Sermon for 4/27/14 on Acts 17

Click Here:  Acts 17:16-34

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Let’s dive into something controversial, shall we?

Let’s talk about desserts. 

Now, some of you are equal opportunity dessert lovers.  If it has sugar in it, you’re interested, and dinner is often the meal to be endured before you get to the good stuff.  You don’t have to be picky—as long as it’s dessert, you’re happy.

Now, others of you have favorites.  I’m a favorite kind of guy.  Ice cream and cookies is as good as it gets, and I’m often not too interested in the other options.

Others of you, well, you might prefer cake.  Or maybe pie. 

But we have our favorites. 

Now, let’s just say I made it my personal mission to convert everyone in the church to choosing ice cream and cookies for dessert.  The worst way to do so would be to stand up and tell you that you’re a terrible person for liking cake, and that choosing cake will rot your brain and lead you into perilous moral choices.  What if I belittled you for choosing pie?  Would that work?  Or, would it convince you if I ignored anything you said or anything about you and simply shouted over you?  What if I ignored your lactose intolerance and simply told you that ice cream was right for you anyway—would you find that appealing?

Now, if I really wanted to win you over to ice cream and cookies, what would be the best way to do so?  I’m guessing it would be to learn what you like, to get to know you, and then maybe invite you over to my house to try some homemade ice cream and cookies.  Maybe you’d convert right then.  Maybe you’d be curious enough to come back and try it again later.  Maybe you’d lead unconvinced.  Any way it ended, you’d have had a positive experience with someone whom you believed deeply cared about you and getting to know you and your interests. 

So this is the ideal way I’d convert you to a lifelong love of ice cream and cookies.  It’s much more reasonable and, probably, appealing than any alternative. 

So when we come to talking about something much, much more important that dessert, how are we going to approach others about our faith?

When we find Paul in Athens in Acts 17, he’s in a city filled with idols.  It’s a place foreign to Christianity, and note how he approaches the people in the city.  We know that his spirit was provoked within him, but rather than rant and rave and hope that his anger converted the Athenians, he instead spends days in the synagogue engaged in conversation with the Jews.  He’s in the marketplace every day talking with the philosophers.  He spent time getting to know the people and the city, and only then does he begin to address the Athenians.

When he does speak, he speaks to the people, rather than over them.  He starts with something they can all relate to—their hunger for God.

See, the Athenians were a religious people, a people who were eager to worship.  They simply had the target of their worship wrong.  They knew they were supposed to be worshipping, and so Paul started with that, because it was something they had in common.  From there, he redirected their efforts, their worship, pointing out to them the error of their ways.  They had this statue of the unknown god, where they basically admitted that they weren’t sure what they worshipped, they just intrinsically knew they were supposed to be worshipping.  Paul points out that statue and tells them that this doesn’t have to remain a mystery—that God has pulled back the curtain so that the truth might be revealed.  And that truth is not some esoteric point to be debated—it’s a person, Jesus of Nazareth.

So Paul points to Christ, crucified and risen from the dead.  He starts with the darkness, where the Athenians are, and he brings them into the light.  He is compassionate, yet firm.  He does not waver from the centrality of Jesus Christ, but he also does not bludgeon them for getting it wrong.  They are welcome to repent, invited to repent—but they have to do so around the person of Jesus Christ.

Now, at this point some of them depart.  Resurrection from the dead is too much for them.  Some of them convert, and many others want to hear more.  They’re intrigued.  They’re curious.  They have questions, and before they convert their lives to follow Christ, they want answers.

Friends, the great news for us is that Christianity doesn’t have to be afraid of questions.  We don’t have to hide behind secrets and mysteries—we believe that Christianity is robust and rigorous enough to withstand examination.  For 2,000 years, the opponents of the church have been trying to tear it down.  They have not succeeded, and will not succeed, for not even the gates of hell itself are strong enough to prevail against Christianity. 

So what do we learn from this?

First of all, we were made to seek God.  Paul says this in verse 27.  He notes that God didn’t need to create us, that God wasn’t missing something without us, but that God wanted to create us and knows that we are at our best when we are seeking God with our whole hearts.  God wants the best for us, and our sin interferes with this life, so God longs for us to seek him.  In verse 27, Paul spells out the purpose of life, and our greatest hope.  We are all made to seek God, and those who choose not to pursue God substitute something else.  We all choose to worship something.

Secondly, when we speak to others about God, we need to relate to them.  We need to know them, to care enough to understand where they are coming from.  Paul spent days speaking with Jews and with philosophers.  Paul learned their poetry, which he quotes here.  Paul cared enough to get to know the people he would preach to.  We, too, are called to know our neighbors, to love them enough to know them, so that when we speak to them of faith, we can talk to them in language they’ll understand.  It’s no use talking over people—people want to know you care.

Finally, Christianity can stand up to examination.  We can stand tough questions.  Paul spent days debating philosophers, people who questioned everything.  He didn’t give up or throw in the towel, but had deep conversations.  Many who are curious about Christianity have a lot of questions.  It’s ok.  It’s also ok to not know all the answers.  Just because you and I don’t know the answers doesn’t mean there are no good answers—it just means we need to learn more.  I’m not afraid of science or medicine—they can throw whatever they want at the faith, and I am comfortable knowing what I believe.  We don’t have to be scared.

Friends, all of this points to Christ, crucified and resurrected.  Paul held this in the center, and it needs to be the center of our life, too.  Without it, we drift off course.  If we let Christianity become a set of rules or some method to happiness, we wander from the centrality of what God is doing in Jesus Christ.  God is defeating the power of sin and death in Christ.  Each and every one of us was lost, without cause for hope, until Christ intervened and saved us from our sins by the power of his death on the cross.  We cannot lose this at the middle, for without it we are no different than anyone else.  May we base our lives around this central truth, and may we never deviate.

Let us pray