Be Aware — Acts 13-18

0:00 Very good to be back. I was praying with a man last Saturday, that would be two Saturdays ago, who was on his way to Erie to speak while I was in Cleveland last week. So I didn't get to see him. I would have wanted to, but I see him frequently, so I was also happy to be here. So he he called me on the phone.

0:34 He said, can we pray on the phone? Absolutely. Why not? Can't be in person, but we can pray on the phone. And so he prayed for me, and he prayed words, and I might not get it exact, but he said, Lord, open your word so that the saints in Cleveland would not just be informed, but they would also be transformed.

1:12 Oh, I like that. I like that, that you don't read your bible just to get information. Now you do, sometimes, and it might feel like we do it a lot of times. But if that is all we do, we just want more information, Then perhaps we've already set ourselves aside from the transforming work of the Holy Spirit. As he said through Paul to the church at Rome, you need to not be molded to the world, you need to be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

1:53 We have to change the way we think. We have to change the values that the world has given us to embrace. That comes by the Holy Spirit of God applying scripture, applying what he said to each and every one of us as individuals. And it's hard to have your values changed. I know that.

2:23 I know that the parents give them to you who got them from their parents or society does or the current culture does. They have values. What? By that I mean what you should value. Usually, they're contrary to scripture.

2:40 And it will take the sharp two edged sword of God's word to cut those out of our lives, to open our eyes to see that we are embracing the world. Now, there is no more apt passage of scripture than the seventeenth chapter of the book of Acts. That is our passage that we endeavor to look at today. As I was singing that song, you are the one we bow down to, you are the one we adore, beautiful words, we would add these words, and I trust you would pray with me these words. You are our head.

3:30 You are the one we endeavor to honor as head. You are our shepherd. You are the one we endeavor to follow with every step that you give us on earth. That's our prayer. That's our prayer for our time in his word.

3:53 That's our prayer as believers. We need to learn how to follow. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your word. Thank you, Lord, for your son, the Lord Jesus Christ, the word that became flesh and dwelt among us.

4:12 We thank you that your spirit has been sealed into us. He is a sign of of you possessing us, that which is a guarantee that we belong to you. And yet, Lord, we would acknowledge that we struggle to be filled with him at all times and to be led by him. And we would acknowledge also that we would love more information. What we need, Lord, is transformation.

4:45 So we commit our time, a short few minutes we have together in this chapter of acts to you. Details that are rich, details you've intended for that transforming work of your spirit. And we pray in Christ's name. Amen. Pop quiz.

5:39 That's probably Antioch and Syria. And then they go up to the Taurus Mountains and they get up there and where it says Istanbul, below that is Bursa. That's Mycea, where they were said, you can't go. So they dropped down to the coast and then went to Philippi, and then over to Thessalonica, and then to Bria, and then now 17, one, Paul's in Athens. Thank you.

6:08 That's not really a quiz. Right? I was going to have somebody come up and have them show me every place they've been, but you won't recognize those names. They're not Bible names, some of them. But I would seriously suggest this to you.

6:29 If you're seriously studying the book of Acts, not just attending to a family bible where it happens to be a study in the book of Acts. That's one thing. And I know that some of you are probably doing that because you have your own study outside of the family bible, which is great. But should it be the book of Acts? And I highly recommend you find somewhere online, and I can give you several, that will show you where in the book of Acts each of the epistles were written.

7:03 Why do I say that? Because I've told you several times the book of Acts does not have the word love in it. It is astonishing to me that the whole church was born and grew up to that point in Acts where it closes probably in the mid sixties, right, under Nero's rule as emperor, that there's no mention of love. It's unheard of. We we would not want to boast about that, that the churches were built without a message of love.

7:39 Love is that. We need it. I agree. I'm not I'm not diminishing it. I'm saying you won't find the word mentioned.

7:49 But if you would go to Paul's first letter, his first letter. Now, James wrote before Paul his epistle. Paul wrote first to the churches in the Galatia region, and he probably wrote before he started his second trip. Now think about one of the great verses that... Galatians that talk about the love of God.

8:20 I'll just give you one. I'm crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, yet not I. But it's Christ who lives in me. In the life that I now live, I live by faith in the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.

8:45 You see, he didn't wait long to express and to explain and to proclaim and detail all that God's love is to the individual churches where he's been, and it is a necessary truth. But you would do well in your private reading, maybe before each Sunday, to find out where Paul is in our study and what's he writing, and who's he writing to and why is he writing it. And you'll see the New Testament unfold. Okay? Because one of the issues that I've always had was the continuation verse of Acts two forty two.

9:32 If you continue in the apostles' doctrine, alright, continue means one step at a time. So I'm going take a step, now I'm going to continue, I'm going to take another step, and I'm going to take another step. So I have my hand up, Lord. I'm asking you, what is the outline of the Apostles' doctrine? Show it to me, because I want to make disciples, and I want to be a disciple, and I want to know what's next that I should be doing.

10:00 What's next I should be focusing on? So show me the outline of the Apostles' Doctrine. And I'm therefore convinced that it unfolded. As events happened, things were documented, things were written down, letters needed to be written, the spirit of God needed to address it in letter form. And the Latin phrase, verbavalent, scripta manant, simply means man's words fly away.

10:31 Written words, they last forever. And that's how we treat God's word, lasts forever. Not one punctuation mark will leave it. It will endure forever. That's the solidness of the word of God.

11:13 Now I say that because that's how the seventh chapter start, or the seventeenth chapter verse 16 starts. If you turn your Bibles to Acts 17 verse 16. What is the bang? This? If I keep touching it?

11:30 Yeah? Okay. Verse 16 of Acts 17 then. While Paul was waiting for them in Athens. We'll just stop there.

11:41 I mean, I'm I'm not trying to read through all this and then go back and read it again. I'm I'm just going to emphasize a few words. He's waiting in Athens. He was taken to Athens after he had a similar experience in Berea, where the crowd of homeless, jobless people who agitated followed him from Thessalonica to Berea. And he left Berea and was taken to the coast and then sent down to Athens.

12:14 And the problem I presented to you last week was technically, right at this point, he's not where God called him to be. The vision was to go to Macedonia. Once he left Berea, he's out of Macedonia. He's in Achaia. He's not where God told him to go at that time.

12:34 And that's a struggle that we have as Christians. Alright? To suddenly realize, this am I still doing what God wants me to be doing? Am I still where God wants me to be? All kind of questions that Paul could have at this point.

12:51 Think of how the mission trip started at the end of chapter 15. Way back in 15. The mission trip started with saying to Barnabas, let's go back and visit all the churches that we planted in the Galatia region. And the very first problem, Barnabas isn't gone. I mean, that that would stop a normal person right there.

13:19 Barnabas, you're not gone? I said, let us go back. Us, us, me and you. Barnabas, I'm not going. I'm not going.

13:30 And God had already sent Silas back with them after delivering the gifts. And so, in dealing with the argument in the church in Jerusalem about circumcision, and so here's Silas now standing there ready. God had provided somebody to replace Barnabas. Because God already knew that Barnabas wasn't going to go. And so Barnabas takes John Mark, who was the center of the controversy, and goes back to Cyprus.

13:59 And the church at Antioch commends Paul and Silas to go on the second trip. They commend him. You would think that's spirit led. I would. I would not question the work of the spirit there as he started in the thirteenth chapter, the spirit of God said, separate unto me Paul and Barnabas for the work whereunto I have called them.

14:21 As they were praying together with three other brothers. So it was under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Right? And so, boom, that happens. Do we follow that pattern?

14:32 Well, we try. We're not real good at it, but we try. Alright? We do our best. Alright?

14:40 And I know I was a commended worker. I went out from Erie to the Far East. I know what it was like to sit in front of brothers and say, The Lord's telling me to do something. Right? So they go, and before you know it, visiting the churches in Galatia, there in the sixteenth chapter, suddenly the spirit of God stops them.

15:18 So they sail up to Europe and go to Philippi. Meet a man? First, meet a woman. You know, can you imagine, this isn't right. Something's not right.

15:33 God showed me a man, call me, but I'm dealing with a woman who's a prophet. She's not even Jewish. You see, but Paul being led by the spirit of God, being sensitive to his leading, understanding God's purposes and introducing things into his life that he is not prepared for. He easily could have said, hold on, I'm checking out, this is not right. I came to see a man.

15:59 He saw a man in prison. Right? Absolutely. And so because he's available, he makes himself available to what's next without any self will. Without self assistance.

16:19 I'm going insist that it can't be this because it should have been that. That's not what I want to do. I want to do this instead. Because he surrendered to Christ. He's allowing the spirit of God to occupy him, to direct him, to use circumstances to adjust.

16:40 What's next? They leave Philippi, go to Thessalonica, great time except for they get driven out. Not by the people who accepted them, by people who were jealous. And so now, there's a brother in Thessalonica, Jason, who has to post bond. That bond probably included.

17:05 You can never have this guy back to your house. If so, you'll go to prison. So now, Paul has to be occupied with how Jason is doing. They leave Thessalonica, get to Berea, similar things happen. People followed and they chased them.

17:23 Now they're in Athens. Now this word, this word. Paul was waiting for them. For who? For the workers you left behind.

17:35 And you even send some probably back to Thessalonica to see if conditions change because Paul knows he's not at Macedonia. He knows he's in Achaia. He knows where he's at. So he's waiting. He could have just said, he didn't have to say he was waiting.

17:55 The spirit of God didn't have to include that word to give us a description of what was Paul doing. Was he immediately preaching again? No, he was waiting. And I came home from China. I thought I was going back.

18:12 I thought I was going back. I thought Premier Dang had a good grip on letting us in. It changed. Suddenly, foreigners weren't welcome. Right?

18:26 I spent a year, maybe two, maybe three, thinking about nothing but the Chinese that I left behind when I was in America. So I could look out and see people, I'm not thinking about you, I'm thinking about Chinese. I know what it's like to be concerned about what you were doing before God redirected you. Here, God's redirected them. He has to process that.

18:55 When he gets to Corinth, he writes back to Thessalonica, and you want to read two powerful letters. And he writes them back in quick succession, maybe thirty days apart, forty days apart, because his heart is overflowing to the work in Jason's house, to the work that's going on. His heart is still there, and yet he's sitting in Athens waiting. Waiting. Waiting for news, waiting for them to catch up, waiting for more guidance, waiting for direction.

19:39 No. I'm not saying do that, as we'll see Paul didn't. He's waiting in Athens for something. I suggested a few possibilities. I can't tell you that's what he's waiting for, for sure.

19:54 But based on his letters back, he eventually says in his first letter to Thessalonians, Satan stopped us from coming back. Wow, that's a powerful statement. First Thessalonians, I think chapter two. Satan stopped us. And the mechanism he used to stop us is a word that means we were on a road, and he suddenly dug a big chasm that we can't get over.

20:21 Satan prevented us. That's a confession of what? That Satan had the victory or God's timing has changed? You see, where God's timing has changed. Yes, Satan thought he had the victory when he had Pilate say, crucify him.

20:39 Didn't he? We got him. Crucify him. Satan thought it. And we know Thessalonica became a very powerful Christian church.

20:48 You know that. You know that in three eighty AD there was the Edict of Thessalonica where the emperor Theodosius said there can be no mixture of Arians and Christian doctrine. That we have the Nicene Creed. That is God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, co equal, co eternal, what we call the Trinity. Arians said, no, God made his son.

21:12 He's not God himself. Theodosus, three eighty AD, stationed in Thessalonica because he was sick and recovering, called two people together in both ends of the Roman Empire and said, We're going to pass an edict. You can't believe that anymore. Thessalonica was a powerful church. It was used in God in history.

21:33 Alright? Even though we don't see that in this chapter. So, waiting in Athens, going back to verse 16, he was greatly distressed to see the city was full of idols. Yeah. You know that word distressed?

21:56 Only used twice in the New Testament. Excuse me. I don't need a mason to give me a glass of hot water, please. Yeah, you. You're the only mason I know.

22:10 Warm water. It doesn't have to be steaming, just warm. So the only other word this word distresses uses, guess where? The letter he wrote to Corinth, the second letter, or the first letter he wrote to Corinth in the thirteenth chapter when he's talking about how beautiful love is. And he says this, Love is not easily distressed.

22:34 It's not easily angered. Oh, hold it. You seem easily angered here by what you see. And now you're going to write a whole letter that says love isn't that? Don't you love the Athenians?

22:46 Easy question. Easy question. Hard to manage, maybe? Not not really hard. But he's not talking about a person.

22:59 He's talking about idolatry. He's talking about being distressed by idolatry. Remember last week, I asked you, what do you bow down to? What do you bow down to? Now, you might not even know or willing to admit what you bow down to, but Jesus Christ does.

23:18 You can't fool them. You can't fool them who you're chasing on this planet. You can't fool them. You can't fool them. Doctor Ramsey, the archaeologist, has three great books out.

23:35 One is Paul the Traveler. He writes in this about Paul here. This is extraordinary versatility of Paul's character. I love that phrase. The extraordinary versatility of Paul's character.

23:48 He's so versatile that he's sitting in Athens, which is the college center of the world. The education, the history, I mean, long gone what it was at one time since the Romans conquered it, put it in its place. It's not even the capital of Achaea. Corinth is. Right?

24:10 But it's still the center of learning. I mean, of the Caesars were sent there for education. Some of the scholars from Athens were sent to Rome to teach their kids. I mean, it is the center of education. You know that.

24:24 We have so much in our culture that come from the Greeks, in case you didn't know. Thank you, Mason. Not cold, but still rewards for you. You said warm water. I know.

24:38 I'm just saying it's not cold, but still rewards for you. Just using the scripture that if you can offer a cup of cold water. But this is Paul who's saying what? He's saying what he wrote to the church at Corinth also. I've become all things to all men.

24:56 Why? That by all means some might be saved. To the Jew, became a Jew. To the Greek, I became a Greek. This is Paul sitting there having been raised in Tarsus, which is part of a Jewish province of Cilicia, by which he was considered a Roman citizen that he'll use in chapters to come.

25:17 This is him saying, right, I can think like them. Therefore, I can engage them. I can engage them. And the city was wholly given to idolatry. One of Nero's close officers said, you could find a god in Athens before you can find a man.

25:37 There's so many statues. They're all over. Right? So, verse 17, he reasoned in the synagogue with both Jews and God fearing Greeks, as well as in the marketplace day by day with those who happened to be there. Great that he didn't have a select audience, he was just talking to anybody.

26:28 I'm sure you heard of Stoics. People are Stoics. Some of the Caesars are Stoics because they learned that from the Greeks and the leading Greek about it was Zeno and I could give you all the history about that, but I would not bore you nor would I have occupy your time thinking about Zeno or Epicurus himself, who started Epicureanism. Just know this, by this point in history, most of the huge philosophies and philosophers of Greece are gone. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Zeno, Xenophon, all of them are gone.

27:04 And these are the two groups that remain, and they are diabolically opposed. And they also, in my opinion, they represent... I don't need any Greek to tell me that I'm a proud person. And I don't need a Greek philosopher to tell me what it means to pleasure myself. He just gave them names.

27:26 Those are the issues of our bodies. First John chapter two. All that's in this world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, they're not of God. They're not, they're of this world. That's being a stoic?

27:52 Everything based on your ability to endorse in a proud way, being a fatalist, an epicurean. And that is just pleasure, pleasure, lust of the flesh, lust of eyes, lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes. And then you add the pride of life. I'm having a blast. It's so great here.

28:10 Right? These are not that distant concepts. Don't think that you have to be a member of a stoic society to be and practice stoicism. Fatalism was one of their key ingredients. Ever hear the phrase, it is what it is?

28:41 That's stoicism. Nothing I can do about it. It is what it is. You don't know God, do you? You say that.

28:49 You don't know God. Right? And as we are left in the world to engage the world in the gospel, We have a lot of opposition, and when we deal with that opposition sometimes in a in a... Well, that's just faith. That that...

29:06 You know, that's just faith. That's just how it is. Nothing we can do about it. It is what it is. The church is probably filled with more stoicism and epicureanism than you know.

29:22 The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life. They're not of the father, they're of the world. They took him and brought him to the Europagus. Well, you know, Mars Hill, where Socrates was sentenced. We want to know what new teaching this is you're presenting.

29:43 You're bringing some strange ideas to our ears, and we would like to know what they mean. For all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there spent their time doing nothing but talking about and listening to the latest ideas. Yeah, that was a city full of podcasts. You know how many Christians get their theology from podcasts? And TikTok, TikTok lawyer, TikTok Christians.

30:06 You know, here's two minutes of wonder. I'm glad I'm my age. I really am. I'm glad I'm my age. Right?

30:32 Now we see the spirit of God doing what? He's got a purpose for being there. Suddenly shift, you know, suddenly, you know what? I was so angry I couldn't let this go that this city is so full of idols, now I'm in a conversation. You're bringing me to the same hill that Socrates was in Stirapagos and you only come here to discuss serious things and so you got me here because I told you the truth and so here I am and guess what?

30:56 I'm standing up to talk to you. You ever go over to Crocker Park? Is it a park or it's Crocker Mall? Crocker Park. Park?

31:06 I've been there when it's like really crowded. I don't know if it's still like that. Did you ever just get upset that people are so busy with their whole world? Your fellow Cleveland Westlakeians? Slow down.

31:23 I want to tell you something important. He stood up. And I'm not talking about a man standing up for the first time at the Lord's Supper, which they should do anyway under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Every man should stand up, and if I had it my way for at least a year, it would just be alphabetical order. But I'm clear, there's no doubt in my mind that's not the Holy Spirit, but that's how I would arrange it.

31:49 It's your turn, get up. Right? No, I wouldn't do that really. But sometimes you just, it's the same three. And what, are their initials together or what?

31:57 No, but that's the work of the Spirit to stand people. This is the work of the Spirit of God. And Paul suddenly realized, I've been waiting here thinking about Thessalonica, I've got to tell these people, the people in front of me. I've got to stand up. I've got to take account.

32:14 I've got to show myself. I've got to be identified. I've got to take a step. I got to take a stance. I got to stand up.

32:24 And he did it passionately. He already knows how he feels. And all we have to add to that is the Holy Spirit power. The power of the Holy Spirit living in him. That's what he needs.

32:37 He needs to get up and deliver a message. So here it is. Starting at verse 23. As I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I found an altar, even this inscription, to the unknown God. So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship, and this is what I'm going to proclaim to you.

33:01 How perfect of an intro, of a message. Because even though Paul said in Philippians, everything I am, I lay down. It's but dung to me. It's refuse. Everything I was raised to be, I consider it a waste in comparison to knowing Christ.

33:23 And every time he tried to lay it down, God himself found a way to use it to speak to the nations. Yes, he laid it down. But God said, no, you pick it up again. Because you know some of these people that we're talking about. You know Epimenides.

33:41 You know Eratostes. You know the poets he's quoting. You know the story of the unknown god, you know all that because you were taught that in Tarsus by the Greeks. And there's wonderful history to that. I'm not going to explain that to you now.

34:00 This is Crocker Park. This is everybody walking there looking to spend, drop at least 4 or $500 on that top of the line stuff. It's somebody who's got a different God in their life because they're living on excess. That's their god, to be able to spend their money like that. You don't have to ask what the name is.

34:25 Chasing after what? Another thrill? Yeah, our our our country is goofy because of how much money we spend on recreation, on fun, on toys, on food. You don't have to go far. This is what I want to proclaim to you, the God you don't even know is a name, but you're like Pascoe.

34:49 You know Pascoe's wager? He said there's four conclusions to this belief stuff. You believe in God and God exists, so you're better. You believe in God and God doesn't exist, so it doesn't matter. You don't believe in God and he does exist, so you're a jam.

35:03 You don't believe in God doesn't exist, doesn't matter. Be the first one. Just in case he exists, I'm going to believe. We're going to name a... We're going to have a statue just in case there's a God we don't know his name?

35:19 Yeah, because we don't want to offend him. If he does exist, we don't want to offend him and therefore lose out the blessing of his presence or power or whatever he's going to give us for acknowledging that he's a god. That's the goofiness of the Athenians. That's culture like Paul says to the Church of Rome. They professed themselves to be wise.

35:40 They became fools. Right? And all this is taking place at the Aeropagus. I mean, they're looking up at a hill that's the Acropolis, the Parthenon, and all those huge, wonderful places of Athens. This is where this conversation's taking place.

36:35 You were born in the right street. God had appointed you to be born on a certain place in a certain city. That's his purposes. He knows. He's delivered you here.

36:53 For what reason? He did so, verse 27, so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. For in him, we live and move and have our being. That's another poet, Greek poem quote. As some of your own poets have said, we are his offspring.

37:19 And therefore, since we are God's offspring, we should not think that God, that the divine being is like gold and silver or stone, an image made by human design and skill. And now the great, great gospel. Verse 30. In the past, God overlooked all this. He overlooked it.

37:45 Have you, has God himself ever communicated that to you? You've lived how many years? I just want you to know. You fumbled, you fumbled, you fumbled, you failed, you failed. You're selfish.

37:58 You sought this, you sought this. But I want you to know. I want you to know. Doug Torr, I want you to know. I overlooked all that.

38:07 If God can overlook all your past, he can just say, I'm not looking at that, I'm overlooking that. I'm overlooking all your failure, all your insistence, all your self will, all the lust of your eyes, the pride of life. I'm overlooking all that. Because you did it ignorance. You're ignorant.

38:29 You didn't know better. A merciful God. Don't we know that Paul declares to the church of Rome in the second chapter, it's God's goodness that brings you to the point of repentance. That I can turn around? Yeah.

38:49 God commands everybody, everywhere to turn around. Verse 30. Did you ever hear such a good news? Everything you've done is overlooked. But repent.

39:05 Turn around. And I've used this passage to preach the gospel in multiple continents. Then I realized, you know what? How many Christians right now, even in this room, aren't and know they're not right with the Lord? You know you're saved, but you're not right with the Lord because you know you're not walking with him.

39:29 You know that. I don't know that. I can't look out there and say, well, let me pick out who's not walking with the Lord. But in a group this big, there has to be some, especially people, you know, that are younger, under the age of 70 maybe, or 60. They're just not walking with the Lord.

39:46 And I get that because I didn't always either. I was selfish, self willed, self determined. I'm going. Did you ever think about why God wrote to the second, his second letter to Corinth in the fifth chapter? What's he say in the fifth chapter?

40:02 To a church, to Christians, to those he already identified as those who are redeemed, those who are sanctified, those who belong to Christ. You know what he says? I'm begging you, in the fifth chapter. I'm begging you, be reconciled to God. And not one of them said, what do you mean reconciled?

40:20 I've already been saved. I don't need to be reconciled. I've been reconciled once. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's position.

40:29 I'm talking about your condition. The condition you sit in here this morning. God has overlooked everything you've ever done, but turn around. Turn around. Go towards him.

40:47 Walk in the spirit. Learn to be sensitive to the spirit of God in you, sealed there by God himself for the purpose of giving you the power to be an overcomer on this planet. Giving you a voice, giving you power to stand up in situations, say, hold it, hold it, I got something I need to say. I got something I need to say Crocker Park. And I don't know if you go to Crocker Park or not.

41:14 I know some of you brothers went all over Cleveland and preached on the streets. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. Couldn't do it enough. Couldn't do enough.

41:26 He had already said in the fourteenth chapter in the past, God let all nations go their own way. Did you ever sense that for yourself? How gracious God is to let you go your own way when you say, nah, don't want to go there, I'm going this way. And we turn around and say, you're still with me, right? Because you promised never to leave me, so come on, let's go.

41:42 And you're inviting the Lord to go with you because he promised he'd never leave you. But you're not even close to following the Lord. You don't even want to. You know his clear instructions and you're saying no, I want you to follow me instead. And hallelujah that you never leave me nor forsake me.

41:56 That assurance just means a lot to me. Okay, That's contempt. That is Christian contempt. God has overlooked everything you've done. Turn around and go towards him.

42:13 God has overlooked everything you are. Turn around. Go towards him. Go towards him. Right?

42:21 Those days are over. It's his goodness that brought you to the point of repentance. Repentance is not just a gospel message. It's an everyday message. Brothers and sisters, what do I have to turn from today, Lord, or else I'll end up being myself?

42:38 Which is death and destruction. One more word. Promise. Just one more. Verse 32.

42:54 No. Verse thirty one and thirty two. The command to repent is based on what? Because he set a day when he's gonna judge the world. He's gonna judge the world with justice by the man who he has appointed, and he has given proof this to everyone by raising him from the dead.

43:13 See the resurrection of Christ, we celebrate Easter once a year. That's proof that he's going to judge the world. He's going to judge the world by that man. Which is what caused him to react so negatively. Because that was a word that was used only by one poet, Aeschylus, and it was said of Zeus who said nobody can come back to life.

43:36 And that word is used by Paul because being who he was, and he could say that word and every Athenian knew exactly who he was quoting and knew exactly what he meant. And so, therefore, some of them sneered, verse 36. But others, we wanna hear you again. Paul left the council. Some followers of Paul believed others, and some were Dionysus and Derek Demeris and a number of others.

44:05 Now, how long was he in Athens? Setting Jeremy up here. Right? Could be up... Some say he could have been there for at least three months before he finally decided to go to Corinth.

44:21 I don't know. But it's not a day. It's not a day. He's heading west to Corinth. That's the eighteenth chapter.

44:41 I do have one more announcement. Jesus Christ is coming back. The king is coming. Get ready. The king is coming.

44:52 Let's close in prayer. Father, we thank you for your son. We thank you that you've given us details that we can learn from. Our prayer, Lord, is what we started with. Transform us.

45:05 Make us more like your son, more usable, Lord, to you and your purposes here in Wesley. We commend ourselves to you for that. Giving you thanks for your son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.