Study the Word

Guest (Male): Pastor Thom Keller on how the Lord often uses the gift of prophecy in our day and age.

Pastor Thom Keller: How many of you have ever been someplace where you heard somebody speaking, and as they're speaking, you say, "That's me. He's talking about me." Maybe it was a message on the radio. Maybe Charles Stanley. It was like he was speaking to me. It's very interesting.

But how many have had that happen? That's this work of prophecy where God, through his Spirit, gives a message to somebody. They very well have no idea it's directed at you or they're even directing it at anybody. It's just the way the Spirit works to make manifest the secrets of our heart. And that most times takes place in the course of preaching or teaching.

Guest (Male): Welcome to our broadcast today. This is Study the Word, and we'll return to Pastor Thom Keller in a second. Today, Tom will continue his series through the book of Acts. As we delve into chapter 13 today, we'll witness Paul and Barnabas as they embark on their first missionary journey.

In these verses, we also get a great description of ministry to and for the Lord. Every Christian is a minister and missionary. And so let's allow the Lord to speak to our own lives about our own missionary quest.

Pastor Thom Keller: We're in Acts, as I said, we're in Acts chapter 13. To give a little bit of background, again, for some of you, this whole Bible thing is really brand new. To give a little insight on the whole Bible, the Bible is divided into the Old Testament and the New Testament. The New Testament is only about this much of the whole Bible, right there. And this is the Old.

The first part is the Old. A lot of people start reading their Bibles and they start in the very beginning, which is Genesis. It's a better idea to start in Matthew because Matthew is where you learn about Jesus, the four Gospels. But the way it works out on a timeline is the Old Testament creation took place about 4,000 years before Christ, roughly.

All of these dates that I'm going to give you are within 50 years, which is as close as they can surmise. 4,000 years BC, Abraham was the founder, really the father of the Jewish race and also the Muslim as well; they claim him as their father too. But he came along in 2,000 BC. So creation 4,000 BC, 2,000 BC came Abraham, and then David came at about 1,000 BC. All of those taking place at those very close to those even thousand-year increments.

And then Jesus comes along. Again, they surmise around 4 BC to 29 AD he lived, and he was crucified in 29 AD. That's where the New Testament picks up. The New Testament picks up with the story, the life of Jesus: his birth, his life, his death, and his resurrection. Those stories are contained in the Gospels. The first four books of the New Testament—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John—are known as the Gospels, the good news of Jesus.

So that's the beginning of the New Testament. The book that follows the Gospels is the book of Acts, which is known as the Acts of the Apostles. It's really the story of the first-century church. After Jesus was crucified and resurrected, it's a story of how the church took off from that point.

Acts begins then where the Gospels left off, about 29 AD, and it goes on to about 67 AD when Paul is in Rome awaiting trial in prison. So the book of Acts is a period of about 38 years. And today in Acts 13, we are just about in the middle of that 38-year period. This is about something 14 or 15 years in.

The last story, by the way, the last book in the Bible is the book of Revelation. That's the last book date-wise that was written. That was written by John the Apostle while he was on the island of Patmos, written somewhere between 96 and 100 AD. So the New Testament then would go from about 4 BC in that range to 100 AD.

The Old Testament goes from 4,000 BC up until about 400 years before the time of Christ because there's a 400-year period there that's silent. As we said about Acts in the beginning, it was written by Luke. Luke was a physician; he goes into great detail. Many people believe that the book of Acts was really written as a defense by Luke for Paul as he was awaiting trial.

It was going to be used in his defense before Caesar when he appeared before him. It's called the Acts of the Apostles, but as we go into this, from this point forward there's very little of the other apostles mentioned anymore. There are little vignettes here and there, but from this point forward almost the entire book of Acts will be about Paul primarily, the Apostle Paul.

So let's get started. Acts 13. "Among the prophets and teachers of the church at Antioch of Syria were Barnabas, Simeon called the black man, Lucius from Cyrene, Manaen, the childhood companion of King Herod Antipas, and Saul. One day as these men were worshipping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, 'Dedicate Barnabas and Saul for the special work I have for them.' So after more fasting and prayer, the men laid their hands on them, sent them on their way."

Most of Acts from this point forward is going to center around Antioch. The center now moves from Jerusalem to Antioch. The reason is that Antioch becomes really the center for the Gentile Christians. It's where Paul is sent out from on his first missionary journey which we're going to be looking at.

It is the hub of Gentile Christianity. In fact, in chapter 15, if you remember this, it's from Antioch that Paul and Barnabas journey back to Jerusalem to ask the apostles about this issue of legalism, these Judaizers that are trying to get these Gentile Christians all tied up in Jewish law. That happens in Antioch and they go back to Jerusalem and convene with the apostles there asking them that question. It's easy to miss it, but when you read through Acts from this point forward, look how many times the location is in Antioch. It really becomes the center.

Now it says here that there were prophets and teachers. We want to park here a little bit and just look at this because this is going to come up throughout the book of Acts. Let's just deal with it here and have an understanding. It says among the prophets and teachers of the church at Antioch and then it names these men. The prophets and teachers.

There are really three offices that deal with this that are listed in the Bible. The first is a prophet, the second is of teaching, and the third is of a preacher or preaching. We'd like to just look at these and see how these are exercised in the life of the church. A prophet means to prophesy.

When you go to the concordance, there's only one Greek word for the word prophet, which is not that common for Greek. There are usually a number of Greek words for one English word as you know. But for prophet, there's only one Greek word. That means every time you come across the word prophet in the New Testament, every time, it means what I'm going to say next.

There are two root words that compose prophet: "pro" and "phemi." "Pro" means in front of, prior to, kind of like foreground, foretold, to be proactive is to be active involved in something before something happens. It means to be in front of. And "phemi" means to show or to make known one's thoughts, to make known one's thoughts.

So what prophecy really means every time you see it is the idea of that in advance, in "pro," for, in front of, God revealing somebody's thoughts. That's what it means. It could be God's thoughts, but many times it's the thoughts of other people that the prophet has. So the most common use in the New Testament is not predictive; it's not telling about the future.

The idea instead is the inspired delivery of a warning, an exhortation, an instruction, or a judgment which makes manifest the secrets of your heart, my heart. That is the primary use of prophecy in the New Testament. It's a message somebody speaking and somehow God through them reveals the secrets of your heart.

How many of you have ever been someplace where you heard somebody speaking and as they're speaking you say, "That's me. He's talking about me." Maybe it was a message on the radio or Charles Stanley. Charles Stanley has some kind of prayer line because I always hear people saying this about Charles Stanley. The man, it was like he was speaking to me. It's very interesting, very interesting.

But how many have had that happen? Right, okay, yeah. See and that's this work of prophecy where God through his Spirit gives a message to somebody, they very well have no idea it's directed at you or they're even directing it at anybody. It's just the way the Spirit works to make manifest the secrets of our heart. And that most times takes place in the course of preaching or teaching. It can be a gift all by itself, exercised all by itself, but many times it's within the use of those two other gifts, those two other ministries.

The second one is to preach. And for preaching, there are four Greek words that apply, but in this context it's only ever used primarily one way and the word is "evangelizo." "Evangelizo." You know what "evangelizo" means, right? It means to share the good news, to evangelize, to share the good news of Christ with the lost, with those that are not yet converted.

The other three words simply mean to talk in a preaching kind of way. You ever say it to your parents, "You're preaching at me again," you know, "Stop preaching at me." It's just you're talking, you're yada yada yada yada, you're preaching. But the "evangelizo" is the one that's used for preaching.

Now the significance of this is that preaching is primarily, almost certainly, for the unconverted. It is pointless to preach to believers because at the heart of the definition of preaching is to evangelize. Once you're saved, you don't need to be preached to. Preaching is for the street corners, for the crusades, for the unconverted, for "invite a friend" Sunday. It's times when the Gospel is made clear with the purpose of converting the unsaved.

The idea of teaching is this. There are three Greek words for the gift of teaching, for the ministry of teaching. They all mean the same thing. The first one means to give instruction, the second one means to instruct or train, and the third one means to teach. So when you see in the Bible it says teaching, that's what it means, exactly what that means, to teach.

And this is what the body needs. The body needs instruction in the word of God. Those that are saved need to learn the power that is in this book. We already know Jesus if we've been evangelized and we've responded to that evangelism, but we need to know the power of this book.

I remember one time we were walking through Lebanon going door to door witnessing to people, and at the corner of 8th and Chestnut Street, there's a gas station there. We were walking across the parking lot of the gas station, there was a fellow there that the guy that I was with knew. He was a bodybuilder, real buff guy, and he was the man. You'd see him and say, "He's the man." You would, you'd go "Wow, that's the man."

So we invited him to church. He didn't have much interest in church. He didn't have much interest at all. You could just see it in his face. He was kind of kind, but just kind of blew it off. And then I mentioned that we were also having a course on marriage relationships. He said, "Really? Marriage? You know how to make a marriage work?"

Now he wasn't married, he was living with his girlfriend, but he said his relationship with his girlfriend was a wreck. "Do you have something that would help? Do you have something that could help that?" See he wasn't interested in the Gospel, but he was interested in the instruction of the word. And see that's really what the world wants to know. Okay, you're a believer, how's it impacted your life?

How are you different? What tools do you have? How are you different than you were before? What have you learned that's made you different? What practical advice can you give me out of this book? Preaching doesn't give that to you. It's kind of like preaching is like this to the believers.

It's kind of like you want to be a pole vaulter and you go find a coach. And you say, "Coach, will you be my pole vaulting coach?" "Yeah, I'll be your coach." "Great, will you start teaching me?" "Yes." So you decide to get together Monday at 5:00. Monday at 5:00, you go out to the pit and he says, "You know what? You should be a pole vaulter.

In fact, I know you can be a pole vaulter. You'd be a great pole vaulter. I can see it, you've got the legs, you've got the arms, you can do this, I know you can. Do you believe it?" "I believe it! Yes, I believe it!" "Okay, I'll see you tomorrow night." Tomorrow night, you come back. "You could be a pole vaulter. You should be a pole vaulter. In fact, I can see you..." "But we went through this yesterday." "Yeah, but I just want to encourage you, you can be a pole vaulter."

See, but he never teaches you how to be a pole vaulter. You need to recruit pole vaulters to have pole vaulters, but they need to be instructed. What happens is this is really the reason that a lot of people end up dropping out of churches and they never figure it out.

They get preached to Sunday after Sunday, but there's no instruction that changes their life. Evangelizing the unconverted is the change that needs to take place, the first change is like I've often said, flipping that switch that allows the power of the Holy Spirit to work through you. But we don't learn in ignorance; we learn out of the word of God. It's what the body needs. And maybe some of you could be great pole vaulters.

All right, back to these beginning verses. It says Barnabas is listed. He's from Acts 4. He was Paul's traveling companion, he was known for being an encourager, and he's also from Cyprus, and we're going to be talking about Cyprus in a little while. Simeon the black man, this may be the same Simeon who carried Jesus' cross. There's nothing that makes that clear, but it's possible; some of the commentators said that is a possibility.

And Manaen was a foster brother of King Herod Antipas. This is the same Herod that beheaded John the Baptist. So being a foster brother, he would have grown up with him and would have had some interesting connections. And it says that they were fasting. One day as these men were worshipping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said...

Fasting is mentioned throughout Acts. Fasting can be going without a lot of different things, but most times it's a commitment to go without food or water for a certain period of time. Water they say you can live three days without water, about 40 days you can live without food before your body starts to cannibalize on itself and starts taking strength out of organs that won't come back. But a lot of times, and the Jews in this era, they would fast two times a week, a good Orthodox Jew. And here these men are fasting.

Should fasting be a part of our life? Is it something that we should practice? Well, Jesus said that some prayers are only answered by fasting. When they encountered a demon that the apostles couldn't cast out, they say, "Why couldn't we cast out that demon?" and Jesus said, "That kind only comes out by prayer and fasting."

So we know there are some prayers that are only answered by fasting. I remember one time a man saying that Jesus told his disciples not to fast. If you ever encounter this argument, let me walk you through this a little bit. He said that Jesus really downplayed it because he said in Mark 2, the religious leaders came to Jesus and said, "Why don't your disciples fast?" Remember?

They said, "Why don't your disciples fast?" Jesus' response was, "Do the guests of the wedding group fast when they are with him? But someday he will be taken away and then they will fast." And so people have taken that to mean that Jesus was downplaying the importance of fasting or even saying that there's no need to fast.

At first glance, it appears that way. But remember what Jesus taught the disciples about fasting. Remember? Matthew 6, Jesus said, "Do not let others know that you are fasting. In fact, try to appear as though you are not fasting and your Father in heaven, who sees this in secret, will reward you openly."

So he told his disciples that when you fast, don't let anyone know. Keep it a secret. So when they came and said, "Jesus, why don't your disciples fast?" his only other option would be to say, "They do." But if he would have said, "They do," he would have been going directly against what he told them not to do, which is to tell others.

And again, remember he never said they didn't fast. Jesus, wow, the master of questions, the master of everything, he says, "Do the guests of the wedding group fast when they are with him?" You know if you ever really get in a jam, really in a jam, ask a question. Have you learned that from Jesus? You ever get in a jam, just ask a question. "Why do you say that?" or "What do you mean by that?" Jesus, whenever he got in a jam, he asked questions.

Well, and it says that they laid hands on them and they set them apart. And again, this is the first instance that we know of where a church took a group of people and sent them out to evangelize. This is the first time it appears. It's some 14 years in. Let's go on, verse 4.

"Sent out by the Holy Spirit, Saul and Barnabas went down to the seaport of Seleucia and then sailed for the island of Cyprus. There in the town of Salamis, they went to the Jewish synagogue and preached the word of God. John Mark went with them as their assistant. Afterward, they preached"—there's the word preached, "evangelizo"—"they preached from town to town across the entire island until they finally reached Paphos."

Now this Seleucia is right here, so they went there first and now they're going to Cyprus and they're going to end up at Paphos. It says that they went to the synagogue. Wherever there was a city that had 10 male Jews, they were commanded to have a synagogue.

So as we go through Acts, you're going to see times where Paul goes into a city and he just preaches in the open places. And there are times where when he first goes into the city, he goes right to the synagogue. His typical way is to go just right into a synagogue.

So we assume that when he gets into a city and he just starts preaching anywhere, it's because there weren't 10 male Jews in that city. Because the standard procedure, and you think about it, it would be the most honoring way to God, would be to start there and let it spread out. Just keep that in mind as we go through the book of Acts.

Now it says that John Mark went along. This is the same John Mark who had recorded the Gospel of Mark, which is understood to be the words of Peter. This is the same John Mark whose mother was Mary, the same Mary who had the upper room where they believed that most of the first-century church early events took place.

Some believe her house even was the home of the upper room meal, the last supper. And so this John Mark goes along with them. And there's a little bit of problem that pops up with him as we'll get to. So it says they reach Paphos, the city on the west coast of Cyprus, which is now a part of Lebanon.

Paphos was a city known for its immorality. They were especially famous for their worship of Venus, the goddess of sex, eros, love. And again in Greek, there are three words for love: "phileo," "eros," and "agape." "Phileo" is brotherly love—Philadelphia is from "phileo." "Eros" is erotic love, and "agape" is unconditional love. Venus was the god of eros.

Well, let's go on, verse 6. "Afterward, they preached from town to town across the entire island until they finally reached Paphos, where they met a Jewish sorcerer, a magician, a false prophet named Bar-Jesus. He'd attached himself to the governor, Sergius Paulus, a man of considerable insight and understanding.

The governor invited Barnabas and Saul to visit him for he wanted to hear the word of God. But Elymas the sorcerer, as his name means in Greek, interfered and urged the governor to pay no attention to what Saul and Barnabas said. He was trying to turn the governor away from the Christian faith."

Now note first of all that this province had a governor. In the Roman Kingdom, provinces fell under two different categories. The first category required troops because it was an area that was maybe prone to hostility or overthrow or sedition; they would put troops in that area.

That would be a military province; it would be ruled by the military. In areas where that wasn't a problem, military was not needed, they instead would appoint a proconsul or governor. It was ruled by the Senate, not by the military. And so Cyprus we learn had a governor, which means it's not a military center; there probably weren't many Roman soldiers on this island.

Of him, it says that he had an advisor named Elymas. Most of your Bibles, how many of your Bibles say that, Elymas and not Bar-Jesus? One of the commentators made an interesting point. They said that Bar-Jesus means son of Jesus. That's what "Bar" is, son of.

They said that Luke wrote this whole book in Greek. And for him to take this word and pull it out of Greek and put it back in Arabic, which is really where it comes from—the word really means the skillful one—but they said that probably Luke just couldn't bear to write with his pen "son of Jesus" for this man. And so he took his Arabic name, the skillful one, and used that instead.

Guest (Male): We're going through Acts right now on Study the Word with our pastor and teacher Thom Keller. You can hear this message again by going online to ccleb.com. Again we're at ccleb.com. There are many other messages for your growth and edification there too. Or call and request a CD copy at 717-507-7862. That's 717-507-7862.

Here in the month of November, we're pleased to offer you a book by D.L. Moody we think you'll benefit from. It's called Your Victory in Jesus. If you're a Christian, you have victory, and that victory was secured by Christ at the cross. But the question that remains is, are you living in victory?

Join D.L. Moody as he explores true victory and start to experience the overcoming life ruled by Christ instead of fear. For a gift of any amount, we'll send this your way with our thanks. So call today, 717-507-7862. Or you can write to Study the Word, 740 Willow Street, Lebanon, Pennsylvania, 17046.

You're invited to worship with us here at Calvary Chapel Lebanon where Tom serves as pastor. Visit ccleb.com for our service times and see what's coming up at the church there too. When you get a chance, download our free Android app. Search Calvary Chapel Lebanon in the Google Play Store. Thanks for studying the word with Pastor Thom Keller. We'll dig deeper into the book of Acts with Tom next time. We hope you can join us.