The Word Made Plain

Guest (Male): 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 18, verses 1 through 2.

Tony Clark: A great time of successful ministry occurred when Jesus fed the 5,000 men with just five loaves and two fish. Counting women and children, it was over 15,000 to 20,000 people. It was a great time of success. Everybody’s belly was filled. It was just a great time. All of a sudden, in John chapter 6, it says that they were about to come and take Jesus by force and make him their king. It was a great time of success and exciting times. Right after that, Jesus sent his disciples away right into the midst of a storm.

Every time Paul experienced success in ministry, Satan stirred up enemies to run him out of the city. It was no different in Athens. Let's see what happens in verse 1. After these things, Paul departed from Athens and went to Corinth. "After these things" refers to Paul debating with the Greek philosophers on Mars Hill in verses 22 through 34 in the previous chapter. After these things, Paul left the city of Athens and went to the city of Corinth, which was 53 miles away. He arrived there alone.

Let me stop here because this is one of the greatest traps used by the enemy of our souls, Satan, and that is to get us alone. He wants to get us to isolate ourselves from church and other Christians. We know that he arrived there alone because Timothy and Silas don't arrive in Corinth until verse 5. If you're here and you are a loner, a maverick, or a lone ranger, let me beg you to get other Christians around you praying for you and encouraging you.

If Satan can get you to isolate yourself, he can bombard you with arrows of discouragement. He can do that like never before. Proverbs 18:1 says, "A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire. He rages against all wise judgment." Let me unpack that verse for you a little bit further. The Hebrew word for "isolate" is "parrad," and it means to spread, to scatter, to separate, or divide. The Hebrew word for "rages" is "gailah," and it means obstinate or stubbornly refusing to change one's opinion or course of action.

This is how it works. When we isolate ourselves or separate ourselves from other people, all we have left is our own thoughts. You would think that you are right in everything and in all matters. When someone comes around you and questions your thoughts or behavior, you become obstinate or stubbornly refuse to change your opinion or course of action, just like this Hebrew word means.

This is why the translators used the word "rages," because you get violently angry at the people who would dare challenge your viewpoints or course of action. As we become more sophisticated as Christians, we say, "Well, the Lord is leading me to do this." When you use the name of the Lord, it means don't you dare think you're going to challenge my course of action.

Get people around you. Get into a small group. Come to church and surround yourself with Christians to pray for you and encourage you to walk after God and His Word. When you isolate yourself, you're left to your own devices and your own thoughts. When you are left to your own thoughts, you think you're right because all you're doing is talking to yourself. You think you're right, and you are insulted when someone comes around you and questions your behavior or course of action.

You need other people around you. Another reason to get Christians around you and not isolate yourself is because of what happened to the Israelites in Deuteronomy 25:17-18, which says, "Remember what Amalek did to you on the way as you were coming out of Egypt, how he met you on the way and attacked your rear ranks, all the stragglers at your rear when you were tired and weary and did not fear God."

These are some powerful verses because our Amalek, Satan himself, comes at us the same way. He attacks us when we have fallen back in our walks with God. We are no longer in the front line on the front lines of the battle. Now we are in the rear. Like we used to say in the Marine Corps, we are in the rear with the gear. We become stragglers at the rear. We have put it in neutral spiritually. This happens when we become tired and weary.

Sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is take a nap. Notice Satan attacked them when they were tired and weary. The most spiritual thing you can do is take a nap. While we were gone, we actually went on a vacation. Can you believe we did that? You know what I did? I woke up, got in the Word, read, prayed, and went to work out. I came back, took a nap, went to eat, and maybe took another nap. I got up, hung out, woke up, and did it all over again. I took another nap. I think I was averaging maybe two naps a day.

It felt so good. I didn't feel any guilt. My phone wasn't working. I was out of the country, and I felt good. My phone wasn't beeping and booping. Nobody could contact me, and I was happy about it. I took some naps, and I woke up when I wanted to wake up. I didn't have to go to a meeting, I didn't have to do another thing, I didn't have to counsel anybody, and I didn't have to talk anybody off the ledge. It was just a beautiful thing. I enjoyed every minute of it.

Sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is take a nap because Satan attacks when we're tired and weary. Satan has attacked me in this area time and time again when I was tired and weary from ministry. What is the result of all this? We no longer fear God like the Israelites. We falsely believe that we’ve got it. We think we will call on God for the big stuff, but right now we’ve got it. We think we don't need God. It's a dangerous mindset.

Here is Paul in Corinth alone, tired, weary, and discouraged from a busy time of ministry. Let me take a few moments to describe the city of Corinth because what kind of city was Paul entering? By Paul's day, around AD 50, Corinth had replaced Athens as the leading political and commercial center in Greece. It had a population of approximately 650,000 people and was the capital of Achaia.

Nearly all traffic between northern and southern Greece passed through this city. Because of its location and traffic, Corinth became very corrupt to the point that to be called a Corinthian was synonymous with a bad name. Several words with "Corinthian" in them were found in Greek literature. For example, "Corinthianazomai," which means to "Corinthianize" or to practice sexual immorality, was part of the Greek language.

A "Corinthiastes" was another word which was equal to being a whoremonger. Even Plato himself referred to a prostitute as a "Corinthia kore," kore being the Greek word for girl. A "Corinthian kore" was equal to being a prostitute. For almost every city in America today, this has been said. The major cities in our nation have negative connotations said about them. Chicago is now referred to as "Chiraq" because of the killings and the shootings there.

When people hear you're from Newport News, they say, "Oh, you're from Bad News." I just heard from a police officer last service that Newport News is known as "Newport Afghanistan." That was the word he used, and it has a negative connotation to it. Gary, Indiana, where I was born and raised, at one time was known as the murder capital of the nation. The list goes on and on throughout the cities here in America.

According to the viewpoints of those who live overseas, the term "American" carries the same negative connotation as "Corinthian" did at this time. It used to be a time where people wanted to come to America, the land of the free, but now several countries are forbidding their people from traveling here because of the constant violence and the mass shootings.

Towering some 1,500 feet above Corinth was the temple of Aphrodite, the goddess of love, in which 1,000 temple prostitutes would come out each evening to offer themselves to the men as an act of worship to the goddess of sensuality. Today, these temple prostitutes will come to you by the thousands in the form of call girls and call boys, webcams, and porn sites. This is the city Paul entered: alone, discouraged, and depressed.

Look at verse 2. And he found a certain Jew named Aquila, born in Pontus, who had recently come from Italy with his wife Priscilla, because Claudius had commanded all the Jews to depart from Rome; and he came to them. God knew that Paul needed someone else to help him shoulder the burdens he carried, showing that we can never do ministry alone. Paul found desperately needed companionship in a certain Jew named Aquila and his wife Priscilla.

They came to Corinth from Rome because the Emperor Claudius decreed that all the Jews leave. We have a little background from the secular historian Suetonius. He tells us why. He said in his writings, "The Life of Claudius," that there were Jewish riots instigated by a man named Chrestus against Christians. Rather than deal with the situation, Claudius simply ordered all the Jews to leave Rome. This is how Aquila and Priscilla ended up in the city of Corinth. Paul, Aquila, and Priscilla became close friends.

Have you found that Aquila and Priscilla for your life? Have you found that couple that you know you can call on to get some encouragement from or to pray with you? Small groups or marriage fellowships are places to start. This is so important to find a couple like this because eventually, you will be discouraged or depressed and need an encouraging word spoken to you or need someone to pray for you.

Proverbs 12:25 says, "Anxiety in the heart causes depression." That is incredible. Anxiety is worry. Worry causes depression. You're worried about something that has not happened yet, and it has so gripped you that you're depressed over it. Ladies, this is where you come in. You worry about everything. It can cause depression. This is Scripture here. Notice what it says: "But a good word makes it glad."

This is where we come in when we have found an Aquila and Priscilla for our life. When we are worried and depressed about something, this person can come with a good word to make us glad again and bring us up out of that discouragement. We need these people in our lives. So often, we isolate ourselves and stay in our state of depression when we need someone that's going to speak a word to us to make us glad.

If you isolate yourself and say, "I don't need an Aquila and Priscilla up in our business," you are making a mistake. That's normally us men and our pride. We're the ones that come with that kind of mess. We don't want folks up in our business. They were nice to hang out with and go eat with, but we don't want them in our business. Men, that's us. You better have somebody up in your business because everybody else already knows your business. Your wife already told her friends and her coworkers.

You're the only one who still thinks that this thing is private. Everybody knows about it! You might as well get somebody up in your business. You're struggling! You need an Aquila and Priscilla to get in your business. In our pride, we say, "I can do it alone, I don't need anybody else." You're setting yourself up to be a target for Satan. Paul needed someone and he found Aquila. Please notice that he found Aquila, meaning he was looking for him. That word means "found after a diligent search."

The Bible says if you want friends, you have to show yourself friendly. Some of you don't even know what that is. You're just nasty. Some of you have a countenance that says: "Don't come within 10 feet of me." Then you go home and say, "I wish I had Aquila in my life." You need an Aquila in your life to encourage you. We need this because things are great now. Amen. Thank God you're in that season.

There are going to be some times that you're going to need a word. There are going to be some times you're going to be worried about where the next paycheck is coming from, how the bills are going to be paid, or whether you're going to have a roof over your head. That worry and anxiety is going to cause depression. But the Bible says, "A good word makes you glad." You need someone in your life that's going to be able to speak a good word to you.

When you isolate yourself, you're left to your own devices and your own thoughts. Paul was not sitting back in isolation and seclusion saying, "Lord, send me an Aquila." No, Paul went looking and found Aquila. Where did he find him? You have to wait until next time because where he found him is a good place. It's a good place to find that person that's going to speak a good word to you.

Loneliness, discouragement, and depression come to all of us. When we isolate ourselves, we become perfect targets for Satan to attack us. The solution is to find an Aquila and Priscilla, a godly couple that can encourage and pray for us through these dark times. Aquila and Priscilla can be found in marriage fellowships, small groups, singles ministries, and men's and women's groups. You can't do it by yourself.

We need each other, especially in these dark times we live in. We can easily hide or isolate ourselves behind our phones or some computer screen and try to find comfort in someone on social media. But we need human contact. We need interaction with each other face to face. Even while we were gone and we were out of the country, my wife reminded me that there were several times she FaceTimed our kids and grandkids.

Face to face is important. Because I make my living talking, my family and my siblings know I don't like to talk on the phone. Once I leave here, I don't like to talk. I'm real quiet. Our roles reverse in the home. She becomes the more talkative one and I'm quiet. I'm talked out. My sister knows that. We would text back and forth, but there are times she calls and I say, "Oh boy, she's calling. What's happened now?" She says, "No, nothing's happened, everything's good. I just had to hear your voice."

We need human interaction. In this generation today, many of them have social awkwardness. They don't know how to interact with people because they're playing some war game with somebody in England and China. They think they're interacting, but they're just behind a screen. We grew up where we played outside. We didn't come back home until the street lights came on. We drank out of a garden hose.

We were okay. We were running and we just did our thing. We fought with each other, but we were friends the next day because we learned conflict resolution on our own by interacting with each other. We couldn't just be out there playing and see our friend and be weird. If you had beef, you said, "I'm sorry for yesterday, come on over and play with us." That's how we did it. We developed these personal skills.

This generation is clueless when they get around actual people. They only know how to interact behind a screen. We need face-to-face interaction. This is why there's a lot of depression and stuff happening today, because we are isolating ourselves. Yes, I love technology. It's great when it's working. But it also isolates us and gives us the false sense that we are interacting with people, and we're not.

It was amazing. We were in Hawaii at a conference, and one of us was sick. My wife called the doctor and the doctor popped up on her iPad. He said, "How can I help you? Based upon the symptoms, go pick this up at the nearest Walgreens." I was right on the screen. I didn't have to go in. Technology is great, but we need interaction with one another. We need FaceTime. We need people.

We need Aquila and Priscilla. We need people who are going to speak into our lives and give us a good word that will chase away the anxiety that causes depression. I'm not talking about mental illness; I'm talking about the worry and anxiety that causes depression, like the Scripture says. I'm talking about the type that a good word will make you glad. Seek until you find an Aquila and Priscilla.

If you tried that already and they told your business, then that wasn't the right Aquila and Priscilla for you. Don't give up because that person couldn't keep their mouth shut. You need some mature person that's going to help you and talk you off the ledge sometimes and get you back in the game. We need that. If you isolate yourself, you're going to be an easy target for Satan.

Let's pray. Father, thank you so much for your Word. I pray, God, that your Spirit will lead us and guide us into all truth. I pray your Holy Spirit would draw your people to you. There are many people discouraged today, Lord. They're lonely and feel like they're by themselves. I pray your Spirit would move upon their hearts and their lives. Oh God, have mercy upon them. Draw them to you today.

Lord, if there's anyone here who has not repented of their sin and accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior, let them believe that you died on the cross and were buried and rose again. Lord, you said if they confess that, you would save their souls. Do a work in people's hearts today in Jesus' name. Amen.

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