Sermon Tone Analysis

SLIDE: Acts: The Mission

SLIDE: Ephesus (video will auto start when you flip to this slide)

AUTO-SLIDE: Sermon Title (should pop up 5 seconds after video ends)

Background Info

I hope that video helps Ancient Ephesus come to life for us as we study Acts 19 this morning.

Archaeology is exciting because remains give us a lot of insight into cultural details which help Scripture become even more real.

Only about 18% of the ancient ruins have been uncovered, leaving another 82% of ancient Ephesus buried!

It was a huge city with a population somewhere between 300,000 and 500,000 people lying on the Western tip of Turkey.

It was a beautiful, wealthy, and sophisticated city.

During Caesar Agustus’ rule, Ephesus rose to it’s position of glory.

Later, Emperor Tiberuis’ opened a business district in the city around 43 BC, which was only about 10 years before Paul arrived.

Ephesus flourished because, through it’s port, commerce flowed to Asia.

Ephesus was viewed as the capitol of Asia and it was free to operate however it pleased without Roman interference.

According to some sources, Ephesus was second to only Rome in commerce and culture until it was destroyed sometime between 220 and 300 AD.

SLIDE: MAP

It seems likely Paul would have left Jerusalem in the spring of 52 AD traveled to Antioch which was a 5 week journey, and according to Acts 18:23, he “spent some time there.”

Paul would have most likely arrived in Ephesus in 53 AD and remained there for two to three years.

I really wanted to cover all of Acts 19 in one message because our chapter highlights six events which give a big picture of what God was doing in Ephesus and Asia.

Believers were passionately serving our mighty and amazing God!

Second, all six events reveal a great spiritual war in Ephesus.

In each event the Holy Spirit fought evil spirits causing the Gospel to rapidly spread across Asia in a very short time period through excited, new Christians.

Some of you will appreciate this… all week long as I preparing this message kept hearing this movie line in my head, “Hello, Mrs Par?

This is Karie.

Weird things are happening!”

Weird things took place all over Ephesus as spiritual warfare was raging.

The first Spiritual battle was the...

The Missing Spirit (19:1-7, Eph 4:30, Gal 5:16-20)

recorded in...

Acts 19:1–7 (ESV)

1 And it happened that while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul passed through the inland country and came to Ephesus.

There he found some disciples.

2 And he said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?”

And they said, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” 3 And he said, “Into what then were you baptized?”

They said, “Into John’s baptism.” 4 And Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, Jesus.” 5 On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.

6 And when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying.

7 There were about twelve men in all.

Upon entering Ephesus, Paul encountered about 12 men who truly thought they were Jesus’ disciples.

They had even been baptized!

Paul was quite aware of his role as a teacher because he often came upon people who knew almost nothing about Jesus and knew almost nothing about living life just like Jesus lived, so Paul, accustomed to asking good questions, probed a bit.

He asked a very important question in v 2, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?”

It is really interesting that these disciples of John, did not know about the Holy Spirit.

John the Baptist himself witnessed the Spirit descending on Jesus and in Luke 3:16 prophesied that the Spirit would descend and baptize believers with the Spirit and with fire.

John’s disciples should have known these things.

Paul clearly believed several things are true about the Holy Spirit:

WE NEED TO KNOW...

Salvation and baptism of the Holy Spirit occur at the same time without exception.

The Spirit is a seal, recieved at the time of salvation and is the only source of a believer’s regeneration.

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Paul knew these men had not repented or believed in Jesus’ and His forgiveness of sins.

Without the Spirit, these 12 men were doomed to eternity in hell.

We need to know that Spirit baptism is required for eternal life.

When Paul wrote the Ephesians 4:30 a few years later, he reminded them of this...

(VERSE SLIDE)

Ephesians 4:30 (ESV) 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

On the day of redemption, God himself will not accept a person who does not have the Holy Spirit.

Paul was greatly concerned for these men’s eternal lives!

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Paul believed something else.

His question contains another very important concept.

Christians can clearly tell when the Holy Spirit indwells us.

(repeat)

I have a homework task for you when you re-read this section this week… use the internet to search for when the words, “the Spirit of God came” are used in the Bible.

You will discover that time and time again when the Spirit arrived, mighty things happened.

People, possessed the Spirit, always clearly know that God was with them.

At the moment of salvation, a person is instantly changed.

That person clearly knows something is different.

Ephesian 5:18-21 tell us that the Spirit possessed can say “no” to sin.

Sinful thoughts can be repelled, and a new believer will be able to speak differently, act differently, and view life differently.

Galatians 5:17 tell us that the Spirit works just as mightily now as He ever has… “the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, (the Spirit) keep(s) you from doing the (sinful) things you want to do.

Moving back to our text, these 12 men completed spiritual rituals, but those rituals didn’t save them.

Compare what happened and how they felt when these men truly repented of their sin in Acts 19:5-6.

Verse 5 begins with the words, “On hearing this...” Sometimes hearing means doing/believing.

Other times when someone “heard” the text also records that a person did not act on what they had heard.

In verses 5 and 6, these 12 men “heard,” but they obeyed by faith.

Paul never would have baptized them if they had not repented of their sin and believed that Jesus was the Christ.

Verse 5....

they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.

6 And when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying.

Salvation, Baptism, Spirit indwelling, Spirit empowerment all happened in a quick, immediate chain of events.

None of those men could ever doubt salvation from that point on.

Their lives were remarkably different!

Spiritual Battle #2 in our text is...

Magical Handkerchiefs (19:11-12)

Ephesus, like Corinth was sin city.

Ephesus was a city firmly under Satan’s control.

In John Bunyan’s book, “Pilgrim’s Progress,” Christian and Faithful see before them a town they must enter because the Holy Way passes through it.

It is an ancient town named Vanity Fair which quite aptly describes Ephesus

In Vanity Fair, merchandise is bought and sold year round such "as houses, lands, trades, places, honors, preferments, titles, countries, kingdoms, lusts, pleasures, and delights of all sorts, as whores, bawds, wives, husbands, children, masters, servants, lives, blood, bodies, souls, silver, gold, pearls, precious stones, and what not."

At all times, one can see "jugglings, cheats, games, plays, fools, apes, knaves, rogues, thefts, murders, adulteries, false-swearers, and that of a blood-red color."

Historian’s accounts indicate that Ephesus was similar to Vanity fair.

All manner of wickedness was commonplace in the city and evil spirits had been at the root of the problem.

Our text also tells us that God used magical handkerchiefs to wage spiritual warfare on the evil spirits that plagued that city...

Acts 19:11–12 (ESV) 11 And God was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, 12 so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick, and their diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them.

In those days tradesmen typically wore aprons.

Some aprons functioned as tool belts and would have protected their clothes from dirt and grime.

Other times, aprons and handkerchiefs functioned like today’s sweat and shop towels.

Whenever Paul touched handkerchiefs or aprons, even when the dirtiest things on a person’s body had touched Paul and a sick person diseases left and evil spirits came out of them.

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We need to know that..

God makes even the dirtiest things useful for his kingdom!