The time we've been given | Sunday Sermons

I think I'm going to handle the scripture reading today.

It'll be from Acts chapter 20, verses 22 through 24.

Acts 20:22–24

The Bible says, And now, behold, I am going to Jerusalem, constrained by the Spirit, not knowing what will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and afflictions await me.

But I do not account my life as of any value, nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I receive from the Lord Jesus to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.

This is the word of the Lord, Church.

Amen.

So, church, um, last week we were in the city of Ephesus.

Do you guys remember?

Who was sleeping last week?

Tell me the truth.

So last week we were in the city of Ephesus.

Paul had actually spent three years in the city of Ephesus, and while he was there, he was writing letters to the churches in Macedonia and the churches in Achai, and he was telling them, I want to collect an offering.

Okay, so they're planning on putting together an offering from the Gentile churches as a gift for the church in Jerusalem.

And this is sort of a show of solidarity and unity with the Jerusalem church, kind of almost like an evidence of the genuineness of the work that God was doing among the Gentiles to the Jewish church in Jerusalem.

And so Paul gets sort of the end of his time in the city of Ephesus, and he leaves and he begins to travel through the churches of Macedonia.

So he visits Philippi and Thessalonica and Berea, and then he goes down to the area of Greece.

And it says he spent about three months down there in Corinth.

And a lot of people believe he was just waiting out the winter there until it was a good season for sailing.

As he was getting ready to sail to Syria, back where the church of Antioch is, and then down below is Judea, he hears of a plot by the Jews to murder him.

And so he makes some different travel arrangements.

And instead of going straight to Syria, he travels back up through the churches of Macedonia, and then he sets sail for across the Aegean Sea, back toward the city of Ephesus.

He's about to make his trip around and he's going to go back to for the trip to Jerusalem.

But it seems like maybe while he was on this journey through these Macedonian and Greek churches, that as he was traveling there, it became apparent that the Holy Spirit was telling him that when he gets to Jerusalem, he's not going to have such a good time.

And so he's starting to realize that this might be the last time that I actually make it back to this area.

This might be the last time that I actually get to impart something to these believers in Ephesus that I've spent three years discipling and training, raising up leaders, trying to prepare this church.

And so he doesn't want to stop in the city of Ephesus because I'm sure he's probably figured, you know, I'm trying to get to Jerusalem by Pentecost.

If I go into the city, man, I'll never get out of there.

I'll have to say hi to everybody.

I'll have to hug all the grandmas and, you know, have conversations with all the people.

And so what he does is he sails past Ephesus.

He lands in a place called Miletus, and from Miletus, he calls for the elders of the church in Ephesus.

And so there's three main points.

He calls the elders and the pastors, the leaders of the Ephesus church to come and join him in Miletus so he can say farewell to them.

And there's three main things that he wants to say to them in this farewell address to them.

And the first one is that his time with them had always been for a limited time, right?

It had always been limited.

It wasn't ever the case that he was going to just stay forever, but that God had given them that time for a purpose.

Secondly, that that purpose was that they would be prepared to leave when lead when Paul was gone.

And finally, the message was that the time had finally come and they would never see him again.

And so, church, as we read through this passage today, I want you to just imagine yourself in the shoes of the Church of Ephesus.

Amen?

Amen.

Amen.

Let's practice.

Amen.

Hallelujah.

Praise God.

Alright, I want to hear lots of those during the sermon today, okay?

It's going to help to keep me awake.

Verse 17, it says, Now from Miletus he sent to Ephesus, and he called the elders of the church to come to him.

And when they had come to them, he said to them, You yourselves know how I lived among you the whole time, from the first day that I set foot in Asia, serving the Lord with all humility and tears and with trials that happened to me through the plots of the Jews.

How I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable, and teaching you in public and from house to house, testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance toward God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.

So the first point that he wants to make to these believers, to these leaders from the Church of Ephesus is the time that we have had is limited, but it was given to us for a purpose.

Paul, of course, was addressing people that he loved.

These were people that he had introduced to Jesus, okay?

He had brought them to faith and then not just left them as spiritual babies, he had discipled them and trained them into leaders themselves.

These were elders, these were deacons, these were pastors and shepherds and teachers, and he's called them and he's trying to just impart to them something, you know, that they can hold on to after he's gone.

And Paul, of course, had always known that his time in Ephesus was going to be limited.

I mean, he wasn't planning on, you know, putting roots down there and staying forever.

He had always understood that he had a limited amount of time to accomplish the work that God had given him to complete while he was there.

And that was true whether God just moved him on to another city or whether maybe his enemies succeeded in killing him and martyring him, and he went to the presence of the Lord.

But the point is, he had always known that his time there had an expiration date, and he didn't have any time to waste in the work that God had given him to do there.

And Faith Church, as a church, us too, this exact same principle is just as true for us as it is for them.

The time that we have is limited.

We're not going to always be together.

But the truth is that God has given us this time to serve a purpose.

This Sunday actually marks seven months of pastoral ministry for me here.

Okay?

And a well, thank you.

Thank you.

So it's been a good time getting to know you guys.

It's been a good time, you know, and I'm out of here.

See ya.

No, I'm just kidding.

So it's been fun getting to know you.

It's been fun, you know, starting to do ministry together and the things that we've done here.

Um, but you know, just like that, seven months has passed us by.

And that's how fast time passes.

But it's funny because it feels like in a lot of ways we've been sort of just trying to find our new normal and settle into what's our rhythm gonna be.

You know, the last pastor, our last pastor was here for 23 years.

You know, he was here for 23 years, and in a lot of ways, I think in the back of our mind, we might be saying, we're setting that as our expectation, right?

Oh, we got 23 years, you know, with this pastor before we gotta go on a pastoral search and find another one.

But you know, the Bible says that tomorrow's not guaranteed to anyone.

We're not guaranteed tomorrow.

Much less three or five or ten or fifteen or twenty years.

And so I'm not saying that I'm going anywhere, church, but what I'm saying is that God hasn't given us probably as much time as we think to get the work done here that he's called us to do together.

Amen?

Amen.

So we aren't guaranteed tomorrow.

And so Paul understood that his time in Ephesus was limited.

There was far too much work to do to waste any time.

He knew that he had to work hard with the time that God had given him in order to prepare them for the day when he had to leave.

And he also knew that that day would pass faster than they thought.

And so it seems like, as I said, in his trip through the churches of Macedonia and in Greece, it the Holy Spirit had kind of made it obvious: hey, this is it.

You're not going to make it back to Ephesus.

And so in verse 22, he goes on to them and he says, And now, behold, I'm going to Jerusalem constrained by the Spirit, not knowing what will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies to me in every city that imprisonment and afflictions await me.

But I do not account my life of any value, nor is precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I receive from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.

So Paul's like, okay, guys, well, the day's here.

The day has come, and I've come to tell you my time here is done.

You know, I'm going to Jerusalem, I feel constrained by the Holy Spirit.

In other words, I feel compelled that this is what the Holy Spirit is telling me I need to do, and I have no idea what's going to happen when I get there, but all I know is that all the churches I went to in Macedonia and in Greece and all the way back, I keep hearing from the Holy Spirit that when I get there, chains and imprisonment and persecution are awaiting me.

And I don't know if I'm going to live, I don't know if I'm going to die.

I just know I'm going to suffer.

But I want you to know, guys, that I'm not holding my life dear or precious to myself.

I just want to finish my course, man.

I just want to finish the ministry that I received from the Lord Jesus Christ to testify to the good news of the grace of God.

I just want to give my life as an offering.

I want to finish the race.

I want to win the prize.

He's saying.

In verse 26, he goes on, therefore I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of you all.

He said, For I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.

Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.

So his first thing he wanted them to understand was, you know, we've always had a limited time.

And that time has always had a purpose.

And the second thing he wants them to understand is that purpose has been to prepare you to lead after me.

Okay?

This is my time's done now, guys.

It's time for you to do what I prepared you to do.

But I want you to understand something.

I testify to you before all of you this day that I'm innocent of the blood of all, because I didn't shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.

And as he says this, I know that Paul has Ezekiel 3 in his mind.

In Ezekiel 3, God tells Ezekiel the prophet, he says, I'm setting you as a watchman over Israel.

When you hear a word from me, you're to go warn the people.

He says, if I give you a warning for the people and you don't go tell them and warn them, if I tell you that that person's wicked, I want you to go to that wicked man.

I want you to tell him to repent.

But you don't go tell him, that man's gonna die.

And he's gonna be punished for his own wickedness.

So nothing unjust is happening.

He's just getting punished for his own witness, without wickedness.

But I want you to understand something.

If I tell you to warn him and you don't warn him, I'm gonna require his blood at your hand.

He says, but if I tell you to warn someone and you do go warn them, and they don't turn and they perish and they're punished for their sins, well, they'll still be punished, but you've delivered your own soul because I told you to warn them and you obeyed me and you gave them the warning.

And Paul's saying the same thing, he's saying, I'm innocent of the blood of all here, because I didn't shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.

In other words, I taught you, I prepared you, I equipped you, I told you the whole truth every single time.

I gave you my own example.

I was faithful to the charge that God gave me for you, and now it's your turn to be faithful to the charge that God's given to you.

This verse is why a lot of pastors like to preach through books of the Bible, because you know, if I just pick and choose every week what I'm gonna teach, well, I might just skip over something that's uncomfortable.

I might not say something that's hard.

I might want to make sure you enjoy it, you know, so you want to come back the next week.

But if I preach through a book of the Bible, now I have to preach every verse.

I have to say everything.

I can't miss anything, I can't skip it.

I have to give you the whole counsel of God.

But it's important because I'm gonna stand before God someday and I'm gonna have to give an account for what I did here.

Amen?

So Paul's telling them, I didn't shrink from telling you the truth.

Now it's your turn to be faithful to what God's calling you to.

So Paul's time had been given to him and to them to serve the purpose of preparing them to carry the message forward without Paul.

And this is why there was no time for them to just sit back and be comfortable.

There was no time to just watch other people serve God and watch other people grow in their faith.

In the book of Hebrews, the writer of the letter, he's writing to the to the readers that he's writing to, and he's he's trying to explain some deeper truths.

Yeah, that's good.

That's real good.

In the letter to the Hebrews, the writer is writing to them, and he's trying to explain to them some deeper truths, okay?

And it's almost like he gets frustrated because he it's like they they don't they can't comprehend, you know?

It's like, ugh, like I want to tell you more, but you're not ready for it.

In chapter 5, verse 11, it says, About this we have much to say, and it's hard to explain, since you've become dull of hearing.

For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God.

He said, You need milk and not solid food.

For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness since he is a child.

But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

So basically, he's saying, you've been followers of Christ for long enough that you should be mature by now.

You should be the leaders already.

You should be teaching other people, but you still need someone to teach you.

You know, and it's like with our biological children, we just expect that they're going to continue to grow and develop, like barring, you know, a disability of some sort.

We expect that they should just continue to grow, they should continue to mature, they should continue to develop, and our job as parents is basically to make ourselves obsolete, right?

Our job is to make it to where our kids don't need us anymore, which is like the worst nightmare of a parent.

Like, I want my kids to need me, you know, I want my baby girl to always need me.

But my job is to prepare her for the day that I'm not going to be there to take care of her anymore.

My job is to make sure that she's independent, that she's strong, that all my kids can stand on their own, that they can grow up to be mature people themselves.

See, we expect children to go from being infants that need everything done for them to being adults who can not only care for their own needs, but they can also reproduce and train their own children.

To grow into independent people themselves.

Because the truth is we won't always be there, right?

That's the hard responsibility of being a parent.

And the time that God gives us as parents is limited.

And it's given to us for a purpose.

Not for us to settle in for another twenty years of setting in the pews.

But to grow into spiritually mature people who can both be the next generation of leaders and also prepare for the next generation of leaders after.

Amen.

Some of you here are called to be the next leaders of this church.

Some of you here are called to be deacons, some of you here are called to be elders, some of you here might be called to be pastors.

Amen.

Yeah.

Praise the Lord.

Hallelujah.

Amen.

Glory.

I come from more like active churches, you know, where people yell at you while you're preaching and stuff.

So, you know, I'm trying to train you guys.

It'll take a while, but we'll get you, we'll get you there.

And so, guys, I guess my point here is my job is not to settle in, to lead this church forever.

As much as I might love to do that, and again, I'm not planning on going anywhere, right?

But my job is to equip you, the ones who are already here, and to equip those who come to be the next leaders of this church, the next elders and deacons and Sunday school teachers and worship leaders and youth leaders and disciplers, mentors.

And so a pastor can work hard to equip you, but he can't choose for you to step into God's fuller calling for your own life, can he?

Only you can do that.

But there's another reason besides just reproducing, that believers need to become mature.

And it's to recognize and defend against predators.

In verse 28, Paul tells them, Be careful, pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the Church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.

I know that after my departure, fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock, and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things to draw away the disciples after them.

Therefore be alert, remembering that for three years I did not cease to admonish every one of you with tears.

And so his final point that he wants to make with them is this now is your time to lead.

And so follow my example.

He says, Pay careful attention to who?

Pay careful attention to yourselves and pay careful attention to the flock.

Okay, pay careful attention to yourselves.

Be spiritually mature people.

Tend to your own spiritual growth and health.

That's something that needs maintenance, just like our physical bodies need maintenance, right?

If I just never shaved in here, you would think there's a homeless guy standing up here trying to teach the Bible.

If I never showered, I would have to stay way back here.

We'd have to move the pulpit like back up here, right?

Yeah, right.

But we need maintenance on our physical bodies, and the same thing is true for us spiritually.

We need to maintain our own spiritual condition.

We need to stay vigilant.

We need to pay careful attention to our own souls.

One of the biggest dangers is becoming overconfident in our own spirituality, overconfident in our own, you know, spiritual status or something, or our own knowledge.

But the Bible says in 1 Corinthians, take heed, you who think you stand, lest you fall.

Don't become overly confident in your own spiritual condition.

Stay focused, especially as you begin to lead.

The Apostle Peter wrote in 1 Peter, he said, Be alert and be sober-minded, because your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking who he wants to devour.

The overconfidence in your own holiness, your own strength, your own knowledge is the enemy's best friend.

So he says, Watch yourselves, pay careful attention to yourselves, and pay careful attention to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers.

To care for the church of God which he obtained with his own blood.

That's a pretty heavy cost he paid, isn't it?

So, how valuable do you think that the church and every little lamb that's his is to him?

And what kind of a responsibility is that to be set over and watch over them?

It's a big responsibility, right?

See, Paul uses shepherd imagery here.

And whenever I think of, you know, shepherd imagery, I think of David, you know?

Because the Bible talks about that that the Lord is our shepherd.

Amen.

He wrote the 21st.

Third song.

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures.

He leads me beside still waters.

He restores my soul.

He though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.

He's with me, his rod and his staff, they comfort me.

He gives this imagery of a shepherd.

But a shepherd's only job is not to lead them beside still waters and lead them into green pastures.

It's not just to lead them, it's not just to feed them.

He also has to defend them.

Remember when Goliath was threatening the nation of Israel and David went and talked to Saul and he told him, Listen, I can do this.

Okay, when I was just a little tiny shepherd guy watching my flock, when a lion or a bear would come, I would chase him off.

And if he turned on me, I'd grab him by the beard and kill him.

This uncircumcised Philistine is going to be like one of them.

Okay, he recognized the threat and he defended the sheep.

And Paul says, I know that after my departure, fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock, and from among your own selves will arise men speaking twisted things to draw away the disciples after them.

Therefore be alert.

So of course, Paul isn't thinking there's literally going to be some animals running around and biting people or anything like that.

He's talking about spiritual predators.

He's talking about false teachers bringing in false doctrines that would lead people away from Jesus.

He says they're going to come in from the outside, and he also says they're going to arise.

Like some of you guys who are here saying farewell to me right now are going to turn and you're going to start spitting false doctrine and you're going to try to drag away believers and cut off a little portion.

I'm going to take a little portion of this congregation.

I'm going to go over here and I'm going to start my own thing.

But that's one of the functions of spiritual maturity in Hebrews 5.

He said, solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

And so Paul is saying, follow my example.

Guard the church.

Protect God's people from false teachers and false winds of doctrine.

Keep them spiritually safe, but also train them to spiritual maturity as well.

Don't leave them as those who forever need protectors.

Help them become those who can lead, those who can train, those who can spot a predator themselves, those who can disarm a predator.

He says, Remember that for three years I did not cease to admonish you, everyone, with tears.

And finally has come the time for Paul to say goodbye.

In verse 32, he says, Now I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified.

And ultimately what he's saying is, at the end of the day, the church belongs to God.

That Paul has done all he could, he said all he could, and the only thing left to do is to remember that ultimately the church belongs to Jesus.

He's their true shepherd.

And so he says, I commend you to God.

I commend you to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and give you an inheritance.

The truth is that spiritual growth requires your participation.

It requires my participation, right, Carol?

We're the only ones who can choose to step onto the path of spiritual growth for ourselves.

In order to move from spiritual birth to spiritual maturity, we have to participate with God's Spirit within us.

But the good news is that He doesn't leave us to figure it all out for ourselves.

As we step into discipleship, as we embrace becoming the people, God, show me what it is you've made me to be, who you've called me to be.

Is it an elder?

Is it a deacon?

Is it a pastor?

Is it a missionary?

Is it an evangelist?

Like what have you called me to be?

A youth leader?

A children's church leader?

Like what have you called me to be?

As you step into that process of becoming the person that God called you to be, he meets you right there.

In Philippians, Paul wrote, I am confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will also complete it unto the day of Christ Jesus.

And so, church, faith church, just as in Ephesus, the time that God gives us is limited.

We don't know the day or the hour.

Right?

We don't know how much time we have.

We hope we have lots and lots of time.

But what's true is that we don't have time to waste.

Because the purpose of that time is preparation of a new leadership.

It's training up new mentors, new disciplers, new leaders, new elders, new pastors, new teachers.

And the third part that we need to hear is this it's time to embrace our call to step into that calling right now.

Not a week from now.

We don't need to talk about it for the next three years.

We just need to step into it right now.

Trusting that as we step in on it out in faith, that God's gonna meet us right here.

Amen?

Amen.