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 bibles to Acts chapter 20, verses 1 through 12.

Tony Clark: I am not going to go overboard with it, but everything tastes better with bacon. Wrap it with some bacon. I do not trip on that. The Bible says, “Let no man judge you,” in food or in drink or regarding a festival. Stop right there. We have Christians today who are saying that Christians should be observing the Jewish festivals like the Day of Pentecost, the Day of Atonement, and all that. Paul is telling us to let no one judge you in food or drink or regarding a festival, new moon, or Sabbath.

Paul goes on to say that these are a shadow of things to come. When you see a person's shadow, it is not that person; it is just their shadow. The feast days, the Sabbath, and all those dietary laws were just a shadow of things to come. The substance is Christ, meaning that Christ is the fulfillment of the festivals and the fulfillment of the Sabbath.

In Matthew 11, Jesus says, “Come unto me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest,” or I will give you Sabbath. it is through Jesus Christ that we experience our rest. In the Greek, this word for rest is *anapauō*. It means to give rest, to give intermission from labor, and by implication, it means to refresh. I have to ask you today: are you at rest today? Or are you weary and heavy laden? Do what Jesus says and come to Him. He will give your soul Sabbath.

Many of you are not at peace in your soul. Fanny Crosby wrote one of those famous hymns about it being well with her soul. Is it well with your soul? This is something that you need to ponder in your own heart because you can easily put on a show outwardly and go home and weep yourself to sleep. You can only find rest when you come to Him. Jesus did not say come to the bottle, the couch, or the drug. He said, “Come to me and I will give you the rest that you are looking for.”

Romans 14:5 says, “One man esteems one day above another; another man esteems every day alike. Let each be fully convinced in his own mind.” I am convinced that every day is the Lord's day, and I worship Him every day. Someone else wants to make Saturday their day. You can do that, but do not try to put some guilt trip on someone else because they do not want to observe Sabbath the way you do. That is the Word of God. I wake up every day worshipping and praising God.

The early church worshipped on Sunday. They called it the Lord's Day because it was the day the Lord was resurrected. It was also the day that the Lord appeared to the disciples in John chapter 20 after His resurrection. The church was born on a Sunday on the Day of Pentecost. We also have proof from the early church fathers—Justin Martyr, Ignatius, Tertullian, and Irenaeus—who confirmed that the early church worshipped on Sunday, the first day of the week, and not the seventh day of the week.

According to verse seven, they broke bread. This meant that they had a meal together and afterwards they had communion. They also listened to the Word of God being taught. In this case, Paul continued his message until midnight. He did this because he knew that he would be leaving them and they would not see each other anymore, so he had a lot to teach them.

The Greek word for “spoke” is *dialegomai*, which is where we get our English word “dialogue” from. It does not mean that he was just there preaching to them until midnight. It was a dialogue; it was a question and answer time. It is just like whenever we have a time of question and answers, I always have to cut it because we would be there talking all night long. We always run out of time. Paul was not just being long-winded until midnight.

Let us learn a few lessons from Eutychus. The first thing we see is the reason for his drowsiness. According to verse eight, there were many lamps in the upper room, showing why Eutychus fell into a deep sleep. He tried to get some fresh air by sitting by the window, or actually the windowsill, not realizing that all of the fumes from the lamps would flow out of the window where he was sitting.

According to the Greek word for young man, *pais*, it means that he was between the ages of seven and 14 years old. The lateness of the hour had taken its toll on the boy. We can easily become drowsy like Eutychus when the only time we talk about Jesus Christ is when we are around a bunch of Christians. If church is the only time we are vocal about our relationship with Jesus Christ, we will begin to doze off like he did.

It reminds me of the two bodies of water which are fed by the Jordan River. You have the Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee. While the Sea of Galilee is full of life, nothing can survive in the Dead Sea. Even though the Jordan River flows into both, it only flows out of the Sea of Galilee. The Dead Sea has no life because it has no outflow and no outlet.

You and I will either be like the Sea of Galilee, giving out the Word and full of life, or we will be like the Dead Sea, taking in Bible study after Bible study. Because we do not give out, we start to doze off in the back pew and become a professional Bible study attender. Make sure you are giving out the Word you are receiving here so that you do not become spiritually drowsy and end up like Eutychus.

He ended up falling out the window from the third story and was taken up dead. I have seen many people like Eutychus who, because they were spiritually sleepy, ended up falling into sin and were taken up spiritually dead. You were once so excited about God and church, but because you became spiritually drowsy, you moved toward the back and ended up falling into sin. People wonder how they fell into sin when they were at church all the time. That is because they were getting fatter on the Word of God and not exercising it by giving it out.

If this has happened to you, there is hope for you. Look at verses 10 through 12. Paul went down and fell on him and embraced him. Paul did not come down on Eutychus; he went down to Eutychus. There is a huge difference between these two statements. Our tendency is to come down on those who have fallen into sin. We do this with our children and those around us. No, we need to go down to them and embrace them like Paul did.

I wonder if we are in an uproar when we see a spouse, family member, or friend who is spiritually dead. Or do we just go on with our lives? I am sensing in the church that there is just a spirit of indifference where people just do not care anymore. We can see someone in need or spiritually dead, and we just go on about our lives. No longer do we care or do what Paul is doing by going down to them and embracing them.

It reminds me of Matthew chapter 2 when the wise men came to Herod. They asked where the King of the Jews was born because they had come to worship Him. Herod grabbed the religious leaders together and asked about the King of the Jews. They quoted Micah 5:2, which says that the Messiah was going to be born in Bethlehem. Bethlehem was just a little city five miles south of Jerusalem. These religious leaders knew the Word of God, but were so indifferent that they did not even want to travel five miles south to see their long-awaited Messiah.

This is a word for those of us who have been walking with God for some time. We can easily become indifferent. We can know the verses, but we can all of a sudden just become spiritually numb. We hear about somebody struggling and we feel like we have too much in our own life to deal with other people. In the parable of the Good Samaritan, a Levite and a priest saw the man beaten up and they crossed the street.

The Jews hated the Samaritans and wanted nothing to do with them. The quickest way to get from Jerusalem to Galilee to the north was to go straight through Samaria, but they hated the Samaritans so much that they would go all the way around to keep from that Samaritan dust getting on them. Every time Jesus told a story, He made the Samaritan a hero. A Samaritan came and bandaged up his wounds and took care of him.

For many of us, we become just indifferent like that priest and that Levite. I see this spirit in the church where we are so concerned with our own life and our own problems that we do not have time to deal with other people. We need to be careful of this. Paul would later say in Ephesians 2:1 that He made you alive who were dead in trespasses and sins. This is our spiritual condition apart from Christ. Are you spiritually dead to the things of God, to prayer, or to another Bible study?

How do we minister to people in this condition? The same way Paul did. Paul went down to Eutychus and embraced him. It is God's unconditional love that is going to bring the Eutychus in our lives back to life. It is not loving them in their sin, but loving them through their sin. They went back up and broke bread and were comforted. Someone needs to go back to church. You have been Eutychus long enough.

It is time to wake up before you find yourself falling three stories down into sin. This is a warning for someone here. You have been dabbling a little bit in sin, and it is time to stop the dabbling or you are going to have a hard fall. If you have a Eutychus in your life, do not come down on them, but go down to them and show them God's unconditional love.

God's love wants to bring you back to life again. If you will come to Him in humility and brokenness, the Lord wants to find you. As we are wrapping it up here, this is business between you and the Lord. Two weeks ago, I will never forget one of the guys that is part of our security team. I talked to him after church. Monday morning I get a text and said that man passed away. Saturday I was doing a funeral.

You never know around what corner death is. You do not want to play around with life. Life is so fragile. You always want to make sure your life is right with God. If you have never repented of your sin and asked Jesus Christ to come into your heart and save you, then this is your opportunity to do that. Father, we are so grateful for Your love for us and Your kindness. We pray that Your Holy Spirit will move in our midst.

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