So the confrontation of this sermon is, leave your dead idols, there's one that has been resurrected. There's one God, there is one human race, there is one savior, and there is one judgment. The polytheism then of Athens is sort of swept into one philosophical garbage heap. God demonstrated the true God His power by resurrecting His Son from the dead.
Life's most absolute certainty is dying, and He overpowered life's most absolute certainty. As Christians, we often refer to the Gospel of Jesus Christ as good news. But there's a side of the Gospel that people don't really enjoy talking about. The bad news of the Gospel is that judgment is coming. There's a day when Jesus will judge the world. Every person who ever lived will face eternity with Him or apart from Him. That's a message that the Apostle Paul preached in the ancient city of Athens. And we're looking at that today here on Wisdom for the Heart.
Stephen Davey returns to the book of Acts with this message that he's calling Judgment Day. James Woolsey, a director of central intelligence, was speaking at a conference on global organized crime. Somebody sent me this rather funny incident that took place, and he told the story as part of his speech. This incident occurred when the FBI agents were conducting an investigation of a San Diego psychiatric institution. After hours of reviewing thousands of medical records, the dozens of agents worked up quite an appetite. So the agent in charge of the investigation called a nearby pizza parlor to order dinner for his colleagues.
The following telephone conversation took place and was recorded by the FBI, who was in the process of taping all incoming and outgoing phone calls. Agent, hello, I'd like to order 19 pizzas and 67 cans of Coke. Pizza man, where would you like them delivered? We're over here at the psychiatric hospital.
To the psychiatric hospital. That's right, I'm an FBI agent. Pizza man, you're an FBI agent.
That's correct, just about everybody here is. Oh, and you'll have to go around to the back entrance to deliver the pizzas. We have the front doors locked. Pizza man, and you say you're an FBI agent? That's correct, and everyone over there is an FBI agent?
That's right, we've been here all day and we're starving. I don't think so. Click. Well, I hope you don't think I'm insensitive for using something like that as an illustration, but I thought it illustrated well the problem of communication. What the agent could have done is develop maybe a little background before he got to his request and would have been given perhaps a little more credibility or maybe a little longer phone conversation before eventually the guy hung up.
But because the background wasn't fully established, the request was ultimately discredited. We have been listening to the sermon by the apostle Paul to the Athenians and frankly our last four discussions have been covering nothing more or less than background information because he's about to reach his request and you have to understand that his request will sound just about as ridiculous. So in order for Paul to get his message across, he spends a lot of time on background. He has been introducing the Athenians to this unknown God and he has declared in verse 23 that this unknown God is more than a monument. Verses 24 and 25, he has declared, my God made all there is, and we have spent time studying those points. He, the creator of the universe is transcendent.
He is over and above all there is. He is separate from creation yet at the same time imminent, intimately involved in creation. Then in verses 26 to 29, he said, my God is the almighty mover and shaker of planet earth. That is, he is the divine resource. He is the divine ruler. He is the God of anthropology. He is the God of history. And now with that as background, Paul has set the stage for the final and the most compelling part of his sermon and the most confrontational.
I would summarize his final point simply by saying, if you have your notes, you might care to follow along. His fourth point is simply that this God is the divine or holy magistrate in the coming judgment. And this is his conclusion. And this is the confrontation of the gospel. Judgment day is coming. But in order to understand this particular judgment that he is so clearly warning them of, we need to understand that there are more than one future judgments. Judgment number one is the judgment of believers. This judgment is referred to as the bema seat. The original Greek word bema gives us that context of a tribunal used in several different contexts.
One of the most popularly known would be the context of the Olympic games or the Greek games where the victorious athletes stepped up to the bema seat where the athletic judges sat and received his laurel wreath. I would place this soon after the rapture of the church. Most pre-tribulational expositors are those that believe the rapture takes place before or pre-tribulation, that period of time where God's wrath is unveiled.
Place this just before the marriage ceremony of the church to the lamb, the marriage supper of the lamb. So it's taking place in heaven shortly after the rapture. Now the Bible makes it clear that if we understand the definition of salvation, that this judgment is not a judgment that determines whether or not you get into heaven. The very fact that you have been raptured has secured your position in the kingdom and in heaven. All of that takes place after you are confirmed in your holiness.
You'll never sin again. It is, however, a judgment of believers' works, and it will determine their position of authority in the kingdom. There will be governors in the kingdom, those in leadership, those with authority because they have been faithful to Christ's church and cause, and there are governors in this auditorium.
There are also probably a few garbage collectors who have been unfaithful. Lest any of us, however, think that we will stand before that bimah with any thought that we have accomplished, anything of ourselves that is either a reward for faithfulness or position of authority or anything else other than the grace of God. It might be good to refresh our minds with what Augustine said in the 5th century as he referred to the bimah seed as a time when God crowns his own gifts. What he meant by that was that the only way we can perform any measure of obedience to God is by God's merciful help.
Not only does God stoop to help us obey him and do his will, at the bimah seed he will reward us for doing only those things that we could not possibly do without his help. That's why we will give our crowns back. This is not the judgment Paul is warning the Athenians to avoid. Judgment number two is the judgment of the nations. The rapture has taken place. The believers are in heaven undergoing judgment of the believers and the marriage supper or ceremonies of the lamb, and it will go by so quickly. But on earth there is this time known as the tribulation that has unleashed the wrath of God.
It's a seven-year period. God will accomplish a lot of things. A lot of things will occur on earth.
Terrible judgment on humanity that precludes the final judgment. The world will unite its armies to march against little Israel. One of the other things that will occur is that the ecumenists will have their lifelong wish come true. All the doctrine that divides and interpretations of Scripture that set others aside will be disbanded, and there will finally be one world, church, unity among all who profess some belief in a supreme being.
And they will follow their mesmerizing leader we know as the antichrist. Well, following this seven-year period, Matthew 13 informs us that the redeemed and the unredeemed will be separated. The unredeemed will be placed into Hades to await the final judgment. The redeemed will enter the kingdom, those who during this tribulation period place their faith in Christ. They will be ushered into this thousand-year reign where you, as the bride of Christ and I, will reign with him.
These will be our subjects, and we'll have a thousand years of wonderful experiences on planet earth, only to end, of course, by some rather horrible things we don't have time to get into when God's power will again be displayed. But they will be cast into Hades, those unredeemed, at the end of the tribulation to await the final judgment. And that is the judgment that I believe Paul is referring to here. It's the third judgment, the great white throne that's clearly spelled out in Revelation chapter 20. This is the final judgment. This is the comprehensive judgment of all of humanity, all of unredeemed humanity that have ever lived, billions of people. Smith summarizes that what will happen here in this divine courtroom is, first of all, individuals will be proven guilty sinners. Second of all, this court will reveal that the individual is not redeemed and is therefore liable for his own punishment.
He refused to accept the punishment that Christ took in his place. And so rather than being protected in Christ, thus not there at that great white throne, they stand naked and bare before a holy God. And one day there will be an accounting with all of humanity. Now notice chapter 17.
Let's pick it back up with verse 30. Therefore, he's coming to the conclusion now that is on the basis of everything I've just said. Therefore, having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all everywhere should repent. The word translated overlooked comes from a word that could be rendered, did not interfere. It doesn't mean that God has blinders on and, oh, I just didn't see that. It means he did not interfere. In other words, God didn't wipe Athens off the face of the earth with their first expression of idolatry. His grace is long suffering.
He hasn't interfered yet. Paul says there's something new now, this new gospel, this new dispensation, this message of a final accounting. And so you'd better repent. That is, you need to change your mind and leave all these dead idols and follow the one and true living God.
Why? Because verse 31, he has fixed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness through a man whom he has appointed. By the way, Jesus Christ himself referred to himself, as he talked of judging, as the man, capital M, the son of man, John chapter 5, verses 17 and 22. It makes it very clear.
Why would he use that kind of expression, that kind of title? Well, if you follow Paul's logic through this sermon, we've discussed how he earlier declared that all humanity came from one man, Adam, the first man. All of mankind came from one man. Now all of mankind will be judged by the second man, the second Adam, the God-man. And while all of humanity created, as it were, this one race of humanity, those who have followed Christ creating this new race, as it were, a Christian, redeemed, born again, they will not experience the judging of this man. Now by what right does this God-man judge the world?
Look further. Having furnished proof to all men by what? Raising him from the dead. So the climax, the confrontation of this sermon is, leave your dead idols. There's one that has been resurrected. There is a powerful God.
His entire sermon could be summarized this way. There is one God, there is one human race, there is one savior, and there is one judgment. The polytheism then of Athens is sort of swept into one philosophical garbage heap. Those are all dead idols. They're all dead gods and goddesses. God demonstrated the true God, his power, by resurrecting his son from the dead.
Life's most absolute certainty is dying and he overpowered life's most absolute certainty. In our nation today that has become a melting pot, a sort of mixing bowl of polytheism and pluralism and even syncretism where you can create your own God that fits your lifestyle and makes you feel comfortable and happy and continues to make inroads like Athens did here in their own way. I've been reading recently an issue of World Magazine. They interviewed a gentleman who was a former Buddhist for fourteen years and I've mentioned to you how Buddhism is gaining popularity in this country, which I find really ironic because Americans don't like to talk about our one hell. Buddhism has sixteen hells, but that's beside the point, I guess. At any rate, Jim Stevens in this article is raising his concern over the fact that Buddhism is growing in its influence into not just the unregenerate world but local churches and even in formal evangelical works. Buddhist monks, he says, are increasingly welcome as speakers in churches. Last Christmas St. Anselm's Episcopal Church in Orange City, California brought in a statue of the Buddha and celebrated his birthday alongside that of Christ. But this gentleman who was a Buddhist for fourteen years says he eventually reached what he called the despairing dead end of Buddhism and came to grips with the quote concrete reality of Jesus Christ's resurrection was converted. The Buddha's dead.
Jesus Christ is alive. And it is in that living that he substantiates his right to be the coming judge of all the world. Now, have you ever thought about the fact, ladies and gentlemen, that for Jesus Christ to be the judge, he'd have to be God? The only way billions of people from all of human history could ever be judged fairly and righteously so that no verdict could possibly be wrong with any person would demand every attribute and every quality of God's nature.
We don't have time for all of them, obviously, but let me give you two or three of them. First of all, this divine magistrate of all of humanity would have to be holy. He would have to be the perfect standard of holiness. Have you ever said anything that made someone else feel guilty at work or maybe you challenged their lifestyle or said something to challenge a point of view and they fire back at you something along the lines of who do you think you are?
You're just like me. Well, in the case of Christ, he is not like us. He cannot be cajoled. He cannot be influenced. He cannot be bribed as a judge. He cannot be manipulated. For, in fact, if he could be influenced in one case of one person out of billions, then that would render any of his other verdicts suspect, wouldn't it?
He must be the holy righteous standard. I used to watch People's Court when it was on. You ever watch that show? I sit there and I listen to the first side. I think, man, they got some great points. Yeah, they're innocent. Then the other side is step up and I think, oh, wow, they sound good, too.
You ever have that problem? You can't judge between the two? Well, a holy God, by the way, will command such awe and respect as he discerns the intents of each heart. Part of the problem with us being a judge, a human being, is the ability for all of us to not only justify our sin but to look pretty good in the process. There aren't many people that I've ever encountered with the gospel that said, well, you know, I really am. I'm pretty good. I've heard that, I've never heard anybody say, well, you know, I need that. I'm really a guilty sinner.
Someone in our church slipped me an article out of the Wall Street Journal where they had a little interview going on in this particular section. Is cheating ever okay? Well, that, you would think, is a simple thing to answer, N-O. Here's a high school honors student, a senior. She says, I think there are different degrees of cheating. I'm a dedicated student, but when my history teacher bombards me with 50 questions due tomorrow or when a teacher gives me a fill-in-the-blanks worksheet on a night when I have swim practice, aerobics, homework, and church, of all things, I'm going to copy from a friend.
I guess they can go to church. Interesting. It's not like I won't know the stuff for the test, and since I only do this when I need to, it isn't a habit.
Every kid does this when they're in a pinch. It doesn't mean they are, quote, cheaters, unquote. The ability of the human rationale to justify and vindicate is incredible. You know how I know that?
Because I do it. It will take a holy God before whom the unregenerate billions stand that command such respect by his holiness that they will dare say anything. Well, the holy God said, thou shalt not lie. Cheating seems to be a form of deception. To me, in deception, I've always felt as synonymous with lying, and that's his holy standard. Ah, but this divine magistrate, he didn't know my circumstances.
In her mind, she had a number of them. Okay, so this divine magistrate not only needs to be holy, but he needs to be omniscient. That is, he has to know all the facts. He would never be able to weigh all the evidence in billions of lives with billions of illustrations and billions of nuances and billions of possibilities and understand every bit of it and know every motive of every human heart unless he was who? God. But the world, if you've tried to do any judging lately, is not filled with guilty sinners. It is filled with misunderstood innocent people.
Right? Jesus Christ knows the innocent from the guilty. That means he must know all things. So Jesus, the man, must be God in order to know all the circumstances, know all the options, all the alternate possibilities, all the motives, all the thoughts that went into that action that I did. He alone must know. Well, you know all the facts, Lord. You say you know all the facts, but you still didn't see, you know, my circumstance.
Okay, so the divine magistrate must not only be holy and omniscient, but he must be omnipresent. He saw you fill out your income tax return. He was there with you on that date. He saw you cheat on that exam.
God was, as it were, sitting next to you when you watched that movie or logged into cyber porn. He heard you. He watched your lips form the lie to your boss or to your wife or husband. He heard your filthy mouth. You see, in that judgment, the judge and the jury will also be the chief eyewitness.
He saw you. He is eminently qualified to be your judge, but that still wouldn't be enough. In order for God to be the righteous judge, he must be holy and omniscient and omnipresent, capable of rendering a verdict that lasts for eternity because of crimes against his eternal son and neglecting his eternal gift.
He would also have to be powerful enough to carry the verdict out because certainly billions of people would overthrow his throne and render his verdict meaningless. So he must be omnipotent. The apostle Paul said to the Athenians, you think that Zeus is all powerful? In him you live and move.
You know nothing of powerful. This is my God, the ruler, Lord of heaven and earth, almighty God, who will one day be this awesome, awful, terrifying judge. And God reveals his power how? By raising from the dead his son, the man who will one day occupy the throne as judge and jury and executioner of the eternal sentence. And notice verse 32.
Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some began to sneer, but others said, we shall hear you again concerning this. So Paul went out of their midst. Some men joined them and believed, among whom also were Dionysius the Areopagite. Interesting. This is one of the 30 judges who believed.
And a woman named Damaris and others with them. By the way, the three responses to Paul's sermon exist not only in the world today, but they exist within this auditorium. There are those who are critical and disbelieve.
There are those who are curious and want to hear more. There are those who are converted. How do you avoid this awful judgment day? Paul gave the key word repent. In that repenting, you turn in your mind view of who Christ is and you recognize that you must receive him as your own. No more vindication, no more justification, no more of a good person. Oh, I am a sinner and I am in desperate need of the grace of God. And you take that which Jesus Christ has offered to you.
Well, as you pack your Bibles away, let me tell you one illustration and we'll close. In 1829, a Philadelphia man named George Wilson robbed the U.S. mail and killed a person in the process. Wilson was arrested. He was brought to trial. He was convicted and sentenced to hang. And some friends of George Wilson went through political channels and eventually reached President Andrew Jackson and asked for a pardon. And Andrew Jackson decided to pardon him. The pardon was delivered to the sheriff. The sheriff informed George Wilson of the pardon and upon being informed, he refused to receive the pardon.
Well, this really threw things in an uproar. What do you do with a pardoned man? Surely you can't execute him. So they went back through the channels to President Jackson and he was dumbfounded and turned it eventually over to the U.S. Supreme Court. And they deliberated on this subject and then rendered their decision. John Marshall wrote the opinion that basically said a pardon which is refused is no pardon at all.
And even though the pardon lay on the sheriff's desk, George Wilson was hanged by his neck until dead. Ladies and gentlemen, the pardon of God is available. It was written in blood on the cross of Jesus Christ. Right now, he is the lamb slain for you.
One day he will be the judge who will judge all those who refused to receive the pardon. If I could make you, I would, but I can only encourage you to move from being critical, from being curious, to being converted. Opening your heart to this lamb who is this unknown God to the world.
But to you, his name is Jesus Christ. This is Wisdom for the Heart with Stephen Davey. We're so glad you found us and took the time to listen. We've been working our way through this section of the Book of Acts on this Vintage Wisdom series. In a couple of weeks, we're going to come back and finish out the Book of Acts. But next time we're with you, we're going to do a series from the early chapters of Genesis.
Be sure and join us for that. Before we leave you today, I want to make you aware of two resources related to this series. First of all, we have a study guide that corresponds with this series from Acts. Many people have used it for personal Bible study to help them go deeper into this portion of God's Word. We've also had small groups, Sunday school classes, and group Bible studies use this as the curriculum for their time together. If you'd like information about this study guide, give us a call today at 866-48-BIBLE. You'll also find information at wisdomonline.org. Secondly, this series is available as a set of CDs. If you'd like to own this series, we can help make it available as well. Once again, that number is 866-48-BIBLE. As I said, we'll be in Genesis 1-1 next time, so join us for that here on Wisdom for the Heart.
