We are working our way through Acts. We're in Paul's second missionary journey, Acts 17, beginning in verse 16, and I'll read the end of the chapter, but let me go to the Lord in prayer before we begin. Our Heavenly Father, we thank you for giving us your word. And Lord we, as we have just confessed, our very purpose for living is to glorify you, to enjoy you forever. And Lord the heavens are declaring your glory, and even our conscience bear testimony that there is a true and living God.
But Lord we, thank you that you have also given us your word and have spoken to us and given us Christ. Have given us your Spirit, Lord, I pray now that by the power of your Spirit, you will indeed work within our hearts, that we will pay attention, that we'll be eager, that we'll be like the Bereans expecting you to speak, looking through the Scriptures to see if this is indeed what you have said, and if that is Lord that we would not only be hearers, but doers, that we would believe it would be merciful to your people. Now, in Jesus's name, People of God, hear God's word for us this morning from Acts Amen.
chapter 17, beginning in verse 16. Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him, as he saw that the city was full of idols. So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there. Some of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers also conversed with him. And some said, "What does this babbler wish to say?" Others said, "He seems to be a preacher of foreign divinities"- because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. And they took him and brought him to the Areopagus, saying, "May we know what this new teaching is that you are presenting? For you bring some strange things to our ears. We wish to know therefore what these things mean." Now all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing except telling and hearing something new.
So Paul, standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said: "Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with the inscription: "'To the unknown god.' What therefore do you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. And he made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling places, that they should seek God, in the hope that they might feel their way towards him and find him. Yet he is actually not far from each one of us, for"'In him, we live and move and have our being'; as even as some of your own poets have said,"'For we are indeed his offspring.' Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this, he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead." Now when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked. But others said, "We will hear you again about this." So Paul went out from their midst. But some men joined him and believed, among whom were Dionysus, the Areopagite and a woman named Damaris and others with them. He who has ears, let him hear the Word of God. Please be seated.
It is indeed a new year, and often in New Years, that means a fresh start. It means new calendars, new diets, new goals, and all those things can be good and helpful to set goals, reading goals, nutritional goals, whatever it might be. But often, as people are beginning a new year, they are really, indeed desiring a new beginning, because something wasn't quite right last year. Something new or better, as they look forward to is often a reflection of it.
There was something absent, there was something not good in the following year. So I hope the New Year for. Fills that guess what? I'm longing for.
Most new year's resolutions actually, in fact, are not simply about habits, but actually about hope. People are searching for peace, for purpose, and they are looking for these things, often in relationships or money and comfort and again, maybe this is the year I get what I'm truly longing for, true peace, true purpose. But all of those things are not found in the things of this world, as Paul will remind us, they are not found in the idolatry of this world, but are found in Christ alone Acts chapter 17, it drops us into Athens, which, in many ways, Athens is the constant reset.
Year Athens was filled with the new Athens had new ideas, new philosophies, new meaning.
Athens was a place filled with answers, but absent of the truth. And if you remember, we are following Paul, and Paul is in his second missionary journey. And humanly speaking, I think if you were to give Paul a performance of you of his last missionary efforts in the other towns, I think humanly speaking, we might say it's not going so well. Paul's having a difficult time. But thankfully, the church doesn't operate like a business.
It is the bride of Christ. But you remember, Paul has gone to Philippi, and he's beaten up there, and though most of the fruit we see is a woman, a slave girl and a crusty old jailer, he moves on to Thessalonica, and there are riots that break out again. Not great, we would say.
Their host, Jason is his home is raided. He's dragged out, and after three weeks, he's forced to leave. Paul and Silas are able to get to Berea at night, but the mob from Thessalonica chases them to Berea, and they are forced to now leave Berea.
Those who were caring for Paul were told, put him on a boat, and they sent him now 300 miles to Athens. This guy needs a break. He's bruised, he's beaten, he's tired, and I It doesn't tell us exactly, but I think this is probably what's happening here. Is the idea is, let's give this guy a little bit of a sabbatical. He's been beaten up pretty much at every city he's gone to every town.
He's been beaten and bloodied run out. Let's go to Athens. It wasn't planned for him to go to Athens. We we get the the impression from Paul, this was not on his planned missionary journey to be in Athens. And in fact, we're told he's just there waiting. He's waiting for Timothy and Silas his companions to join up with him. So he's just resting. He's He's healing, but he's in Athens, right? So if you're in Athens, you have to look around, right? What a beautiful city. This is the city of Plato and Aristotle. This was also the city where Socrates was put on trial and sentenced to death. But it's a beautiful city. This is where Western society really begins in Athens.
And we are told, as he is walking in the streets, you know, he sees things. Probably saw the Parthenon, that magnificent marble masterpiece, that temple dedicated to the goddess Athena. Beautiful architecture, intricate sculptures, a symbol of Athenian power and achievement. And not only this temple, we are also told that the city is full of idols that is literally given over to idols. It's everywhere.
We're told in verse 16 that he doesn't say, Wow, isn't this wonderful? He says his spirit was provoked with him. He saw the idolatry around him, and it gives Paul a holy grief that God's glory is being stolen away, that God and His name are not being hallowed in all these wonderful things, that men are not honoring the true and living God or giving thanks to God. And we can do that sometimes, too, can't we? We can walk around a museum, and we can admire the innovation and art. At work. But then, who ultimately is getting the honor, who ultimately is getting the glory and admiration? Is it man, or is it God? And what Paul sees is he's walking through Athens, and he sees all the glory and all the beauty. He sees that God is being robbed. The honor should be going to God, not man. Paul sees the beauty, and he says, Isn't this tragic? The beauty has become a distraction from the truth. God has given good gifts to his creation, but they aren't being honored. They're not being thanked that that he's given man these different gifts of creativity and and and beauty that's part of us being made in the image of God. Is our being able to create beautiful things, even non Christians, right?
That's called common grace, called Debussy. Probably not a Christian, but you can't help but listen to his Claire de Lune and feel there's something heavenly about that we've been created in the image of God, and glory should be given to God in all that we do, not to creation.
I think also we have to ask ourselves too, do we get provoked in our spirit when we see all the idolatry around us?
And it is indeed all around us, it might be. It might look a little bit different than it did in Athens. But how often do we hear, in our own culture, do what makes you happy, as opposed to do what makes you holy, the idolatry of self do what makes you, gives you pleasure, gives you comfort, that's idolatry, rather than serving the true and living God. The religion of comfort that suffering is the ultimate evil, rather than sin, which is also why the cross is still so offensive to our culture because it attacks the god of comfort when we are told to take up our cross daily. Now Paul doesn't then start tipping the statues over and smashing the paintings, we're told. He begins to reason with them, begins to talk with them, and he starts in the synagogue. He has common ground with the Old Testament, scriptures. Remember, this was his custom. Whenever he went into a city or town, he started at the synagogue, because at least there's some common ground, some understanding of the Old Testament. But we're also told he went to the marketplace. The marketplace was not only for commerce, but for hanging out, and this might be difficult for us in our individualized culture, but it was often pictured like what we might think of a coffee shop, where people just kind of gather together, maybe talk, and that's what's happening here. It was a place of discourse. It was a place of dialog in the marketplace. And they aren't talking through a computer. They actually talk face to face, which is another different thing, maybe for our culture too. But in the marketplace, we're told there are Epicureans and Stoics. Epicureans, they believe that goblin God probably maybe existed. However, God is kind of aloof. God is distant.
He is far the purpose of life, avoid pain, pursue peace through pleasure.
That sounds pretty familiar to us, right? I mean, our culture must. We're full of Epicureans, though we're not label them like that anymore, but God's kind of maybe here, maybe not. But if he is, he's so far away, it doesn't really make a difference. Just eat, drink, be merry. That's the Epicureans. Stoics believe that God is near. In fact, God's everywhere. God's in everything and but the path of a flourishing life is to live in accordance to nature. That is what they call the logos, and using reason to master your emotions. And you see both of these people that are mentioned here, the Epicureans and the Stoics. They are seeking peace and purpose, though they are using two different ways.
Epicureans are using pleasure for peace and pleasure and purpose sorry and Stoics are using harmony for purpose and peace. They accuse Paul, as he begins to speak of being a babbler. There's actually a picture of a little bird like picking up seeds here and there, and the idea is they're calling Paul a scavenger of ideas, and he's just picking things from here and there, and he's making it his own. They he mentions Jesus, and they think, Well, okay, maybe this is some deity of the Jews. But also the resurrection, which for them would have been the Anastasia, the Greek for. The resurrection.
So you know, Paul is talking about this Jesus, maybe this Jewish God in Anastasia, a Greek god that we're more familiar with, and he's somehow combining them to talk about this new religion. So they bring him to the Areopagus, which means hill or a rock of Aries. Rome would have called it Mars Hill. It was a place of adjudicating religious ideas philosophies.
Does a religion? Does a philosophy have wisdom? Will it stand up to scrutiny? Is there any truth in this that we can talk about? And that's what it talks about, that they're really not so much interested in truth.
They just like talking about new ideas. What's interesting?
That's an interesting idea.
Let's talk about that. Paul doesn't have the common ground with them as he has with those in the synagogue. So it's actually interesting to learn how he engages with them. We'll, we'll mention, we'll look at it here, but he'll, he'll find common ground with them, but he will also correct where, where there's also a common curse as rejected and suppressed the truth of God, where men have exchanged the truth of God for the lie. And what's also interesting too is that what Paul's about to say there is so much biblical truth in it, and we'll point out even some of the scriptures. But he never quotes, you know Psalm this, says this, or, you know the Prophet here says this. He's speaking again to people who don't know the Bible at all. So even if he mentioned the psalm, they most people would be like, what is that? So he just gives them the truth. And that is also, I think, common for us in our day and age. We are constantly more and more in a culture that knows less and less about the Bible.
There aren't many people, I think you would interact with on the street that could actually tell you what the four Gospels are or what the 10 Commandments are. It's becoming less and less in our culture. And so this is becoming more and more familiar, what Paul is doing with what we are dealing with now as a church. Now, Paul begins now in verse 22 he says, Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious, for as I pass along and observe the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription to the unknown God.
Paul's first point is to observe that they are worshippers. In fact, everyone is a worshiper.
No exception. You are a worshiper. We know. And sociologists would tell you that you can go anywhere in the world, even the most remotest untouched places in the world, and you will find at least one thing, well, two things, sin.
And you also find worship. And he directs them to the altar that they have created, to the unknown God. He says you are seeking. And you even admit you don't know. And just in case there's one God that we missed, we're just going to make it, you know, because we don't want that God to be upset. So this unknown god, we just want to cover all of our bases in case he gets upset. But Paul is saying, wouldn't you like to know? You don't have to guess in fact, whether you're right or wrong.
He says, This is what I'm going to proclaim to you now, the one true and living God. And he begins, he is the creator the heavens and the earth and everything in them he created.
Well, this is Genesis one and two. He doesn't say Genesis one and two, does he? This is also Psalm 19. The heavens declare the glory of God. Paul's saying, look around creation again. This is Psalm 19, though he doesn't quote it. He says, the creation there's no language barrier.
Whether you speak Greek or Hebrew or English, the creation itself is declaring to you the glory of God day and night constantly. Imagine a minister followed you around every single day, every single moment, and just kept telling you, God is glorious. God is wonderful.
Night and day, you can't get away from it. And it's revealing to you that there is God. Romans one again, Paul says God is clearly seen in the things he has made his eternal power and divine nature. God isn't the creation. He is the creator and sustainer of that creation. He doesn't live as Paul continues to live in temples made by hands. Nor is he worshiped with men's hands, as though He needed anything. The Epicureans at this point would be like, you're correct. God doesn't need us, but Paul corrects them. God is not far from us. He's involved, actually, in everything that we do. In fact, God. Determines where we go, what man does. God is sovereign over our history.
Psalm 139, this is Paul. Where shall I go from your presence?
There's nowhere where you can go and hide from God. God is everywhere. You can't escape his spirit. In fact, you need him?
You're dependent on God. Paul says that in him, you live and move and have your being. You have life and breath in God.
Everything in creation is stamped, made by God, and in fact, you are part of that creation. Revelation is not just around you. In creation, you are part of it. Ecclesiastes says eternity is set in our hearts.
You yourselves are proof that God exists. You are created by God. You are part of that revelation. And you yourselves, and your own conscience bears witness that there is the true and living God. You know, there is something about us being made in the image of God that directs us to the heavenly isn't there?
And this is one reason, right why we love superheroes movies so much, because someone powerful comes and crushes evil.
We love it. This is even why someone like an Alfred Hitchcock, who was not a professing Christian, but we love his movies like vertigo and and rear window, they Captivate us so much because there's some truth in it, that so often in his movies, there's an idea of of what if someone finds out who I really am, and there's a fear of something being uncovered and deep down that resonates with all of us. We're we're afraid of someone finding out our what's really in our hearts, what we've really done. And Hitchcock got that as being made in the image of God. And so being made in the image of God as we look around culture, and we think of things we resonate, or things even we enjoy, which should not direct us so much to ourselves, but to God, who is set as Ecclesiastes, says eternity in our hearts, we're all everything we do is really directing us heavenward to God. We are made by God, though God isn't like us, he isn't like his creation, and that's what Paul says. Isn't it kind of silly to think that God who made everything is like the creation? He's not like gold or silver or stones formed by us.
Isaiah 44 the idols are worthless. One guy, he takes a piece of wood from the field, and with half of the wood, he warms up his house and the other piece of the other half of the wood, he forms into an idol, and then he bows down and says, deliver me. You are my God.
Well, you better hope that you got the right half of the piece of wood and didn't actually put God in the in the fire. That'd be bad. But Isn't that silly?
And that's what Paul's saying.
Isn't that silly to think that the Creator God is gold or silver or stone that we have fashioned with our hands, whether it's marble or it's ridiculous. And what Paul now says, despite the revelation around you, you being part of that in your own conscience, you still don't know God. The problem is not ignorance, even though we're told God overlooked it, he hasn't canceled it, but he hasn't brought it to account yet. But the problem is rebellion, and you're accountable. Judgment has been delayed, but it hasn't been canceled, and this is where Paul now starts to press them, as I'll seek to press you that God commands all, all people everywhere, to repent. This is God's call to you, that you, too repent from your idolatry. Why?
Because Paul says there is a day that is fixed. Stoics believe that history is cyclical. And Paul says, No, it's linear. It is going to a fixed date in time. There is a calendar day in time that is yet to come, and maybe soon, very soon, it is a fixed day, and on that day, judgment will come, and it will be a just judgment. Paul says there will be no single sin that goes unaccounted for. There will in fact, be perfect justice that will fall upon the world, you will not dissolve into nothing as the Epicureans believed. In fact, you will stand before God and the risen Christ will judge you in righteousness. But you are not righteous. You are idolaters. Your religion. Will not help you or save you. In fact, Paul tells us they will damn you. This is why Jesus died. And Paul's sermon, here is a summary of what he said. He talks about the risen Christ, Risen from what death that Jesus died for your idolatry. This is why Jesus came to take all of your sin and your wicked heart, your defiled heart, to take your judgment upon Himself on the Cross, which is death, the just judgment that you and I deserve.
Christ took it on the cross and he died. He took the wages of sin. Is death. He took the curse, he took the wrath. But not only did he die, He is risen, and that is the good news that Jesus Christ is risen from the dead, and he is now giving you the opportunity to believe, to repent, to believe that God has had patience with us, but is now calling us to repent and believe, to submit to the risen Lord. No more unknown god, but now forevermore, the creator and redeeming god. What's interesting that is that Paul just leaves. Then there's no manipulation, there's no emotional pressure. He doesn't say, Now, after this message, I just want to, let's turn the lights down a little bit. We're going to play some music. We're going to repeat just as I am 20 times. He gives them the truth, and he says, You are now responsible. You will stand before the true and living God.
You will be judged, and your only hope is found in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's your responsibility. Now. What will you do with it? It is not unknown to you anymore. It is now known to you. What will you do with that message? There's no salvation, there's no hope, there is no purpose outside of living for the Christ and putting your faith in Him. And how did people respond? Much like people respond today, mockery. Some people are maybe indifferent. They said, we'll hear you again. How many people have you invited the church and say, Yeah, I'll come to church.
I'd like to hear that again. And they don't come. They're too polite to mock you, but they're indifferent. They don't come.
Well, we have that here too.
People say, Yeah, let's hear that again. Thanks for Thanks for that. But they move on, and maybe that's you too. Thanks for inviting me to church today.
Thanks for bringing me to church today. But I'm moving on, or you can believe that's what we see here. There's a few that believe, and again, as we start another year, and many will begin a search for the new new purpose, new peace, new salvation. Just like the Athenian people who searched everywhere in philosophy, religion, science, pleasure, God still remained unknown. But just like in Athens, in God's mercy, God sent them a preacher, as he is sent to you this day that what is unknown is now proclaimed to you the Lord Jesus, Christ. He is the crucified and risen Lord. Do not leave him alone, unknown in your hearts, in your life. Not leave Christ unknown, but repent and believe and be saved. Find your purpose, find your peace this year, and it is found in Christ alone. Let's pray our Heavenly Father. We, thank you for giving us Christ, the Lord. We, thank you that all of us in various ways, you have brought people into our lives to proclaim Christ to us, someone who was maybe unknown to us at one point in our lives, you've made known to us. And Lord, I pray that now, by the power of your Spirit, you will help us to receive it, to not put Christ off, to not mock the message, not be indifferent to it, but to believe it, to put off idolatry and to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, be merciful to your people. We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.