With God, There Are No Coincidences - Life of Paul Part 83

Hey, if you brought a Bible today, how about opening with me to Acts chapter 23.

We're going to continue and we're coming down the homestretch in the study of the life of the great man, the Apostle Paul. You know, back in January 1975, I was finishing up my last year of seminary training over at Capital Bible Seminary in Lanham, Maryland. And he was giving me a job. And so I said, Well, sure.

Okay. And actually, the pastor was from a small church in Northern Virginia named McLean Bible Church. And after meeting with him, I agreed to work for six months on a trial basis as the assistant pastor of McLean Bible Church from January of 1975 till June of 1975. During that time, I taught adult Sunday school, I did a little preaching. I did hospital visiting, I did some counseling. And at the end of those six months, in June of 75, I moved on.

It wasn't that anything was wrong. It's just I really felt the Lord was taking me on to go do doctoral work. And so I left here, I taught for the next five years at Capital Seminary, where I graduated, and I went and did my doctoral work up at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore and Old Testament.

But in the fall of 1979, God really began to do something in my heart. You know, I finished my doctoral class work and, and I started getting bored teaching seminary. Now, let me make it clear, there's nothing Capital Bible Seminary is a wonderful place.

And I'm all for theological education. But you know, honestly, I just wanted to be where the bullets were whizzing. You understand what I'm saying?

What I'm saying? I wanted to be where the action was. And in my mind, this meant being the pastor of a local church, where I could preach and where I could teach and where I could challenge people to make an impact on their community. And so I began praying about I didn't really tell anybody, I just started praying about it, and said, Well, Lord, if you want me to go be, you know, the, the pastor of a church somewhere, then you you open that door. Well, in the spring of 1980, the pastor here at McLean Bible Church resigned, and the pulpit committee that got together to start looking for the new pastor over here at McLean, well, my name came up. Now, honestly, at that point, I had never been a senior pastor before. I did not had not put in for the job. No, no pulpit committee in their right mind would have looked at me because of my lack of experience. The only reason they were even interested is because I had been here for six months, five years before that, and they kind of knew who I was.

So they sent over and wanted to know, Do you have any interest at all in becoming the pastor at McLean Bible Church? And the rest, as they say, is history. And here I am. You say, Well, wow, what an amazing coincidence it was that you were here for those six months. Well, folks, I don't believe it was a coincidence at all. Actually, I believe that God put me here for those six months in 1975, because he already was planning to bring me here in 1980 as the senior pastor, and he knew that the only way that was going to happen was for me to have been here for those six months in 1975.

I don't believe it was a coincidence at all. Now, that's what we want to talk about today. We want to talk about your life, and whether there are really any coincidences in your life, or whether everything going on in your life is something different and has a different explanation. We're going to use Paul's life as our classroom. So let's look at what happened to Paul, and then we'll come back and talk about you and me.

A little bit of background. Remember the Apostle Paul is in Jerusalem here in Acts 23. It's the end of his third missionary journey. It's the summer of 57 AD. Remember, Paul was in the temple when some Jews from Ephesus started a false rumor that he brought a Gentile into the temple.

He had not. A mob ensued, and they were beating Paul to death when the Roman army came along and rescued him. Wanting to know, as we saw last week, what all the hubbub was about, the Roman army commander asked the Jewish high council to get together. He brought Paul in in front of them, and chaos resulted. Verse 10 of this chapter says, the dissension there at the council became so violent that the tribune was afraid Paul would be torn in pieces, so he ordered his troops to go down and take Paul back to the barracks.

Now that's where we've been, so let's see what happens next. Verse 11. And that night, the Lord stood near Paul and said, take courage Paul, as you have testified about me in Jerusalem, so you must also testify about me in Rome. And of course, reading the rest of the book of Acts, we know this happened exactly the way God predicted it would happen. Paul went to Rome and even got the chance to share Christ in front of Emperor Nero.

But here in chapter 23, we start seeing the coincidences that happened that led to the fulfillment of God's promise. Watch verse 12. The next morning, some Jews formed a plot and bound themselves by an oath saying they would neither eat nor drink until they had killed Paul.

More than 40 men were involved in this plot. So they went to the chief priest and said, we have taken an oath not to eat or drink anything until we've killed Paul. Now therefore, ask the tribune to bring Paul before you. As though you wanted to conduct a more thorough investigation of Paul's case, we will lie in wait and we will kill Paul before he arrives here.

Now you understand what's happening here, right? They were going to set an ambush for Paul. They wanted the high council to say to the tribune, hey, send him back.

We want to talk to him one more time. And while Paul was on the way, they were going to ambush him and kill him. So verse 16. And the son of Paul's sister, that is Paul's nephew, heard of their ambush and went into the barracks and told Paul about it. Now friends, this verse raises a lot of interesting questions. For example, number one, does this verse mean that Paul's sister was living in Jerusalem along with this boy, Paul's nephew?

Well, the answer is probably not. She was probably back home in Tarsus and had simply sent her son to Jerusalem for his Jewish education, much like years before Paul's parents had sent him to Jerusalem for his Jewish education. The second question this raises is, was Paul's nephew a follower of Christ who was then sympathetic to Paul's faith?

I don't think so. I find it very hard to believe that if someone this close to Paul had been a follower of Christ, that Paul would never have mentioned him anywhere in the Bible. So no, I don't think this young man was a follower of Christ. He said, well then, Law, that raises another question. Why would this young man put loyalty for his uncle ahead of his Jewish roots and his Jewish loyalty?

Well, the answer to that question is I don't know. I have no idea why he would do that. And that leads us to the fourth question and really the biggest and most important question and that is how in the world did this nephew find out about the plot against his uncle Paul? I mean this plot must have been one of the most closely guarded secrets in all of Jerusalem. So how in the world did this kid find out about it?

Well, maybe, I don't know, I'm just guessing. Maybe he was clerking for one of the rabbis on the high council and he overheard it in the hallway. Or maybe he was in the bar one night and some of the assassins came in and started drinking too much and before it was over they had let something slip.

Or maybe there was some first century Linda trip that invited him to lunch and told him. I don't know how he found out about it but somehow he found out about this plot in an amazing turn of events and he went to Paul and told him what was going on. Well, verse 17, then Paul called one of the centurions, one of the junior Roman officers, and said take this young man, my nephew, to the tribune for he has something important to tell him. So the centurion took the young man to the tribune and the tribune took Paul's nephew by the hand, drew him aside and asked him privately what is it you wish to tell me? Then the young man said the Jews have agreed to ask you to bring Paul down tomorrow to the council as though they were going to examine him more thoroughly. Do not listen to them for more than 40 of them will be waiting in ambush for Paul. They have taken an oath not to eat or drink until they kill Paul.

They are ready now just waiting for you to consent to their request. So the tribune dismissed the young man and instructed him to tell no one that he had reported this. Then he called two centurions and ordered them to get 200 soldiers ready by 9 p.m. with 70 horsemen and 200 spearmen in order to take Paul to Caesarea that very night.

Now stop for a second. May I remind you that the entire garrison in Jerusalem that this tribune commanded was only a thousand troops. And what we see here is that he takes 470 men, almost 50% of his entire garrison, and sends 470 men to guard one man, the apostle Paul.

This tribune was serious, friends, about the fact that no Roman citizen was going to get assassinated on his watch because he knew what the repercussions would be for him if that happened. Well, he also commanded them to provide a mount to put Paul on so that he could be brought quickly to Felix, the Roman governor. Now I just want to remind you here the total time that Paul had been in Jerusalem.

Let's show you a map. They took Paul from Jerusalem, northwest, 70 miles to Caesarea, which as I've told you before was the real seat of Roman government here, not Jerusalem. The total time Paul was in Jerusalem from Acts 21 when he arrived to Acts 23 when he gets to sent to Caesarea is seven days. You say, you mean, Lon, Paul caused all that trouble in seven days?

Yeah, seven days. That's all it took him to make that much trouble in Jerusalem. That's all he was there. Well, the tribune wrote a letter to the governor that accompanied Paul. And here's what the letter said. Verse 25, Claudius Lysias, that's the name of the tribune, to his excellency, Governor Felix, greetings. This man was seized, talking about Paul by the Jews, and they were about to kill him when I came along with my troops and rescued him. I did this because I had learned that he was a Roman citizen.

You say, wait, wait, wait, stop, wait a minute, wait a minute. That's not true. That's not true. That tribune, when he rescued Paul, had no idea who Paul was.

He didn't find out he was a Roman citizen till later on when he had ordered Paul to be flogged, which, oh, by the way, he doesn't even mention in his letter to the governor. You're right. This is a classic example of political misspeak. In fact, if you live in Washington, D.C., a letter like this ought to make you feel warm and fuzzy all over on the inside.

It's like opening up the Washington Post and reading it over coffee in the morning. Yeah, that's right. We know, we understand these letters. Now, verse 28, in wanting to know the charges for which they were accusing Paul, I brought him before their counsel. I found that the charges had to do with questions about their law, but there was no charge against him that deserved death or imprisonment. And when I was informed of a plot to kill this man, I sent him to you at once. So the soldiers, I also ordered, forgive me, that his accusers bring charges against him before you. So the soldiers carrying out their orders took Paul by night, and they brought him to Caesarea.

And when he had read the letter, Felix said, I will give you a hearing after your accusers arrive. Then he ordered Paul to be kept under guard in Herod's palace. Now, we know from archaeology that Felix was the governor of Judea from 52 AD to 60 AD, exactly the period when the Bible says that Paul would have been sent to him. Once again, when we look at history and archaeology, it confirms the historical accuracy of the Bible, just like we would expect it to. And since Paul was a Roman citizen, Felix had the right to judge his case because Felix was the Roman governor of the province.

Now friends, let's summarize what's happened. Remember, if the apostle Paul's nephew had not heard about this plot, it is almost certain that this tribune would have consented to send Paul back to the Jewish council. If that had happened, it is almost certain that Paul would have been lightly guarded by Roman soldiers on the way. And it is almost certain then he would have been killed in a bloody ambush on some back street in Jerusalem.

But instead, look what happened all because of the coincidence that his nephew heard about this. Instead, Paul is now in Roman custody as a protected Roman citizen. He's going to get the opportunity to share Jesus Christ during two years at Caesarea with every Roman dignitary in the ancient Near East at the time. Then the Roman government, at their expense, is going to send him to Rome, no charge to Paul, where he's going to get the opportunity to share Christ with the elite in the Roman Empire, including Emperor Nero himself.

None of that would have happened had it not been for this crazy coincidence where his nephew found out about this plot. Now, that's as far as we want to go in the passage today, because it's time for us to ask the most important question. And you know what our question is, so are you ready? Yeah? You guys ready down to overflow? All right, here we go. Ready?

One, two, three. So what? Right. You say, so what? You say, Lon, as far as I'm concerned, the apostle Paul was one lucky puppy.

That's all I got to say. Think about it now, to have his nephew hear about this just at the right time, to be just at the right place, not a day late, not a day before, and hear about this plot, he was one lucky puppy. I mean, that was a pretty amazing coincidence. Well, was it really a coincidence? Let's define, what is a coincidence? The dictionary says, and I quote, it is the chance occurrence of things at such a time and in such a way as to seem remarkable. A coincidence, it means that if you didn't know any better, you'd swear somebody had actually designed the events to go the way that they did. But since we know that there's no guiding hand running this world, therefore, no matter how remarkable it looks, it's got to just be, well, a coincidence. It's just luck.

It was just an accident that it went that way. When we open the pages of the Bible, however, my friends, we find a completely different worldview. We find a completely different explanation for the things that go on in life. The Bible's worldview is all based on the existence of a sovereign God, who is in total control of every detail of the universe, who intervenes in the affairs of people's everyday lives on a regular basis. The worldview of the Bible tells us that this God causes the details of our lives as followers of Christ to click into place with exact precision, so that his will and his purpose for our life gets worked out.

Now that's the worldview of the Bible. I'm sure most of you guys are aware that in every professional sport, there's a draft of new talent. And in virtually all the professional sports, the draft works the same way, and that is the team with the crummiest record gets the first pick.

We all know that. However, in the NBA, the National Basketball Association, they have a completely different system. By the way, before I go on, do you guys know that here in Washington, we actually have an NBA franchise?

Did you all know that? Yeah, we do. Now, they used to be called the Washington Bullets, but then they conducted a huge contest to rename them, and I had a suggestion that I sent in. My suggestion was that they stop calling them the Washington Bullets, and because of their performance over so many years, they called them the Washington Blanks.

That was my suggestion. Well, they stink. They're terrible. Michael Jordan couldn't even help these people. So the blanks seemed to make sense to me. Well, they didn't like my idea, and so they chose the Wizards. Now, the Wizards have been in this system for the first draft pick for many, many years in a row, and here's how it works. They take a bunch of these little ping-pong balls, and they put them in this little glass doohickey thing, and they swirl them all around like the lottery, and then you need a PhD in mathematics to figure out the exact formula they use, but somehow by popping these ping-pong balls up and picking them out of here, they decide which team gets the first pick. The Washington Wizards, in spite of the fact they've been in the ping-pong ball lottery for many, many years, have never gotten the first pick. In fact, they just did the ping-pong ball thing last week. Here's how USA Today reported the results, and I quote.

The Orlando Magic, for the third time since coming into the NBA as an expansion team for the 1989-90 season, won the draft lottery and will have the first pick in next month's draft. That was luck, end of quote. But was it really? Listen to what Proverbs 16 says, verse 33. It says the lot is cast in the lap, or we might say the ping-pong balls are all put in the little glass doohickey thing, but every decision is from the Lord.

I don't care how random it looks. God is in control of where those ping-pong balls go and who gets the first pick. Now, what this means is, obviously, God is not a Washington Wizards fan. That's one of the things that it means. But the other thing it means, what this verse means, is that there are no such thing as accidents.

There are no such things as random events. The verse says God controls it all. The verse says followers of Christ, we need to understand that in our life, there is no luck, there is no fate, there is no karma, there are no accidents, there are no coincidences. Everything that enters our lives, God is simply working out His perfect plan for you and for me. That is the world view of the Bible. Now, if you're here today and you've never trusted Jesus in a real and personal way, let me say to you that when I came to Christ, this was one of the things I most wanted.

Maybe even more than heaven and eternal life. I had spent 21 years running my own life and made a complete disaster out of it. And I often thought if I could scroll it back to the beginning and do it all over, I wouldn't do any better. I didn't know how to run my life. I knew I couldn't run my own life.

And I knew that I needed somebody else to do it. Let me say for the last 33 years, Jesus Christ done a great job of running my life. And maybe you're out there saying, hey, I've been running my life for X number of years and made a complete mess out of it.

Friends, let me tell you something. You can trade in running your own life for letting Jesus run it and you'll be glad every day the rest of your life you did. And it comes as part of the package deal when you give your life to Jesus Christ.

So if you're in that condition, I hope you'll think about that. You say, yeah, but wait a minute. You don't really believe, do you, that the God of the universe that keeps, you know, Neptune from bumping into Pluto, you know, out there, you don't really believe that God comes down and gets involved in the everyday little dinky details of my life. Do you? Do you really believe that? Oh, friend, I believe it. I believe it. I believe it. Yes, I do.

In fact, you're sitting in living proof that God does that. Let me tell you a story. In 1995, we got a phone call from a fellow named Stuart Mendelson. I'd never heard of him. He was a little known politician here in Northern Virginia on the school board. And he was running for the board of supervisors from the Dranesville district.

And our old church, McLean Bible Church, the old building was in that district. We had hundreds of people who lived in his district. And he called to find out, we'll show you a picture of him. He called to find out if we would be willing to let him come over. No, we weren't going to endorse him.

We weren't going to hand out promotional material. He just wanted to come over, stand in the lobby and shake hands and introduce himself. I said, well, I don't know, Stuart.

I need to meet with you first and get to know you and find out where you're coming from. And so we met. And I learned some things about Stuart. I learned he was a Jewish believer just exactly like I was. I learned he'd given his life to Christ in the chapel at the Naval Academy where my son was going. And I learned that on every position that really was important to us, Stuart stood where we stood and so we said, okay, you can come over and shake hands in the lobby. And he did.

Well, here's an amazing thing. He won. By a couple of percentage points, this guy won. And after he won, I took him out to lunch to congratulate him. And he said at lunch, well, you know, I want to really thank you.

I'm not sure I would have won without the support I'm sure I got from people there at McLean Bible Church. Thank you. And I said, you're welcome. And I said, Stuart, I just want you to know you owe me one. You don't owe me two and you don't owe me 17 favors.

You owe me one favor. And at some point, I'm going to call you and I'm going to call that favor in. And then we had a nice lunch. We finished lunch and had a very nice lunch. Well, about two years later, we learned that the National Wildlife Federation property where you're sitting today might be coming for sale. So I called Stu up and I said, hey, could we have lunch over at McLean Hilton?

I'll never forget. We met for lunch. And I said to him, hey, Stu, do you remember a couple of years ago that I said that you owe me one favor? And he's like, yeah, I remember that. And I said, OK, well, I'm here to collect.

The National Wildlife Federation is going up for sale and we want to take that property and turn it into a church. And I thought Stu was going to choke on his clover salad that he was eating there at McLean Hilton. He's like, you want to do what? And I said, that's the favor. And he said, I don't know if I can do that. And I said, well, Stu, I didn't you don't get the right to decide what favor you give back. I'm sorry.

That's the favor. And that's where we need your help. Well, you know, that began a 14 month fight here in Fairfax County to get permission to turn this property into a church. The neighbors were against us. The McLean Citizens Association was against us. All the local papers were against us. In fact, even some other churches came out against us. But we are we had one person who was for us and that was Stu Mendelson.

And you know what? This property, we found out, was in Stu's district by one quarter of a mile. Stu's district ends at the toll road and we were in his district by a quarter of a mile. And when it was all over and the smoke cleared, we had won at the Board of Supervisors. Ten to zero was the vote.

Then in 2003, we won another ten to zero vote to put our special needs center on the five acres next to us. And then after that, Stu decided not to run for re-election again. Now, I don't think those events are connected in any way. But isn't it interesting that the eight years we needed Stu Mendelson to be our supervisor were the eight years God gave him.

And I want to say categorically, there is no way in the world we would have ever gotten permission to build a church on this site if anybody else had been our supervisor but Stu Mendelson. You say, wow, that is an amazing coincidence. Well, you can believe whatever you want, but I don't believe it was a coincidence. And let me tell you, Stu himself doesn't believe it was a coincidence. He said at our men's retreat, and I quote, It wasn't a coincidence.

I believe the Lord put me in office for this very purpose. In fact, I would often say to him, Stu, how does it feel to be like Esther? He said, what? I'd say, remember what Mordecai said to Esther. He said, who knows, but that the Lord put you in your position for just such a time as this. And I said, Stu, that's how I feel about you.

Every time I walk by you, you look like Esther to me. Well, that's how I feel about it. Now you say, Lon, what are you trying to say, friends? I'm trying to say there are no such thing as coincidences when Stu Mendelson won that election in 1995, when God even put it in his heart to try and run in 1995. God already saw this property for us. God already saw that special needs center for us.

God already was working. This was not a coincidence. Friend, there are no coincidences.

There are no accidents. Everything is just incidents of God working out his perfect plan for those of us who are followers of Christ. Now you say, well, you know, Lon, that's wonderful. But any nincompoop can stand up there and talk about stuff like that when everything goes right and everything goes good and you have these wonderful victories. But what about when bad stuff comes into your life? I mean, what about when stuff you don't want comes into your life?

You're suggesting that I should still see those as God's wonderful working His plan for me? Absolutely. Absolutely. I believe that we should be like Job. You remember what Job said? He said, and I quote, Shall we accept good from the hand of the Lord and never accept adversity? The Lord gives. And sometimes the Lord takes away. But either way, blessed is the name of the Lord because he's got a plan.

And in all this, Job did not sin in what he said by charging God with wrongdoing. I believe that's how we've got to be. And folks, in the process of getting this, we had to go through that. You know, we looked at other properties that didn't work out before we ever heard about this property. We looked at an old CIA building. You wouldn't believe what was in the walls of that building that we were going to have to tear out of that building.

So we said, Nah, nah, nah, we don't want to do that. Then we looked at the Evans Farm Inn property. I actually had lunch with Mr. Evans and some other folks and we were talking about purchasing that property 25 acres in the middle of McLean. And I thought this is perfect, God, this is perfect. I was so excited about that. And I won't tell you all the details, but that fell apart.

He said, How did you feel about that? I was pretty disappointed. I got to tell you, I was pretty disappointed.

I remember saying, God, that's the only 25 acre parcel anywhere in McLean. How could you not let that work out? I was pretty disappointed. He said, Well, what did you do? Well, I did what Job did. I said, Lord, sometimes you give and sometimes you take away and I don't know what you're doing. Maybe you want to give us 30 acres somewhere.

I'm just going to trust you. Well, you know what? God didn't give us 30 acres. He didn't give us 35 or 40 or 45. He gave us 52 acres right at Tyson's Corner.

He more than doubled Evans Farm Inn and gave us a 230,000 square foot building with it and we paid less than we were going to pay for Evans Farm Inn. You say, What a coincidence. Come on. Come on.

Aren't you listening? I had to do what you have to do, which is Romans 8 28. I have to trust God that God works all things together for good. Even the things I can't understand, even the things that I don't have an answer for. He works all things together for good for those of us who believe in Jesus Christ. And friends, I want to say to you here today in closing that maybe you've got in your life some coincidences, some situations that are confusing to you or that you don't have answers for or that are painful.

I want to challenge you to be like Job. I want to challenge you not to sin with your mouth by accusing God of letting you down. I want you to trust God and say, You know there are no coincidences. This is in my life because God wants us in my life because one day I'm going to look back and say just like Evans Farm Inn, Oh yeah, I understand now why God did it that way because he had something better for me. Friends, if you've got an Evans Farm Inn in your life, let me just tell you, one day you're going to look back and you're going to say, God, I didn't understand it then but I can see now you had total control. Folks, don't you ever believe there's a coincidence in your life.

There isn't. There are only incidents in God working out his perfect plan for you. Remember what Jeremiah said, For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. Plans for good and not for evil to give you a future and a hope. You take those things in your life you don't understand and you see them as God's working and God will give you peace and God will prove to you that he knows what he's doing.

I hope you can do that. Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, thanks for talking to us today about real life, right down where we live. Every one of us has stuff that happens in our lives, curve balls that get thrown at us that seem to make no sense. But Father, it's a great comfort to know when we have a curve ball thrown at us. It's a great comfort to know who the real pitcher is.

That it's you. It's not random fate or senseless bad luck. You are the pitcher. And Father, thanks for reminding us today that the purpose of those curve balls is not to strike us out. But it's to work your perfect plan for our lives and Father, my prayer is that you would help us to trust you. Help us take those circumstances that we don't understand right now. Give us peace that we can lay them at your feet. And just like Evans Farm Inn, we can know that you've got something else better for us if you're not giving us something now. That you've got some other plan for us if you're not letting our plan work out. Lord, help us simply to trust you and walk with you even as the Apostle Paul did. Thanks for talking to us today. Change the way we react to life because we were here today and studied the Word of God. And we pray this in Jesus' name. That God's people said, amen.