English Standard Version (ESV)
Paul and Barnabas at Lystra
8 Now at Lystra there was a man sitting who could not use his feet. He was crippled from birth and had never walked. 9 He listened to Paul speaking. And Paul, looking intently at him and seeing that he had faith to be made well,[a] 10 said in a loud voice, “Stand upright on your feet.” And he sprang up and began walking. 11 And when the crowds saw what Paul had done, they lifted up their voices, saying in Lycaonian, “The gods have come down to us in the likeness of men!” 12 Barnabas they called Zeus, and Paul, Hermes, because he was the chief speaker. 13 And the priest of Zeus, whose temple was at the entrance to the city, brought oxen and garlands to the gates and wanted to offer sacrifice with the crowds. 14 But when the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard of it, they tore their garments and rushed out into the crowd, crying out, 15 “Men, why are you doing these things? We also are men, of like nature with you, and we bring you good news, that you should turn from these vain things to a living God, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that is in them. 16 In past generations he allowed all the nations to walk in their own ways. 17 Yet he did not leave himself without witness, for he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness.” 18 Even with these words they scarcely restrained the people from offering sacrifice to them.
Paul Stoned at Lystra
19 But Jews came from Antioch and Iconium, and having persuaded the crowds, they stoned Paul and dragged him out of the city, supposing that he was dead. 20 But when the disciples gathered about him, he rose up and entered the city, and on the next day he went on with Barnabas to Derbe.
***********************
***********************
How many of you know someone with
more money than you have?
How many of you know someone with a
bigger house? How about a better
job? Know anyone who seems happier than
you are?
How many of you know someone who
goes to church at a place where the sermons don’t try to make you feel
inadequate right off the bat?
The point of this is that if you
want to be number one in a category, you’ve probably got some work to do,
right? All of us know someone who might
be doing better in one category or another, someone who might seem like they
have it all together in some way, shape or form. Advertising is great at reminding us of our
inadequacies, because someone out there has a product or system they want to
sell you that will enable you to do better in a certain category. Want to make more money? Get a bigger house? Be more attractive? My email spam filter is filled with people
promising just such results. We are
inundated with reminders of our how inadequate we are.
Why start out talking about
this? Because I believe that it’s
important to think about our sense of self and how we allow ourselves to be
defined. Hopefully, over the last 6.5
years you’ve heard me emphasizing that you are a child of God, precious in his
sight, worthy of love. The message of
the Christian church should be that each and every person on the planet is
completely worthy of Christ’s, and therefore our, love, not because they have
earned it but rather because we worship a God who lavishes love on his unique
creations, each one made in the image of God.
We carry an inherent dignity within us because of who made us and how we
are made, not because of what we have done.
But the world wants to label and
define us based on its standards, and this is very, very easy to buy into. Think about it—if you meet someone, what one
of the first questions they’re going to ask you. Easy—they’ll ask what you do. It’s a way we define each other. We form impressions of one another by our
interior judgments of certain jobs.
Also, we judge one another based on how we look and what we drive and
where we live. We do this to one
another, and we do this to ourselves, and we often find ourselves not measuring
up, and what happens is we end up in these vicious cycles trying to keep up
with a certain level of living only to discover that, once we have achieved what
we thought was a comfortable level of living, there is still more work to
do. It’s impossible to ever get ahead,
because the world is telling us that there is always someone ahead of us, and
that we have to be number one. We’re
never allowed to rest.
See, this all matters because if we
believe what God says about us, rather than what the world says about us, I
believe it can fundamentally alter the way we think, live and treat one
another.
Today’s Scripture lesson is a great
example of what can happen if you place your sense of self in the hands of
others.
Paul and Barnabas are in Lystra,
and they are there to proclaim the Word of God.
Paul has been talking about Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world who
loved us enough to die for us, and all the while a crippled man has been
listening intently. Paul notices him,
and he reaches out by the power of God to heal him. The man leaps up and begins to walk, and the
crowd is amazed.
In fact, the crowd is so amazed
that they believe that Paul and Barnabas are gods who have taken on human
form. They’re ready to worship Paul and
Barnabas. The fatted calf is about to be
killed and the entire city is going to celebrate Paul and Barnabas! They are enraptured by the presence of these
two men.
Now, let’s pause for a moment.
This probably feels pretty awesome,
right? An entire city suddenly thinks
that you are a god. You’re going to get
a ticker-tape parade, right? Everyone is
going to adore you. People will throw
parties for you. They will give you food
and money and fancy clothes and nice things just because they think you’re the
best. You are awesome, and everyone
wants to be near you. You could get used
to this, right?
In America today, we have such a
celebrity culture that it doesn’t take much of an imagination to think about
what this might be like. The paparazzi
spend their lives chasing celebrities to take pictures of them, and we buy
their products. We want to dress like
the celebrities, do what famous people do, and it comes dangerously close to
idol worship. Entire magazines are
dedicated to celebrities. And most of
them love the attention. They love
having the eyes of the nation upon them.
If I were in their shoes, I might, too.
It’s an easy thing to get caught up in, right?
When we let the world, define us,
things like this can make us feel on top of the world.
But here, in a few short verses, we
recognize how fickle the world’s attention can be. We see the danger in allowing ourselves to be
defined by the opinion of the world, by the adoration of the masses. If we pursue worldly fame and adoration, we
may get it. But we may lose it, too.
Here, Paul and Barnabas are about
to have a sacrifice made to them, but in verse 19, suddenly the passion of the
crowds is stirred against them, and suddenly these folks who were worshipping
Paul and Barnabas are ready to kill them.
Just like that, the crowds are persuaded and Paul is dragged out of the
city and stoned, and the crowd only leaves him when they believe he is
dead. Like flipping a switch, the world
turned on Paul and sought his life.
Friends, if we allow the opinions
of others to define us, we will find ourselves crushed, because the world is a
fickle place. If our sense of self depends
on the affirmation of others, we’re in big trouble, because you can’t please
everyone, and if you spend your life trying you, too, will feel like you’ve
been run over.
So where does your heart receive
satisfaction? Do you hear the still,
small voice of God reminding you that you are precious in his sight? Do you let God satisfy you? Is your identity rooted in the fact that you
have been made in the image of God and called to a life of discipleship? Or are you so busy trying to catch up with
the people ahead of you that you’ve missed the voice of the Holy Spirit calling
you into authentic discipleship, in which the ears of your heart listen to God’s
voice, and it is God that defines your life and its purpose.
If you let God, the one who made
you and calls you by name, satisfy the desires of your heart, which he created,
I promise that you will not live your life chasing other people. You will spend your life pursuing the vision
of God, serving him by loving others, and your life will be a witness to his
glory.
But it’s hard work to ignore the
siren call of the world, who wants to offer you its adoration. It’s much harder work to let God satisfy
us. But it is the work that will last
forever.
Let us pray
No comments:
Post a Comment