Acts 14: 1-7 Let Everyone Dance!

Acts 14: 1-7  At Iconium Paul and Barnabas went as usual into the Jewish synagogue.  There they spoke so effectively that a great number of Jews and Greeks believed.  But the Jews who refused to believe stirred up the other Gentiles and poisoned their minds against the brothers.  So Paul and Barnabas spent considerable time there, speaking boldly for the Lord, who confirmed the message of his grace by enabling them to perform signs and wonders.  The people of the city were divided; some sided with the Jews, others with the apostles.  There was a plot afoot among both Gentiles and Jews, together with their leaders, to mistreat them and stone them.  But they found out about it and fled to the Lycaonian cities of Lystra and Derbe and to the surrounding country, where they continued to preach the gospel.

Paul and Barnabas, after two difficult weeks of ministry in Antioch of Pisidia, left that area and walked 96 miles to Iconium, a three or four day journey.  In Antioch they were threatened with death so they shook the dust off their feet as a warning to the people of that city.  The word of the Lord spread through the whole region.  But the Jewish leaders incited the God-fearing women of high standing and the leading men of the city.  They stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them from their region.  So they shook the dust off their feet as a warning to them and went to Iconium.  And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.  (Acts 13:49-52)  As these two disciples journeyed inland in Turkey, their hearts were filled with joy, for the word of the Lord had been spread through that whole region.  Even though they left with a target on their backs: the threat of death by stoning, they knew they had fulfilled the will of God in that part of Turkey.  They went away from Antioch of Pisidia with glad hearts, experiencing Jesus’ words, Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.  Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.  (Matthew 5:11-12)  First in Cyprus, then in Antioch of Pisidia they were participating in Jesus’ commission to go into all the world and preach the gospel.  Now after being threatened with death, they were going to Iconium to deliver the salvation message that Jesus the Messiah has come to earth to redeem men from their sins.  Both Jews and Gentiles in these communities where they had ministered had accepted this message of the Good News, but there were also people in these areas opposed to their ministry.  Many Jews were fervently marshaled against the gospel.  Jesus said about them, The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.  The Lord has done this and it is marvelous in our eyes’? “Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it.  And whoever falls on this stone will be broken; but on whomever it falls, it will grind him to powder.”  (Matthew 21:42-44)  Those who should have been the builders of the knowledge of God and his redemptive plan were dead-set against the salvation message that Jesus is the Messiah.  Paul would continue to preach in the Jewish synagogues, but the message of the Good News spread like wildfire in the Gentile world.  Many Gentiles gladly accepted this message of redemption, and as a congregation of believers they became a nation bearing the fruits of it.  People of all kinds would accept the wonderful message of being born again, having eternal life with God through faith in the substitutionary work of the cross of Jesus Christ.  As Jesus said about the tenants who were initially chosen as caretakers of his vineyard: their betrayal of the owner of the vineyard would bring horrible judgement on them, grinding them into powder.  As Stephen said at his stoning, “You stiff-necked people!  Your hearts and ears are still uncircumcised.  You are just like your ancestors: You always resist the Holy Spirit!  Was there ever a prophet your ancestors did not persecute?  They even killed those who predicted the coming of the Righteous One.  (Acts 7:51-52)  Paul on that day of Stephen’s stoning was part of the stiff-necked people.  He threw his lot in with the murderers of Stephen.  But his encounter with Christ on the road to Damascus changed him completely.  He was no longer a tenant of betrayal but became a caretaker of the vineyard for the glory of the owner: God.

Jesus, the Good News, was born into a world racked with sin and chaos.  It was a world with sinful people, as in Noah’s time: every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood.  (Genesis 8:21)  Even God’s chosen, led out of slavery in Egypt by miraculous events, crossing the Red Sea on dry land, failed to be obedient to God.  On Mount Sinai they were given the perfect law of God, but they carried idols of other gods in they satchels.  In the Promise Land, as we read in the book of the Judges, we find the Israelites unfaithful to God.  Why were these people who had seen God’s marvelous work of deliverance from slavery not faithful?  They lacked faith because even in the best of men and women, humans are lawbreakers, for they possess the DNA of Adam and Eve.  The Jews were religious at times, faithful at times, but inconsistent in their service to the One and Only True God.  They were like sheep who have chosen their own pasture.  We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way.  (Continued below)  Because of such rebellious behavior, they needed a true and faithful Shepherd.  Jesus came to be that Shepherd.  However first he had to pay for their sins of disobedience, for God demands total allegiance.  Jesus came to place men and women in right standing with a righteous God, carrying the people’s sin to the cross: but the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.  (Isaiah 53:6)  Paul is preaching this Good News of redemption in the communities of the Greeks.  These Gentiles were not chosen initially to hear the message that Moses received about God on Mount Sinai, wrapped in the Law.  Now Paul is talking about Jesus who has satisfied all the requirements of the law.  He is ministering about the circumcision of the heart: obedience to the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ, not through works.  In a Jewish synagogue, Jesus read a passage from Isaiah:  The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor.  He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion—to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning,and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.  They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of his splendor.  (Isaiah 61:1-3)  We see Paul and Barnabas as oaks of righteousness.  They are fulfilling Jesus’ mission on earth by proclaiming the good news to the poor.  They are healing the brokenhearted.  They are setting people free from their captivity to Satan.  They are telling Jews and Gentiles that Christ has come to bring great favor to them, to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.  To deliver this redemptive news of Christ to the Jews and the Gentiles, they faced much adversity.  To combat this adversity from some in Inconium, Paul and Barnabas performed many miracles to substantiate what they were saying about Jesus Christ.  Paul and Barnabas spent considerable time there, speaking boldly for the Lord, who confirmed the message of his grace by enabling them to perform signs and wonders.  As with the world today, when people are overlaid with great darkness because of the devil’s hold on them; they often need signs and wonders to confirm the reality that there is a God in heaven and that He sent Jesus Christ to deliver them from their captivity to sin.  Many times in lands that are controlled by cults that worship many gods, God comes to people with miraculous signs, dreams, trances and visions.  God’s love for all people is so fervent that He will reveal his existence to those who call out to him in earnestness.  He stopped Paul, a radical Pharisee, on the road to Damascus by blinding him with a great light.

Now in Iconium we see great resistance cropping up.   There was a plot afoot among both Gentiles and Jews, together with their leaders, to mistreat them and stone them.  The disciples are now aware of this threat so they leave the area to go to Lystra, 20 miles away, a good day’s walk.  The message of salvation has taken root in Iconium, now for the disciples it was time to move on.  The struggle for existence will always be in Paul’s life.  At first he was with Barnabas, a fellow Jew, and then later he would journey with Silas, a Gentile.  But always there would be a target on his back.  Zealous people who were adverse to the Good News would plot and scheme to kill Paul.  He never knew safety from these haters.  They jailed him, beat him with rods, stoned him.  He was never out of harm’s way absent from these communities either.  For in between these Gentile cities there were gangsters and robbers who might accost him, stealing from him and abusing him.  He also faced natural disasters such as drowning at sea or in rivers.  Paul’s life was always precariously lived.  Jesus promised his disciples that their lives would always be on the line from persecution and even death.  I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace.  In this world you will have trouble.  But take heart!  I have overcome the world.”  (John 16:33)  These disciples knew the resurrected Lord, but still to follow Jesus unreservedly was a difficult assignment.  Peter complained about that when Jesus told him, “Feed my sheep.  Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.”  Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God.  Then he said to him, “Follow me!”  (John 21:17-19)  With such a prognostication about his life, Peter wanted to know about John’s future.  Is he also going to be treated so terribly when he is old?  But Jesus told him not to be concerned about what might happen to John but to be concerned only about his life.  And his life should consist of following Jesus to the end.  As with all Christians we are buried IN CHRIST and we live IN CHRIST.  We will dance the dance Jesus made for us and we will sing the song he has prepared for us to sing.  We are his vessels as long as we live.  No other tune will we dance to or sing.  We know as children of God as we progress through our lives, the sweetness of Jesus’s voice as we dance.  His closeness, his song in our ears brings the warmth of love to us.  And someday as this earth passes from us, we will be present with God and his beloved Son.  Nothing we can think of is better than to be in the household of God.   Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked.  For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless.  Lord Almighty blessed is the one who trusts in you.  (Psalm 84:10-12)  Friends around this breakfast table as we look at each other, we know we will be present with the Lord.  Our faces might be glad or sad now, but one day all trials of this earth will disappear, tears will be wiped away, and joy will radiate our faces.  We love the account of Paul and Silas in jail.  Everyone in the jail heard them singing praises to God when they were chained in the depths of a jail.  About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them.  (Acts 16:25)  Are we singing this morning, even in chains?  Or do we feel we are chained to a wall in an everlasting prison?  Dear ones, hear the redemptive music God is singing even when you despair.  Dance with him.  Paul had to hear that music or he would have quit many times.  But the music is always playing for you--the dance is always on.  As Jesus would say, You who have ears, hear the voice of God and his songs.     

Acts 13:40-52 Seeking a Home!

Acts 13:40-52  Take care that what the prophets have said does not happen to you:  “‘Look, you scoffers, wonder and perish, for I am going to do something in your day that you would never believe, even if someone told you.  ’”As Paul and Barnabas were leaving the synagogue, the people invited them to speak further about these things on the next Sabbath.  When the congregation was dismissed, many of the Jews and devout converts to Judaism followed Paul and Barnabas, who talked with them and urged them to continue in the grace of God.  On the next Sabbath almost the whole city gathered to hear the word of the Lord.  When the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy.  They began to contradict what Paul was saying and heaped abuse on him.  Then Paul and Barnabas answered them boldly: “We had to speak the word of God to you first.  Since you reject it and do not consider yourselves worthy of eternal life, we now turn to the Gentiles.  For this is what the Lord has commanded us: “‘I have made you a light for the Gentiles that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth.’”  When the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and honored the word of the Lord; and all who were appointed for eternal life believed.  The word of the Lord spread through the whole region.  But the Jewish leaders incited the God-fearing women of high standing and the leading men of the city.  They stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them from their region.  So they shook the dust off their feet as a warning to them and went to Iconium.  And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.

In the above scene we see Paul and Barnabas finishing up their work in Antioch of Pisidia.  For two weeks Paul had tried to convince the Jews and God-fearing Gentiles to follow Jesus Christ of Nazareth.  As in most of these Greek cities where they evangelized, some Jews but many God-fearing Gentiles accepted the Good News.  As the prophets foretold, many Jews were scoffers.  They wonder and perish for they fought openly against the Good News.  Paul became very tired of the Jews contradicting what he was ministering.  They heaped abuse on him, and probably as did the Greeks in Athens, Greece, they ridiculed what he said.  On the second Sabbath a large crowd gathered to hear what Paul was ministering; this made the Jews jealous to see such a large gathering.  When the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy.  Of course this happened in Jesus’ ministry too.  Large crowds followed him, making the elite Jews of Jerusalem jealous of him.  They knew they were losing the people to this man, Jesus.  Now In Antioch of Pisidia we see the same thing: jealousy and hatred of the two disciples of Christ.  Paul knew his commission from Christ was to go to the Gentile world, so that is why we find the two in Turkey.  However, since they were both Jews, they felt the best reception to the Good News would be from the Jews.  But Paul’s primary mission from Christ was to minister the gospel to the whole world.  I have made you a light for the Gentiles that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth.  So we see this once respected Rabbi, Paul, out into the the Gentile world, talking about a man, Jesus Christ, who was resurrected from the dead.  Paul had lost his place of honor within the Jewish community.  When he was hunting down Christians to have them murdered or at least tortured in Jerusalem, he had the confidence of the High Priest.  The elite priests of Jerusalem knew Paul had all the qualifications and qualities to be part of their brotherhood: leaders of the Jewish society in Israel.  He was a Pharisee who conformed to the laws and regulations of Judaism in the strictest manner.  (Acts 26:5).  Nevertheless, when Paul is presented to King Agrippa after his two years of confinement in a Roman prison, Governor Festus introduces him as a person hated by all Jews everywhere.  The next day Agrippa and Bernice came with great pomp and entered the audience room with the high-ranking military officers and the prominent men of the city.  At the command of Festus, Paul was brought in.  Festus said: “King Agrippa, and all who are present with us, you see this man!  The whole Jewish community has petitioned me about him in Jerusalem and here in Caesarea, shouting that he ought not to live any longer.  (Acts 25:23-24)  Paul was a scourge to the majority of the Jews everywhere.  When he was arrested in Jerusalem, the Roman soldiers had to lift him to their shoulders to keep the mob from killing him.  This once respected Rabbi, a darling of the elite, was now considered an anathema to the Jewish people.  He was perfect when he was killing Christians, but now he was hated by the majority of the Jews, who were willing to do anything to have him killed.  When he was killing others for the sake of Judaism, he was acceptable.  Many a time I went from one synagogue to another to have them punished, and I tried to force them to blaspheme.  I was so obsessed with persecuting them that I even hunted them down in foreign cities.  (Acts 26:11)

Paul had lost everything in life: all of his closely held dreams of what he would become eventually as a strict follower of God.  He thought that through the works in his life as a dedicated follower of God, he would win many promotions in the Pharisee sect.  He probably knew he would after a time become part of the Sanhedrin that rules Israel.  Once loved by leaders of Israel, now he was hated by them, with a constant target on his back.  Jesus’ call to him on the road to Damascus cost him everything: his life, aspirations, dreams.  ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?  It is useless for you to fight against my will.’ "‘Who are you, lord?’  I asked.  “And the Lord replied, ‘I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting.  Now get to your feet!  For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my servant and witness.  Tell people that you have seen me, and tell them what I will show you in the future.  And I will rescue you from both your own people and the Gentiles.  Yes, I am sending you to the Gentiles to open their eyes, so they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God.  (Acts 26:14-18)  To emphasize this call, Saul was blinded for three days.  And we can assume that he requested many things from Jesus, but not to be an anathema to the whole Jewish community.  He might have pleaded with God as Jesus pleaded with God.  Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me.  (Matthew 26:39)  But the cup was not taken away from Jesus and neither was it taken away from Paul’s life.  We hear Jesus say to Saul, Now get to your feet!  A command given to all of us who are born-again because we met Jesus on the road to Damascus.  Your feet, your hands, your lips are to be used.  No divine intervention will happen; you will carry out your assignment in the flesh.  We heard the angel who rescued Peter from jail, “ Get to your feet and get dressed.  You are going to carry out your assignment in fleshly deeds and work."  Peter walked out of prison.  He had to walk.  He did not float out of prison, he walked!  Jesus carried the cross; He was totally in the flesh.  He did not just find himself at a place called Golgotha.  Jesus walked, Peter walked, and Paul will walk out his life, walking thousands of miles to drink the cup that God had placed on his life.  For I have appeared to you to appoint you as my servant and witness.  Tell people that you have seen me, and tell them what I will show you in the future.  And I will rescue you from both your own people and the Gentiles.  Jesus rescued him as he was on the missionary field, but finally in Rome after his mission was completed as God directed him.  It is told by history that Paul died a violent death.  When he fulfilled his mission, God took him home.  He found his home that he was seeking all along.

Paul was disgusted with his fellow Jews; he knew one reason they did not want to move away from Judaism: the cost in their lives would be very great. The followers of Jesus would certainly find themselves ostracized from the Jewish community.  No longer would they be accepted in the synagogues.  They would lose their standing in the Jewish society.  To be a follower of Jesus would carry much trauma.  The Jewish leaders and the Greeks of high standing rallied against Paul’s ministry.  The Jewish leaders incited the God-fearing women of high standing and the leading men of the city.  They stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and expelled them from their region.  So they shook the dust off their feet as a warning to them and went to Iconium.  By this discouraging outcome of their ministry in Antioch of Prisida, Paul and Barnabas knew their target for the Good News was primarily the Gentiles.  We see later on in their ministry, some Jews believed but many Gentiles believed.  The strongest opposition to the Good News came primarily from their fellow Jews.  Paul always carried the charge of Jesus Christ when he met Jesus on the road to Damascus.  He could not avoid this command of Jesus.  He could never go back and blend into the Jewish community.  God had called him for a special mission, one that was held in the heart of God from the beginning that salvation through Jesus Christ is to all people.  God through Paul, would open the Good News to all people.  However, the cost was great to this missionary, Paul.  But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ.  Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.  (Philippians 3:7-11)  Paul was conformed to the death of his Savior, a cross-bearing life.  He counted his life as nothing.  He sold his life to Christ.  The price of servanthood is sometimes very great.  To keep in step with the Spirit sometimes leads us to a place where we do not feel comfortable.  For some of us, we say to ourselves, why should I start my day with Jesus and end my day with Jesus?  Why?  Because we are the light of the world; we are ambassadors of a kingdom that is eternal, that will never fade away.  “Do not let your hearts be troubled.  You believe in God; believe also in me.  My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you?  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.  (John 14:1-3)  Paul’s whole ministry speaks of a home for all people that is eternal.  He spoke of a resurrected Christ who has paid the price for this home.  We shall never die if we put our trust in this gift of love: Jesus, who has been given to us by the Creator himself.  This message is pure love for all people whom He has made in his image.  It cost Paul a lot to deliver this message.  He lost honor and prestige with his own people to give this message to the world.  Then the question for us is how much are we paying for our home.  Are we unwilling “TO GET UP” and deliver the Good News in words and actions to all we meet?  Often we hear good messages coming from our pastors.  We hear them and say, Amen!   But then the feet, the hands, the lips that are necessary to carry out what we heard in church are not there.  Paul carried a message of Good News to the world.  At that time implementing the gospel message would cost some their lives and for others, they would face persecution.  In this Christmas season as we celebrate a little baby’s birth, let us remember in our celebration, that we, whether new or old in Christ, must carry out our assignment in life as Paul did.  The Jews in Antioch did not accept his message, but did not prevent him from going to Iconium.  Let no obstacle, no discourgement in our lives prevent us from going to Iconium.      

    

    

      

    

  

 

Acts 26-39 Seeds Grow on Good Soil!

Acts 26-39  “Fellow children of Abraham and you God-fearing Gentiles, it is to us that this message of salvation has been sent.  The people of Jerusalem and their rulers did not recognize Jesus, yet in condemning him they fulfilled the words of the prophets that are read every Sabbath.  Though they found no proper ground for a death sentence, they asked Pilate to have him executed.  When they had carried out all that was written about him, they took him down from the cross and laid him in a tomb.  But God raised him from the dead, and for many days he was seen by those who had traveled with him from Galilee to Jerusalem.  They are now his witnesses to our people.  “We tell you the good news: What God promised our ancestor, he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus.  As it is written in the second Psalm: “‘You are my son; today I have become your father.’  God raised him from the dead so that he will never be subject to decay.  As God has said,“‘I will give you the holy and sure blessings promised to David.’  So it is also stated elsewhere:  “‘You will not let your holy one see decay.  “Now when David had served God’s purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep; he was buried with his ancestors and his body decayed.  But the one whom God raised from the dead did not see decay.  “Therefore, my friends, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you.  Through him everyone who believes is set free from every sin, a justification you were not able to obtain under the law of Moses.

In the above passage we see Paul introducing the Jews and God-fearing Gentiles in Pisidian Antioch to Jesus of Nazareth.  Jesus might have been known to some of them, for Jesus’ popularity had spread to other lands, but for most of them, they were probably quite ignorant of what happened to Jesus in Jerusalem and why.  Paul tells them that he and Barnabas and others, who knew and walked with Jesus, have the responsibility to present the message of salvation, the GOOD NEWS, to the world that has come in and through Jesus Christ.  The Romans, at the behest of the Jewish elite, executed Jesus on a cross.  By condemning Jesus to death, they fulfilled the words of the prophets that are read every Sabbath.  Jesus' agonizing death on the cross fulfilled the Psalmist's words: I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint.  My heart has turned to wax; it has melted within me.  My mouth is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; you lay me in the dust of death.  Dogs surround me, a pack of villains encircles me they pierce my hands and my feet.  All my bones are on display; people stare and gloat over me.  They divide my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment.  (Psalm 22:14-18)  In Jesus’ dying moments He experienced everything the prophets wrote about him.  He fulfilled their words of what the Messiah would experience in his last few minutes on earth.  He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth.  By oppression and judgment he was taken away.  Yet who of his generation protested?  For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished.  He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.  (Isaiah 53:7-9)  In the land of the living where people were enamored with violence and sin, He was sinless.  He carried their sins to his death.  He became God's propitiation for the people's sins.  Paul tells the people of Antioch, by the death of Jesus, God ransomed Jews and all others from the hands of the oppressor, the devil.  But God’s Messiah, Jesus, did not inhabit the tomb long, for as with Jonah, He was in the earth’s domain for only three days.  God raised him from the dead.  After his resurrection, he presented his resurrected self to his followers and commissioned them to tell of this Good News that God through faith in his works would give all people, everywhere, eternal life.  By being raised from the dead, He fulfills the promise God gave King David:  I declare to you that the Lord will build a house for you: When your days are over and you go to be with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, one of your own sons, and I will establish his kingdom.  He is the one who will build a house for me, and I will establish his throne forever.  I will be his father, and he will be my son.  I will never take my love away from him, as I took it away from your predecessor.  I will set him over my house and my kingdom forever; his throne will be established forever.  (1 Chronicles 17:10-14)  Of course, David a man of flesh eventually fell asleep, he was buried with his ancestors and his body decayed.  But the one whom God raised from the dead did not see decay.  But his offspring, God promised would never face decay, instead He would reign forever over the house of David and all others.  The Good News is that Jesus paid the price for sin and death.  Through him eternal life is guaranteed to all people who place their trust in his work on the cross.  He paid the complete price for the transgressions of humans, for their rebellious nature to the God of creation.

This promise of eternal life to all people began in the Garden.  God made people in his image, in his likeness.  In their freedom, Adam and Eve chose to go their own way.  This was part of God’s plan for humans from the beginning of time.  God made humans with the privilege to organize their lives as they desire, not necessarily as God desires for them.  Eve, because of Satan’s words, chose to be like God, to plan out her own existence.  This desire to be separated from God brought a condition of sin and rebellion in humans. The crescendo of this rebellious nature happened In Noah’s time, hundreds of years after creation.  The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.  (Genesis 6:5)  God dealt with this generation by destroying them through the flood, starting over with mankind through Noah’s family.  Yet the decay of sin was still present in humans.  However, God was gracious to mankind and chose not to punish them further; instead, He gave them grace through an idol worshipper: Abraham.  God called Abraham’s family out of the land of Ur of the Chaldeans, northern Turkey.  Later they settled in southern Turkey where Abraham’s father, Teran, died.  Then God through unmerited grace told Abraham to leave the land of his forefathers and settle in Canaan.  He also told Abraham things that were improbable or even impossible: The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.  “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.  I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”  (Genesis 12:1-3)  This intervention into Abraham’s life left Abraham with a choice: either believe these words he heard from God or keep his mindset of believing in his idols.  He chose to believe God’s words, which God credited to him as righteousness.  God gave Abraham right standing with him because Abraham chose to believe God’s words instead of his inclination towards serving idols as the direction in his life.  Abraham so much believed God’s words that he even was willing to give up his only son Isaac as a sacrifice because God requested that of him.  For him, in his fleshly understanding, God could fulfill his promises to him through his son Isaac, but God asked him the unimaginable: give Isaac to me on an altar of sacrifice.  Because Abraham stood solid in his faith, God affirmed his words to Abraham by saying to him,  “I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore.  Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”  (Genesis 22:16-18)  Now Paul is affirming this blessing to Abraham in the synagogue in Antioch.  He and Barnabas and others are going to all lands spreading the Good News that was given to Abraham, through your offspring [Jesus] all nations on earth will be blessed.  This blessing is encapsulated by faith in Jesus Christ, the resurrected One.  Therefore, my friends, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you.  Through him everyone who believes is set free from every sin, a justification you were not able to obtain under the law of Moses.

God has never lost contact with, or forgotten, his eternal plan to make humans into his own, eternal children.  Through freedom as God has freedom, the human race lost contact with God, rebellious to him and his nature.  To the Antioch congregation, Paul is declaring the Good News of God’s salvation plan to alter the composition of mankind, making them born-again people.  We see Paul quoting Psalm 2:7, You are my son; today I have become your father.   We know Christ from the beginning of time was united with God the Father.  He has always been with the Father, a part of the household of God.  But Jesus called himself, the Son of man.  Christ became flesh as we are flesh, and his flesh died, as we will die.  When resurrected, He became the universal created one, from the flesh, as the son of man, to eternal life: Today, you are my son, passing from the fleshly garment of a human into the raiment of eternal life.  We too who are buried with Jesus in faith will hear that announcement in our own resurrection: Today, your are my son or daughter.  We are the seed that fell on good ground.  But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it.  This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”  (Matthew 13:23)  We will flourish because of the work of Christ in us.  We are those that Jesus is not embarrassed to introduce us to his Father.  For we are those who accept the Good News of transformation of the flesh into eternal life.  This is a promise not only for us but to all the people of the world.  Each of the redeemed can say, I delight greatly in the Lord; my soul rejoices in my God.  For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.  For as the soil makes the sprout come up and a garden causes seeds to grow, so the Sovereign Lord will make righteousness and praise spring up before all nations.  (Isaiah 61:10-11).  The blessings of Abraham have come to all of his descendants.  And who are his descendants?  All who are clothed in righteousness and holiness of Jesus Christ, the Jews first and then the Gentiles.  So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.  There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.  If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.  (Galatians 3:26-29)  We should consider the blessings of Abraham as ours.  He went to a new land, a land he did not own. There in that land he was promised that he would become the possessor of it.  All of this was unimaginable to his flesh, unobtainable for sure by human effort.  But God promised it to him, and it was fulfilled through his descendants who came out of slavery.  We too have been in slavery to sin and rebellion, but God has delivered us from slavery through the blood of Jesus Christ over our lives.  The Jews were delivered from Pharaoh’s hand, through the blood of lambs.  We have been delivered out of sin and death by the blood of THE LAMB.  Our release has been completed.  We now have a land to occupy, forever known as the kingdom of God.  We are no longer homeless, bound to the waywardness of this world.  We have a home with the eternal Father.  He will never leave us or abandon us, for He gave his only begotten Son for us.  This is the GOOD NEWS that Paul was trying to hammer home.  God’s salvation plan from the beginning has been culminated IN JESUS THE CHRIST who lives forever, so WIILL WE.  For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.  For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.  (John 3:16-17)  Praise the Lord!  

 

 

 

  

Acts 13:20-25 Let There Be No Weakness!

Acts 13:20-25 “After this, God gave them judges until the time of Samuel the prophet.  Then the people asked for a king, and he gave them Saul son of Kish, of the tribe of Benjamin, who ruled forty years.  After removing Saul, he made David their king.  God testified concerning him: ‘I have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.’  “From this man’s descendants God has brought to Israel the Savior Jesus, as he promised.  Before the coming of Jesus, John preached repentance and baptism to all the people of Israel.  As John was completing his work, he said: ‘Who do you suppose I am?  I am not the one you are looking for.  But there is one coming after me whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.’

In this focus, we see Paul continuing to introduce Jesus to the synagogue of Pisidian Antioch by recounting some major points in the history of the Israelites.  Paul tells these Jews that in Egypt they became a great people, but were in bondage to Pharaoh.  When they went into Egypt as nomads and shepherds, they did not understand anything much about being a nation.  But when they left Egypt, they understood well the components of a nation, how to organize a society that consisted of hundreds of thousands of people.  Before their 400 years in Egypt, they were nomads, wandering from place to place to feed and to take care of their animals.  They had no place to call theirs, for they did not own land.  God had other plans for them.  He promised Abraham that he would own land: Canaan.  In Egypt, even as slaves, he made the people prosper during their stay in Egypt.  (17)  God led them out of Egypt by displaying his mighty power to Pharaoh and to the Egyptian people.  After they were free from their bondage in Egypt, they wandered in the wilderness for forty years.  Finally God allowed them to enter Canaan and take possession of that land.  In Canaan they were faithful to God only as long as Joshua and his contemporaries lived, but as soon as the first generation died off, the decedents of Abraham chose to worship idols again.  In the time of the Judges, it could be said there is no God in Canaan or for the Israelites no real allegiance to the God of Abraham, the one who brought them out of Egypt.  After that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel.  Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals.  They forsook the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of Egypt.  (Judges 2:10-12)  The Israelites chose to worship the gods of those people who they were supposed to have driven out of Canaan.  Their failure to do away with the inhabitants of Canaan inundated their society in idol worshipping.  The gods of the people of Canaan became their gods, a trap God said they would fall into if they did not get rid of all the inhabitants of Canaan.  Their gods became a snare to the Israelites, causing the Jews to fall under the control of the people of Canaan.  At different times, the Midianites, Canaanites, Moabites, and Philistines would rule over the Jews.  Because of God’s grace and his promise to Abraham, He would raise up judges to deliver the Israelites from their oppressor.  Finally in the time of Levi and Samuel, the Israelites had gained more control over their own lives, but still worshipped other gods that contaminated their lives; they would go in and out in their faithfulness to God.  Although, in Samuel’s time, the Jews were quite obedient to his rule, but the Israelites saw that the other people surrounding them had kings to rule over them, so they clamored to Samuel to allow them to have a king rule over them.  God gave them what they desired.  Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king.  As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you.  (1 Samuel 8:7-8)  The Jews rejected theocracy and turned to autocracy, the rule of one man.  The first king was Saul from the small tribe of Benjamin.  He was a humble man at first but then turned into an unruly autocrat.  God rejected Saul.  He had Samuel select a new king from the household of Jesse.  The youngest son of Jesse was selected as the new king: David, revealing God’s grace once again, selecting someone not deserving, but the youngest, inexperienced son of Jesse.  After removing Saul, he made David their king.  God testified concerning him: ‘I have found David son of Jesse, a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.  Paul tells the Jews in the synagogue that David was a man after God’s own heart.  He was willing to be led by God.  In essence he brought back the attitude of a theocratic rule, allowing God to rule the Israelites.  However, David's self-willed weakness of lust in his personal lifestyle eventually caused the splitting of Israel into two kingdoms.  His son Solomon followed David’s lifestyle of marrying many wives and having many concubines.  This weakness corrupted Solomon’s reign.  He fell out of God’s favor by accommodating his idol-worshipping wives, allowing their idols to contaminate Israel.  

Paul emphasizes King David’s faithfulness to God.  David chose to allow God to direct him as he ruled the Israelites.  David’s willingness to follow God in directing the Israelites found favor with God; therefore, out of his lineage would come the Messiah, who would always do the will of God.  From this man’s descendants God has brought to Israel the Savior Jesus, as he promised.  In Jesus, the Messiah, there is no weakness, self-willedness.   David failed to live a holy life, but Jesus would be without sin.  David ruled as a secular king in a theocratic manner.  Jesus would not take the secular throne, but He would rule as divine leader, one who would lead people to God, his Father.  Before Jesus could take his rightful place as the Messiah in the Jewish community, John the Baptist's ministry was to precede him.  Before the coming of Jesus, John preached repentance and baptism to all the people of Israel.  The Jews everywhere knew the ministry of John, a call for the Israelites to repent of their sins.  Jews from from Israel and other countries came to John to be baptized for the remission of their sins.  This period of confession of the Jewish people was a necessary step to the introduction of Jesus.  John came baptizing in water sensitizing people to their need for repentance, but Jesus would baptize with fire.  “I baptize you with water.  But one who is more powerful than I will come, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.  He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.  (Luke 3:16)  John’s baptism reveals the people’s desire to be right with God, but Jesus will baptize with fire, purifying the soul within.  No longer will people serve God just outwardly, but now inwardly.  This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel after that time, declares the Lord.  I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts.  I will be their God, and they will be my people.  (Hebrews 8:10)  Paul is informing the Jews in Pisidian Antioch that the old covenant, which was never truly followed by the Jews has now been replaced by the new covenant that Jesus is Lord and that He will change the inner man from a rebel to being obedient to the will of God from their hearts.  This transition moves from outward obedience to laws, to obedience from the soul, the heart.  It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they did not remain faithful to my covenant, and I turned away from them, declares the Lord.  (Hebrews 8:9)   Paul is introducing the Jews to the promise God had given them from the beginning: one day they would have the Messiah in their midst and he would deliver them from the oppression of the world.  He would be so powerful that even a great, holy man like John the Baptist would not be worthy to even unbuckle the straps on his sandals.  There is one coming after me whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.  Even the most righteous of the people in the Antioch synagogue could not come close to the perfection of the Messiah, Jesus Christ.  By Paul relating the waywardness of the Jewish people even after having supernatural events in their lives, he exposes the Jewish people to the need of a Savior, a righteous mediator between them and God the Father.  

Paul is telling these Jews that the Good News is that the Messiah has come and that He has fulfilled the prophets’ words about him.  Jesus died for the sins of all people, and his salvation has come to the Jew first and then to the rest of the world.  He is recounting the history of the Jews to explain to them their unruly nature and that the law could never make them reliable instruments of the living God.  They failed to hold true to the blessings of Abraham; they gave away their land of Canaan because of idol worshipping.  They willingly followed the gods of the people they were supposed to replace in Canaan.  Their behavior became even worse than their idol worshipping neighbors.  They sacrificed their own children who were gifts from God, who made them prosperous in Egypt because their population grew faster than the Egyptian's population.  Paul is reminding them in this short-hand account of the history of Israel that their recalcitrance and their eventual dispersion to other countries was a result of sin, and that they have needed a savior all throughout their history.  These Jewish synagogue attenders knew their history.  They also understood that the Jewish people have faced discipline by God because of their waywardness to God’s directions and commandments in their lives.  They were very versed in their history because of their pride in their Jewishness, their separation from the Gentile world.  They have longed for the Messiah to come to them and to restore the Jewish people to a place of honor in the world, to throw off the yoke of oppression.  Paul was now giving them the answer to their prayers: for the Messiah to come to them and bring real salvation to them and their people.  And all that hope is locked in the man Jesus, who called himself the Son of man.  Paul in recounting the history of their people was telling them that the Messiah has come and that He will bring the fire to their hearts, changing them from just human beings to eternal beings, new creations.  Jesus said to the Pharisee Nicodemus you must be born again; you must make the transition from an earthly vessel to a heavenly vessel that can live with God for eternity.  As Paul reveals Jesus to these Antioch Jews, he reveals the truth of the new covenant.  Jesus has come to redeem all people from their empty way of living, that which was not successful for their Jewish ancestors.  He has not come with a new way of living or new laws; He has come to all people, shedding his precious blood for the sins of the world, making them right with God for all eternity.  Jesus fulfills every requirement that a holy God has placed on people.  Now these Jewish brethren of Paul, need to believe this fact by faith.  Baptism in water would never save them, obedience to the law would never make them right with God.  Only the likeness of God in them would make them right with God, and that comes through faith, believing in Christ’s work and not the work of the flesh.  We have that same privilege today to place our faith in Christ’s work at the cross, trusting in our eternal salvation because He shed his blood and rose victorious from the grave.  

 

 

Acts 13:14-20 Love One Another!

Acts 13:14-20 From Paphos, Paul and his companions sailed to Perga in Pamphylia, where John left them to return to Jerusalem.  From Perga they went on to Pisidian Antioch.  On the Sabbath they entered the synagogue and sat down.  After the reading from the Law and the Prophets, the leaders of the synagogue sent word to them, saying, “Brothers, if you have a word of exhortation for the people, please speak.”  Standing up, Paul motioned with his hand and said: “Fellow Israelites and you Gentiles who worship God, listen to me!  The God of the people of Israel chose our ancestors; he made the people prosper during their stay in Egypt; with mighty power he led them out of that country; for about forty years he endured their conduct in the wilderness; and he overthrew seven nations in Canaan, giving their land to his people as their inheritance.  All this took about 450 years.

We see in the above focus that Paul, even though called to the Gentiles, was carrying on his ministry in a city where a big contingent of Jewish people lived.  He and Barnabas had first journeyed to the island of Cyprus to minister to Jews.  He now goes to Pisidian Antioch, an important city in the Roman Empire, a city with a thriving Jewish community.  As we see in Paul and Barnabas’ first missionary journey, they are fixed on carrying the Good News to their fellow Jewish brethren.  After all, for them, Jesus Christ came to the Jews through the womb of Mary, and He ministered primarily in the Jewish country of Israel.  Therefore, his brethren should be the first to know about the Messiah coming to redeem the world from sin and destruction.  Paul moves away from Cyprus to go to Pisidian Antioch, a harrowing, difficult journey; first sailing 200 miles from Cyprus to Perga, which is located on the coast of present day Turkey.  Then he and Barnabas, without Mark, go to Pisidian Antioch, a 300 mile arduous journey inland through the Taurus Mountains to speak to the Antioch Jews.  Paul, in his sermonette to the Jewish community in their synagogue, begins his talk to them by telling them how they became prosperous in their 40 years of slavery in the country of Egypt.  This prosperity could be described in three ways: their population was growing faster that the Egyptian population, they were exposed to a civilization much more advanced than their shepherding lifestyle, and finally they left Egypt with the gold and silver and finery of the Egyptian people.  Through their wilderness travels, they were carrying with them the luxury of the Egyptian society, which also included idols and images of other gods to worship.  These gods of Egypt that they carried with them caused much trouble for the Chosen.  Even though they knew Moses’ God, the I AM, had delivered them from Pharaoh’s hands with mighty power and that he led them out of that country, they were a stubborn people.  God endured their rebellious nature all the way through their forty years in the wilderness.  The Israelites clung to the Egyptian gods.  This weakness manifested itself when Moses went up Mount Sinai to receive the law, the full revelation of the I Am, they immediately fell into open idol worship because Moses was absent from them.  Aaron made them an Egyptian idol in the form of a golden calf to worship.  God disciplined them for that behavior, but He still had to put up with their recalcitrant, rebellious nature for forty years in the wilderness.  Even though God had chosen these particular Semites, the descendants of Abraham, as his own, they resisted God’s authority over them.  Nevertheless, only Jacob’s descendants would be God’s chosen, when they went into Egypt.  The family of Jacob consisted of sixty-six people.  When they left Egypt, they numbered in the hundreds of thousands.

The Israelites original father was Abraham.  Abraham, their patriarch, was raised in an idol worshipping environment; however, he came to know the I AM, Jehovah God, the creator of all things.  God because of his grace came to Abraham, spoke to him about his future and the future of his descendants through dreams and visions.  In these supernatural experiences, God promised Abram that his barren wife would have a son and that the land of Canaan would be his inheritance.  He told Abram not  to be afraid for He would be Abram’s shield in life and his great reward.  However, He showed Abram that his descendants would experience slavery for four hundred years.  “Know for certain that for four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and that they will be enslaved and mistreated there.  But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions.  (Genesis 15:13-14)  Paul begins at this point in his talk to the Antioch Jews to remind them of their history that they were birthed out of slavery as a free people, a special people who because of Abraham’s faith have obtained God’s favor.  Sounds somewhat contradictory, for they are ordained to go into slavery, but Esau, a descendant of Abraham through the loins of Isaac, lives free in the hill country of Seir, but Jacob’s descendants find slavery as their inheritance.  We know Ishmael, from the seed of Abraham, also lived free in the area east of the Red Sea: from Havilah to Shur.  (Genesis 25:18)   Now Paul’s ministry is directed primarily to the seed of Jacob, not to the other Semites born from Ishmael and Esau or to the Greeks and Romans.  We see Paul on the Sabbath talking to his fellow Jews, even though Abraham’s promise from God was that he would be the father of many nations, many people.  Abraham’s choice of believing God’s words to him that he experienced in dreams and visions was more real than any idol worshipping.  His stance of believing God’s words to him was called faith.  God counted Abraham’s willingness to believe what he heard from God as righteousness or right standing with God.  Abraham affirmatively believed God would give Sarah a son and that he would receive Canaan as his own.  This strong belief of Abraham made God his friend.  Jehovah became Abraham’s great reward.  Abraham and his descendants would always have God with them.  We see in this transition of Abraham, the idol worshipper to a follower of the Creator, the hand of God’s grace towards him.  The Holy Spirit was intricately involved with Abraham’s decision to know God.  This activity of the Holy Spirit’s involvement with the thinking of men is illustrated when Peter said to Christ, you are the Son of God, the Messiah.  Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”  (Matthew 16:16)  His affirmation of Jesus as the Son of God originated with the Holy Spirit.  Abraham’s willingness to believe what he dreamed and saw in visions was God’s work in him, not his fleshly mind or intellect.  Both Peter and Abraham sinned later in their lives, but God did not count that as unrighteousness, for they knew God by faith.  The faith in God in both instances came before the real act of circumcision.  Circumcision has nothing to do with holiness; it is but a confirmation that you are now God’s child.  But real circumcision is not an outward show, but an inward work of God.  Peter went on and experienced the infilling of the Holy Spirit, an inward work of God, not just an affirmation that Christ is the Son of God.  An inward work makes a new specie, a born-again specie that can inherit eternal life. 

Paul in presenting the Good News to these synagogue attenders was acting as a surgeon.   He was attempting to surgically removed the law as the standard of salvation for these Jews and replace it with faith in the works of Jesus and in his resurrection.  For the Jews, accepting the law and living up to its obligation was the standard of holiness, for them there was no other way to serve God or to please the God of creation.  Now Paul is setting before them THE WAY to know God, and it comes only through faith in God’s Son’s work on the cross.  This is a hard transition for the Jews, for anything other than obeying the law throws them into the abyss of eternal darkness.  Paul ends his talk to them with this statement: Therefore, my friends, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you.  Through him everyone who believes is set free from every sin, a justification you were not able to obtain under the law of Moses.  (Acts 13:38-39)  This is a monumental change in the Jewish belief system.  How could one man’s life in their time bring a place of righteousness in their lives?   How could they throw away hundreds of years of Jews believing in the efficacy of the law?  For Paul his 500 mile journey from Cyprus to them was so representative of his commitment that he would endure anything and everything to tell his fellow Jews the Good News, that Jesus saves, that the Messiah has come to the world for them and all people.  Paul understood well that Abraham’s blessing was for the future.  He understood the Seed of Abraham would be carried down to Mary, the mother of Jesus.  Jesus the Christ is the fulfillment of all the promises made to Abraham, the man of faith.  Through Jesus all nations will be blessed, new births will happen, new creations, born in the likeness of God will come to earth, and a new land, God’s kingdom, will come to all people.  Jesus fulfilled every revelation of God through the law.  Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.  For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.  (Matthew 5:17-18)  What should the law accomplish?  To make men and women right before God.  Jesus fulfilled every jot and tittle of the law.  He completed the work God required of men and women to be right with him.  Therefore, to know God we place our faith IN THE WORKS OF CHRIST, or we are covered with his blood, the final and only sacrifice that is pleasing to a holy God.  Paul in this breakfast focus is at the beginning of convincing his Jewish brethren to place their faith in the works of Jesus—a challenge that is still going on today.  Will the Jews transition from believing the law is the only way to God?  Will the Gentiles believe this Jewish man, Jesus, is the path to knowing the Creator of all things?  This is the challenge of all Christians within the world today.  How can the world know that this Good News is the way to an eternal God?  By the Christians' love they will know the truth of Christ.  A new command I give you: Love one another.  As I have loved you, so you must love one another.  By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”  (John 13:34-35)  Only the new specie: the born-again, can love as God desires.  Old men and women will be critical of others and judge others, harm others, but new creatures will love as God loves.  Faith in God requires love.  The question for us breakfast companions: do you love freely or is your love only for those you think deserve love?  Paul and Barnabas traveled 500 miles to tell the people in Pisidian Antioch that God’s instrument of love, Jesus Christ, has come to them.  Such a love drove them to Antioch to deliver the Jews of that city from sin and death.  Amen!   Where does God want you to take the salvation message today?  Where is your Antioch?