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Anglican Church Noosa
Acts 13:14-43
Alive Again - Resurrec9on Truth
Rev’d Lynda Johnson
This week is the end of our Alive Again series, and today we’re looking at Paul’s interac9on in An9och.
Every other speech we’ve looked at in this series has been from Peter.
But today we’re moving to Paul to
finish the series off.
Before we delve into that, let me recap what we’ve done over these weeks since Easter.
Firstly we looked at Peter beginning to emerge as the leader of this fear-filled bunch of disciples when they
needed to replace Judas aNer the ascension, and he said 'one of these must become a witness with us of
his resurrec9on.'
1:22
and then we saw his incredible transforma9on into the fearless leader and what he said in his speech on
the day of Pentecost in Acts 2.32 - "God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of it."
Next we looked at Peter’s speech to the crowd aNer healing the lame beggar in chapter 3, and in v.15 he
said "You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead.
We are witnesses of this."
Then we saw Peter and the other apostles before the Sanhedrin aNer they’d been miraculously released
from jail, and in 5:32 Peter said - "We must obey God rather than human beings.
God raised Jesus from the
dead, whom you killed by hanging him on a cross.
God exalted him to his own right hand as Prince and
Saviour that he might bring Israel to repentance and forgive their sins.
We are witnesses of these things,
and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him."
Last week we saw Peter with Cornelius and he was sharing the great revela9on that the gospel is to go to
everyone, even the Gen9les!
Horror of horrors!!!
And he says in 10:39-41 - "we are witnesses of everything Jesus did in the country of the Jews and in
Jerusalem.
They killed him by hanging him on a cross, but God raised him from the dead on the third day
and caused him to be seen.
He was not seen by all the people, but by witnesses whom God had already
chosen - by us who ate and drank with him aNer he rose from the dead."
And then what happened?
— the Holy Spirit came on everyone who heard.
And that day, even Gen9les were bap9sed.
And in today’s passage we move to chapter 13 and vv.30,31,
where Paul says …
'But God raised him from the dead, and for many days he was seen by those who had travelled with him
from Galilee to Jerusalem.
They are now his witnesses to our people.'
What I’m hoping you can see from these verses, each taken from the readings from this series, is that the
resurrec9on of Christ was the impacaul thing for these apostles.
The resurrec9on is what changed them.
They saw Jesus back from the dead.
Yes, they were fearful at the beginning, and yes it took the coming of the Holy Spirit to encourage and
embolden them.
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But it was not the coming of the Holy Spirit that they were talking about, was it?
It was the resurrec9on.
That’s what they were talking about, and how important it was to them that they
carried out what Jesus had told them to do - that they would be his witnesses to the ends of the earth.
They couldn’t stop talking about the truth of the resurrec9on.
They couldn’t stop talking about the truth that they had witnessed the resurrec9on, and therefore, they
had to speak about it.
Do you remember what 'witness' means?
We looked at this together at the beginning of the month.
The
greek word is martus.
And the same concept comes into our word 'martyr'.
Martus means - one who gives public witness and suffers the consequences.
Nobody does this unless what they are witnessing to is TRUTH.
Resurrec9on Truth.
Now let’s look at what’s actually happening in today’s passage.
Acts 13.
The Apostle Paul had been through his own encounter with Jesus.
A lifle different than the other apostles, but certainly no less drama9c.
Paul was a tyrant of the first order.
He was ac9vely persecu9ng Chris9ans, and seemingly enjoying it along
the way.
The accounts of his behaviour in the early chapters are disturbing to say the least.
But aNer he watches Stephen being stoned to death, on his way to another 9rade of persecu9on,
something incredible happens which changes him.
He meets Jesus on the road to Damascus.
He goes through a process of change and growth, and comes out the other end a convinced follower of
Jesus who then has a mission to achieve the complete opposite of what he had been doing.
Instead of hun9ng down and killing followers of the Way, he ac9vely promoted the Way and wanted more
and more people to follow it.
This is a turnaround of the first order!
Brothers and sisters if ever you may want to doubt whether someone could become a Chris9an, please take
encouragement from Saul becoming Paul.
There are people that I doubt could ever turn to Christ.
I need to reprimand myself when I think that Robin Bristow could never become a Chris9an.
I need to repent when I doubt that Vladimir Pu9n could become a Chris9an.
Or an 18 yr old shooter.
Or our atheist aunt, or our really lovely neighbour.
And to be brutally honest with myself, I think I doubt it, so that I can be off the hook.
So that I can validate my lack of conversa9on.
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There’s no point in talking to them.
Can’t imagine them becoming a Chris6an.
But the truth of the resurrec9on can impact anyone at any 9me, and that is why we need to be witnesses.
It is why Saul and Barnabas were set apart by the fellowship in An9och to go on a journey, This was Paul’s
First Missionary Journey, and here’s the route.
He went from An9och in Syria to the other An9och in Pisidia.
What we now know as Turkey.
They went to the coast, then sailed to Salamis on Cyprus, walked across Cyprus to Paphos, ministering
wherever they were.
Then sailed to Perga in Pamphylia, then went on to Pisidian An9och.
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