When Christ is proclained...
- Some people will Hate... (Acts 5:33)
- It shows them that they are wrong.
- It tells them that they can't save themselves.
- Some people will Avoid... (Acts 5:34-39)
- But God's people will Rejoice and Endure! (Acts 5:40-42)
- Persecution
- Praise
- Preseverance
Review Matthew 10:24 | John 13:16 | John 15:20
Why do people hate the gospel?
Three signs of authentic faith
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:00-00:01
Open up your Bibles with me, please.
00:02-00:11
If you're visiting with us, at Harvest Bible Chapel, we believe in proclaiming the authority of God's Word without apology.
00:12-00:15
And right now we are walking through the book of Acts.
00:16-00:31
And our theme this year is from Acts 1:8, when Jesus promised the disciples, "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you." Why would the Holy Spirit come upon God's people?
00:31-00:47
Well, Jesus said, "You will be My witnesses in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and even to the ends of the earth." So the purpose of God's Holy Spirit coming upon us is so that we might be witnesses for Jesus Christ in this lost and dying world.
00:49-00:51
So turn to Acts 5.
00:51-00:56
And while you're turning there, I think it was J. Adams said one time that preaching is like mass counseling.
00:57-01:05
I believe that that's true, but if we could just sort of change gears, I know this might be a little awkward on Mother's Day, I'd like you to do something for me.
01:06-01:10
I'd like you to counsel me today, because this is a safe place, right?
01:10-01:11
I can be honest.
01:12-01:12
Can I be honest here?
01:13-01:15
One of you said yes, I'm just going to go with that.
01:16-01:18
I'm just going to be completely honest.
01:18-01:24
And again, please withhold your judgment, but I hate my mailman.
01:25-01:28
I absolutely hate my mailman.
01:28-01:29
I hate him.
01:29-01:31
I hate his little white truck.
01:31-01:32
I hate his little shorts.
01:33-01:35
I hate his little dress socks that he wears with his shorts.
01:35-01:45
I hate my mailman because - now hang on - because when my mailman comes, he brings me all kinds of stuff.
01:45-01:48
He brings me - like this was just some mail that he just brought.
01:49-01:51
He brings bills to my house.
01:52-02:01
And he sticks them in the box I'm like, I didn't want to pay this last month, and I don't want to pay it this month either, jerk.
02:01-02:06
But he just keeps bringing them, and he just keeps filling my box with all this stuff.
02:07-02:10
And well, okay, this is my Israel magazine.
02:10-02:12
I do like when he brings this, so I'm going to keep that.
02:13-02:19
But not only does he bring the stupid bills, but the jerk also brings all these stupid flyers.
02:19-02:20
Coals. I'm not going to shop at Coals.
02:21-02:23
Why do I want that? You throw it away.
02:23-02:24
I don't want this garbage at my house.
02:25-02:26
And this is Macy's.
02:26-02:28
Is there even a Macy's around here?
02:29-02:33
Is there? Is there a Macy's around here?
02:33-02:34
Oh, there is.
02:34-02:35
Well, I'm not shopping there.
02:36-02:40
And the Walgreens, I didn't even know that was still in business.
02:40-02:42
CVS Pharmacy, I was spirit of competition.
02:43-02:45
And then we get this thing with Target.
02:46-02:48
What's been happening with Target lately?
02:49-02:49
Anything?
02:52-02:54
Not sure which bathroom this lady would use.
02:56-02:59
This has nothing to do with the actual message today, but can I make a comment on that?
03:01-03:03
You have to come to your own conviction about that.
03:05-03:08
I would never let my children go into the bathroom by themselves.
03:08-03:09
I just wouldn't.
03:11-03:22
And if you're concerned, even going into the bathroom with your children, you know they have those family bathrooms that are single occupancy, that you can deadbolt, use those.
03:24-03:28
Or if you decide, hey, this is a deal breaker for me, I'm not going to Target at all, that's your choice.
03:31-03:35
But something I think we can't do is be surprised.
03:36-03:37
Target isn't the church.
03:39-03:45
And somehow, in the church, we hear these things happening, we get all flustered like, how could they do that?
03:47-03:49
The world is going to act like the world.
03:50-03:52
And listen, it's going to get worse.
03:52-04:22
not going to get better and do we really think that signing petitions and protesting and do we really think that targets going to be like oh well we offended the Christians like where is that written it's going to get worse so come to your own convictions about that protect your children above all things seriously let's not be so shocked that a worldly organization is embracing this this wave of decadence that's washing over our nation.
04:22-04:25
Why is that surprising to anyone?
04:25-04:26
Target isn't the church.
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They're in the business to sell stuff.
04:31-04:33
So, what was I saying?
04:34-04:35
Oh yeah, my mailman.
04:36-04:36
The jerk.
04:38-04:39
Captain Jerk.
04:41-05:15
And I think I've made it abundantly clear to him that I only want letters and cards from Grandma $5 in it, but he keeps filling my mailbox with this stuff and I Don't understand Why he has to be such a pain in my neck Obviously such talk is foolishness You know that my mailman doesn't sit at the end of my driveway and pull up and go How am I going to make Jeff Miller mad this time and he's rooting through his truck?
05:15-05:19
"Let me see if I can find some more bills." You realize, he doesn't do that.
05:21-05:25
My mailman doesn't sit and decide what to put in the box.
05:25-05:26
He doesn't determine what I get.
05:27-05:32
He only delivers the mail.
05:33-05:35
He doesn't decide the mail.
05:36-05:38
Look at v. 33.
05:40-05:48
It says, "When they - religious leaders - They were enraged and wanted to kill them.
05:50-05:52
They wanted to kill the disciples.
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They wanted to kill the apostles.
05:54-05:54
Why?
05:55-05:57
Well, your Bible says when they heard this, when they heard what?
05:57-06:01
Well, remember a couple of weeks ago when we were going through Acts, when they heard Peter's sermon.
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Remember Peter's sermon?
06:03-06:04
Back up.
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Let's get a quick review of Peter's sermon.
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Verse 29, Peter says to these religious leaders after they were arrested, after the angel got them out of jail, after they went right back to the temple to preach, where they were brought before the council again, very gently this time.
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It says, "Peter stood before them and he said, 'We must obey God rather than men.
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The God of our fathers raised Jesus, whom you killed by hanging him on a tree.
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God exalted him in his right hand as leader and savior to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.
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And we are witnesses to these things.
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And so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey Him." Understand in this passage, Peter was the mailman.
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Peter did not make up the message.
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You understand that Peter was only delivering the message that he was given to deliver.
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Doesn't it seem crazy to you?
07:09-07:19
Just as crazy as it was that I would be so mad at my mailman, doesn't it seem crazy that there are people that want to kill Christians just because of the message?
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And just as the apostles didn't make up the message, they just delivered the mail, just as Peter was the mailman.
07:27-07:29
Church, you need to see yourself that way.
07:31-07:33
Our job is not to make up the message.
07:33-07:37
That's why at Harvest Bible Chapel, to proclaim the authority of God's Word without apology.
07:38-07:52
And if you've come here once or twice or a hundred times, you know that when we get up here, whether it's me - Mark Ward spoke last week, Jane Eyre has spoken, we've had others - anytime somebody gets up here, it is to proclaim what the Word of God says.
07:55-08:00
But simply for that, people are going to want to kill God's people.
08:01-08:10
And though it seems so irrational, We need to be prepared for fallout when we stand for Christ.
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That's what we're going to see in this passage.
08:12-08:13
Again, Peter preaches.
08:14-08:18
In these few verses we're going to look at this morning, this is the fallout.
08:18-08:22
When Christ is proclaimed, when God's power is at work, this is the fallout.
08:22-08:29
Number one, we just read the verse, "Some people will hate." "Some people will hate," looking again at verse 33.
08:29-08:38
It says, "When they heard this, Peter's servant, they were enraged." The word "enraged" literally in the Greek means they were cut in two.
08:38-08:39
That's what that means.
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They were cut in two.
08:41-08:45
They were so furious, the Bible says that they wanted to kill them.
08:45-08:49
Show of hands, how many people here have ever been so mad at someone that they wanted to kill them?
08:49-08:50
Don't raise your hand on that.
08:52-08:56
I honestly can't remember ever being that angry with somebody.
08:57-09:00
That I've literally physically wanted to murder them.
09:01-09:02
I've been angry at people.
09:03-09:05
I can't remember ever being this angry.
09:06-09:10
This is a whole other level of angry.
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Some people are going to hate.
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And I want to remind you, this seems so hard, but I want to remind you of something that Jesus said.
09:25-09:28
When Jesus says something, we should listen, right?
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If Jesus says something one time, Do you think we should listen?
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If Jesus says something twice, do you think maybe we should listen a little closer?
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What if Jesus says something three times?
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I was studying that this week.
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You know, Jesus had this little saying that He used.
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I found it three times.
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It's in Matthew 10:24.
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It's in John 13:16.
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And it's in John 15:20.
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The recurring theme, Jesus used this phrase.
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He said, "A servant is not greater than his master." I want to read John 15:20.
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Jesus said, "Remember the word that I said to you?
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'A servant is not greater than his master?' If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you.
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If they kept My word, they will also keep yours." So just like we shouldn't be so shocked target in this bathroom issue, we shouldn't be shocked when people hate us simply because we love Jesus Christ.
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Why shouldn't we be shocked?
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Because Jesus said over and over and over, "A servant is not greater than his Master." Why do you think if Jesus would stand and proclaim the words of eternal life and pour out grace and love people, and they took Him and beat Him within an inch of His life and then publicly crucified Him, if they would do that to Him, what makes you think we're exempt from the world hating us?
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What makes you think that we deserve better treatment than Jesus?
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Jesus said it doesn't work that way because we're the servants, He's the Master, and a servant is not greater than his Master.
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If they did it to Him, they're going to do it to us.
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Look, this is reality.
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It's not my job to give you a pep talk and have you leaving here feeling warm and fuzzy.
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When we proclaim the authority of God's Word, you have to see that this is reality.
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And we can't just pretend this stuff isn't happening.
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Because it is.
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There are parts of the world right now where people are being executed publicly on the streets because they love Jesus Christ.
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We're seeing this more and more and more coming to this country that lauds tolerance for everyone except us.
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I have to remind you that this persecution, this hatred, is because of Jesus' name.
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It's called being persecuted for righteousness' sake.
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It's not persecution if they hate you for jerkiness.
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Meaning, you're obnoxious, you're self-righteous, you're constantly looking down on everyone.
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And because that's your attitude and that's the way you carry yourself, and people are turned off by your personality and they dislike you, that's not persecution.
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That's just you being a jerk.
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It's not persecution if they hate you for hypocrisy.
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You know, you get on social media, you get on Facebook, and you post dirty jokes and sexual pictures, and then you post Scripture verses, and people see your Scripture verses and they're like, "hypocrite." "Oh, church boy, I saw what you posted earlier." And people hate you for that?
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They don't hate you for righteousness' sake, they hate you because you're being a hypocrite.
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It's not persecution if they hate you for preachiness.
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You know, you're constantly trying to correct people.
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You're constantly rebuking people.
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You're unable to have a regular conversation with people.
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You're trying to hold the world to a biblical standard which never works.
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It's not persecution if they hate you for those reasons.
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Persecution for Jesus' name.
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for righteousness' sake.
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People hated the apostles.
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People are going to hate you.
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People are going to hate everyone who stands with Jesus.
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Why?
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Why is that?
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You know, when I first got saved and was called into ministry, I thought this is going to be easy because I had this elementary understanding of the Gospel.
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And I'm like, this is it.
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You just tell people Jesus loves them and He died for them.
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Who doesn't want to hear that message?
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That's awesome, right?
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And everybody's going to want to hear that.
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"I found that that's not true." Why do people hate the Gospel message so much?
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Here it is.
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They hate the Gospel message so much because the Gospel gets to the heart and hits the world with realities that the world doesn't want to face.
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It hits people with realities that we don't want to face about ourselves.
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This is why people hate the Gospel.
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It's because it's not true.
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I've got this down.
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Why do people hate the gospel?
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There's lots of reasons.
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Here's the two big ones.
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Number one, the gospel shows me I'm in the wrong.
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People hate the gospel because the gospel message is, "Look, you're wrong." Your self-centered attitude, your selfish lifestyle, your total disregard for the things of God, your lack of compassion for people.
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The Gospel calls you, first of all, to say the three hardest words in the English language.
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And the three hardest words are not, "I love you." The three hardest words in the English language to say is, "I was wrong. I was wrong.
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I was completely wrong." The Gospel calls you to start there.
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That's the beginning of repentance.
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The Gospel shows me I'm in the wrong.
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That's offensive.
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And secondly, the Gospel tells me I can't save myself.
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That's a hit on my pride.
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I'm not good enough to save myself.
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I can't become good enough to save myself.
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I can't save myself.
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I don't just need help.
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I need somebody to do it all for me.
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And there's no plan B.
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It has to be Jesus, because Jesus is the only one who died to pay the penalty for my sin.
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Jesus is the only one that can restore life to this dead person.
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And that's a hit on my pride to say I can't do anything about that except trust what somebody else has done for me.
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This is a message about forgiveness we saw back in verse 31.
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This is a message about eternal life we saw back in verse 20.
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And you have to be ready to accept these things from God.
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If you're not ready to come to the end of yourself and say I need forgiven; Some people, obviously in the context of this passage we're looking at today, they see the gospel as an attack on them and some people are going to hate.
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They're going to say, "Let's just kill them." Or, or, or, maybe we can just ignore them instead.
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That's the second point. Drop this down. Some people will avoid.
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Some people will hate.
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Some people will hate.
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Some people will avoid.
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Let's look through the text here.
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It says, verse 34, you have this scene, here's the apostles standing before the council and Peter just gives this message and they're like beside themselves.
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They're foaming at the mouth and they wanted to kill them.
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Verse 34 says, "But a Pharisee in the council named Gamaliel, a teacher of the law, held in honor by all the people, stood up and gave orders to put the men outside for a little while.
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He's like, "Look, we've got to talk offline.
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Take the apostles outside.
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We've got to have a little private conversation here about this." Now, who was this Gamaliel?
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History tells us he was, and the Bible tells us both, he was one of the most prominent rabbis of his day.
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And he had an extremely famous student, and that was the apostle Paul.
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chapter 22 verse 3 says that this guy was the Apostle Paul's mentor this was the guy that taught the Apostle Paul the law so he was highly esteemed put these guys outside we're gonna have a chat look at verse 35 he said to them men of Israel. Take care what you're about to do with these men. Hey, well let's not be so hasty here guys. Hey, simmer down. Deep breath. Verse 36, "For before these days Judas rose up claiming to be someone or somebody excuse me and a number of men and about 400 joined him.
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He was killed and all who followed him were dispersed and came to nothing.
18:55-19:04
After him, Judas the Galilean rose up in the days of the census and drew away some of the people after him.
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He too perished, and all who followed him were scattered." So Gamaliel's like, Let's time out here guys.
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Let's think about this.
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You remember this guy Theodos?
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400 men killed.
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This guy was killed and his followers were dispersed.
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Probably because his name was hard to pronounce.
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And then there was Judas.
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Remember him? He's kind of a famous guy in history.
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Actually, you know the Zealots?
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Jesus had a disciple named Simon the Zealot?
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Well, this Judas was the guy that founded this Zealot movement.
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like revolutionaries.
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And he was the guy that started that.
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So Gamaliel was like, "Remember these guys? You remember what happened?" Verse 38, "So in the present case, I tell you..." He's like, "Look, same thing, guys.
20:00-20:36
You had this leader, had this following, leaders killed, the followers scattered." "In the present case, I tell you..." his advice, "Keep away from these men. Let them alone. For if this plan, or this undertaking, is of man, it will fail." Gamaliel's like, "Look guys, you get these movements that pop up from time to time. You get this charismatic leader, and then when the leader dies, the followers Let's just first look, guys, here's my advice to you.
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Notice he says the same thing two different ways.
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He goes, "Just keep away from them.
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Let them alone.
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We already took out their leader, Jesus.
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So let's see what happens to them.
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Because if this is just like a man-made thing, like these other two guys, it's going to fail." He says, "Really, it's just like a fad.
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It's a fad.
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People get excited about it for a while, and then fad dies out.
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You know, it's a fad, like pet rocks.
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How many people had a pet rock?
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Anybody have a pet rock?
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Just my wife?
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Anybody else?
21:19-21:19
Really?
21:21-21:22
Nobody else had a pet rock?
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All right, who here is embarrassed to admit that they had a pet rock?
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Mm, my baloney detector's going off.
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OK, what about jelly bracelets?
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Who had jelly bracelets?
21:35-21:36
Oh, come on.
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OK, thank you.
21:37-21:37
Thank you.
21:37-21:38
Some of you had jelly bracelets.
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All right.
21:41-21:41
Kids of the '80s?
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Rat tails.
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Who had a rat tail?
21:47-21:49
How bad did we want a rat tail in the '80s?
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Darren and I wanted rat tails so bad.
21:54-21:55
And we were not allowed to have rat tails.
21:55-21:56
Do you know what rat tails are?
21:57-22:00
That's when you just let this one little piece of hair in the back grow.
22:00-22:03
You cut everything else, but that gross.
22:04-22:07
We had kids we went to school with that were rocking the rat tails.
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We're like, man, their mom loves them more than our mom loves us because we couldn't have a rat tail.
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It was just a fad.
22:17-22:21
You know, one of my favorite fads was, you remember pegging your pants?
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How many people pegged their pants?
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A few people.
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You expect some people to be honest in church.
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And look at this.
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I still got it.
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See, I still got it.
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That's a perfect peg right there.
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For you younger people-- I know some of you guys are looking at me like I have three heads-- in the '80s, you just didn't go to school unless you pegged your pants.
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Because this was cool.
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This meant you're just nerd extraordinaire.
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This meant you're in the in crowd, pegging your pants.
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Get to the other one later.
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But you see, Gamaliel's point was just simply that.
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He goes, this is a fad, guys.
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Charismatic leader, the charismatic leader dies, and then eventually everybody else just kind of loses interest.
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He's like, so here's what I think, guys.
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Just let them alone.
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Just ignore them.
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You guys are so bent.
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Just ignore them.
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He says if it's just a man-made thing, it's going to fail.
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Look at verse 39.
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This is an interesting statement.
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He says, "But if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them.
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You might even be found opposing God." They took his advice.
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He says, "If this is a God thing, you're not going to stop it.
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In fact, if this is something God's doing and you're working against it, That means by default, you're going to be fighting God.
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So, okay, so it's either, Gamaliel's like, it's either a man thing or it's a God thing.
24:04-24:07
Now, which do you think the council thought it was?
24:08-24:11
You think the council thought that this was a man thing or a God thing?
24:13-24:13
A man thing?
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That's what I think.
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I think they were kind of like, they obviously weren't really sold on Jesus even though there was a lot of stuff about Jesus they couldn't explain.
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What do you think Gamaliel thought it was?
24:25-24:29
Do you think that he thought it was a man thing or that he thought it was a God thing?
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What do you think?
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He's an interesting character because of anyone.
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He would have had all the tools to come to believe.
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He not only had the Scriptures, but he had a deep knowledge of the Scriptures.
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Do you think Gamaliel knew about Psalm 22?
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The suffering of the Messiah?
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Do you think Gamaliel knew about Isaiah 53?
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The suffering of the Messiah?
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He knew about these Old Testament passages that say the Messiah is going to come and the Messiah is going to suffer.
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He would have had these passages memorized.
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He had all the tools except simple faith.
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Why was he on the fence when everyone else wanted to kill Jesus?
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These are the things I think about as I'm studying this.
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Did Gamaliel hear Jesus speak?
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Some scholars and commentators say that he would have been one of the people had input in crucifying Jesus.
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He had been behind that whole movement.
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Was he there when Jesus was crucified?
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Did he see the darkness and earthquakes and dead people coming out of their tombs and the curtain being torn in the temple?
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I mean, even if he wasn't right there, surely he heard about that stuff.
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Why was he on the fence?
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This advice, is this just wisdom from experience?
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I think maybe these other guys might have been like the young hotheads, and he was just like, "Look guys, I get a few miles on the car.
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I've seen things in my day like these other guys.
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I mentioned this Thutis and Judas.
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I've seen this kind of thing before.
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Is it just experience speaking?" One thing's for certain, and that is this, Gamaliel was uncertain.
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You see it in his own words.
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"If..." "If..." "Might..." He keeps using all these "maybe" words.
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If this is this, and if this is this, and you might be opposing God.
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It's just all uncertainty.
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And church, that's not faith.
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Faith is according to Hebrews 11, the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.
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Faith is absolute certainty in the Word of God.
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So what this guy had was not faith.
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Regardless of his reasoning for the advice, the point from the passage is pretty clear that when you stand for Jesus, some people are going to hate you, and some people are just going to avoid you.
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Church, this is reality check because we think that persecution means that something's wrong.
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That's not true.
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Persecution means that something's right.
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Persecution means that you're standing on the conviction of God's Word.
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And when you do that, a servant is not above his mask.
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Persecution is going to come.
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I just read yesterday - did you guys see this?
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The mayor of New York City is telling citizens to not eat at Chick-fil-A because they believe in the Bible.
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Do you think we're going to see more of that kind of stuff, or less of that kind of stuff as time goes on?
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We're going to see more.
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It's going to happen.
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Some people are going to hate you.
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Some people are just going to avoid you.
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Number three, write this down as we come down the homestretch.
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The God's people, the people of God, but God's people will rejoice and endure.
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Look at verse 40.
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They took his advice, like you're right, you know what Gamaliel, you're right, we'll just let them alone.
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Good advice, we'll let them alone.
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Look at the next verse.
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It says that when they called in the apostles, remember they sent them outside, so they called them back in, and it says when they called in the apostles, they beat them.
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You know what that beating was?
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That was 39 lashes.
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Deuteronomy 25.3 says that 40 was the limit.
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So their custom was to only do 39 because they were afraid if they got in the heat of the moment there beating them, they might lose count.
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So they tried to aim for 39.
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That way if we accidentally gave one too many, we didn't violate the law.
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They take Emilio's advice and they beat them half to death.
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Emilio didn't seem to protest that that I can see from God's Word.
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They beat them and charged them.
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I think this is kind of funny.
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And charged them not to speak in the name of Jesus.
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If you've been going through the series with us, how well has that worked to this point?
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How well has that worked?
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Stop preaching!
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Jesus is the Messiah!
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Stop preaching!
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Jesus is the Messiah!
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And they're like, okay, we're just going to take another run at this.
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Guys, we're serious.
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Stop preaching!
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And spoiler alert, I don't think it's going to work this time either.
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And then it says they charged him not to speak in the name of Jesus and let them go.
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Let them go.
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So what's next?
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So the disciples went back to their homes, and they gave each other hugs and cried on each other's shoulders and said, "It's getting too hard.
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Let's close up shop.
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It's not worth it.
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Let's file a lawsuit against the council.
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Let's demand our rights.
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Let's start a campaign.
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Let's start a petition.
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Let's start a revolution!
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None of the above, actually.
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The opposite of what we would expect to happen is what happens.
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Look at v. 41.
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It says, "Then they left the presence of the council rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name." Did the Bible say that?
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Isn't that astounding?
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These guys just got beat within an inch of their lives.
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They just got flogged 39 times.
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And they break into a worship service on the way home.
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They weren't embittered.
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They were rejoicing.
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They weren't disillusioned.
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They were rejoicing.
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They weren't angry.
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They were rejoicing.
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And they said, "Isn't it awesome that God would count us worthy to suffer dishonor for the name?" They're like, "We're just like Jesus!
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We stood for God and we took a beating!
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High five!" And like, "What?!" Rejoicing.
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That they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name.
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Incredible.
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Incredible.
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Notice, nothing changed the mission.
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Look at the last verse for today.
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Nothing changed the mission.
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And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ.
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This just fired them up even more.
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They went to the temple.
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That's our equivalent of going to church.
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They assembled as a congregation for worship and teaching.
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They did it corporately in the temple.
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And it's just from house to house.
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That's why we do small groups.
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So they had the corporate thing, and then they had the small group thing happening house to house.
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And even though Gamaliel seemed sort of indifferent and uncertain about everything, Gamaliel was right about one thing.
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And that's this.
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God's people can't be stopped.
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I want you to jot this down You see this in the passage so clearly.
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You might not need this today, but you're going to need it five minutes from now, a week from now, a year from now.
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What we see in this passage very clearly are three marks of authenticity.
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For the times that you might struggle, is my faith real?
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Here are three signs of authentic faith from this passage.
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And I even alliterated them for you.
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Persecution, praise, and perseverance.
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Three marks of authenticity.
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Persecution, praise, and perseverance.
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These are signs that you're legit.
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You're faithfully serving Christ.
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First of all, persecution.
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Are you above your Master?
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If standing for Jesus Christ means you're being hated or being avoided, it means you must be doing something right.
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Praise.
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This is a mark of God's people.
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Can you worship while you're suffering?
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Can you do that?
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The world can't do that.
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People that don't have God's Holy Spirit are completely unable to do that.
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They just go into despair mode when suffering comes.
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Only God's people by the power of God's Spirit.
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The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy.
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Joy. Right?
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Peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.
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But joy - that's from God's Spirit.
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That's a sign that God's Spirit is indwelling you.
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That you can go through these kinds of sufferings to Jesus Christ and be rejoicing over it.
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It's praise.
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Persecution and praise.
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And then finally, perseverance.
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Perseverance.
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What is going to happen in your life that's going to stop you from loving, from serving, from worshiping Jesus Christ?
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What's it going to take?
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If you take a beating because you go to church, will that stop you from worshiping?
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If you get fired from your job because they find out that you're a Christian, is that going to make you walk away from Christ?
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If your family disowns you because the fruit of the Holy Spirit is coming through you, is that going to make you stop?
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The answer is absolutely not.
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If you're a true Christian, perseverance is from God.
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Nothing - nothing is going to stop you.
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Perseverance.
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God's power is in you and that makes you unstoppable.
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The more the world stands against God's people, the more God's people are going to manifest this unstoppable power.
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Rejoice as God is blessing you this evidence that your faith is real.
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And remember, when it gets hard, you and I, we're just the mailman.
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Let's pray.
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Father in Heaven, You never advertised that it would be easy.
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And sometimes we have this fiery trial come upon us and we're surprised by it.
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We can't believe it.
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And we're so shocked the things that the world is doing, but Your Word makes it so clear.
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And we come to a passage like this, and we see that there's nothing new under the sun.
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The world hates You.
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Because the world loves darkness.
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Father, for those of us who have received this gift of grace, this gift of eternal life in Jesus Christ, who have been transformed, who have been regenerated, who have been born again, Father, we embrace this call that You've placed in our lives.
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Because the truth is, we might only be here for a couple more minutes or a couple more years.
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We don't know.
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This is a short time.
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Father, we want to endure persecution in a godly way.
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Father, we want to praise You while we suffer.
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Father, we want to persevere only because You put that in us.
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We know it's going to get harder.
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That's why we cry out in total dependence.
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We need You.
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We thank You, Father, that You've promised to never leave us or forsake us.
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We thank You that You've given us these evidences that remind us that as Christians, We're not called anything less than soldiers.
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Nobody enlists in the military expecting it to be cushy in the same way we are soldiers of Jesus Christ.
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Father again, let Your light shine through us.
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Let us see ourselves simply as vessels that Your light shines through.
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Let us see ourselves as the mailman.
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We don't make up the message.
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We don't compromise the message.
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It's just simply our job to take the message that You've given us and to deliver it.
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We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Acts 5:33-42
What exactly caused the huge backlash in verse Acts 5:33? Can you share a time someone hated you (or hates you now) because you’re a Christian? How did/do you handle it?
What do you think Gamaliel (Acts 5:34-39) really believed? Why do you think that? What do you think about his advice to the council?
In Acts 5:41, why were the disciples rejoicing? Why is that a cause for celebration? Be honest - do you celebrate hardship? How can you begin to rejoice over suffering if you haven’t already?
Breakout Questions:
Confess your sins to one another and pray for one another.