Review / Introduction:
How to Fearlessly Defend your Faith: (Acts 24:10-21)
- Be Ojbective.
- Use the Bible.
- Stick to the Issues.
The Example for Paul:
- Broke Roman law? (Acts 24:11-13)
- Broke Jewish law? (Acts 24:14-16)
- Broke God's law? (Acts 24:17-21)
1 Peter 3:15 - but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect...
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:26-00:31
Open up your Bibles with me, please, to Acts 24.
00:33-00:38
Acts 24, where we left off last week as we walked through God's Word.
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While you're turning there, if you haven't turned there already, some of you know this, but I know not all of you do, but this is an absolutely true story.
00:50-00:54
When I was in college, I was nearly arrested for attempted murder.
00:55-00:56
That is a true story.
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And it's kind of funny now, but I promise you it wasn't funny at the time.
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So, arrested, nearly arrested for attempted murder.
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How did that happen?
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I'm going to give you the short version.
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If you want to hear the long version, I'll be glad to tell you.
01:11-01:22
But while I was going through college, I was a magazine vendor, and I had two Walmarts and two K-marts, and one of my K-marts, I was walking in to do my magazines, and I was eating Spree.
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How many people know what Spree are?
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that delightfully fruity candy.
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And it came in a foil tube and I wouldn't like tear the foil because I didn't want little pieces of foil everywhere.
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So I'd slide the spree up the tube.
01:33-01:48
Well, I was, that's important to the story, but I'm walking in and I'm like, to one of my Kmart's and I thought, well, I'm gonna, I better put this in my pocket because they sell spree and I don't want them to think I'm just like taking it off the shelf and eating it while I'm doing the magazine.
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So I fold it up and stick it in my pocket and go in and I'm doing the magazines, right?
01:54-01:57
Rotating them putting out the tabloids and the TV guys. Do they still make TV guides?
01:58-02:32
That's still a thing Am I showing my age? Okay. Anyways They still make magazines All right. Um, so I'm doing the magazines and as I'm as I'm stalking the magazine shelf to police officers walk up to me Absolutely true story. No embellishment here whatsoever. But two police officers walk up to me and they like excuse me, sir. I'm like, yes and They said, "What are you doing here?" And I said, "Well, I'm trying not to be smart-alecky here, but I'm like, well, I work here.
02:33-02:40
It's not like I, in my free time, I just wander into stores and play with their magazines, right?" That would be weird.
02:40-02:54
But the one police officer said, "Do you have a knife on you?" And I said, "Yes, I do." He took a step back, he said, "I want you to pull it out nice and slowly." So I pulled it out.
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He goes, "Nice and slow." And I went...
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Now, this wasn't the actual knife.
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No joke, the actual knife that I had that night was about half this size.
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I used it to cut the bands off of the magazines.
03:10-03:11
So I'm like...
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And he goes, "You can put that away." And I said, "Well, what seems to be the problem, officer?" He said, "Yeah, we got a report that you were coming in here to murder someone." I'm like, "But I work here." He said, "Well, that's the report that we got." I'm like, "Well, obviously you have the wrong person." So he gets in his little, you know, the shoulder radio thing.
03:37-03:45
He says, "Could you describe the suspect again?" I'm like, "This will clear it up right here." Came back through the radio.
03:45-04:11
"Caucasian male, approximately 200 pounds, "blonde hair, maroon dress shirt, "khaki pants, brown shoes." And I'm like, "Oh no, that is a weird coincidence." And they said, "Sir, we're going to have to frisk you." And I thought for a second, okay, this is gonna be really weird when some people, I was pastoring a church at the time in Ohio.
04:12-04:30
It's gonna be really weird some of those church members come into Kmart and they see the pastor being frisked in the front like, "Hey, we'll see you tomorrow morning, bring your Bible." And so I'm being frisked in the front of Kmart and they obviously didn't find anything on me and the police, they seemed very confused.
04:30-04:33
They took my information, driver's license, wrote everything down.
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They just seemed very confused and they left.
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I remember thinking to myself, what was that all about?
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And I finished my magazines, I walked out of the store, I pulled the spree out of my pocket.
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I was like, "Wait a second, this was like 10 or 11 at night and it was in a foil wrapper?" I think what happened is somebody saw me with that foil wrapper folding it and putting it in my pocket and they thought that I had a switchblade.
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And I was nearly arrested.
05:12-05:15
But I was falsely accused, for sure.
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And I can tell you from that experience, and a few others that I'm not going to get into today, I can tell you from that experience that it is no fun to be falsely accused.
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And that's exactly what we're looking at in the life of the Apostle Paul, is he is falsely accused.
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see my ordeal was done in an hour. The thing that he was falsely accused of carries ramifications all the way to the end of the book of Acts, including this trial that we're going to be looking at today. So by way of introduction, again if you're just joining us, if you're just listening online for the first time, we're going through the book of Acts. Paul is at this point in Acts 24, he's falsely accused of bringing Greeks into the temple in Jerusalem, which he did not do.
06:05-06:32
And he was attacked by a mob of angry Jews and was promptly rescued/arrested by the Roman tribune Claudius Lysias, who sent Paul to Caesarea, not only for his own safety, but but also to send him to Felix, who was the governor of Judea, the Roman governor of Judea, and that's where Paul stands trial in the passage we're looking at today.
06:33-06:43
Paul was actually with Felix for two years, and his time with Felix is kicked off here in this first trial.
06:45-06:51
As we look at the text, again, we're going to see Paul has to once again defend his faith.
06:52-07:02
The question I want to ask you as you're looking through this passage with me today is, how well are you going to do when you have to defend your faith?
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I know for many of you that has already happened.
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For some of you it's going to be happening very soon.
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Maybe it's going to be happening at Thanksgiving.
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How many people here are the religious nut of your family?
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Anybody?
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You're like the religious nut of your family?
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Okay.
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And you're going to have people, maybe this Thanksgiving, putting you on trial, so to speak, for your faith.
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Maybe you have that friend or co-worker that knows you're a Christian and they love to always try to stump you.
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Throw out those hard Bible questions.
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Maybe this week the Mormons or the Jehovah's Witnesses will show up at your door and your faith is suddenly on trial, the question is, are you going to be ready for that?
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I want to remind you, as we look at Paul's defense, defending your faith is not about winning or losing an argument.
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And I get to tell you that because this is something I...
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it took me a while to learn.
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When I was a young Christian, you know, studying apologetics and studying the Bible, always loaded for bear, I always felt like, you know, there were times the Mormons would come to my house, and I'm like, "Come on in!" And I would just biblically trash them for like two hours, and they'd leave with their tail between their legs, and I'm like, "Victory!" And I was so proud of myself.
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And did that really do anything for the kingdom?
08:26-08:30
My pride certainly did, and sharing the Word of God always does.
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But I realized that it's not about winning the argument.
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I mean, we can see that through the book of Acts, right?
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How many times in Acts, Paul shares a gospel, it's like people get saved, they're lining up.
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We wanna receive Jesus.
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Oh, we saw plenty of that, didn't we?
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How many other times in the book of Acts have we seen Paul preach the gospel and people are, all right, let's put the boots to this guy.
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We've seen that too.
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So understand that God doesn't gauge faithfulness on your perceived results.
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It took me a while to get that, people.
09:07-09:11
If I don't win the argument, I lose, and God's disappointed in me.
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And that is so not true at all.
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God is honored when His Word is honored, when Christ is exalted, and we lovingly and humbly share God's truth with people.
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That honors God, no matter how people respond.
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Remember, Noah preached for 120 years, and not one person believed him outside of his own family.
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It's not about results because, write this down, results are up to God.
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Results are up to God.
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What did Paul say in 1 Corinthians 3? "I planted, and Paul is watered." But what? God gives the increase. God gives the growth. Only God can do that.
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I can't argue somebody into the kingdom. I can't persuade somebody to be born again.
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God does the work.
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And that's good news, isn't it?
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Because if it was up to you and if it was up to me, we'd have a lot of fear.
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We're talking about fear this year at Harvest Bible Chapel.
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I will not fear.
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And think about it.
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If somebody else's salvation was up to you, you'd live in fear, wouldn't you?
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I could have shared the gospel with this coworker, but what if I don't say it right?
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Or what if I have a rotten attitude?
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What if I come across as a bit of a jerk and he doesn't like Jesus because of me?
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And you would have a lot of reason to fear.
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But the reality is it's up to God, so you can be fearless.
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God promised in His word, in Isaiah 55, His word always accomplishes the purpose for which it's sent out.
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So when you share God's word, God's gonna deal with it.
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I just have to honor His word.
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He'll take care of the results.
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So as we look at this passage, we're going to look at how Paul defended himself.
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We're not going to look so much at what he said.
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We'll do some of that, but I want you to see here how he defended his faith.
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And we're going to do something a little different today.
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Usually we sort of work through the outline as we go through the text, but I'm going to give you the whole outline first here, at least the whole first part, not the sub points in the bottom.
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I'm gonna give you the whole outline.
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You ready?
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How to fearlessly defend your faith.
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Since we're doing things different today, we have an acrostic. The acrostic is "bus." You see that on your outline? Bus, B-U-S.
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Like, "All right, what's the acrostic mean?" I don't know. You can come up with that.
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All right, I wrote the rest of the sermon. You write this part.
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But here it is, church. Listen, kidding aside. When it comes time to defend your faith, you just have to know three things. And if you can nail these three things, and you can stick to these three things, then you will share your faith effectively every time. Every time. Number one is be objective. Be objective.
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Meaning we're just dealing with facts here. We're just dealing with truth. We're not dealing with my opinion or your personality. You see it's not an effective way to share your faith if somebody asks you a question about the Bible and you're like well you're just a you're just ignorant you're just stupid and you just don't listen. That's not objective. Now you're making it a subjective, personal thing.
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That's the first thing.
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We're gonna see all this in the text.
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I'm just giving you the outline ahead of time.
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Say thank you.
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Be objective.
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Number two, use the Bible.
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Use the Bible.
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Again, not about personalities, not about my opinion.
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Well, I think God's like this.
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It doesn't matter what I think God is like.
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What matters is how God has revealed himself to be in his word.
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So you stick with what the Bible says.
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So be objective.
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And secondly, use the Bible.
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And the third one, this is another thing I've had to learn the hard way people.
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So let my pain be your gain.
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The third one is, stick to the issues.
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Stick to the issues.
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We'll talk about this more in a minute here.
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But I learned this the hard way.
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Especially in prison ministry.
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People ask a question and you start to answer it.
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And as soon as you do, onto the next question, like, but I didn't even finish the answer.
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And then you're trying to answer their new question.
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And now they're onto the third question.
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And now you're trying to answer that one.
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And in your conversation, you and you want to encourage the other person to stick to the issues.
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So this is how to fearlessly defend your faith.
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Why fearlessly?
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Because as soon as we talk about sharing your faith, evangelism, witnessing, There's people that are going to tighten up.
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Because so many people are afraid of these moments.
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What do I say?
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What if they ask a hard question?
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I don't want to look stupid.
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I just like to lovingly encourage you of Proverbs 28.1, right, the righteous are bold as a lion.
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Remember we talked about that in the beginning.
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Adult lion's roars can be heard over five miles away.
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Why do they do that?
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Why would a lion roar and let everybody know where he's, because he's not afraid.
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He's not an animal that camouflages himself, hides thinking a predator might get me if I'm not hidden.
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I'm scared of what's out there.
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A lion just steps right out there and lets everyone in the zip code know, here I am.
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The Bible says that's the boldness that we have in the Lord.
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If you wanna fearlessly defend your faith, be objective, use the Bible, stick to the issues.
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Okay, that's the sermon.
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Here's the illustration from Paul.
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Look at verse one.
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"And after five days the high priest, Ananias, came down with some elders and a spokesman, one Tertullus.
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They laid before the governor their case against Paul.
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So in just five days, they managed to put a case together and they even got a lawyer." that's that Tortullus. He's their lawyer and they're showing up to court and it says they went down. Why? Because Jerusalem's on a hill, right? So if you're leaving Jerusalem, you're always going down. They went down to Caesarea. Now this Tortullus was an expert in Roman law and the Jews took him because they knew the only way they were going to get any punishment put upon Paul was to prove to Felix that Paul broke Roman law.
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Look at verses 2-4.
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It says, "And when he had been summoned, Tertullus began to accuse him." Accused Paul.
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Okay, so it's like you have the courtroom scene in your mind, that's what's going on here.
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Okay, so the prosecuting attorney stands up, Tertullus.
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Here's what he says, opening statement.
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"Since through you, Felix, we enjoy much peace, and since by your foresight, most excellent Felix, reforms are being made for this nation in every way, and everywhere we accept this with all gratitude, "But to detain you no further, I beg you in your kindness to hear us briefly." Everybody say, "Gag." This is just flattery. Nobody was buying this.
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Here's the real story. You study history?
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Here's the real story. Do you want to know what was good about Felix?
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Alright, write this down. I'm going to tell you everything that was good about Felix.
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You ready?
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He stopped the Sakari, the assassins.
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Remember we talked about them being led by the Egyptian.
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He stopped the Saqqari and that was it.
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That's the only good thing about Felix that anybody has ever said about him in all of history, period.
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This is flattery. They're just trying to butter him up.
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Felix was the Roman governor of Judea from about 52 to 59 AD.
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In fact, two years after this trial, we're going to see in verse 27, he was removed by Nero.
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Look at verse 5, it says, "For we have found this man," Paul, "For we have found this man a plague, one who stirs up riots among all the Jews throughout the world, and is a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes." Wow, that's...
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I've been called a lot of things in my life, but that one's just harsh.
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They call him a plague.
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He's not just like a virus or a disease.
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They're like, "This guy is a plague.
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Everywhere he goes, he just infects everybody with his nastiness." All the Jews throughout the world...
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That's a bit of an overstatement, I would say.
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He goes on, he says, "He even tried to profane the temple, but we seized him." That was a lie.
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The Jews didn't seize him, the Romans did.
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Verse 8, "By examining him yourself, you'll be able to find out from him about everything of which we accuse him." Okay, so there's three charges brought against Paul here.
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Three charges.
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Very systematic.
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The first charge was against Roman law.
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Verse 5.
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And they say he's constantly stirring up riots.
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One thing the Romans never tolerated was disturbing the peace.
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You've ever heard of the Pax Romana, the peace of Rome?
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They were all about that.
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They didn't have anything to do with people that would disturb the peace.
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And if somebody was disturbing the peace, they would squash that immediately.
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So the first accusation here is he broke Roman law because he's constantly disturbing the peace.
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Secondly, he broke Jewish law.
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He's a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes.
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Talk about that in a second.
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And then the third accusation, the third charge, is he broke God's law.
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He broke God's law.
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He profaned the temple.
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Remember, that was the whole accusation.
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This all started because he was accused of taking Greeks into the inner parts of the temple, which he didn't do.
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Remember, the only substance they had for that argument was they think they saw him out in the city somewhere with a Greek, maybe we saw him.
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I think he was like, you know, in the city with the Greek and that turned into, oh yeah, Paul's constantly taking Greeks right into the temple where it's forbidden.
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Now, I'm gonna answer this question real quick.
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The second part of verse six and the first part of verse eight is left out of a lot of Bible translations.
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And actually, if you look down at the bottom of your Bible, You'll see a footnote.
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You see that?
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My Bible has a footnote.
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It says, "Some manuscripts add, and we would have judged him according to our law, but the chief captain Lysias came and with great violence took him out of our hands, commanding his accusers to come before you." Why is that a footnote?
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Because when they're putting the Bible together, they had many, many, many, many thousands of different copies of the manuscripts and these verses were in some but they weren't in others. So what do we do with it? Well, if they don't belong, and you read this passage straightforwardly, they're just simply urging Felix to examine Paul. In verse 8, "By examining "Him," that "him" refers to Paul then. Like, "Hey, we want you to examine Paul, but if these verses really do belong, here's the thing, verse 8, that "him" refers to Claudius Lysias, the Roman Tribune. And what they're saying is, "By examining Claudius Lysias yourself, you'll find out about everything we're accusing Paul of." And basically they're throwing Claudius under the bus. Hey, that's where that acrostic fits. Right there. Bus. I knew we'd find something.
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But here's the point. Don't get all caught up in this. The point is it doesn't really matter. It doesn't matter. Whether the verses belong or they don't belong, the point is this. These Jews were before Felix saying, "Look, we don't like Paul, and we want you to do something about him." That's the bottom line. So verses 10 through 21, we're going to see Paul's example of how he defended himself.
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Paul didn't have a lawyer.
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Paul didn't even really have a lot of time to put his case together.
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Verse 9, it says, "The Jews also joined in the charge, affirming that all these things were so." Verse 10, "When the governor had nodded to him to speak, Paul replied, 'Knowing that for many years You have been a judge over this nation, specifically five years at this point.
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Paul says, "I cheerfully make my defense." Now, he's not buttering him up here.
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What he's saying by knowing for many years you've been a judge over this nation, what he's saying is, "Listen, you know how things work around here, Felix.
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You know the dynamic between Romans and Jews and between Jews and Jews, and you understand how all this works.
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So because you're not a rookie, because you know what's going on, I cheerfully, he says, I make my defense.
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So Paul makes a systematic defense.
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Number one, first of all, the accusation was, did he break Roman law?
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Here's his answer in verses 11 through 13.
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Did he break Roman law?
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He says, you can verify that it is not more than 12 days since I went up to worship in Jerusalem And they did not find me disputing with anyone or stirring up a crowd either in the temple or in the synagogues or in the city.
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Neither can they prove to you what they now bring up against me." Stop right there.
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Paul's saying, "Okay, first of all, here's my defense.
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Did I break the Roman law?
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Well, let's look at the facts.
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It's been 12 days since I went up to Jerusalem.
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Five of those days have been in Caesarea, we just saw in this passage here.
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Plus there was a time that Paul went through the Jewish purification.
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Paul's point is, "I really didn't have much time to start a revolt, did I?" Not much time to amass a gang and start rioting and disturbing the peace.
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I want you to see first of all, we talked about being objective.
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It's exactly what Paul did here.
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He didn't make it personal.
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He didn't make it about the personalities, Not Felix, who doesn't have a great reputation.
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Not Claudius Lysias, not the high priest, who we saw was a violent thief.
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He could have brought all of that stuff up, but he didn't.
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We're going to see in this passage, Paul stuck to the three accusations.
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He goes, okay, these are the three things that are on the table.
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These are the three things that we're going to address.
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And that takes us to the, you know, other principle that we're seeing in the play here, that he stuck to the issues.
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He stuck to the issues.
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You see the accusation, you broke Roman law, you broke Jewish law, you broke God's law.
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And Paul, in his defense, okay, here's the answer to the Roman thing, here's the answer to the Jewish thing, and here's the answer to breaking God's law.
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Very systematic.
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Again, stick to the issues and do not get sidetracked.
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Several years ago, in my old church, I got a phone call from a guy.
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He said, "I'm going to commit suicide.
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I have some health problems, and I decided I can't take the health problems anymore, and I'm going to kill myself." And I said, "Well, why did you call me, if that's the case?" He said, "Well, I don't know what happens to a person when they die.
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And I just wanted to call and make sure.
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I heard that if you commit suicide, you go straight to hell.
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And I just wanted to call a church to make sure that's not the case.
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I said, "Let me ask you a question." I said, "You said you're not sure, right?" He goes, "Yeah, I'm not sure." I said, "Do you really want to step into eternity, not sure where you're going to land?
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Is that your plan?
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You're going to step into eternity, you have no idea what's waiting for you, that's your plan?" And he said, "You should work for a suicide hotline." I said, "Well, I'd like to get together and like to talk to you about what the Bible says." Remember last week we talked about Providence, do you remember that?
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So this guy gave me his address, I went to his house.
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I show up and as soon as I saw him, I'm like, "Dude, I know you." He looked at me and looked at me, he goes, "I know, I know you too, but I can't think of where." And I said, "We worked together when I was 15 at a local restaurant." He's like, "Oh yeah, that's right." And I said his name. I'm like, "Yeah, your name's so-and-so.
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And you remember we worked out at this restaurant together?" "Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah." So, I'm talking about Providence.
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So I said, "I'd like to tell you what the Bible says." And I started to share the gospel with him.
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And he's like, "What do you think about creation and evolution?" And I started answering that.
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And I'm like one minute into that.
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And he's like, "Well, what about the dinosaurs?" And I start to talk about the dinosaurs.
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"Okay, well, what do you think there's life on other planets?" And now we're talking about that.
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This went on for like 20 minutes.
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And finally I just closed my Bible and I said, "You know, I'd really like to help you, but I don't think you're ready to listen." He goes, "Well, sure I am." And I said, "No, you're not actually, because every time you ask a question, you don't listen to what the answer is, you just ask the next question." And it was extremely frustrating.
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But I just want to encourage you, he's still with us today, in case you're wondering, but I just want to encourage you, don't let people sidetrack you because it will be a fruitless conversation and you have, I think, the responsibility to lovingly say to that person, "Look, you asked me some very specific questions and those are the questions I want to talk about." and you get sidetracked and they're trying to throw all these things at you and...
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You're not teaching and they're not learning.
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So stick to the issues.
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You want to talk about this, let's talk about this.
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All right?
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Number two, Paul's accusation here.
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Did I break the Jewish law?
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Look at verses 14 through 16.
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Did I break the Jewish law?
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He says, "But this I confess to you, that according to the way," that's what they called followers of Jesus, "which they call a sect, I worship the God of our fathers, believing everything laid down by the law and written in the prophets, having a hope in God, which these men themselves accept, that there will be a resurrection of both the just and the unjust.
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So I always take pains to have a clear conscience toward both God and man." To Paul's defense here, the second accusation is I broke Jewish law.
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Paul's saying, "I'm a Christian, but that's not exactly heresy." Paul says, "Listen, I worship the God of the Jews." And do you see here, again, using these principles, Paul used the Bible.
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Paul used the Bible.
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Don't make the issue between you and the person.
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Don't make the issue between my church versus your church.
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When your faith is on trial, you want to make the issue between that person and the Bible.
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Like here, that's what you think, but I want to show you what God said.
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You say, "I used to think this way too, but I want to show you what God said." Make the issue between them and God's Word.
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By the way, if you don't believe the Bible, then your discussion is just gonna be opinion versus opinion, and that just isn't gonna get you anywhere.
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You might as well talk about football.
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Here again, Paul sticks to the issues.
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He decides to circle back to the main issue, the real issue that enraged him.
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It wasn't the Greek in the temple thing.
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The real issue that enraged was his belief in the resurrection.
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But look at how he words it here.
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He says in verse 15, "There will be a resurrection of both the just and the unjust." What does that mean?
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Well, jot these references down.
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We're not going to look at them today, but you can do a little Bible study yourself.
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John 5 28-29.
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John 5 28-29.
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And I write down Revelation 20.
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Revelation 20 verses 11 through 15.
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The Bible teaches that there are two resurrections.
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The first resurrection is for God's people.
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People that are born again receive Jesus Christ.
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The Bible says, I'm giving you the very short general version here because we could spend hours on this.
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But the Bible teaches that if you're a believer in Christ, when He returns, you will receive a glorified body.
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What's that like?
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Well, 1 Corinthians 15 says, it's kind of like the one that you have, but it's gloriously different.
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It's like the difference between a watermelon seed and a watermelon, and I don't mean your new body's gonna be put like a watermelon, that was a bad example.
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It's the difference between a seed and a fruit, basically, that's made of the same stuff, but gloriously different.
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And you're gonna have a glorified body that you're going to enjoy forever.
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It's not going to get sick, it's not going to die, it's not going to get weak.
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You're going to have it to enjoy in Christ's presence forever.
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That's one resurrection, but there's another one.
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After the millennial reign of Christ, Revelation chapter 20 teaches that every person who's rejected God, every person who has refused to accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, who has seen the gift that God offers of eternal life and grace and mercy and says, "I don't want your stupid gift." Every person that does that, after the thousand year reign of Christ, the Bible says that they will receive a glorified body too.
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See, here's the horrifying thing.
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Just like a believer's body is eternal and indestructible, the unbeliever's body also will be eternal and indestructible because it will be in hell to constantly suffer but never be destroyed.
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A body that's constantly on fire but never consumed.
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It's a horrific thought.
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The Bible clearly teaches that.
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You are going to be somewhere forever.
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And it's not based on how good of a person you were.
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It's not based on, "Did I go to church? Did I keep the rules?" The issue is this, "Am I forgiven of my sin?" As I stand now by nature in the flesh, I am guilty of sin.
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But when I receive the gift, the God that I sinned against gave me this gift.
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When I receive that gift, I'm pronounced in God's courtroom not guilty, forgiven.
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A gift of eternal life that can never be taken from me, by the way.
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When you're pronounced not guilty, when you are forgiven, when you are born again, there is not a power anywhere that can undo that.
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You are eternally secure.
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You're going to be forever somewhere.
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Where are you going to be?
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Number three, finally, and systematic, "I didn't break Roman law. I didn't break Jewish law." Well, the last accusation is, "Did you break God's law, Paul?" Look at verse 17.
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He says, "Now after several years, I came to bring alms to my nation and to present offerings." Do you remember? That's why Paul was in such a hurry to get to Jerusalem.
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He wanted to... There are all these poor Christians, and all the Gentile churches took an offering.
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And Paul's like, "I've got to get to Jerusalem. I've got to get this offering to them." I was like, "Guess what I was doing? I was bringing money to poor people." He says, "While I was doing this, they found me purified in the temple without any crowd or tumult.
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But some Jews from Asia, they ought to be here before you to make an accusation, should they have anything against me.
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Or else, let these men themselves say what wrongdoing they found when I stood before the council, other than this one thing that I cried out while standing among them. It is with respect to the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial before you this day." The last part of Paul's defense, he says, "I was bringing relief. And by the way, I was purified in the temple, so I wasn't breaking Jewish law either. I went through the purification.
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He said there was no rioting. Paul says, "By the way, where are the witnesses?" Shouldn't a trial have witnesses?
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If there's all these accusations that I was causing, all these problems, where are all the people that can give testimony?
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"Yes, we saw him here doing this, saying this, and these were..." He says, "Where are they?" They no-showed, if there are any.
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Again, be objective.
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Be objective.
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Paul says the only accusation really, here's the real issue, let's just be real objective here.
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The only accusation that they have against me is that I believe in a resurrection, which by the way, the Pharisees also believe in that, and they're part of the Sanhedrin.
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So you can't even say believing in a resurrection is a crime because some of the Jewish council believes in a resurrection.
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So Paul's basically saying here, You know, "They're beef with me. These Jews, they're beef with me." It doesn't belong in a Roman court.
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So do you see in this passage, Paul employs these three things, these three principles that I would commend to you.
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And if you can get these down, it's not going to matter who comes after you.
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You're going to, with a cool head, be able to fearlessly, And Christ exaltingly defends your faith.
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And the first one is be objective.
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Use the Bible and stick to the issues.
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1 Peter 3.15 says, "But in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy." But look at this, "Always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.
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Yeah, do it with gentleness and respect.
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It's important to know now so that we can be prepared for when, because we don't always know when we're going to need to make that defense.
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We saw in Paul's case, he didn't exactly have time to prepare a case, did he?
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He didn't even have a lawyer.
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He didn't have time to get his documents in order, or call in expert witnesses.
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You could say he didn't have time to prepare, but you could also say he was already prepared long before this trial.
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So what about you?
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When your faith is in the hot seat, are you going to be ready?
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When your faith is on trial, you too can be fearless.
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Be objective, use the Bible, stick to the issues.
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Let's pray.
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Father in heaven, thank You for the example of Your Word today.
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Father, just as I confess to my brothers and sisters here, and to You God, I have messed this up so many times in my life.
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What a great example You've given us in Your Word of how to lift high your word and make a defense of the faith without being personally abrasive, personally offensive.
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God, in Your sovereignty and Your providence, You know when every single one of us are going to have to make that defense.
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For some of us here, it might be this week.
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For some of us, it might be at Thanksgiving.
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that the questions, the accusations, it's going to be coming after us, and we're going to have to defend ourselves.
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For some of us, Father, the cult might show up at our front door tomorrow.
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Some of us might be going to a hostile work environment that knows we're Christians and loves to try to make us look foolish.
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God, You know every context, everyone represented here.
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I pray, Father, now that You're using Your Word and Your Holy Spirit, Father, is working in our hearts in such a way that whenever that time comes, we can make a defense.
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And again, Father, it's not about us winning or losing a debate.
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It's about by Your grace, by Your mercy, Lord willing, It's about you using our testimony to lead others to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ.
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We trust you, Father.
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Let us be prepared to proclaim your name.
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Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Amen.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Acts 24:1-21
Paul made his defense "cheerfully" (Acts 24:10). How can we have that attitude when we feel on the defensive?
Acts 24:15 talks about the resurrection of the just and the unjust. Explain what that means. See John 5:28-29, Revelation 20:11-15.
Why is it important to stay objective when sharing? What are ways we can make it subjective? Why could this be a problem?
What is your big take-away from this passage?
Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another - to be fearless.