and succeed.

Let's remember that today.

Let's remember that this week and the next time something comes at you from left field and blindsides you and it seems like all is lost.

It is not.

It's an opportunity for the Lord to use you, to do great things, to bear fruit, and to unify other people around you.

So listen, I want to pray for us now.

I want to pray for us that the Lord would be so good as to draw our hearts into what he's doing, to encourage us, again, motivate us, unify us in the awesome purpose that he's called us to.

Let's pray.

God, we thank you for how awesome your word is.

It always is.

We thank you for what you're seeing, or what we're seeing here in Acts 11 and what you were accomplishing and what you were doing.

All the difficulties and the speed bumps and the awful things that happened, only serve to advance what you were going to do.

Lord, I pray that we would remember that in our life, whether it's personal trials and difficulties that are before us, whether it's shared ones as a church.

God, I pray that you would open up our hearts and show us your heart.

Show us what you were doing, encourage us, and continue to do more than Ephesians 3.

As Ephesians 3 says more than all we can ask or hope.

God, we use you far more abundantly.

God, we thank you again for your kindness to us.

We thank you for your grace towards us.

Lord, continue to do these things to your glory.

We pray it all in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, that does it for us today.

Have a great Sunday and a great week as well, and we'll see you right back here next weekend.

Your love.