5 Observations of Paul's Spirit-Empowered Mission
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Why didn’t you come sooner?
Why didn’t you come sooner?
“Hudson Taylor told the story of an ex-Buddhist merchant, an educated man, who had been baptized after attending the little church in Ningpo. ‘He asked me soon afterwards, “How long have you known this Good News in your own country?”
“Hundreds of years.”
“Hundreds of years! And yet never came to tell us! My father sought the truth, sought it long, and died without finding it. Oh, why did you not come sooner?” ’ ”
Spirit-empowered missions will preach the gospel to bring about the right worship of God.
Spirit-empowered missions will preach the gospel to bring about the right worship of God.
I have quoted this before, and it is worth quoting again. John Piper says
“Missions exists because worship doesn’t.” John Piper
The only clarification I would make in regards to Acts 14 is
“Missions exists because the right worship doesn't exist.”
The cities that Paul and Barnabas visits are steep in Greek pagan worship. For example, in Lystra, the people though Paul was Hermes, the Greek god in charge of delivering messages, because he did all the talking. The crowd thought Barnabas was Zeus the head god of Greek mythological pantheon gods.
The misunderstanding when Paul was preaching the gospel (Acts 14:7) and then healed a lame man, which is extraordinary. Because they have the wrong understanding of God, they had the wrong worship. Paul corrects their understanding by
and there they continued to preach the gospel.
and speaking rightly about God.
Acts 14:15. Paul says,
“Men, why are you doing these things? We also are men, of like nature with you, and we bring you good news, that you should turn from these vain things to a living God, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that is in them.
In 14:15, Paul makes the point that their worship is vain because they do not worship the “living God, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that is in them.”
Missions is about correcting fallen man’s understanding of God and his relationship to God. You must tell the truth. You speak in such a way that God is rightly portrayed as both righteous and merciful, man is fallen and depraved, and Jesus is seen as the only way of salvation. I think this is what is happening in verse 1.
Now at Iconium they entered together into the Jewish synagogue and spoke in such a way that a great number of both Jews and Greeks believed.
Paul “spoke in such a way,”(Acts 14:1) that is he preached rightly about God, rightly about man, and rightly about God’s salvation through Jesus Christ.
There is a bad trend in Western missions. many well-intended churches send people to build houses and wells for clean water, and never preach the gospel. They are convinced missions is more about good deeds than right worship. This is folly. If Paul and Barnabas went to Lystra and created a food for the hungry without the gospel, the hungry would have still persisted in the wrong worship. They would have thanked, Zeus, a false god who has no life for the very thing the living God gave them; the God who
In past generations he allowed all the nations to walk in their own ways.
Yet he did not leave himself without witness, for he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.”
Spirit-empowered missions will preach the gospel to bring about the right worship. And God will bring about right worshipers.
Spirit-empowered missions will gather God’s elect.
Spirit-empowered missions will gather God’s elect.
What is the fruit of the gospel being preached? Conversions.
Now at Iconium they entered together into the Jewish synagogue and spoke in such a way that a great number of both Jews and Greeks believed.
In Lystra, even though there was great opposition, Paul returns to the city
When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch,
strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.
The gospel was also believed in Derbe,
When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch,
The main idea here is that Spirit-empowered missions always bears the fruit of conversions. God is saving a people for himself from every tribe and tongue. When his word goes forth, it always accomplishes what it set out to do (Isaiah 55:11).That is why it is vital that we preach the gospel rightly when are on mission. God saves his people through His message.
Why are we confident that Spirit-empowered missions will bear fruit?
Spirit-empowered missions is encouraged to go to the ends of the earth by the reality that God is commited to saving his elect.
Throughout Acts we have seen a repeated idea in Luke’s account of salvation; God;s sovereign act in salvation.
Peter ends his sermon explaining to the crowd
For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.”
A few verse later Luke records
praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.
As we have said before, Paul’s conversion in chapter 9 is an example of God’s electing work. For God told Ananias
But the Lord said to him, “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel.
In Acts 10:34-43, Peter preached the gospel. In his sermon he acknowledges the apostles
not to all the people but to us who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.
A few verse later, when Peter is preaching, the people do not start praising God until the Holy Spirit falls on them. Then Peter offers baptism.
After Paul is done preaching and the Gentiles are rejoicing at the word of God, Luke says
And when the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord, and as many as were appointed to eternal life believed.
The bible teaches that God chooses a people fro himself. Just as he chose Israel to be his special nation (Deuteronomy 7:7-10), he also has chosen people in the New Covenant to be his own. The bible calls these people the elect, to which Paul says,
Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.
Wayne Grudem makes the point about Paul’s missionary life regarding God’s gathering of his chosen people, the elect,
Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Bible Doctrine 3. As an Encouragement to Evangelism
He knows that God has chosen some people to be saved, and he sees this as an encouragement to preach the gospel, even if it means enduring great suffering. Election is Paul’s guarantee that there will be some success for his evangelism, for he knows that some of the people he speaks to will be the elect, and they will believe the gospel and be saved. It is as if someone invited us to come fishing and said, “I guarantee that you will catch some fish—they are hungry and waiting.”
God revealing to us that he has already gone before us and chosen those who will be saved does not hinder the mission or evangelism. It supports it. It comforts us and encourages the church to always be sharing the gospel. no matter what circumstance. For we are confident that God will never let one of his elect slip away from his hand.
J. I. Packer notes in His book, “Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God,”
Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God 4. Divine Sovereignty and Evangelism
Some fear that belief in the sovereign grace of God leads to the conclusion that evangelism is pointless, since God will save his elect anyway, whether they hear the gospel or not. This, as we have seen, is a false conclusion based on a false assumption. But now we must go further, and point out that the truth is just the opposite. So far from making evangelism pointless, the sovereignty of God in grace is the one thing that prevents evangelism from being pointless. For it creates the possibility—indeed, the certainty—that evangelism will be fruitful. Apart from it, there is not even a possibility of evangelism being fruitful. Were it not for the sovereign grace of God, evangelism would be the most futile and useless enterprise that the world has ever seen, and there would be no more complete waste of time under the sun than to preach the Christian gospel.
The point of the matter is this, if God did not elect those in Christ, no one would come to Christ. Evangelism would be pointless because the power of sin over us and our depraved heart would never respond to the gospel. God’s sovereign grace ensure some will respond.
Consider how badly Paul had been treated by the people of Lystra. He was stoned and dragged out of the city to die, only to get up and go back into the city to preach the gospel and encourage the souls of the church? What caused him to get up and go back in the city? As a matter of fact, what helped him endure all the sufferings he endured evangelizing and doing mission work?
Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea;
on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers;
in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure.
And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.
He knew without a doubt God was calling some to be saved because he understand the doctrine of election. I would contend that the doctrine of election was a strong tower of refuge to his remaining faithful in the face of opposition.
Spirit-empowered missions will provoke the Devil.
Spirit-empowered missions will provoke the Devil.
If there is one reoccurring theme we have seen so far in the early church, as it is seen in the book of Acts, it is opposition to the gospel. From the begin of the church at Pentecost until Acts 28, you will find over 22 accounts of persecution toward God’s people as they evangelize the lost and go on mission.
There is a correlation between the gospel message and opposition in the book of Acts. Every time the gospel is preached, opposition arises against God’s people. It happened in Acts 2 when Peter preached his sermon. It happened in Acts 4, and then again in Acts 8 when Stephen was done preaching; he was martyred. Paul went on a in Acts 9 until he was saved. Opposition arises in chapter 12 at the hands of Herod, followed by jealous Jews and an apostate magician in chapter 13. Now in chapter 14, the same trend continues. In Acts 14:1, they preach the gospel and some believe. In the next verse you see
But the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the brothers.
The apostles have to extend their stay and disciple those who were saved. Undoubtedly, the new church was evangelizing because you read in Acts 14:4-7, that opposition arises once again.
But the people of the city were divided; some sided with the Jews and some with the apostles.
When an attempt was made by both Gentiles and Jews, with their rulers, to mistreat them and to stone them,
they learned of it and fled to Lystra and Derbe, cities of Lycaonia, and to the surrounding country,
and there they continued to preach the gospel.
When Paul and Barnabas enter Lystra they preach the gospel and heal a lame man. However, after the misunderstanding about who they were,
But Jews came from Antioch and Iconium, and having persuaded the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing that he was dead.
When the apostles circled back to the churches they had planted, one of the messages they had for these new Christians was
strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.
if you are going to follow Jesus and joyfully advance Hi kingdom by making much of Jesus in the church, community, and home, you are going to suffer. Opposition always arises when the gospel is preached.
Jesus warned us that if they persecuted him, the world will persecute us as well (John 15:20). We also know that Paul warns Timothy in his second epistle that anyone who desires to live a godly life will be persecuted (2 Timothy 4:1-5).
We have an enemy, Peter warns,
Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
You must accept that Spirit-empowered missions, that is Christians who love making much of Jesus and sharing His gospel among the nations and neighborhoods, will be persecuted by people who do not realize they what Paul describes to the Ephesian church in
in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—
Followers of the ruler who exercises authority over the lower heavens, the spirit working in the disobedient, that is Satan.
Spirit-empowered missions will be advanced in waves.
Spirit-empowered missions will be advanced in waves.
The success of God’s kingdom seems to come in cycles. Someone shares the gospel. People get saved. Then persecution arises and the church looks defeated. Then, in time,there is revival, a nation is redeemed. Then persecution arises and the church looks defeated. Revival hits again, now continents have the gospel. Persecution hits, and the church looks defeated. Persecution is to be expect in the cycle of God’s kingdom being advanced.
Pentecost births the church. thousands are added and the fire of the gospel is spreading all over Jerusalem. Then Peter and the apostles are arrested. The church prays
And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness,
to which God answered their prayer in chapter five. Peter and the apostles preach the gospel and more are saved. then they were arrested because the religious leaders were jealous at the impact they were making, and yet the gospel was continued advancing among the people despite imprisonment and floggings.
By chapter 8, Stephen preaches a powerful Spirit-filled sermon. He is martyred and persecution hits the church. This time, however, the church moves out of Jerusalem and into Judea and Samaria, just as Jesus said it needed to in Acts 1:8. Chapter 9, Saul is killing the church, literally. By chapter ten, Saul is now Paul, a convert and Peter converts Cornelius and his family as the gospel moves toward the Gentiles.
Paul and Barnabas are preaching the gospel to the point where half the city if Iconium agrees with them. And jsut when the gospel is making a real impact, Paul and Barnabas are forced to leave because of persecution.
When an attempt was made by both Gentiles and Jews, with their rulers, to mistreat them and to stone them,
they learned of it and fled to Lystra and Derbe, cities of Lycaonia, and to the surrounding country,
They get to Lystra, preach the gospel, people get saved, they get stoned by the people. And just when you think you have killed the gospel,
But when the disciples gathered about him, he rose up and entered the city, and on the next day he went on with Barnabas to Derbe.
The irony of this is that everywhere Paul preached the gospel and was persecuted he still planted a church. Furthermore, he circles back to strengthen all of them
When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch,
In God’s providence, the Kingdom of God comes in waves. It will hit the shoreline and move up, only to be persecuted and receded back a bit. But then eth next wave hits and it goes further inland. Charles Spurgeon is keen here when he describe the same phenomena in wave cycles. He says,
300 Sermon Illustrations from Charles Spurgeon The Irregular Progress of the Lord’s Cause (2 Samuel 15:13–23; Acts 14:22; James 1:2)
I do not think that the Lord’s cause was ever meant to be consecutively triumphant, without intervals of defeat. The sea advances to the flood tide wave by wave; first one wave advances, and then it recedes; then another comes up and recedes again, and sometimes when the tide is coming to the very highest, there will be one of those waves that seems to go back and leave a wider space bare of sea-water than before.
And so it is with the cause of Christianity. A great wave rolled up at Pentecost, but it seemed to pause a while under Herod’s persecution. Then came other waves, until the world beheld in some degree the light of Christ in all its corners. But again there was a pausing for a while in those ages that we call the Dark Ages. Then came a mighty wave again, which we couple with the name of Luther and of Calvin. Again there seemed to be a drawback, and then again in the days of Whitefield, and Wesley, and Jonathan Edwards, and others, there was another revival. And so it will be, I suppose, right on to the end of the chapter—progress, and then a staying of the work; great success, then temporary defeat.
The central application for you is obedience. Everyone who was persecuted in Acts never stopped preaching the gospel. They never stopped evangelizing the lost. When persecution comes, its part of God’s design to advance his church. No matter what happens to you or FBCL, we must never stop spreading God’s message of salvation. he will use your obedience to bring about the next wave.
Spirit-empowered missions will strengthen the church.
Spirit-empowered missions will strengthen the church.
If you look at you will see
When they had preached the gospel to that city and had made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch,
strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.
And when they had appointed elders for them in every church, with prayer and fasting they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed.
Then they passed through Pisidia and came to Pamphylia.
There are couple wise moves Paul and Barnabas did to strengthen the church. First, they shored up their faith. This verb means to cause someone to become stronger in the sense of more firm and unchanging in attitude or belief. Paul and Barnabas made the new disciples stronger in their commitment to Jesus. These churches saw Paul get stoned. They saw first hand what he meant when he said “through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.” Paul and Barnabas likely shored up their theology and comforted their fears. Luke says Paul and Barnabas “encouraged them to continue in the faith.” The verb for encouraged means to console. Spirit-empowered missions is scary and costly. Discouragement at the loss of life and property was real then as it is today. Being passionate for Jesus will cost you and you soul will need to be consoled.
One of the ways the church is strengthen and encouraged is by hearing about God’s work among the nations. When Paul and Barnabas got back to Antioch
Look at
and from there they sailed to Antioch, where they had been commended to the grace of God for the work that they had fulfilled.
And when they arrived and gathered the church together, they declared all that God had done with them, and how he had opened a door of faith to the Gentiles.
And they remained no little time with the disciples.
The worded commended carries two ideas for us. First it means to praise or extol. The church was excited to hear what God had done through Paul and Barnabas. They praised God and their missionaries for the work. Secondly, the word carries the idea of entrust. The gospel and the missionary work is entrusted to these men to continue the work, which is what they do a few chapters later when Paul goes on his second missionary journey.
The encouragement is, the persecution is not stopping the advance of God’s kingdom. Jews and gentiles are coming to faith and Jesus is being high and lifted up to the ends of the earth. Hold fast church. God is still working.
The second wise thing Paul and Barnabas did to strengthen the church was to appoint elders for every church. The elders are pastors who oversee the church. You will notice that elders is plural. There was more than one. The church is not healthy when it is lead by one pastor. Also notice that the elders came from the church itself. He did not bring in elders from other churches. God had men ready to serve who were identified and installed with prayer and fasting. Finally, notice that the deacons are not mentioned. I think this is because Luke was conveying that Pal and Barnabas were establishing the pastoral eldership first and foremost. Deacons are not pastors and do not lead in that capacity. Deacons are the hands and feet of the church. They serve the physical needs underneath the leadership of elders.
The newly appointed elders at these churches would pick up the teaching and preaching ministry at the church. They would “strengthen the souls and encouragement the church to continue in the faith” just as Paul and Barnabas did.
400 Prayers for Preachers May You Be Known as the Savior of All the World
We make our prayers to you, O Lord God, most merciful Father, for all people in general, that you will be known to be the Savior of all the world by the redemption purchased by your only Son Jesus Christ; even so that such as have been until now held captive in darkness and ignorance for lack of the knowledge of the gospel may, through the preaching thereof, and the clear light of your Holy Spirit, be brought into the right way of salvation, which is to know that you are only very God, and that he, whom you have sent, is Jesus Christ. Likewise, we pray that they whom you have already endued with your grace, and illuminated their hearts with the knowledge of your Word, may continually increase in godliness, and be plenteously enriched with spiritual benefits; so that we may altogether worship you, both with heart and mouth, and render due honor and service unto Christ our Master, King, and Lawmaker.