Sermon Tone Analysis
Overall tone of the sermon
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Stott suggests that the unusual expression kateidōlon means ‘a city submerged in its idols’.
Athenian Culture:
“Submerged” in its idols (Stott - see Pillar commentary)
High value on knowledge/good thinking.
Always wanting to hear something new
Were still searching for the truth they desired (The Unknown God)
Epicureans were known for
‘their pursuit of happiness and contentment through detachment from social competition and denial of divine interference in human affairs, especially the threat of retribution’
Peterson, D. G. (2009).
The Acts of the Apostles (p.
490).
Grand Rapids, MI; Nottingham, England: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.
Stoics, on the other hand:
sought ‘to live in harmony with the natural order, which they believed was permeated by a rational divine principle or Logos’.
They were essentially pantheistic and thought of the divine being as ‘the World-soul’
Paul comes to Athens offering something old, yet it seems new, because instead of trying to give them the new thing they want, he offers them what they need: a way to be made new.
Our world is a lot like Athens.
Submerged in our idols: the things that we value have become so woven into the fabric of our lives, it’s hard to imagine alternatives.
Our idols are not deities in the same way as the Athenians, though.
They’re all of the things that we tell ourselves and one another that we must have in order to be happy and complete.
We love knowledge and new ideas.
Assuming, of course, that they are consistent with what we already want to believe.
Even as Americans express less trust in experts than at any other time in our history, We’re still quick to latch on to whatever new study or expert opinion comes out that confirms what we want to believe.
And yet, we are still searching for something.
For truth.
For comfort.
For contentment.
For the things we keep telling us our idols and our great knowledge are going to give us, even though they never do.
So we keep chasing after the latest and greatest; the hot new thing that’s going to fix it all.
Like Paul in Athens, the church doesn’t have a new thing to offer.
We return, week after week and year after year, to the same ancient texts, and we do so with the knowledge that they will say the same thing they did last time.
We return to them, not in hopes of finding something new, but because we know that these stories show us the path to being made new.
We know that all the time we spend chasing after our idols and seeking out new knowledge is really an effort to transform ourselves into who we want to be.
But through Jesus, God has shown us the way to become who we are meant to be.
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