Acts 17:1-9
February 2, 2003
The Reasonableness of the Gospel
All too often common sense is not common enough. Sound reason is often lacking. Thinking is a lost art.
Ray Poore called his wife, saying that their dog bit him and he was going to kill it. She raced back to their mobile home in Winchester, VA to find Ray dead. It appears that Ray decided to beat his dog with his shotgun by holding the barrel of a loaded gun. Ray’s mother, commenting on her son’s cruel and stupid actions commented only as a mother could: “Ray was a very intelligent man, but he didn't always use his intelligence in the right way." ...Like, say, to think. (This is True 1/26/03)
Also in Winchester is another person forgetting to engage their brain. Shaun Breeden decided to rob the First Union Bank in Winchester. Unfortunately, he chose his own branch. The teller not only recognized him as a customer, but his demand note was written on the back of a deposit slip imprinted with his name and Social Security number. Faced with the evidence against him, Breeden plead guilty. Well, at least he wasn't stupid enough to claim his innocence. (This is True 9/8/02)
Our world is full of people who thrive on stupidity, as though the fuel which makes them run is high octane idiocy. But while we may chuckle at the ignorance of those around us, some will level the same accusing finger in our direction when it comes to the reasonableness of our faith. It is not uncommon to hear the allegation made that Christians are a few fries short of a happy meal.
You may recall how in 1993, Washington Post writer Michael Weisskopf issued his notorious declaration that evangelicals are "largely poor, uneducated, and easy to command…" Conservative Protestant intellectuals were quick to call his bluff. Yet only a year later, when historian Mark Noll, himself a conservative Protestant, published a book called The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, it was widely greeted by his coreligionists not with cries of "Scoundrel!" and "Traitor!" but the murmur, "Alas, ’tis true." (J. Budziszewski First Things, 100 p. 52)
Our passage this morning reminds us that the gospel we believe is good news that is to be well reasoned, well grounded, but may not always be well received. As Paul and Silas leave behind a new congregation in Philippi in chapter 16, their backs still bear the scars of their beating; they come to a new town, Thessalonica. There some are persuaded to believe and others are persuaded to riot. But through the passage we see how the gospel, whether believed or rejected, must focus on the foundational truths of Christ’s work on our behalf. READ Acts 17:1-9
Some 100 miles from Philippi, Paul and Silas traveled to Thessalonica. The largest and most populous city in Macedonia, it was founded by Cassander in 315 B.C. and named after his wife, the sister of Alexander the Great. When Paul arrived, it had a population of 200,000 and was a flourishing commercial center which commanded trade by sea across the Aegean and by land because of the Via Egnatia.
On his arrival in Thessalonica, Paul sought to earn his living by working at his trade of tent-making. We learn this from the apostle's first letter to the Thessalonians, where he says, "For you recall, brethren, our labor and hardship, how working night and day so as not to be a burden to any of you..."(1 Thess.2:9). Paul was careful to support himself because there were many traveling philosophers, who had a reputation for selfishness, making the rounds in that first century day. The apostle did not want to be included among that group.
While he established himself in town, he followed his pattern of connecting with the synagogue to find those who may already have the foundation of Scripture to understand how Jesus is the Messiah promised in God’s Word. In v2 Luke describes what took place, focusing more on the approach than the content. It is here we see how the gospel is to be well reasoned.
The gospel is to be well reasoned
With typical Lucan shorthand, we are given a glimpse not only of the major points of what Paul said, but also how it was present. Luke uses words to describe an approach which demonstrates that our faith is to be well reasoned. In verse 2, Paul “reasoned with them from the Scriptures.”
The word here is dialego, from which we get dialogue, a term which means a discourse, an orderly presentation of truth. This reasoning of v2 is further defined as explaining and proving in v3, also terms that form a rhetorical syllogism, a pattern of persuasion familiar to any first-century schoolboy. By deductive logic, Paul propounds major and minor premises, using irrefutable proofs. Taken together, these premises lead by necessary logic to the conclusion, the speaker's goal in persuasion. The witness pattern is as follows (Larkin, Acts 245-246)
- Major Premise: The (Messiah) must suffer and rise from the dead.
- Minor Premise: Jesus modeled these characteristics in his death and resurrection
- Conclusion: This Jesus . . . is the Christ.
Paul’s preaching illustrates for us that we too must engage the mind.
Preaching is to be intelligent discourse, not entertainment. We must never come to church to be amused; rather, we come to exercise our minds through the gospel of God--a gospel that stretches our minds because it speaks about God, who is infinitely greater than our minds.
I know that at times it may be hard to follow a sermon, as it lacks the filler common to our culture. There is not the visual stimulation or the emotional titillation. It calls you to think, to wrestle with the veracity of what is proclaimed. This is not an excuse for dry diatribes or sterile sermons. When you listen to a sermon, ask yourself: “Does this cohere with logic? Does it hang together as a whole?” If not, you may easily find yourself duped by emotional pandering.
While we do not reduce the Christian faith to mere logic, we must not demean the mind which God gave us. We are created in the image of God and should use the minds God gave us. It is an enormous tragedy that a wedge has been driven between intellect and faith for ordinary Christians. Christians of all people ought to be rational, to love truth, and to be using their minds to think what God has taught them to think. Yet we very often get branded as irrational, foolish, superstitious, and backward.
Throughout the course of human history, people who knew the God of the Bible and the truth of the Bible have elevated the educational experience and the minds of the people they encountered. Wherever the church has gone it has raised the ability of people to think. The greatest universities have been founded by Christians. It was Christian scholars in the middle ages who preserved the thinking of not just Christian thinkers but of the Greeks and Romans and others, because they believed that it was reasonable to use one's mind in serving the Creator.
It is in this area I want to challenge our youth. Don’t believe the lie that Christianity demands you check your brains at the door that logic is contrary to faith. When you enter college or the work force challenge the prevailing illogic of our age which seems to dismiss sound thinking that refuses to engage in a dialogue, talking through what is believed to be true.
Logic is not contrary to witness. But logic alone is not what changes a life. It is neither emotionalism nor intellectualism that transforms a sin stained heart, bound to rebelling against God. Change comes as God the Holy Spirit works through God’s Word.
The gospel is to be well grounded
Paul did reason, the terms Luke uses to describe what Paul is doing point to his training in rhetoric, yet the content is vitally important to his approach. He reasoned from the Scriptures. How? He did this by explaining and proving what was necessary.
Again the terms used in verse 3 describe an approach that is logical and coherent. The word to explain literally means to open. But what is opened is more than the scroll and words pointed to on the page. With simplicity the Scriptures are taught so that their minds are opened as well.
This same word is used of what Jesus did with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, as he opened the Scriptures to them so that they could understand what they said about him. To open Scriptures is to reveal its primary theme: the person and work of Jesus Christ. It is not just playing word games or finding hidden meanings in the text, as though the Bible is some hidden code unlocked only by the enlightened.
Paul does not offer proof texts, he gives evidence, he proves. The word prove means to set beside, that is, to put the claims of God’s Word next to their fulfillment. What Paul proved was the necessity of the Messiah to suffer, die and be raised from the dead. From there, he makes the connection between what God said he would do for thousands of years and what he did in Jesus of Nazareth.
Paul used an apologetic argument from fulfilled prophecy and miracle to demonstrate the truth of the Christian faith. Jesus was the one of whom the Scriptures spoke, because the events of his life and death, and resurrection are exactly what the Old Testament predicates of the coming Messiah. The very fact that the expectations of the prophets--some of whom are writing as much as 1500 years before the coming of Christ--all come to fruition in the historical events surrounding the life, death and burial of Jesus Christ is a very powerful and compelling argument. Paul proceeds "to reason" with those in the Synagogue, by setting out what the prophets said this about the Messiah--and then showing how Jesus fulfilled these expectations. "This Jesus is the Christ." (K. Riddlebarger, Men Who Have Caused Trouble all Over the World)
We are not told to which texts Paul turned nor how he made his point. That is not Luke’s interest here. Luke has already given those texts in previous passages, such as in Paul’s sermon in 13:17-41.
Paul may have begun with the first gospel promise in Genesis 3:15, that despite our first parent’s rebellion, God would provide through Eve one who would crush the serpent’s head. Paul may have turned to the messianic psalms which spoke of the suffering Messiah. Psalm 22 describes the crucifixion in detail as his bones are out of joint (14), as his thirst unquenchable (15), as his hands and feet are pierced (16). The early church often used Ps 16 as a promise of the Messiah’s resurrection. Verse 10 states that God will not abandon his soul to Sheol, or let the holy one see corruption. David died, was buried and decayed. This promise applies to his Son, who now is seated on the throne. These, among hundreds of others, were the evidence that what happened in that dusty capital of Jerusalem 2000 years ago was promised long before. The evidence is clear… Jesus is the Son of God, the Savior of sinners.
Paul’s preaching was content driven; it communicates facts necessary for people to respond in faith. Preaching the gospel must be grounded in what is said in God’s Word.
It is not substituting story-telling for biblical exposition, or using some otherwise unexplained Scripture text as a peg on which to hand a string of illustrations. Still less is it moralizing on social questions or speculating about prophecy from TV news of events in the Middle East. If lost people are to be converted and the converted made holy they will need to hear constantly of Christ and his claims upon every area of their lives. (Keddie, Acts 200)
It is said that sharing your testimony is best, saying, “this is what God has done for me” for that is irrefutable … yet it is merely subjective. Rather the gospel must be grounded in the objective Word of God. We use our personal experience as a wall to hide behind when we are afraid of the hard work of studying God’s Word and engaging people with intelligent dialogue.
This means we should stick to the text even as we face a society that is increasingly biblically illiterate. The temptation is to soft-pedal the biblical content of the message, on the ground that people will be put off, or at least confused, by material with which they are unfamiliar. But real change comes by God’s Word.
If the sermon you hear is unreasoned, demand logic. If it is ungrounded in God’s Word …demand repentance. Since faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God, be sure that the principle subject of every sermon is Jesus and him crucified.
The gospel may or may not be well received 4-9
We’ve seen from our text that Paul proclaimed Christ in a well reasoned manner being well grounded in Scripture. What happens next dispels any idea that if we have a logical argument flowing from God’s Word, people will always respond positively. Some were persuaded of the gospel’s claims; others were persuaded that they must rid their city of these miscreants.
In v4 we are told of those who were persuaded. As Paul was proclaiming Christ in the synagogue on the Sabbath, the them in v4 are Jews. They joined, attached themselves to, threw their lot in, with Paul and Silas. In addition to the Jews, God fearing Greeks and women of note also joined.
But there were others who did not like what they heard. Their response lacked the reasonableness which characterized Paul’s presentation.
Why some of the Jews were jealous is not clear. They may have objected to the message itself. Their reasons may be more visceral than intellectual, more of the gut than the mind.
They may have objected to a gospel of grace. We saw this in Acts 13-14 when people initially accepted the gospel but then rejected it when they realized that God’s grace is great for a nominal sinner like me, but can never be applied to a sinner like you. Or it may be that Paul and Silas attracted the very people they sought to reach, the Gentiles and the leading women. The Gentile’s presence in the synagogue probably gave the Jewish community a degree of acceptance in the predominately Gentile city and probably also some financial support.
Whatever the reason, their recourse was not to further engage Paul in an intellectual repartee.
They aroused the rabble. Whereas the ESV calls them wicked men of the rabble and the KJV calls them "lewd fellows of the baser sort", they are literally marketplace loafers.
This term refers to those who had nothing better to do than to hang around the market looking for trouble. They are the soccer hooligans of the first century, the mall rats of Rome. Just as the news has highlighted problems at Mayfair Mall with rambunctious youth, so here those opposed to the gospel got them riled up.
The mob, thinking Paul was being lodged by a local boy; they go to Jason’s house. As Paul and Silas are not found, perhaps having been warned of the ensuing violence, the mob grabs Jason and hauls him before the crowd.
What Luke describes here is particular to this city. Ancient inscriptions tell us that Thessalonica was run by the demos, a people’s assembly, a citizen’s council who acted as the legislative body. The demos (from which we get democratic) would then direct the city authorities, the politarchas, to enact a punishment.
The charges are threefold.
- 1st These people have caused trouble all over the world, they have literally turned the world upside down. That is, they stir up sedition, they are political agitators
- 2nd Jason is harboring them. They have so infiltrated our city, that one of our own, Jason is protecting these troublemakers
- 3rd Finally, and the most dangerous charge, they defy Caesar’s decrees.
Their concern is not unfounded. In the first century there was widespread unrest in the Jewish communities throughout the Roman Empire. Jewish freedom fighters were active in Israel during the reign of Claudius (45-54 A.D.). A militant Messianic movement was fermenting among the Jews of the Dispersion, and the custodians of law and order in the imperial provinces and cities were not likely to draw a distinction between it and the gospel of Jesus the Messiah which Paul preached. In Rome itself there had been trouble of this kind already, so much so that Claudius had expelled the Jewish community from the city (Acts 18:2). Roman writer Suetonius relates how there was rioting at the instigation of a certain man he refers to as Chrestus, which may be a misspelling of Christ. The Edict of Claudius in AD 50 may be the decree Luke refers to here. Thus when viewed in this light the charges made by the Jews could be construed to have a grain of truth in them.
The charge that these Christians had another king, Jesus, which was the most dangerous
As was read earlier, Jesus was accused before Pilate of sedition, of `subverting' the nation by claiming himself to be `Christ, a King', (Lk. 23:2), so Paul's teaching about the kingdom of God (14:22) and about Christ's parousia (the official term for an imperial visit), which we know from the letters to the Thessalonians he had emphasized when he was with them, were misinterpreted. Since the emperor was sometimes called basileus (king), as well as kaisar (emperor), why wouldn’t the title basileus to Jesus (7) be a treasonable offence?
We are called to be conscientious and law abiding citizens, as 1 Peter teaches us and yet we know that as Christ is Lord, there will always be unavoidable political implications. Caesar, be he a king or a president, is God’s servant, his authority is delegated not by the people’s vote, but by our sovereign God’s rule.
When we confess that Christ’s kingdom is not of this world, we are not saying its otherworldliness has nothing to do with our lives, but rather it supercedes and demands our sole allegiance.
In John 18, Christ said to Pilate that his kingdom is not of this world, which in v37 means that he was not rescued from death. Christ as king exercises rule over the nations, but does so from the position of the empty cross and the empty tomb.
Christ as risen king means the gospel is relevant to the conduct of politics and the formation of policy, of course, because the spiritual lordship of Jesus Christ has very practical down to earth ethical and moral implications for civil government and social relations. The gospel is, nevertheless, not a political credo as such, Jesus is not a candidate for political office and the church is not a political party. Nowhere did the apostles say, “Vote for Jesus; don’t vote for Caesar!” (Keddie Acts 201)
The gospel upsets the apple cart, challenges the status quo, and turns the world on its head.
That Christ is king over all creation means that our calling in life is to reasonably and biblically engage our world. We should lovingly challenge their assumptions, point them to Christ. We engage our culture from the perspective of the cross. Real change will come not when we get the White House to buy into our agenda, not when Congress is controlled by our party nor the Supreme Court weighted with judges who will pass biblical laws. While we must be active citizens, real and lasting change which will challenge culture at its deepest levels will occur as we do what Paul did – with Scripture and sound reason point others to Christ.
To do this takes neither positions of power nor great intelligence. What is necessary is simply a willingness to be used by God in whatever area of life he has placed you.
