Acts - Week 14 (22:17-29)

This is ERC Sundays, the messages at Emmaus Rd.

Church in DeWitt, Iowa. ERC is a Church of people

striving to grow in Jesus and make him known to others through

our faith, words and actions. Find out more about our church

at emmausrdonline.org. Here's this week's message.

Last week we left off on kind of a cliffhanger with the Apostle

Paul. So to give you a quick

background, he has been told by friends and by prophets like,

hey, you know, if you if you go to Jerusalem, if you, if you

make this trek, it's going to end in your arrest and probably

your death. And so Paul is Paul's been

working his way back up to Jerusalem.

And last week where we left off is they once again told him like

they, they know you're here and we just stopped.

So we left on kind of a cliffhanger, but we're going to

pick it up today. But before we pick it up, let me

tell you, we're going to skip a little bit and I'll just kind of

preview in on on what we what we missed in the few verses I'm not

going to read. What we missed is the fact that

Paul did go into Jerusalem. And as he goes into Jerusalem,

what happens is he actually does this thing.

They come up with this plan where they're like, hey, if you

go ahead and you, you're going to, you're going to spend 7 days

and you're going to take four people with you and you're going

to, you're going to do all these rights and you're going to do

this devotion. And then the people in

Jerusalem, they won't be able to deny the fact that you are

honoring Moses, you're honoring the law, you're staying within

the customs. They won't be able to deny that.

Well, Paul, even though I, I believe he probably thought that

wasn't going to work, he did it anyway.

He appeased his friends and what happens is exactly what he

thought would happen. At the end of seven days, they

see Paul and they're like done. So what happens is a mob forms

around him and they they begin the process of beating him to

death. Now this terrible beating that

he's taking, it creates quite a ruckus, quite a noise.

And so a Roman cohort of guards comes and they're like, what's

going on? So they kind of break it up and

they try to drag Paul out of the mob, but they can't really do

that. So they have to lift him up.

They literally have to carry him out of the mob.

But Paul does something really, really special here.

He has the wherewithal, he has the mind and he has the

compassion for these people. And So what he does is he turns

to the Roman guards once they kind of get him on back on his

feet and he and he starts talking to them in Greek.

See, The thing is, they suppose that he was this Egyptian guy

that they'd heard about who stirs up crowds and who's

causing all sorts of chaos. They didn't realize who he was.

And so he turns them, talks to them in Greek and asks them,

hey, can I please address the crowd?

I, I mean, really, they just tried to beat you to death.

But sure. OK.

The Roman guards like, maybe out of sheer curiosity, they allow

him to do that. Well, what he does is he

switches languages in a moment and he speaks to them in an

Aramaic form of Hebrew, which was kind of a kind of a formal

Hebrew. And so it wasn't what they would

speak necessarily on a daily basis.

So people really had to quiet down and they had to listen.

So he's got their attention now and he starts to speak to them.

When he speaks to them, he tells his conversion story.

If you remember, if you were here, it's several weeks back,

but on June 15th, we went through that conversion story.

And so he starts to tell his story of how he ended up where

he is. But then something happens.

He says just the right or the wrong thing, depending on how

you take that to get them all riled up again.

And now they're ready for blood. And so that's where we're going

to pick it up. We're going to see where it all

went sideways for him when he had their attention.

We're, we're, we're going to pick it up right there.

So as far as this, as far as this morning, I want to give you

a, a very quick idea of how we're going to look at this

text. We're going to see that Paul has

the source of all these things. And I know that we have access

to that same source of humility, of courage and of citizenship.

But I want to point out how we get these things.

Because The thing is, I, I previewed last week, we are

sometimes we deal with fear and we don't really know how to do

that. Well, not all of us anyway.

We've got all sorts of ways that we try to work through that.

But I'm telling you, we have access to a source that can give

us humility, that can give us courage in the face of no matter

what we're going through. And so that's how we're going to

look at it this morning. Gospel humility, gospel courage,

and gospel assurance in our citizenship.

So here we go. We're going to be in Acts

Acts 22 · chapter mention

chapter 22 and we are going to read verses 17 through 29, the

word of the Lord. When I had returned to Jerusalem

and was praying in the temple, I fell into a trance and I saw him

saying to me, make haste and get out of Jerusalem quickly,

because they will not accept your testimony about me.

And I said, Lord, they themselves know that in one

synagogue after another I imprisoned and beat those who

believed in you. And when the blood of Stephen

your witness was being shed, I myself was standing by and

approving and watching over the garments of those who killed

him. And he said to me, Go, for I

will send you far away to the Gentiles.

Up to this word they listened to him.

Then they raised their voices and said Away with such a fellow

from the earth, for he should not be allowed to live.

And as they were shouting and throwing off their cloaks and

flinging dust into the air, the tribune ordered them ordered him

to be brought into the barracks, saying that he should be

examined by flogging to find out why they were shouting against

him like this. But when they had stretched him

out for the whips, Paul said to the centurion who was standing

by. Is it lawful for you to flog a

man who is a Roman citizen and uncondemned?

When the centurion heard this, he went to the tribune and said

to him, What are you about to do?

For this man is a Roman citizen. So the tribune came and said to

him, Tell me, are you a Roman citizen?

And he said, yes. The Tribune answered, I bought

this citizenship for a large sum, Paul said.

But I am a citizen by birth. So those who were about to

examine him withdrew from him, and it withdrew from him

immediately. And the Tribune also was afraid,

for he realized that Paul was a Roman citizen and that they had

bound him. They made a mistake.

So how do we understand this text?

How do we, how do we get these things?

How do we get the the access to the source of these things?

Well, let's start with humility, right?

I got to tell you this. Last Thursday was men's night at

Sheldon Kinrade's house. Good time.

Yeah, Yeah, good time. And I got to say that I was

humbled there. I really was.

Now here's the deal. I I show up and we play some

bags and it's a good time. Everything's going great.

And as I tend to do, like after bags, I kind of meandered

towards the children because I don't know, I find them

interesting and they're fun, right?

So like, I watch Ruby, we make some mud pies together.

That's a real good time. I go and watch her on the

trampoline. That's really fun.

And I look over and there's Levi and he's pitching at a fence and

I'm like, there's a bat there. I'm going to hit off this kid.

Oh, you bet. I'm going to send this right

into that field way over there. I'm going to call my shop.

So I pick up the bat. I'm like, Levi, why don't you

pitch to me? He's like, all right, so you

know, he starts pitching to me. The first hit I had, I

definitely popped out to third base.

Second hit, grounded out to third, third, third time I made

contact. I think I grounded out to 2nd.

And then finally I'm like, oh man, I got to go.

Like I got, I got to move and I was like, all right, one more.

And so he gets me to a two and two count 2 balls, 2 strikes.

And I'm like, Oh my gosh, I cannot leave here without

hitting this ball into that field.

This is a child. Like I'm a grown man.

He throws a high fastball and I just swing out of my pants and

I'm and I just have to walk away.

This this young man just struck me out.

That was that was an an exercise of humility for me.

I walked away and I was like, man, all right, well, you're not

all that. OK.

Well, here's the deal. That little exercise in

humility, although it is true, like that was kind of a humbling

moment for me. It didn't feel that bad because

I recognize man, you're in your like mid 40s, like this kid is

just going to throw right past you.

It's fine. So it didn't, it didn't bring me

down too much, but I think there are universal things that happen

to all of us that create a sense of humility in US.

And humility is really important.

So let me give you a couple of examples that maybe you've

you've experienced that just help humble you, right?

Well, maybe you're an expert in your field, or at least you

think you are. And then somebody younger and

less experienced comes along and they seem to know more than you.

That's humbling. Or maybe you're used to having

some level of financial independence and through a

series of unfortunate circumstances that you really

can't control, all of a sudden you have to depend on the

generosity of other people. That's humbling.

Or maybe you've you're dealing with some physical things that

are really difficult for you. And so now you can no longer

even do basic cares for yourself and you have to have somebody

else help you with that. Man, that's hard.

Or let me give you one more. Perhaps you're in an argument

with a spouse or a friend. Oh, that never happens.

You're right. So you're in this argument and

you are sure you're right. You are dying on that hill only

to find out you were wrong and you have to eat that crow.

It's very humbling. All these are humbling

experiences, but I can tell you, and I, and I really mean this,

nothing will humble you into the ground more and take your ego

and put it on life support than the gospel.

Let me say that again. Nothing will humble you more and

put your ego on life support like the gospel.

Now you might be saying to yourself, but Pastor Chris, I

thought the gospel was here to make me feel better about myself

than to give me Jesus. How is it that it's supposed to

humble me? Let me show you or let Paul show

you, he says. I imprisoned and beat those who

believed in you. I myself was standing by and

improving and watching over the garments of those who killed

him. Do you see what's happening

here? Here's what I think.

I can't prove it for sure, but I am willing to bet that Paul, at

some point in his 30 years of being a Christian, he met family

or friends or even people that he had persecuted and thrown in

jail or had killed. Can you imagine?

He met them and he had to look them in the face and not just

say that he was wrong, but he had to apologize.

That must have felt impossible, and it would be without the

gospel. Now, of course, that's a very

humbling thing for Paul, but let me tell you that that's not

where he got his humility. He got his humility at the foot

of the cross. That's absolutely where he got

it. And I'll tell you what, let me

let me do an exercise with you. OK, Let's do an exercise.

I'm going to teach you gospel humility in the next few

moments. Derrick Hendrickson did this

with our youth on Wednesday. And I was just like, I don't

know how I'm even going to recover.

So hopefully you recover and I don't lose you after this.

Here's what I'm going to ask you to do.

I'm going to do it too. I want you to bow your head and

close your eyes. Now imagine you were on the hill

called Golgotha. And as you look out into the

distance, you can see Jerusalem, this great city of walls and

buildings and people. But then you focus your

attention on what's right in front of you.

It's 3 crosses and on the middle cross hangs Jesus.

Crown of thorns pushed into his head, dried blood on his face,

gashes wounds all over the place from being flogged, nails

through his hands and his feet. He's gasping for air and you

realize all of a sudden it is your fault he's there.

You are the reason he's hanging there.

What do you say to him? What do you say to the person

that you put on the cross? Go ahead and open your eyes.

I don't know what you said to him.

I know what I said to him. But here's the thing.

I want you to hear also what he says back to you.

I love you. You're worth it.

I would do this a billion times for you, but it's only going to

take once. So do you see it?

Do you see how the gospel can humble you into a healthy place?

But do you also see simultaneously how after it

humbles you into the ground, it brings you to the stars Because

Jesus looks at you and he says, I love you, you're worth it to

me. That's an amazing thing.

And that's what the gospel does, both humbles you and it takes

you right up to where you understand that you are so

important to God that he would give his only Son for you.

We hear that a lot as Christians, but I don't know if

we always take it in. Let's keep moving forward.

How do we get gospel courage? OK, well, as I mentioned, Paul

spent about 30 years after his conversion proclaiming the

gospel in the midst of death threats and beatings and mobs

and being stoned and all this other kind of stuff.

So, I mean, actually, when we, I, I think when we look at this

moment and he's mobbed by the crowd and they're starting to

beat him to death, like this is just another Tuesday.

And that's weird to say, but like, he's used to this.

He spent 30 years enduring the fear of what it means to

proclaim the gospel. Now, as I previewed last week,

how do we deal with this? Because Jesus Christ is not,

he's not something for us or someone for us to like take in

and keep really personal and and keep tied up in ourselves.

We are called to be ambassadors. But that can be really scary.

There's a lot of fear involved in that.

And so I want us to understand how Paul gained access to

something that a source of power that moved him beyond fear.

OK, this is really important. So I'm going to give you three

ways. First and foremost, we have to

acknowledge that fear is real and we don't banish it.

We don't get rid of it. We don't act like it doesn't

exist. We Simply put it in its proper

place. Let me give you three ways that

we can that that we can do or why that's important.

First of all, fear is necessary. I don't know if you've ever

stood next to a 2000 LB bison, but when I lived in North

Dakota, I was near 1 and I was afraid because it is 10 times my

size. And if he decides that he wants

to run me over, I can do nothing about it.

So in fear, I'm like, we should stay away from this thing.

Let's not pet the pretty animal. Don't do that.

Fear is helpful, friends. Don't act like it doesn't exist.

Don't act like you shouldn't have it.

Fear is helpful. God gave you that so that you

wouldn't do something stupid like try and pet a bison, right?

OK, so let's start with that. It's helpful #2 by definition,

if we want to talk about having courage as Christians, courage

without fear is, well, it's not really courage, right?

That's just logical. Like that just makes sense.

There is no courage without fear.

And then the third thing, and and this is really important, I

think you have to kill part of your heart in order to

completely kill fear. And that's a bad trade.

That's a really bad trade. You should not kill part of your

heart for that. So then we have to turn and we

have to say, OK, well then, Pastor Chris, how do I get

courage? How does that work inside the

gospel? Again, two ways.

First of all, we have to cling to the promise of our future.

That will give you courage. In other words, what I believe

about my future should absolutely affect or change what

I'm capable of today, right? So let me give you a scenario.

There's two people and they're both working the same terrible

soul sucking job. Maybe you have a job that feels

like that, sorry, but one person, they're told, OK, you're

going to make minimum wage, you'll make just enough to get

by, you'll pay the rent, and every once in a while you can go

have a good time, right? OK, you know what their attitude

is going to be like at work. The other person doing the exact

same job in the exact same circumstance gets told at the

end of the day, I'm going to give you $3,000,000.

All of a sudden that person is whistling Dixie the entire time

they're working, they're having a great time and they're more

productive than they've ever been and everything is great.

Same job. But what they believe about

their future totally changes how they treat the job today.

And I think that's true for us. You see, the Christian should be

able to and can look at the worst things in this life,

whether it's financial, whether it's emotional, whether it's

social. They can, whether it's death

itself, the Christian can look at all of those things and say I

know my future. It's OK.

I don't have to freak out in this moment.

I can stay calm because I know what God has in store for me in

the future. Now some of you in the midst of

something very difficult right now, maybe you're like, yeah,

but future me, I don't care about that person.

I care about right now. Me.

I understand. I really do.

But if you know your future is secure, if you understand that

God went to the ends of the earth to make sure that you get

to come home no matter what happens in your life.

Well, what that does is it just tells you that death, the worst

thing that can happen to you or happen to a loved one, it will

only make you better. It'll only make you better.

Let me Tim Keller recently pointed out a poem that I

really, really like. I think it's excellent, and so I

wanted to read it to you. It's a poem by George Herbert.

It's called Dialogue Anthem. It's pretty short.

Basically, it's a conversation in poem form between a Christian

and death. Let me read it.

Alas, poor death, where is thy glory?

Where is thy famous force, thy ancient sting death?

Alas, poor mortal, void of story, go spell and read how I

have killed thy king, poor death, and who was hurt thereby.

Thy cursed being laid on him makes thee accursed.

Let losers talk yet thou shalt die.

These arms will crush thee. Spare not.

Do thy worst. I shall be one day better than

before thou, so much worse that thou shall be no more.

What you believe about your future can give you a tremendous

amount of courage today, but if you don't focus on that truth,

you will be wrapped up in fear. Let me give you one more way to

gain gospel access to courage. It goes like this.

I'm going to read Hebrews 12/2 to you.

Look into Jesus, the founder and perfector of our faith, who for

the joy that was set before him endured the cross.

And it goes on. Do you see it?

Do you see how you deal with fear?

You deal with fear through joy. You think Jesus was afraid the

night before he he was going to be crucified?

Of course he was. He sweat blood.

That is the man who's afraid. He begged for his life before

his father, and his father said Nope, too bad.

He was afraid. But he could access a tremendous

amount of courage because of the joy that he knew when he thought

about you. Think about that.

I will joyfully do something that is terrible if it means

that somebody who I love and I care about will be safe.

I can overcome fear. I don't banish it.

I don't screw myself up. I don't act like it doesn't

exist. No, I overcome it with the joy

of knowing that somebody I love is taken care of.

That's enough. And I'll tell you what.

Look forward again. Think about your future.

Can you imagine the joy of meeting Jesus Christ?

I can. I think about it pretty often,

actually. I think about falling at his

feet and I think about like climbing up his robe and hugging

him and not letting him go. That's joy.

I cannot wait for that moment. I can't tell you that's joy.

That kind of joy puts me on a path in my life that I don't

fear very many things because I can't wait for that moment.

I can't wait for it. And it is out of that joy that I

move forward in my life. Even when things are difficult,

find that joy. It's right there.

It's right there. That's how that's two ways that

you can get gospel courage. Let me move on to our last point

because we just need to keep going.

Yeah, OK, Very good. I got to tell you guys I brought

something little illustrative point.

I love being a citizen of the United States.

I do. And there's like, weirdly like,

and I mean, I wasn't just doing this as a bit like when I got my

passport, I was like, oh, this is so cool.

Like I love it. And The thing is like, I, I

thought about this a lot and I'm like, I don't know why I love

this thing so much. Maybe it's like the Super fancy

official seal or maybe it's just the, the seriousness of this

book and what I can do with it. I, I don't know, I don't know,

It's, it's just so cool. And, and I see stamps and, and

that's cool. Here's what the stamps tell me.

They tell me that I've been somewhere, I've been somewhere

different. But you know what this tells me?

It tells me where I belong. It tells me where I belong.

And because I belong here, I get to own part of this.

So do you as an American citizen, you have the right and

the privilege of being a part of this great country.

And, and you own that right. That's, that's such a cool

thing. And, and I love looking at this

because I am reminded of the guarantees that are given to me

because of my citizenship. Paul does this really cool thing

here when he talks about citizenship.

He looks at them and they're going to do the same thing to

him that they did to Jesus. They're going to open him up and

then he claims his citizenship. And then all of a sudden,

they're very afraid because they know he has rights and

privileges which cannot be taken away from him.

That's important. That's really important.

But I want you to see that there's something beyond the

surface here of just Paul's Roman citizenship.

Let me show you what that looks like.

Philippians 320. Our citizenship is in heaven.

This world is not our home. You are not of this world, but I

chose you out of the world. Do you get it?

Do you get the fact that even as an American citizen, that pales

in comparison to being called a citizen of God's Kingdom?

What an incredible thing. I mean, we've been talking about

humility and courage and fear. But think about this.

You are a citizen of God's Kingdom that gives you certain

rights that no human on earth can give to you and no human on

earth can take away from you because Jesus Christ bought your

citizenship at a very high price.

I mean, look at the text. Paul says I was born into this.

The Roman guard says I paid a ton of money for this, but God,

he gave his Son Jesus Christ for your citizenship.

That came at a cost that I can't even fully comprehend.

You are a citizen of heaven and therefore you have these

inalienable rights. You have the right to not live

in shame. You have the right to not live

in guilt. You have the right to not live

in fear. God has granted all these rights

to you, and ultimately you have the right to go home no matter

what the world does to you, no matter what they say to you, no

matter how it tries to beat you down.

You are a citizen of heaven and you have the right to go home,

and God's going to bring you there as you believe in Him.

Do you believe in Him? I hope so.

I hope so, because that's what it takes.

And I'll tell you what, friends, this, this, this is that

passport that you need because it tells you everything you need

to know to gain access to going home.

Do you know it? Do you keep it close to you?

Because I'll tell you what, I keep my passport really safe

when I'm not traveling. It's, it's, it's, I mean it,

it's super safe. Do you keep this close to you?

Do you keep it safe next to your heart?

Jesus Christ has stamped your passport book with his blood.

Don't lose sight of that. Don't lose sight of the fact

that you can be courageous and you can be humble because you

know where your citizenship is and God is going to bring you

home. Amen.

Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, it is so

good to be called yours. I wouldn't want to be called

anyone else's Lord. I just want to be yours.

And through faith, you tell us that we can be.

Lord, I thank You for the price you paid to buy our salvation.

I pray now that there would not be anybody who leaves this room

without having that assurance that You would use Your spirit

and your people to remind all of us that we get to come home.

And that should, Lord, that should evoke so much joy in our

hearts. It should change the way we live

our lives. Help us just to do that Father.

Give us courage, give us humility, give us strength, give

us the assurance of our citizenship with you and Father,

as you do that, I know lives will change.

I know communities can change and we can do it all through

your power and your name. So Father, give us that courage

to do that. Today we pray all these things

in Jesus name, Amen. Thanks for listening to ERC

Sundays. To support the work God is doing

an Emmaus Rd. church, visit emmausrdonline.org/giving.