Luke 24 uses the same word where the two disciples are walking along the road, that Emmaus road that we talk about and hear about. And Jesus Christ, the resurrected Lord, sort of slips in beside him and he's walking along with him.
And later on, after he disappears, they realize what had happened and they said to each other and to others as they testified, did not our hearts burn within us as he opened, same word, the scriptures to us. What this community needs and what our world needs are people who mirror the life of Jesus Christ, who slip in beside other people and open the scriptures to them. In all areas of life, making progress and being effective takes more than good intentions and good desires. Intentions and desires are a starting point, but they need to translate into action. That's true in the Christian life as well. If we want to truly influence our culture for Jesus Christ, that's going to take more than desire.
It takes action. Welcome to this vintage wisdom broadcast of Wisdom for the Heart. Today, Stephen Davey takes you to Acts 17 with a lesson he's calling, Have You Upset Your World Today? In 1894, the rhetoric teacher at Harrow in England wrote on a 16-year-old's report card, a conspicuous lack of success. That 16-year-old was Winston Churchill, who would become one of the great orators of the century. In 1905, the University of Bern rejected the dissertation of a PhD student and called it fanciful. That PhD student was Albert Einstein. Sometimes the value of the world is wrong.
Most often it is. If you were to grade the mark or the effectiveness of the apostle Paul at this juncture in his missionary journey, you wouldn't give him a very high grade. He has been imprisoned. He has been stoned. He's been left for dead. He has had people forsake his ministry. He's been left alone. And the results that he has had have been scattered and somewhat strange. At least that's what it seems like on the surface.
And yet the exact opposite is true. I sort of view it as if a tidal wave has just hit Europe and the water is beginning to spread inland and it will ultimately trickle its way all around Europe. God is beginning a revolution through the apostle Paul and we come to pick up our story and we discover not only an interesting passage of scripture that reveals to us a little bit more about what this individual was doing, but it has within this paragraph one of the most interesting descriptions of Christianity. So let's pick our study back up with Acts chapter 17 verse 1. Now when they had traveled through Antipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica where there was a synagogue of the Jews. Remember the last city he went to didn't have a synagogue so he went down by the riverside.
Well here they had a synagogue. According to Paul's custom, he went there and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the scriptures explaining and giving evidence that Christ or the Christ Christoph the Messiah had to suffer and rise again from the dead saying, this Jesus whom I am proclaiming to you is the Christ, the Messiah. And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas along with a great multitude of the God-fearing Greeks and a number of the leading women. But the Jews became jealous and taking along some wicked men from the marketplace formed a mob and set the city in an uproar and coming upon the house of Jason, evidently where Paul and Silas were staying, they were seeking to bring them out to the people. When they did not find them, they began dragging Jason and some brethren before the city authorities shouting, these men, here it is, who have upset the world have come here also.
And Jason has welcomed them. And they all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar saying, there is another King, Jesus. Ladies and gentlemen, there is a direct relationship between upsetting your world and understanding the word. And Paul's strategy was simple and we're just going to dissect it. He gave people the word and the categorical phrase that described him and that he and that ministry was, he's upsetting the world, even though it didn't really look like it, did it?
You notice back in verses two and three, he reasoned, he explained, he opened the word. If you want to upset your world, the lever is the word of God. So the question though, is this, have you upset your world? Do you have the kind of relationship with the word that creates a revolution in your world?
Well, let's break that down. Let me give you six things that would be needed if we hope to upset our world for the glory of Christ. First of all, you have to begin with a relationship that is spiritual. In other words, you can't get to know God's word until you know who God is. The Bible delivers the revelation that expresses the character and attributes of God. As you study the word, you come to know him.
And I was raised in a non-denominational church that had over the back of the wall, to know him and to make him known. And they had it all right because the first phrase was to know him and then you make him known. You get to know him when you know the word.
You go to the word and discover what it says about the author of the word. In fact, Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians that the natural man, that is the unbelieving man, cannot receive the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him. Neither can he discern or understand him because they are spiritually discerned. So until you have a relationship with Jesus Christ, this is a closed book. You might get a little warm and fuzzy reading the Psalms or maybe the Proverbs are some good idioms that you can, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. But for the most part, this is a closed book.
This will not revolutionize your life and through your life it will not revolutionize your world. Begin with a relationship that's spiritual. Secondly, you must cultivate a conscience that is clear. Peter wrote in 1 Peter chapter 2, he said to put aside all malice, all wrath or envy, all slander, like newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby. In other words, he says before you study and learn the milk of the word, put aside and he gives this long list of sins. Make sure your relationship with Christ is clear when you come to the word so that you can grow thereby. In other words, harboring sin hinders growth. Third, you must replace a desire with a discipline. Basically that longing has to get you into the word that develops a discipline of study in the word. Desire has to turn into discipline.
How many of you have a desire to lose weight? Well, don't put your hand up. Oh, okay, honest people here. I'll put my hand up. I do. Thank you, sir. Come meet me afterwards, sort of support group and encourage each other.
I do. I was being transparent and telling people that when I was married and many of you guys, well, a few of you probably, I had a 29 waist, kind of like that, you know, and then you let your hair out and it kind of sags back down. Well, 29. Now, I don't want to blame it all on my wife, but, you know, I had people coming up to me, you know, with ideas and all this kind of stuff that, you know, don't come up with ideas, okay? Don't tell me what to do. But at any rate, I've gone from 34, that's not bad, 34 waist, to 36 and it's kind of tight, 37. And I'm cutting back. That's not the place to lie.
I haven't been to Schlotzky's in about four months, and that's the truth. I haven't had a Krispy Kreme donut in, okay, not at 48 hours, but I have desire, but guess what I don't have? Discipline. How many of you would love to be able to play the piano? Wouldn't you? I would be able to sit down in your home and just, or another instrument.
How many of you would learn or love to learn, you have a desire to learn a hobby or some craft making ability or any number of things. We all have desires like that, don't we? We don't have the discipline.
So we never then put that into practice. You want a desire to know the words so that you can know the author of the words so that you can revolutionize your world. That's a wonderful desire, but it won't get you anywhere. Eventually it has to turn into a discipline. And so the apostle Paul said to study, to show yourselves approved unto God, not for salvation, the word approved or Doc-a-moth means, so that you can pass the tests of life. Study so that you can pass the tests of life. And you know what happens when you pass the tests of life?
All those watching you in the world see you passing those tests and they have to say, I don't know what you've got, but I don't have it and I want it. You revolutionize their world. So it has to become discipline. It takes more than desire.
Next, you have to develop an attitude that applies. As you study the word, it isn't just so you can get smarter in the scriptural facts. It's so that you and I can become more like, more like Jesus Christ. James chapter 1, you might want to mark that in your margin or your notes. There's a great passage to look at. In verse 22 he talks about the person that is a hearer of the word and not a doer.
He is a forgetful man. And then he gives the illustration of a man who goes up to a mirror and he says, blessed is the man in effect that looks intently into the perfect law of liberty and not forgetting what he's seen acts, does what the word says. The word intently is a fascinating word. It talks about the man who leans toward the mirror to see a clear reflection. You know, you guys did that this morning as you shaved. You kind of leaned into the mirror. That kind of man who responds in accordance with the reflection that he's been given is a blessed man. The word is a mirror. As you and I look into the mirror of the word, we see our reflection. I don't like what I see. I'll put the mirror down.
That'll fix it. Or I don't like what I see, but I'm not going to change. A person is going to revolutionize his world as a person who goes into the word, allows the reflection of the word to reveal his true character and nature and he asks God to change him. So you have to have an attitude of application. Next, you must pursue introductions that are intentional. Introductions of Jesus Christ, that is, that are intentional. Look at verse two again. And according to Paul's custom, he went to them.
Now, Paul for a living made tense, but it was his custom. It was his passion. It was his life to reason. There are three words, in fact, we're given here.
First of all, he reasoned with them. You could write into the margin of your Bible, the word dialogue. It's the Greek word dialogomai, which gives us our transliterated word dialogue. In other words, he isn't standing up just delivering a sermon. There's dialogue. He's having them ask him questions and he's answering them according to the scriptures. And you say, well, isn't it nice that somebody can do that? Isn't it wonderful that somebody can hear a question and go right to the word and say, here's the answer? Has it ever occurred to us that that's what we're all supposed to be able to do? Because Peter said that we're all supposed to be ready to give an answer for the hope that lies within us.
It isn't just for the professional, which doesn't exist, by the way. We are all to do that. He reasoned with them. The second word is he explained the first part of verse three. He explained the scriptures.
He could literally render that. He opened the scriptures. Luke 24 uses the same word where the two disciples are walking along the road, that Emmaus road that we talk about and hear about. And Jesus Christ, the resurrected Lord sort of slips in beside him and he's walking along with him.
And later on, after he disappears, they realize what had happened. And they said to each other and to others as they testified, did not our hearts burn within us as he opened? Same word, the scriptures to us, what this community needs and what our world needs are people who mirror the life of Jesus Christ, who slip in beside other people and open the scriptures to them, who intentionally introduce Christ, the Christ of this book. William Carey, who was the father of what we call modern missions, lived over a hundred years ago in England and he was a shoemaker. And he began to view life like that, that I will intentionally introduce people to Jesus Christ. Have you begun to live like that yet?
You will revolutionize your world if you do. And everybody who came into his shoe shop, he'd find a way to get the conversation around to tell them about Christ. He didn't nail him in the corner or something or threaten to hit him with a shoe. He just took every opportunity he could just present Christ. And one day a friend of his said, William, you're going to ruin your business. To which he responded, my business is advancing the kingdom of God.
I sell shoes to pay expenses. Wow. No wonder that man revolutionized his world. Well, third word that I think is interesting in the latter part of verse three, he gave evidence of Christ's resurrection. The word evidence means to place beside or to set before.
He gives people evidence. You just lay it out before them, according to the scripture. So we don't use the Old Testament. We don't know what he used in the Old Testament, but this kind of got me going.
And I spent a lot of time this week and I've given you a number of references that you could search through and look up and maybe give a friend or especially those who might be a Jewish. Perhaps Paul turned to Isaiah chapter 11 verse one that tells us that the Messiah would be a descendant of David. Maybe he turned to Micah 5 2 that tells us that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem. Maybe he looked up Isaiah 7 14 and had them unroll that great scroll of Isaiah, their beloved prophet, where it says in chapter 7 verse 14 that the Messiah would be born of a what?
A virgin. Isaiah 9 2, while you're here, he might say, look over there. And it says that the Messiah will bring to Israel a great light. You see, when Jesus Christ stood up and said to the people, I am the light of the world, he was saying, I am the fulfillment of that messianic promise by the great prophet Isaiah.
I am the great light. Maybe he took him to Zachariah chapter nine verse nine that says the Messiah will enter Jerusalem riding upon a young donkey. Or maybe Psalm 22 that describes the crucifixion talks about the bones of Jesus being out of joint talks about the agony and the mockers who are there and even records in Psalm chapter 22 the words, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Or Psalm 16 10 that refers to the resurrection of Christ as it says the son of David will not undergo decay. My father was flying back from Russia. The ministry he's been involved with for 40 years is expanding. They're going to open a service center on the Black Sea on the coast there. And what a fascinating place, especially when you think of prophetic scripture saying that the bear will march from the north and you just know that that will be one of the key strategic places where they'll mount up to march against Israel one day. Well, right now it's going to be a place there's no other gospel ministry like it and they've invited them to come.
Large naval base. He was flying back and was flying through Odessa and had a stay over in Odessa for a while in Ukraine and and he said that the airport was filled with Orthodox Jewish men. They were evidently flying and he would find out that they were flying to Israel to celebrate Yom Kippur. They were dressed in their black if you've seen Orthodox Jewish men, black hats, long hair and ringlets and and and boxes on their foreheads that encase the Ten Commandments they take literally but you're there to put the law between their eyes. My dad was sitting there and had his Bible open and was reading in the terminal and young 25 year old Orthodox Jews sat down beside him.
Kind of one of those you know. And my dad started talking to him and eventually worked it around where he was able to ask him a question and he asked him a great question I thought. He said son how will you recognize the Messiah when he comes? And that young man said oh we we will we will know him. He will perform miracles. His personality will be dynamic. We will know him. My father said but there have been many messiahs who've come claiming to be the Messiah of Israel and they've been false messiahs. How will you know? For sure that he is the true messiah.
Oh we will know. My father said I know how you will know in your Hebrew scriptures. And he turned to Zachariah chapter 12 verse 10 where it says that the nation Israel will look upon their returning King the Messiah and they will look upon him whom they have what pierced. That's not in my Bible.
Oh yes it is. Let me write that reference down. And he wrote that reference down. And he turned to Genesis or Isaiah. He said I want to I want to turn to a chapter that you probably never heard in the synagogue and he turned Isaiah 53. I had to write that reference down and he wrote the reference down. He turned to Genesis chapter 49 verse 10 where we're told that first one of the first messianic promises that that the the scepter that is the king scepter will not depart the tribe of Judah and when he comes he will tie his young donkey to a vine. I write that down.
I haven't seen that before. I was right out of the Torah. He said but I believe in the oral Torah. We trace our beliefs back through our father's generation back generation back. We trace it back to Abraham and Moses.
My father said that is the difference. You believe in the oral Torah more than you believe as I do the written Torah. And then he showed him a verse that has moved me as I have thought of it. Zachariah 13 6 where the nation Israel asks their king what are these wounds in your hands and he will answer those with which I was wounded in the house of my brethren. Who knows if that man hasn't gone back to his Hebrew scriptures and studied that intentional introduction of Jesus Christ that may indeed revolutionize his life. Finally if you want to upset your world you must embrace opposition as opportunity. Look at verse 5. But the Jews becoming jealous and taking along some wicked men from the marketplace formed a mob and set the city in an uproar.
Stop a second. Isn't it interesting to you how easy it is to incite opposition to Christ. It doesn't take much and they're there. They're ready to form a mob. It's just we're ready to march.
And Luke doesn't pull any punches as he talks about this. He says he calls them wicked men from the marketplace. They were just ready available.
We have them in our marketplace as well. Available at any moment to stand against the truth. One translation reads describes them as wicked fellows of the rabble. Another one translates it unprincipled loungers of the marketplace. Another translation says worthless fellows from the streets.
A.T. Robertson a Greek scholar of almost 100 years ago simply translated it bums. One commentator that I read who lived over 100 years ago Adam Clark was convinced that these men were lawyers. He obviously was not a lawyer to come up with that kind of conclusion. I believe that these were men who actually made their living off the agora that is the open area where they had the rostrum where politicians would speak. These men could be hired to either heckle or applaud. They were available to do whatever the person wanted if the money was right. And so here they are evidently hired by the Jews. In fact Cicero the first century Roman statesman called these men that made their living this way sub rostrani literally those under the rostrum. They were there to be hired. And so they were hired. These were the hired guns in Macedonia's capital city. Verse 6 when they did not find them as they go off looking for all the silence they began dragging Jason. We don't know anything about him by the way. And some brethren before the city authorities shouting these men who have upset the world have come here also and Jason welcome them.
I love this next phrase. And they all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar. In other words these men are not politically correct. They go against the tide of popular opinion. And we don't like the fact that they upset the world and they make us feel like we're wrong.
Who do they think they are and all that kind of jargon that you've probably heard. They're not following the party line first Thessalonians chapter 1 and we don't have time to go there but that's the sequel of this event. Paul encourages these believers and praises them as he writes you have turned from your gods to follow the true and living God. They turn from it and follow the living God. Verse 8 they stirred up the crowd and the city authorities heard these things authorities politics gives us our word politician now they're involved.
This is really turning into a brouhaha. It's kind of like the riot that was nearly started in Kansas and the House of Representatives and you know they start their session as we do with prayer to who knows who. Well this guy knew who. Pastors name was Joe Wright. Let me read you what he prayed as he opened the assembly that day. Heavenly Father we come before you today to ask your forgiveness and seek your direction and guidance. We know your word says woe to those who call evil good. But that's exactly what we have done.
Kind of feel the fidgeting now starting right. We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and we have inverted our values. We confess that we have ridiculed the absolute truth of your word and called it moral pluralism.
We have worshipped other gods and called it multiculturalism. We have endorsed perversion and called it an alternative lifestyle. We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery. We have neglected the needy and called it self-preservation. We have killed our unborn and called it choice.
We've shot abortionists and called it justifiable. We've neglected the discipline our children and called it building self-esteem. We have abused power and called it political savvy. We've coveted our neighbors' possessions and called it ambition. We've polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it freedom of expression.
We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called it enlightenment. Search us oh God and know our hearts today. Try us and see if there be some wicked way in us. Cleanse us from every sin and set us free. Guide and bless these men and women who have been sent here by the people of Kansas and have been ordained by you to govern this great state. Grant them your wisdom to rule and may their decisions direct us to the center of your will. I ask it in the name of your son, the living savior, Jesus Christ. Amen."
Isn't that great? Somebody in the arena finally stood up and said, the emperor has no clothes. By the way, this prayer was read by Paul Harvey, it says here on his program, and it produced his largest listener response ever. I bet this guy's church grew 1,000.
You know, it's interesting that according to what it says here, it probably wouldn't have gone any further than the House of Representatives, but by the time he finished his prayer, there were representatives rushing for the microphone to begin their angry tirades against this man in his prayer that had made national news. You have upset our world. Has it ever occurred to you that the world is already upside down and we as believers are really trying to set it up right? And when you impact people for Jesus Christ, you're not really turning them upside down.
You are setting them up right. Solomon said that God sets a man upright. David said, you've taken me out of the miry pit and you have set my feet upon a solid rock. And so today, go out and look for ways to influence your world. Thanks for joining us today. This is Wisdom for the Heart, the Bible teaching ministry of Stephen Davey.
Stephen is the president of Wisdom International. If you're new to our ministry, welcome. We have a monthly devotional magazine called Heart to Heart. It's something that'll encourage you and keep you in God's word each day. We send this resource to all of our Wisdom partners, but we'd like to send you the next three issues as a gift to you. You can sign up for that on our website, or you can call us at 866-48-BIBLE and we can give you information over the phone. I hope to hear from you soon. Thanks for joining us and join us next time for more Wisdom for the Heart.
