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This morning we are picking back up in our study of the book of Acts.
If your new to our church this morning, it would be good for you to know that we practice a form of preaching called Expository Preaching.
What that means is we believe the Bible is best taught by taking books of the Bible and then studying them from beginning to end, chapter by chapter, verse by verse, in order to understand what it means in our lives today.
With that said, we are currently doing that through the NT book of Acts.
A book that written for two primary reasons:
First, to tell the story of how the church started and the circumstances that surrounded it.
And second, to give us a template for how Jesus intends the church to function in order to accomplish the mission of taking the gospel to the entire world.
So, if you haven’t been with us, I would encourage you to go online to mcf.life, where you can listen to all of the messages leading up to today.
You may recall from our study last week, Luke gave us some insight into what happens in a church that is All IN.
And when I say All IN, I’m talking about a church that is fully devoted to the mission of the gospel.
A church that is fully commited to the truth of God’s Word.
A church that has fully embraced their faith in Jesus.
A church full of people who are committed to live out their faith not just on Sunday, but every day and in every facet of their lives.
And if you recall, if a church embraces that kind of an All IN mentality, a process of cleansing and growth will take place in that church.
A process that will involve some leaving the church who are not All IN.
A process that will lead to more and more people coming to faith in Jesus.
A process that will cause the favor of God to fall upon the church.
A favor that will extend not only to those who attend, but those who associate and are in proximity to that church.
And I don’t know about you, but I want to be that kind of church.
In fact, as your pastor, I’m committed to being that kind of church.
However, becoming a church like that comes with its challenges.
Challenges that shouldn’t surprise us.
But challenges if we’re not prepared for, could catch us off guard.
Challenges that come by way of persecution.
You may recall back in chapter 4, we saw the first glimpses of these challenges, as a Jewish religious group known as the Sadducees came against the early church.
You may recall Luke said they were “greatly annoyed” or “ticked off” with the church’s teaching.
Luke puts it like this:
Acts 4:
So, who are these Sadducees and why are they so ticked about the teaching of the church?
Well, as we learned, they were ticked off for two reasons:
First, the church was teaching that not only was Jesus the promised Messiah and deliverer of Israel, but that he was the risen Messiah and savior of mankind.
And for the Sadducees, both ideas posed a problem.
#1, they didn’t see Jesus as the promised deliverer of Israel.
Not even something they were willing to consider.
And #2, in their religious system there was no life after death.
In other words, according to the Sadducees, when you’re dead you’re dead.
Not a lot of hope there.
But what the church was teaching was that there was life after death through faith in Jesus.
So, for the Sadducees, this was a double whammy on their belief system.
Second, the Sadducees were politically motivated and had an agreement with Rome.
And the agreement was, if they could keep the Jewish people in line, then Rome would line their pockets and give them all of the power and influence they desired.
That being the case, with the church growing in numbers and an excitement growing towards a promised deliverer, the last thing the Sadducees need is an uprising of the people.
If that were to happen, Rome would get involved and the Sadducees would lose their power and position.
And the last thing they want is to lose their power and control.
So, in order to put a stop to the problem, they ordered the disciples to cease and desist in their teaching.
But as we learned, the disciples weren’t about to stop teaching and preaching in the name of Jesus.
If anything, the threats of the Sadducees only emboldened the disciples to teach and preach more.
And as a result, more and more people were coming to faith in Jesus.
Luke writes in chapter 5:
Acts
So, having been warned once, the disciples are about to face a second round of further threats and persecution.
And as we’re going to see in the book of Acts, with each incident of persecution, the severity of the threats and punishment increase.
And again, this shouldn’t surprise us, because Jesus promised this would happen.
Jesus simply puts it like this in Luke 21:
So, a good question might be, “What does round 2 of persecution look like, and how does it apply to us and our faith in Jesus?”
Those are the two questions we’re going to answer this morning.
And to get us started, I want to begin by building some framework for the next couple of weeks as we walk through this next instance of persecution.
Because in a way, this next round of persecution demonstrates for us the mentality we need to have in order to deal with and overcome the persecution an All IN church will face.
And so to do that, I want to begin by referencing a film series that I believe most of us are probably familiar with.
Question - How many of you are familiar with the film series “Rocky” starring Sylvester Stallone?
I’m sure most of us are probably familiar with the film series, because after all there have been 8 movies in the series, the first in 1976 and the most recent one in 2018.
In fact, there have been so many movies in the series that people often joke that 20 years from now we will still have Rocky movies being made.
But what’s interesting is as much flack as the series has caught over the years, it keeps coming back as a new Rocky movie emerges despite the critics and jokes.
And in a way, that represents what the film series is really all about.
Because at its core, the Rocky is about the underdog.
You all know what an underdog is, right?
Somebody who appears to be a nobody.
Somebody who didn’t have all the opportunities.
Somebody that nobody expects to win.
But what Rocky does is show that the underdog can succeed.
In fact, Rocky does what nobody thought was possible as he takes hit after hit after hit, but he keeps getting back up, until eventually he wins.
In fact, I love one of the quotes that Rocky gives from the 2006 movie Rocky Balboa.
In the scene Rocky is trying to motivate his son who has lost his way.
And so Rocky gives him some advice.
Listen to what he says to his son:
“Let me tell you something you already know.
The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows.
It's a very mean and nasty place, and I don't care how tough you are, it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it.
You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life.
But it ain't about how hard you hit.
It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward; how much you can take and keep moving forward.
That's how winning is done!
Now, if you know what you're worth, then go out and get what you're worth.
But you gotta be willing to take the hits, and not pointing fingers saying you ain't where you wanna be because of him, or her, or anybody.
Cowards do that and that ain't you.
You're better than that!
” Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone).
Rocky understood some fundamental principles of life.
He understood life is hard and life hits hard.
He understood if you want to win, you can’t give up when life knocks you down.
He understood if you want to succeed, you have to get back up, and stop pointing fingers and blaming others when things don’t go the way you hoped they would.
Now, you might be thinking, “Pastor, that’s all great advice.
But where are you going with this?
What does this have to do with being All IN and persecution?”
Here’s where I’m going.
To be honest, I think the church could learn a lot from Rocky’s statement.
Because unfortunately I think the modern church often forgets what it takes to win.
And as a result, instead of fighting to win, we fight to be comfortable.
So we avoid standing up for the truth.
And then when the Christian life does get hard, we play the victim card.
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