The Heart of Mankind Acts 14

In this transcription, the speaker discusses the importance of having a warrior's heart in the face of opposition. They talk about the early apostles being grounded and driven by the heart of God, even when facing evil. The speaker mentions the Jews opposing them and stoning Paul, but Paul doesn't dwell on the persecution and quickly moves on. They emphasize the need to focus on God and truth rather than being self-centered. The speaker also compares this warrior mentality to Winston Churchill's determination during World War II. They encourage others to fight alongside them and to keep their eyes on the goal. Overall, the key message is to have a warrior's heart that fights for what is right, encourages others, and stays focused on the ultimate prize. God in prayer. Dear God, thank you so much that we can come here and worship you now through listening to your word and applying it to our life. I just pray that you would speak to our hearts now in the way we need to be spoken to. Help us to stay out of the way and forgive us for our sins. In Jesus name, amen. So we see the attitude in the heart of these early apostles is just awesome. I mean, no matter what they encounter, they power through it because they're grounded. They know they're doing the right thing. They're driven by the heart of God and they're going against some serious evil right now. And that evil comes in the form of what's known to be as good forever, the Jewish nation. For thousands of years they were known to be as the good guys right on the side of God. But now good is evil and evil is good in their mind. So we have them at Lystra and they encountered quite some things there. They healed a man who was lame since birth. So obviously that would get a lot of attention. And it did. And so then the crowds were impressed by that. But again, they didn't give credit to God. They gave credit to Zeus and Hermes, these Greek gods. And it's their default. Now we see the Jews come in from a long distance. You know, Paul and Barnabas had these Jewish people and Gentile people on the hook for convincing them to believe in Jesus Christ. And then the Jews come out from a long distance away. I mean, they had to make some effort and they drove them out of town. They drove them out of Lystra. And in fact, they stoned Paul. So we're going to look at what drives somebody to go such a long distance to combat righteousness and truth and goodness. We see this today. They go out of their way to combat things that are good. But do we as good people as having a good heart go out of our way to fight that evil? I think it's kind of lopsided and we see that decline. But it's all about the heart. Matthew 15, 8 says this. This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far away from me. But the thing that proceeds out of the mouth comes from the heart and those defile the man. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness and slanders. So it all starts with the heart. Good things come out of the heart. Sure. But bad things also come out of the heart. And we see the evidence of where their heart really is. God destroyed the whole world because of corrupt hearts. Here in Genesis 6, 5, he says, Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Imagine being in that state. I know you can think of some people that are like that maybe, you know, in politics or Hollywood. It seems like everything they do is to combat everything good. And then he says, The Lord was sorry that he had made man on earth and was grieved in his heart. And that sorry just means he was very sad. He's very sad, really, for the people, because he still loved them. Despite their continual evil, he still loved them and wanted to be with them. But he knew he couldn't be with them if they rejected them. So we're going to look at this believer's heart versus unbeliever's heart. We know the truth haters. They're always fighting us. They're warriors. They're fighters. They have a military mindset. You know, in the 60s, they removed biblical teaching from the schools that had been taught for over 200 years in our nation. We know that now that they have taken over the colleges, the professors are statistically 99% or more liberal-leaning, and extreme liberal, too. They've captured corporations. They've captured the media. They've captured politicians and district attorneys, even, to where the law is in place, where they're arresting Christians for standing out in front of abortion clinics and protesting. They get a whole month to celebrate evil in the month of June, and what does a veteran get? One day. What do we get for being a Christian and being a part of the foundation of this nation? Nothing. So they're focused on power and taking power, and we're just not. So a warrior's heart fights the fight no matter what. Acts 14, 19, to our main text here, says, But Jews came from Antioch and Iconium, and having won over the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing him to be dead. So it didn't take him long to convince and to persuade is where that word comes from. Won over comes from the word persuade. So it doesn't take much to persuade these crowds, even to a point of stoning them. And this is the response that we should have that Paul had. He says, But while the disciples stood up around him, he got up and entered the city. The next day he went with Barnabas to Derby. Did he even mention, Oh, I was persecuted. I was stoned nearly to death. Didn't mention that at all. Just got right back up because he wasn't focused on himself. When you're not focused on yourself, you're a lot more successful. You can move on with things. You're not stuck in your head. I always knew that was in high school. I was super shy and I was trying to break out and trying to come up with ways to break out of my shell. And I read this one book, it said, Don't look at the mirror, look through the mirror. I'm like, Wow, that concept kind of made me think like, Yeah, I'm too in myself. You know, I'm too focused on myself. I need to look outside of myself. If our eyes are continually focused on God himself and on truth, ourself doesn't matter so much. The pain doesn't matter so much because we're not focused on the pain. We're focused on the victory that's ahead of us. So this military mindset, Winston Churchill had this, although us along with most of the European nations allowed Hitler to just kind of walk all over him, kind of like what we're doing today in our churches, just allowing them to just move in and take up residence. But finally, he had enough. And so he's like, we're going to fight back. And this is a great quote from him. It's titled, We shall never surrender. It says, We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France. We shall fight on the seas and oceans. We shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air. We shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches. We shall fight on the landing grounds. We shall fight in the fields and in the streets. We shall fight in the hills. So they were backed into a corner. And what does he say? We're going to fight to the death. We're going to fight to the end. And that's how the attitude of Paul was here. He was going to fight literally to the death, to the end. But you know, a lot of times we're afraid to say something about God. We're afraid to make any sacrifice for God because, you know, things are pretty comfortable. And I think that's why they moved so far in on World War II. Hitler got so much ground because, well, they were comfortable. They allowed them to take the ground because, well, it wasn't affecting them quite yet until they were literally dropping bombs on London. And until the enemy comes to our door, and then it's going to be a lot harder to fight back. And the sacrifice is going to be much greater. But the greatest dagger to the enemy is when we get back up and we win. So in verse 21, he says, And after they had preached the gospel to that city, and had made many disciples. So when he was stoned, it wasn't a defeat, it was a victory. We see that through the making of many disciples because of his attitude. If he would have been defeated and went back home, these disciples would not have been created. So where did they return to? Lystra, the town where he was stoned at, the town where they kicked him out of, and to Iconium and to Antioch. So didn't let the enemy affect him, went on. So we know that a warrior's heart fights no matter what. Secondly, a warrior's heart is encouraging, it encourages others to fight along with them. And verse 22 says, strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith and saying, through many tribulations, we must enter the kingdom of God. Saying, it's going to be tough. And now he can definitely say it's tough. I almost died because of what I'm saying. So that example would encourage others to come up along too. A warrior's heart's also focused on the prize, focused on the goal. Philippians 3.12 here, Paul later reveals, not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid a hold of it yet. But one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead. If he would have dwelled on his past, he would have really got stuck because he was persecuting the very people that he's promoting now. You know, you can really have a lot of regrets for doing wrong things in your past, but it's just an anchor. It's just going to hold you back. But today's a good day to start over, kind of like David, got back up on his feet. Even though the sin was great and it was awful, his cure for sin is much greater than that. And verse 14, he says, I press on towards the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. I like that, the upward call, because we're going upward. Our call is to go up to him and spend time with him in eternity. But we want to bring others along with us as we go. You know, and fight no matter what. Focus on the prize, like this runner's mentality, which I'll never understand because I run like 30 feet and I'm like, this is stupid. I am exhausted. My heart's going to probably give out. But, you know, like that Ryan Smith, he made like almost a career. He made a career out of it. And Fawn was huge into running and she says it's hard to explain, but there's this thing, it hurts, it says. But I like this quote, it kind of reminds me of her. Running is hard to explain. Yes, it hurts. Yes, it is one of the best feelings in the world. Somehow that makes sense if you're a runner. So I guess it'll never make sense to me. But yeah, pressing on towards the goal hurts. It's not easy, makes you want to give up. I'm trying this little P90X for 10 minutes every morning. I've made it eight minutes so far the last three mornings. And then after that, I'm like, I'll work up to it. I'll put another 15 seconds in tomorrow. But it's tough. It's tough to have that mindset. It'll be difficult. So we need to be prepared to know what we're encountering. Then that way it's not as difficult. So we need to know our obstacles. We need to know our opposition so that we can take it on in the most efficient way possible. So here are some characteristics of our enemies that we're going to be encountering if you're involved, if you're fighting the fight. First, maybe the scariest one is our enemies can be violent. He says in Proverbs 24, 1. Do not be envious of evil men nor desire to be with them. For their minds devise violence and their lips talk of trouble. So they are scheming violent ways to take over. The ends justifies the means for them. So that's a scary thought to take on. But that shouldn't stop us. So we saw Paul responded in a positive way. But we know that our enemy induces fear and violence and they use people to commit violence. No. Remember when in 2020, what a year that was with COVID with the BLM movement. They caused on this next slide. I'm not sure if it's up there. Yeah. They caused two billion dollars in property damage over that year. Estimated. That this was this is a report I looked at in about August or September of 2020 actually. So they estimate it's probably worse than that. But you know what the politicians did with this? On the BLM website it went directly to ActBlue which goes directly to the Democrat Party. So the liberals raised 1.5 billion dollars. And that was just in quarter three. Okay. So you wonder why we struggled that year a little bit. Amazing. And I had a hard time believing that. But you Google it and it's like Politico and CBS and well I should probably shouldn't believe those guys huh. But they're admitting to it. So it's not a good look. But the ends justifies the means. It was for the cause. You know how many people were arrested? Practically zero. So and in fact many of them were awarded by our vice president. So but Machiavelli you've probably heard of. Oh that's Machiavellian. You know you might have heard that. But that's just the thought that the ends justifies the means. So even if you have to be immoral as long as it's a moral end it's OK. And they've rebranded this just like they rebrand so many different things. The ends justifies the means as a political party or movement. We don't want to have that terminology. So we're going to call it consequentialism. So it's just another fancy way to say that. Consequentialism says as its name suggests is simply the view that normative properties depend only on consequences. So normative properties morality only depends on the consequences. So even if something's immoral while you're getting there it becomes moral all of a sudden because you have a moral end if that makes sense. This historically important and still popular theory embodies the basic institution that what is what is best or right whatever makes the world best in the future because we cannot change the past. So worrying about the past is no more useful than crying over spilled milk. So say they committed a atrocity today. They're thinking well I'm getting to my end goal here in a couple days will be the end goal. So what I do today people forget about it. It doesn't matter. It won't be covered. And that's probably part of the problem. The problem is not covered. So we have to know our enemies are murderers. They can be violent. They'll cover things up to get to the end goal. We also need to know our enemies have an impure heart. Titus 115 says to the pure all things are pure. But to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure. But both their mind and their conscience are defiled. Well if you talk to an unbeliever about morality they'll list a bunch of stuff that you know murder is wrong for one. You might start there with them. Well how is murder wrong if you have no basis for morality. They profess to know God but by their deeds they deny him being detestable and disobedient and worthless for any good deed. So unbelievers corrupt those around him even if they claim to know God. And these are the worst unbelievers the ones that come into the church and claim to know God and have bad motives in their heart to take people away from the truth. And he says they're worthless. And you could say a lot of people call themselves Christians but they're not Christians. They're these people. They claim to know God within the church but their motives and actions will expose them quickly. Why we see evidence of this ideology infiltrating the church. Sixty three percent of Americans identify as Christians. That's really hard to believe. But that marks a 15 point drop in the past 14 years according to the Pew Research as 78 percent called themselves Christians in 07 and the decline of Christians in the US has been matched by a rise in the religiously unaffiliated. Their number has almost doubled since 2007 from 16 to 29 percent. That's rapid acceleration. I mean you saw back you know early 1900s almost all Americans called themselves Christians. So there's a rapid decline and we can see it plotted out here on this chart. And this is about church confidence. There's a lot of research that you can go to on LifeWay Research. But this source is Gallup and it says in 1975 about 68 percent had confidence in their church and now we're down to 37 percent have confidence in their church. And there was even some polls about do you trust your pastor? And it was the same thing. It was almost the same exact chart. Yes I trust my pastor back in the 70s, 70 percent-ish and now it's like 37 percentage. So hopefully we're not that bad. But a warrior's heart breaks down barriers coming back to us, coming back to how we fight. Ephesians 2.14 says, for he himself is our peace who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross by having it put to death, the enmity. And he came and preached peace to you who are far away and peace to those who are near for through him we both have our access in one spirit to the Father. Of course you have this quote, no God, no peace, no God, no peace. Two different words there. So the less peace you see in the world is direct evidence that God is absent from that nation possibly, from the decision-making. God is a God of peace. The gospel is called the gospel of peace. So wherever you see peace, you know that God is involved. Now, well Islam's called the religion of peace, but they made that up. It's actually Islam means submission. So that's just one of their lies. But it's good news that we can have common ground. We can have common ground through Christ. And this is the message that these apostles were preaching, the gospel of peace through Christ so that we could all come together and live as one. And really it was a kingdom mindset because it's not going to happen worldwide. We're not going to live as one until the kingdom comes. And that's what Paul was talking about setting up here and getting ready for. So chapter 14 ends the first missionary journey. He goes back to Antioch, the hub of their church. And this missionary journey that we just went on lasted about one or two years, they approximate. And it went more than 700 miles by land and 500 miles by sea. And remember they're, you know, maybe on camelback or horseback or walking mostly. So but now they're back in Antioch and we go over to chapter 15. So starting a new chapter here. Some men came down from Judea and began teaching the brethren, unless you are circumcised, according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved. So he starts chapter 15 back at the hub of the church, being politically extremely politically incorrect, because the core of the Jewish religion was to be circumcised. And they knew it was significant because God spoke out about it. We can see that here in Genesis 17, 9. He says, God said further to Abraham, now, as far as you, you shall keep my covenant, you and their descendants after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant, which you shall keep between me and you and your descendants after you. Every male among you shall be circumcised. So the Jews are thinking about this. My God told me we need to continue this tradition. But an uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, that person shall be cut off from his people. He has broken my covenant. So I can't blame the Jews. I mean, they're naive. They don't know until they're told the gospel and then they can choose to accept it or reject it. But they're still in their old mindset. And God knew that this was always never about the flesh. It was never about the physical action of circumcision. It was the outward sign of an inward commitment, or in this case, covenant to God himself. And covenants were very serious. You know, when they established a covenant, they would cut like a cow, for example, or a calf or something in half, separate it. Everything's covered in blood. And they'd walk down the middle together, representing the blood of Christ and how significant his death was and how kind of nasty and ugly and smelly that would be. But Christ's death was that way. But God calls out his own people for allowing unbelievers that aren't following his instructions to run the temple. Ezekiel 44 says, You shall say to the rebellious ones to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God, Enough of all your abominations, O house of Israel. When you brought in foreigners, uncircumcised in heart. He mentions that first, doesn't he? The heart is the most important thing. It's about the heart. And uncircumcised in flesh to be in my sanctuary, to profane it, even my house when you offer my food, the fat and the blood, for they made my covenant void. This is in addition to all of your abominations. So they brought in people that maybe claimed to know God, but didn't, you know, like he was talking about earlier. He allowed them to be involved in the church to get into the sanctuary. And he says, Thus says the Lord God, No foreigner uncircumcised in heart and uncircumcised in the flesh of all the foreigners who are among the sons of Israel shall enter my sanctuary. Now, this translates again today, having people involved in church that are not Christians. You shouldn't. One time, one time we had a non-Christian I found out that was on the music team. This was a long, long, long, long time ago. But I had to approach them and not allow it because we don't, I mean, we want people to be involved, but, you know, God doesn't want non-Christians getting into churches and even Christians that are anti-truth being involved in church activities like in such a leadership role like that. So that's an enemy strategy. We come in, take over the church, come in, take over the temple and allowing these non-Bible believers, non-truth seekers to run churches. We have a lot of this today. I like this one. It says, God has commanded us to expose false teachers. And he see this, this wolf with a puppet up above the pulpit says, peace be with you. God will prosper you. And he's like snickering down below. I got him. And then he's collecting some offering probably around the pulpit there real quick. But he says, beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing. They look great, but inwardly they're ravenous wolves. And, you know, they look clean cut. They wear their suits. They got their fancy houses. They look all pristine. But on the inside, they're rotting and they're rotting away. That is rotting away the church around them. False preachers, God takes very seriously. So serious that he's going to allow false preachers to come in and help kick off the end times. So we see this in Matthew 24, four. He says, and Jesus answered to some of them, see to it that no one misleads you. For many will come in my name. And the whole chapter of Matthew 24 is all about the end times. For many will come in my name saying, I am the Christ and will mislead many. Then they will deliver you to tribulation and will kill you. And you will be hated by all nations because of my name. At that time, many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will rise and will mislead many. We're already starting to see this gear up for the tribulation period where these people will come in and just say profane things in the temple and detestable things. He even says there's going to be an abomination set up within the temple itself. And we know the Antichrist will pretend to be Christ himself. Matthew 24, 15, it goes on. Therefore, when you see this abomination, Obama nation, I just had to say a little slower there, sorry, of desolation, which was spoken of through Daniel, the prophet standing in the holy place. Now, what did God just do back in Genesis? He was ticked. He was really ticked off at the people for allowing them into the temple. And he says, let the reader understand. Then those who are in Judea must flee to the mountains. During this time where the abomination of desolation is set up, it's going to be a rough time for anybody who is convinced to believe by the 100,000 witnesses or 144,000 witnesses. There will be believers in the tribulation, but it's not going to be easy. He says, they're going to even have to run away and hide. Not you, Daniel. But this abomination of desolation says the definition comes from the word bideo. Reminds me of the word bidet, you know, that thing that sprays your butt. But it's a detestable thing, which I guess that goes along with this. That's what the definition of this abomination of desolation comes from, this root word bideo, and it means to stink. So, I don't know. We don't exactly know what this looks like. It's going to be something that just totally defiles the temple in a nasty way. So, it's probably going to be some drag queen dressed up in there. I don't know what it is. But the heart of those in charge in the end will be terrible. They'll be unmerciful. They'll be violent. They'll believe in the ends justifies the means type of mindset. And their hearts will be so clear that they're not on God's side. The heart and the mind become visible through deeds. Jeremiah 17, 9 says, the heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick. Who can understand it? I, the Lord, search the heart. Now, that's a scary thought. Hopefully, your heart is right. He says, I test the mind. So, those are two separate things. The heart is the innermost part of who you are. It's that rudder that keeps you going. Yeah, you're going to hit things maybe out front, but you're going to correct and not notice that correction quite right away. But the heart will steer you. And it's the more long term focus thing. But the mind is the more vulnerable thing that can make you make a dumb mistake in an instant. But he says, even to give each man according to his ways, according to the results of his deeds. So, evil hearts are experts at creating confusion, at creating contention and division and a lack of peace. Proverbs 6, 12 says, a worthless person, a wicked man is the one who walks with a perverse mouth, who winks his eyes, who signals with his feet, who points his fingers, who with perverse perversity in his heart continually, continually divides his evil, who spreads strife. Therefore, his calamity will come suddenly. Instantly, he will be broken and there will be no healing. There are six things which the Lord hates. Yes, seven, which are abomination to him. Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood. That's why we fight so hard against abortion. A heart that devises wicked plans, feet that run rapidly to evil, a false witness who utters lies, and one who spreads strife among the brothers. So, that gets into the church, and the church is pretty heavy there. Really, the heart of our problem is a lack of heart within our church. So, evil hearts are experts at fooling others with their smooth speech and flattering words. Romans 6.17 says, Now I urge you, brethren, keep your eye on those who cause dissensions and hindrances, contrary to the teaching which you learn, and turn away from them. For such men are slaves, not of our Lord Christ, but of their own appetites. That's what drives them, is their appetite to do evil. And by their smooth and flattering speech, they deceive the hearts of the unexpected. So, we saw what actions come out of an evil heart. We see what actions come out of a genuine heart, like Paul, moving on, saving people, spreading the gospel, despite the opposition. And we continue here in verse 2, back to our main text. And when Paul and Barnabas had great dissension and debate with them, the brethren determined that Paul and Barnabas and some others of them should go up to Jerusalem to the apostles and elders concerning this issue. Therefore, being sent on their way to the church, they were passing through both Phoenicia and Samaria, describing in detail the conversion of the Gentiles, and are bringing great joy to all the brethren. When they arrived at Jerusalem, now they're back to their home, home base, they were received by the church and the apostles and the elders, and they reported all that God had done with them. But some of the sect of the Pharisees, who I believe, stood up saying, It is necessary to circumcise them and to direct them to observe the law of Moses. The apostles and the elders came together to look into this matter. I got just a few more verses and then we'll wrap up here. After there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said, You know, here's the Pharisees saying, Oh, we got to do this, we got to do that, we got to keep the law. But he says, Brethren, you know that the early days God made a choice among you, that by my mouth the Gentiles would hear the word of gospel and believe. He just got back from ministering to the Gentiles, now he's back in Jerusalem ministering to the Jews. And he says, Then God, who knows the heart, testified to them, giving them the Holy Spirit, just as he also did to us, meaning the Jews, and he made no distinction between us and them, cleansing their hearts by faith. Now therefore, why do you put God to the test? So he's saying these Gentiles, who have no clue about Jewish customs, no clue about circumcision, are now believers in God. And now therefore, why do you put God to the test? By placing upon the neck of the disciples a yoke which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear, meaning the law. They can't keep the law, it's impossible. But we believe that we are saved to the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ in the same way as they also are. So it's impossible to keep the law, the heart is what saved them. And God searches that heart, and believing in our heart saves us now, trusting him with our heart. There's lots of conflicts, disagreements, violence, because so many hearts are lost. But God calls us to balance these things in our life, to fight through when our heart takes us the wrong way. And finally, the last verse, Micah 6.8, he says, He has told you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? But to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God. And humbly is controlled strength, because we know we have the strength and the shade of his right on our right hand, because he's behind us. And he'll guide us in that strength as we go forward, and probably face persecution more and more every day. So let's go ahead and close in prayer tonight. Dear God, I pray that you would just help us to have the right heart before you and just keep us on the right track and just let us keep our eyes on you and the prize that's before us. Lord, we pray that you would just come again quickly and this world needs you, we need you to return. And I just pray that you would just work in our lives as we work for you. I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.