The Word Made Plain

Welcome to The Word Made Plain with Senior Pastor Tony Clark of Calvary Chapel Newport News in Virginia. Currently, Pastor Tony is teaching a study in the book of Acts. Please open your Bible to Acts chapter 27, verses 27 through 38.

Tony Clark: Alright, let’s dive into the Word of God together. Turn with me in your Bibles to the book of Acts. As we continue our journey through the New Testament on Sunday mornings, we find ourselves getting towards the end of the book of Acts. And as you know, uh, God’s will, as we finish up the book of Acts, we’re going to go right into the book of Romans. Um, and then on Wednesday nights, you know, we’re in First Samuel, going through the Old Testament. We’re in chapter 17, learning from the life of David. Uh, and, of course, that great chapter, uh, when David defeated Goliath. And we’ve just been learning some valuable lessons.

Valuable lessons through, um, you know, through the life of David and how to, uh, slay our giants as well. And so, great stuff in the Word of God. And Father, as we have opened up the dialogue through worship to talk to You, we pray that You will speak to us now through Your Word. We pray, God, that You will soften hearts, that we can receive with meekness the implanted Word, which is able to save our souls. Oh, Lord, soften hearts. I pray that this Word will fall upon good soil and that it will bear fruit, some 30, some 60, and some 100-fold.

Oh, God, let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight. Oh, Lord, my strength and my Redeemer, in Jesus’ name. Amen. Acts 27, looking at verses 27 to 38. The title of this message is, "Stay in the Ship." Stay in the ship.

Now, the last thing anyone wants to do is stay on a ship when it is certain that it is in danger or about to sink. No one wanted to stay on the Titanic on April 14th or 15th, in 1912, when it was certain that it was going down. But this is the advice that the Apostle Paul would give the men on the ship. He was on heading to Italy. When it was certain that that ship was about to crash.

See, so often, the things God tells us to do will go against the advice and the conventional wisdom of the world. To give you an example, God told Joshua to do something that went against the wisdom, uh, and the strategies of warfare at that particular time. Oh, he told them in Joshua 6, in verses 2 through 17, to march around the walls of Jericho one time a day for six days, not saying a word. Then on the seventh day, to march around seven times, but on the seventh lap.

When you get around, shout as loud as you can, and these walls will come down. Now, sure enough, it did just that. The Bible is full of stories like this, where God will instruct His people to do something that went against the conventional wisdom of the world. This sort of war strategy that God gave Joshua, you won’t find that for those you higher rank in the military, you won’t learn this at War College.

You won’t learn this type of warfare, to march around the city and don’t say a word, one time for six days, and on the seventh day, march around it seven times and then shout as loud as you can. And then the enemy will just, you know, fall down. You won’t learn that. But that’s the wisdom that God gave, and so often, God will give us and tell us to do things that goes against the conventional wisdom of the world. Why? Because God is saying, watch this. God is saying, can you still trust me when what I am telling you to do doesn’t seem to make sense to the world around you? Can you still trust me?

And this is what God is saying to many of His children, and this is why He gives this type of wisdom to His people throughout the Bible. Can you still trust me when what I’m telling you doesn’t seem to make sense to the world around you? Can you still trust me? Somebody needs to hear that today. Can you still trust God when what He’s telling you to do goes against all of the advice the world gives?

You know, the world loves to give advice, “Follow your heart. Look within.” But the Bible says, “The heart is desperately wicked, who can know it?” Look within, and you’ll be a hot mess if you look within. Now, by way of background, here’s Paul on a ship heading to Rome with 276 passengers. Paul advised them in verse 10, not to set sail at this time because he sensed that a storm was coming. We know that Paul said he was shipwrecked three times. And and one time he spent a night and a day in the open waters, or floating on some piece of wood or something.

So he understood storms and the conditions of storms, and when a storm was brewing, because he had been in three shipwrecks. So he told them, “Look, I sense that a storm is coming. Do not set sail.” But did they listen to him? Of course, they didn’t, and sailed right into a northeaster or a typhoon. As the storm beat up on them, all hope that they would survive was lost according to verse 20. However, God comes to Paul in verse 23 and says that he was going to make it, and he was giving him everyone on the ship as well.

But they had to be shipwrecked on a certain island according to verse 26, and now we pick up the story in verses 27 and 28. Now when the 14th night had come, and we were driven up and down on the Adriatic Sea, about midnight, the sailors sensed that they were drawing near some land. And they took soundings and found it to be 20 fathoms. And when they had gone a little farther, they took soundings again and found it to be 15 fathoms.

Now, it had now been two weeks since they set sail from Fair Havens, uh, according to verse 8. They were being tossed by the storm on the Adriatic Sea, which was in between Italy and the island of Crete, and near the northern coast of Africa. The end of verse 27 said that the sailors, so you navy people, you’re in the Bible. Navy folks. Sensed that they were drawing near some land.

It is believed that they heard the crashing of the surf on the shore. But seeing that it was midnight according to verse 27, they were not certain. They didn’t know it, but they were getting close to the island of Malta, which was 60 miles south of the city of Sicily. They were only three miles from what is known today, as we will see for obvious reasons, called St. Paul’s Bay, no doubt named after Paul’s journey there. To confirm their suspicions, uh, verse 28 said that they were they took soundings.

Which meant that they took a weight with a rope attached to it, and they would lower it down into the water to see how deep the water was. And wherever the water came up on the rope, it let them know, um, how deep the water was in that area. And so it said that they found it to be 20 fathoms or 120 feet deep. And they did it again, and now found it to be 15 fathoms or 90 feet. So what happened next? Look at verse 29.

Then, fearing lest we should run aground on the rocks, they dropped four anchors from the stern and prayed for day to come. Now, hitting the shore at midnight was not a very desirable thing. So the sailors dropped the anchors from the stern and prayed for day to come. And it’s this word “prayed” that I would like to bring to your attention. Uh, the Greek word is “euchomai,” and it means to wish, to pray to God, or generally just to pray.

Uh, I bring this Greek verb to your attention because you may have a translation that just have, “They wished” or “They prayed.” Both are true. Because the implication of the wishing is wishing that God would not only hear their prayer, but wishing that He would answer it as well. And as we will see, Paul is fully in charge of the ship by this time. He had them praying.

After he told them that they were going to make it, he told them in verse 25, “Take heart, because I believe God.” Those sailors dropped the those four anchors and prayed that day would come. The four anchors was a primitive breaking system. They were hoping that the anchors would grab a hold of a rock underneath the water and slow down the ship.

Something else I want to bring to your attention, something about storms. Remember I said last week, for the next few weeks, we’re going to talk about the different types of storms that God allows to blow into our lives, because these storms will help us understand what God is doing. So often we wonder what God is doing in our lives. And for last week, this week, and God’s will next week, we’re going to talk about the different types of storms that God allows to blow our way. And there’s reasons behind them. So when we’re in the midst of them, we’ll know what God is doing in our lives.

Storms have a way of getting us back on track with God. You will find yourself praying and drawing closer to God. Oh, we see this in the life of the Prophet Jonah that we’re going to talk about this week and God’s will next week, who had disobeyed God. God brought a storm of correction. And after he tells those on the ship that the storm was because of his disobedience, Jonah understood that the storm was because of his disobedience to God. He instructs him, he said, “Look, guys, look, this storm is because of me.”

“If you will just throw me overboard, this storm will stop.” They said, “We’re not doing that.” And he said, “Look, you need to throw me overboard.” They said, “We’re not going to do that.” And they kept trying to get themselves out of the storm, out of the storm. Finally they said, “Bro, you get his legs, I get his arms.” And they tossed him overboard. And when they did, the storm did indeed stop. Jonah was swallowed by a great fish, and watch this.

It’s in Jonah chapter 2, verse 1, it says, “Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the fish’s belly.” See, sometimes it’s not until we’re in the midst of a storm and we’re being swallowed by a great fish, it’s when we will start back praying and seeking God again, like we see with Jonah and like these sailors in these verses.

Now, this story is also a beautiful reminder that we can’t rely and rely solely on our skills and abilities doing storms, because they will come up short like we see here. Even though they were experienced sailors, their experience, skills, and abilities could not stop this runaway ship. Sometimes God will allow us to come to the end of our abilities, to the end of our talents, to where all we can do is pray, as we see in this particular story here.

Oh, look what it says there in verses 30 to 32. It says, “And as the sailors were seeking to escape from the ship, when they had let down the skiff into the water under pretense of putting out the anchors from the bow, Paul said to the Centurion and the soldiers, unless these men stay in the ship, you cannot be saved. Then the soldiers cut away the ropes of the skiff and let it fall off.”

Some of these frightened sailors were uncertain whether God would answer their prayers. So as they were pretending to let down the four anchors, they were really letting down the skiff or the lifeboat, trying to escape to land, verse 30 says. See, here’s a lesson we need to learn because fear and doubt will cause us to do a similar thing. Storms can get us back praying, but watch this, but in waiting on God’s answer, we panic like these sailors and try to take matters back into our own hands.

See, we will do all we can to get out of our storms as fast as we can. But God will calm our storm. But watch this, but it’s not until we learn our lessons, God will show us that our efforts are futile. We will get out of the storm when the lesson is learned. Somebody needs to hear that today, not until. Watch this, watch this. This world, and especially our nation.

We will not get out of this pandemic until the lessons are learned that we were supposed to learn. Notice what this pandemic did. It stripped us of our God. You know what our God is? Our God is sports, recreation, and everything else but God. So God took it all away in order to get us back to prayer, get us back to church, get us back to the things of God. And we will not get out of this storm. Cause we’re praying, “Take it away, God, take it away.” And God says, “I will not take it away until you Americans learn the lesson you need to learn.” Why I say Americans? Number one, because I live here. Number two, because it’s worse here than anywhere in the world.

Why? Because we have had a God called entertainment, a God called sports. And we have had this God for so long, and we placed this in front of God for so long. God said, “How you like me now? I’m going to take it all away. Let me see what you’re going to do now. Are you going to come back to me, or are you going to be wishing and wishing that it will go away so you can get back to your God?” Oh, it’s quiet in here. That’s okay. It’s all right.

I love sports just like we all do. And I love it probably a little too much. But let me tell you something, I won’t let anything come before my God. I won’t let it, not at all. And we will not get out of this storm, America. America! We’re not going to get out of this storm until we learn the lesson that we need to. And we’re trying to do all we can to get back, let’s get back to normal. And I’m right along with them. Yeah, let’s get back to normal. But we will not get back until we learn the lesson that we need to learn.

And we’re using all of our experience, abilities, all of our talent and skills to try to get us out so we can get back to our American God. And God said, “You can do all you want. You can put all y’all’s heads together. And you will not get out until you learn this lesson.” Because if God will sweep it away, and we got back to normal, did we learn the lesson that we were supposed to learn?

And I would say, no, we haven’t learned it yet. Oh, 2020 was tough. Yes. Yes. And we were hoping, we were wishing that midnight, on the 31st, that when we woke up, we woke up from a nightmare, from a bad dream and said, “Okay, it’s back to normal. Everything’s normal.” For seven days, for seven days of the year, we’re like, “No, this ain’t this ain’t going nowhere no time soon.” We were wishing, we were hoping that we woke up and it had been different. We were. I was with you.

I was with you. I went to bed early that night. Cause I wanted to hurry up and see 2021. I wanted to see that one. And I and I thought, I thought I, I see it for that. No. No, it’s it’s still. That’s because we haven’t learned the lesson yet. I don’t think we have. Pastor friend of mine said, you know, he said, this this this pandemic, it just exposed people’s heart concerning church. So it’s not that the pandemic took away church for people. No, it exposed what was already in their heart.

That’s all it did. They they felt this way in their heart about church and then the the pandemic just proved it. Just proved it. We got to learn the lesson. How did Paul react when he saw these sailors trying to escape? He told the Centurion, you know, Centurion is a Roman captain over 100 soldiers in verse 31. He says, “Unless these men stay in the ship, you cannot be saved.” Here’s the main point. Here’s the main point of this message. Don’t jump ship.

I know that the storm is raging, the winds are beating intensely against you, and all of your instincts are telling you to bail out, give up, turn back. This is natural, but watch this, God wants to do something supernatural. However, you must stay in the ship. This goes for the ship of your marriage, the ship of your job, or the ship of whatever it is that you are experiencing difficulties in. Stay in the ship.

Oh, I say this because I believe that we jump ship too soon and never learn the lessons that the storm was sent to teach us. So we bring our toxic selves into another marriage, into another relationship, and we poison it. We go to another job, and once again, we start yelling about the people on the job. The problem is us, because we jumped ship prematurely before the lesson was learned.

It’s all the time. Have you noticed all those jobs, what’s the common denominator? It’s you. All the roommates you’ve gone through, what’s the common denominator? It’s you. When you start yelling, “All these people on this job.” He said, “Well, then you just you just got there.” Yeah, but you know, same people on this job. No, it’s the same you. You bring your toxic self.

See, here’s the thing. You know why I believe that we jump ship prematurely? Now, once again, I’m not talking about you jumping ship from an abusive marriage, abusive situation. That’s another sermon. That’s another sermon. I’m talking about we jump ship prematurely on jobs, relationship, marriages, because we never learned coping mechanisms when we were younger. We never learned them. When when we were many of us.

When we were younger, we learned how to cope and deal with difficulty. We came and said, “Hey, boy, he did it to me. Get back out there and make it right with him. That’s your friend, you go out there and make it right with him.” And then the next thing, you know, we’re playing. Because we learned coping mechanisms to in order to deal with the difficulties in life. We played, you know, little league and little, I mean, self out in the in the yard and and we play, and we compete, and we learn how what it is to lose, and we, you know, all right, well, you get it next time and you win next time.

And we learned how to cope with difficulties. We learned how we get mad at our friends, they take their ball and go home, and then you know, next thing, you know, we make up, we, you know, we’re back playing again, because we learned how to cope. But today, today we’re the kids today don’t know how to cope. Number one, we’re in the pandemic, you stay away, you don’t get close. And you know, and then if you do, okay, wear a mask and, you know, mumbling kids mumbling, “What you saying?” “I don’t know what you’re saying.” And, you know, they mumble behind the mask. They don’t know how to cope and deal with each other.

And then in school, they come home, “Oh, this teacher this.” And you’re running up there. You’re running up there chewing out the teacher. And you know your kid is bad as Jesse James. You know Sally is just a terror at home. But though you’re going up chewing some teacher out, and then the the little girl, little Sally, little Johnny just keep going on terrorizing classrooms. No, no, we we learn how to deal with stuff.

Deal with the kid. You know your kid is bad? They’re at home with you all the time. They’ve been at home all year with you. You know they’re bad. But though you’re going to jump on these adults, the you discipline your kid, your baby. Your baby is a terror and you know it. And therefore, you need to deal with them at home. But because you don’t, they don’t know how to cope because mommy lets me get away with it all the time. And they expect everybody to be like mommy. Everybody’s not like your mama.

And you don’t know how to deal with stuff. So what you do? You get mad, you jump ship. You get mad in this relationship, you jump ship. You get mad at this roommate, either move them out or you go move somewhere else. You don’t know how to deal with things. And we jump ship because we didn’t learn mechanisms and didn’t learn how to cope with difficulties and hardships. And we didn’t learn how to deal with disappointment.

You lost. No, today, everybody get a participation trophy. Are you kidding me? You lost. Learn how to deal with losing. There’s going to be disappointments in life. But see, because kids today don’t know how to deal with this kind of stuff, they are quick to jump ship. And see, here’s the thing, because you didn’t learn the lesson, you take your toxic self to the next marriage, the next relationship, the next job, and you poison it.

Because you didn’t learn. See, watch this. The Bible says in in First Peter 2, that we are living stones. If you look at any building, there are bricks and and and they’re put next to each other with some mortar or some cement and keep them right next together. Those are those are dead stones. The Bible says that we as believers, we’re living stones. Living stones are moving.

And God places people next to you in the form of a marriage spouse, in the form of a coworker, and they’re living stones too. If you know stones that are alive, that creates friction. And God specifically placed these people in your life because God sees that there are some rough, jagged edges about you, about your personality, about your little hang-ups, that God is using them to smooth out. But you jump ship before the work of smoothing out is done. And you stay jagged, and you stay sharp, and you stay like that, and you never learn the lesson.

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