Unleashing the Power Within - Acts 15:36 16:15

And this morning I hope to bless you with my message which is called, it's Paul's actually second missionary journey that begins, and the message is, Unleashing the Power Within, How the Holy Spirit empowers and guides through roadblocks.

And I thought the title would be fitting because we do live in Montreal and we're quite used to dealing with roadblocks.

As you see there, I put a picture of a Montreal roadblock to kind of create with you an emotional connection on this subject.

There's a story of a pastor who is going to his church for an important meeting and once he gets there, he notices there's all kinds of roadblocks in front of his church.

So, and now he's really nervous, he goes, oh, how far am

he can find parking, comes around a second time, and again, he can't find parking because all these roadblocks.

So he goes, I got to go back a third time, goes back a third time, it's a long block, it's a dense part of the city, and he comes back and

the third time he still can't find parking.

He just parks the car there and and he takes a chance and then puts a note on on the car on the windshield.

He says, dear officer, in case he gets a ticket, I went around the block 3 times, couldn't find parking, had to leave it here.

And then in quotations he writes, forgive us our trespasses.

Sure enough, the policeman would come around and he sees the car, proceeds to give the guy a ticket, and as he's putting the ticket on the car, he sees the note.

He reads it, and then he turns it around and he says, I'm a new policeman in this territory.

If I don't give you a ticket, I can lose my job.

In quotations, lead us not into temptation.

In the verses today, we will look to see how the disciples will overcome more serious, more significant roadblocks that will be very consequential in the spreading of the gospel.

The Holy Spirit continues to be very active as Paul and Barnabas prepare to go on their second missionary journey to teach, to preach, to witness to the Jews, the Gentiles, and the converts that they seen on their first trip.

And in this specific section of Acts, we're going to see how the Holy Spirit will work in dramatic fashion in redirecting the plans of the missionaries.

These divine interventions will ultimately enable the gospel to reach the farthest corners of the earth.

So my big idea today is how the Holy Spirit empowers and guides the mission through roadblocks.

How the Holy Spirit empowers and guides through roadblocks.

And what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna try to lay out for you 4 scenes that I will cover in these 20 verses.

And the first scene is a conflict that multiplies the mission.

And in this scene, we have the famous disagreement between Barnabas and Paul.

In the second scene, we see a new star disciple that strengthens the mission.

And in this part of the scripture, we have Timothy who's being introduced and joins the mission team.

And in the third scene, we have a divine vision that redirects the mission, and that's the vision of the Macedonian man.

And finally, in scene 4, we have a new frontier that expands the mission, And that's when Paul and his journeymates cross the Aegean and

convert who would be the first convert in Europe as we know it today.

So, and then I will end with concluding thoughts.

So let me pray and then we'll get started.

Father, we just come before you today, and again, we are so grateful to be in your presence and just to be brothers and sisters on this journey together.

And as we journey together, Lord, we know that we will come across roadblocks and obstacles and barriers that are outside and that are within us.

I pray, Lord, that today the message that we will have, the verses we will read, the thoughts that will be shared will be expressed from you through me and that we will all be edified by this.

So let me read for you the first scene, which is Acts 15, 36 to 41.

And after some days, Paul said to Barnabas, let us return and visit the brothers in every city where we proclaim the word of the Lord and see how they are.

Now Barnabas wanted to take with them John called Mark, but Paul thought best not to take with them 1 who had withdrawn from them in Pamphylia and had not gone with them to the work.

And there arose a sharp disagreement so that they separated from each other.

Barnabas took Mark with him and sailed away to Cyprus.

And Paul chose Silas and departed, having been commended by the brothers to the grace of the Lord.

And he went through Syria and Cilicia, strengthening the churches." So the first thing we see here is the purpose of the trip.

Paul and Barnabas decide it would be a good idea to revisit the churches they previously established.

And so it is a two-fold purpose to this trip.

1 is to edify the brothers and sisters that they've already met there and that have already been converted.

And then it's to share the important agreement that was reached at the Jerusalem Council in Antioch.

And this Louis spoke about last week, and he did a very good job in explaining that, and I would encourage you to listen to that message because it has a lot of detail about what that agreement meant.

But I will just review it for you for just a quick review to set the context for what I'm going to be talking about today.

So the Jerusalem Council, the reason for it is because the Jews and Gentiles are now under 1 roof.

They are now converting to Christ, and so they are now assembling together, and the Jews were concerned about maintaining some of the elements of the Mosaic law.

And so they gathered together in Antioch to discuss this important issue and after a lengthy discussion with many leaders involved, they decide on these 4 restrictions, 4 abstentions, which were to abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols, to abstain from blood, to abstain from what was strangled, and to abstain from sexual immorality.

Note, The spirit of this agreement is not the abstentions.

The spirit of the agreement is that salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

Now, there is these restrictions where concessions to preserve the unity between these 2 groups who are coming together with very different traditions and very different customs.

So they were sociological rather than theological, okay?

It's for them to be assembling socially and being able to be united.

They weren't conditional to 1 salvation, but rather to encourage unity in the church.

What Louis also highlighted last week, and I think it's important I mention it again, is that they resolved this issue in a peaceable manner.

They appeared to be practicing some healthy conflict resolution skills, okay?

So they allowed each person to share, to talk about their point of view, and everybody stayed silent while the other 1 spoke, and then finally having the Holy Spirit really instruct them as to what the right thing would be.

And so they did come up with a very good agreement.

And so now we are going on this trip with this information to share with others.

What were the places that they were visiting on their first journey that they wanted to revisit again this time.

So I want to do a quick recap of the places they want to revisit there.

And I have my clicker here, I don't know if you can see this, but there's a little red thing there.

Okay, 3 things I want to highlight here of this trip because I'm going to be talking about it today.

The first thing is, the first place they go here is in Cyprus, okay, and there's an important conversion there of a man named Sergius Paulus, who is the pro-consul of Cyprus, and he would be very influential in sharing the gospel and allowing the gospel to permeate his territory, and then in Antioch too, because he would be traveling to those areas.

And what we remember about Pamphylia here that is important to the discussion today is John, who's also called Mark, decides,

you know what, I think I'm going back to Jerusalem.

It could have been he wasn't agreeing with the ministry to the Gentiles.

It could have been he didn't like the food.

The Bible doesn't spell out exactly what it is, but that's where John Mark would abandon Paul and Barnabas.

And then they would both, Paul and Barnabas would travel by themselves and then they would get to this area here where they would encounter significant persecution and Paul actually got stoned to death but he survived.

Okay, He had been able to survive that, and he should have been dead.

So those are the 3 things, and of course, a lot of good things happened there, because many people were converted.

Many people were saved through that first visit.

So now Barnabas, so Paul now wants to return.

He's the guy who initiates the second visit.

He says, let us return and visit the brothers in every city where we proclaim the word of the Lord and see how they are.

But Barnabas wants to take John Mark and Paul thinks it's unwise.

First roadblock is that Paul and Barnabas disagree.

And the expression, sharp disagreement in Greek, is paroximos, which means a state of irritation expressed in argument.

first I want to mention the fact that I appreciate that Luke doesn't shy away from reporting the conflict.

The Bible in its entirety, it's not sanitized to make everything look good.

If somebody wanted to fool us about the Bible and fool us into believing in Christ, they would sanitize everything and make it look good, right?

And because of that, it teaches us that the Bible has integrity in its honesty.

It also normalizes the conflict and shows that God can accomplish his purposes even through disagreement.

But you say how can conflict be beneficial when it's so difficult?

It affects us physically, emotionally, spiritually.

It can be draining, leaving us paralyzed, wrestling with feelings of anger and disappointment.

I'm sure if I asked you people how many of you enjoy conflict, I'm not going to get a lot of show of hands.

And the people who would want it would be too shy to do it.

Unfortunately, conflict is unavoidable and sometimes necessary in God's economy as we'll see today.

We must learn to understand and make it work for us the best we can.

It's a roadblock if well navigated can lead to positive outcome.

Personally, I tend to be conflict averse.

I grew up in a home where, you know, we were conditioned to try to get along with each other.

I remember 1 of my grandmothers was like that.

As soon as she heard a voice, hey, stop screaming, you got to get along.

And that really worked throughout our whole family.

They tell each other exactly what's on their mind and then but after they've said their piece it's like love you love you love you and I'm just like if I would talk like that to my family we'd never be speaking again.

I remember at work I was averse to conflict when I was in sales.

When we, when the customer had a problem, how it would scare me to think oh I know I had to go there and handle this problem.

There's going to be a back and forth and they're going to be argumentative.

And so, but with time I realized that it was an opportunity to develop a friendship, a relationship with the customer that otherwise I wasn't able to do.

So turning that into an opportunity was helpful to me in my career.

Sometimes I would lose the business and that's good too because now you know where you stand and you can, they can go their way and I could go mine.

So back to this disagreement with Paul and Barnabas.

It appears their personality profiles may have played a role in the difference of opinion about John Mark.

He's a prominent figure in Acts, known for his abilities to instruct and to encourage.

This will be the last time that he's mentioned in the Book of Acts.

He's first introduced in Acts as Joseph, who was also called Barnabas, which is a name ascribed to him for his character of being an encourager.

The reason people have 2 names in the Bible is diverse, so you have to do proper interpretation.

John is his ethnic name, is his Jewish name, and Mark is his Roman name.

So that's why you have John was also called Mark.

Abraham then was given the name Abraham by God.

And the reason for that was it was a covenant.

It represented a covenant between God and Abraham that he would multiply his descendants like the sands of the seashore.

So in the case of Barnabas, it relates to his character and so, you know, we need to interpret when that happens, when there's 2 names, what that means.

So he's also recognized for his generosity.

Barnabas encouraged through his words, but also through his actions.

In Acts 4.36, he sold the property that he had and he put it at the apostles' feet.

He was a protege for Paul when Paul was converted.

And then in 9.27, he's the guy who vouched for him because everybody was afraid of him.

And so Barnabas took the responsibility and had the courage to sponsor Paul and open the way for him to enter the ranks of the disciples.

Barnabas was also considered a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and faith, it says in Acts 11.24, which explains the success he and Paul had together in Antioch in their first mission trip.

He's very concerned about damaging John Mark at a time where he's still very young and he has so much potential.

He's also a relative of John Mark, which would amplify his concern.

Let's look at Paul's personality profile.

We know that he's a wholehearted guy, all or nothing type.

As he was zealous as a Jew, he is now zealous as a Christian.

He has a good idea of what he wants to accomplish, what is needed, and what challenges lie ahead.

He is also a man full of faith in the Holy Spirit, as the scripture indicates through various passages, but discerns something about the situation with John Mark that caused him to arrive at

have wanted to protect John Mark because of a perceived lack of maturity.

He may have been thinking of the stoning in Lykstra, which would have been a very difficult experience for him and wondered how John Mark would handle it.

He demonstrates great bravery throughout his ministry.

It takes courage to be the guy who is willing to speak the truth despite what consequences you endure.

You will remember in his letter to the Galatians, he was not afraid to confront Peter and Barnabas to their face when they were eating with the Gentiles.

They were acting as hypocrites and Paul was courageous to speak the truth.

So while it appears personalities may have played a factor in the

disagreement, these are all speculations.

We don't know for sure because the Bible doesn't spell it out.

But that's probably because it's not important.

What is important is that the Holy Spirit is clearly pointing these 2 great men of faith who are both filled with the Holy Spirit in different directions.

I believe that they end up disagreeing without being disagreeable.

Well, in 1 Corinthians 9.5.6, Barnabas is mentioned again working alongside Paul.

The reference indicates that the friendship between the 2 was unimpaired.

Nowhere else in the New Testament do we hear hard feelings mentioned between Paul and Barnabas.

In 1 of his letters to Timothy, Paul asked for John Mark to be sent for his useful to him.

There may have been reconciliation, we don't know, but it may also mean there was no hard feelings to begin with.

Also we have an indication that these men are used to conflict resolution.

They would have had many years in their experience in Judaism and as Christians involved in such disputes.

Remember, Paul was a Pharisee and Barnabas was a Levite.

Evidence also is shown to us how they handled the issue of circumcision just previously at the Jerusalem Council, which was much more complex than whether or not they should take somebody on a mission trip.

It's safe to assume that they parted ways in a reasonable fashion.

That led him to entertain a third option of separating, which opened the door to ministry multiplication.

Barnabas and John go back to their homies

in Cyprus to strengthen the missionary, to strengthen the ministry that he had started there.

To use a football analogy, Barnabas wants to get John Mark back in the game.

He fumbled the ball, he wants to give him another chance quickly to build his confidence.

And at the same time he might visit key people like Sergius Paulus.

Paul on the other hand finds a collegial partner in Silas, who was also named Silvanus, and he's commended to the work.

He's a leading member in the church in Jerusalem and you'll remember that he and Paul, they traveled together to Antioch to deliver the agreement that was developed in Jerusalem as an eyewitness.

You know, he went with Paul and Barnabas to share what was agreed upon, but he was also an eyewitness of the people that were there in Jerusalem, and having him there brought credibility.

He would end up working with Paul 10 to 15 years.

He's also served as a scribe or secretary for Peter.

And he's known to be a devoted worker who endured hardships and persecution.

So he's a good strategic choice, but they are still down a man.

So as we look at this story, here's 1 application.

Sometimes we need to divide in order to conquer.

Now I wanna be very clear about something, okay?

expected to stay united, to endure 1 another, to be long-suffering, to forgive each other just like Christ forgave us, amen?

Also, this disagreement is not a he said, she said thing, right?

It's a specific mission with a specific purpose under specific circumstances.

In the business world, it'd be qualified as 1 needing situational leadership.

Will it be a good decision for them to split up?

We'll see, as with any difficult decision, we'll only find out after the fact.

So now we go to the second scene here, and the new star disciple strengthens the mission.

A disciple was there named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer.

He was well-spoken by the brothers at Lystra and Iconium.

Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him, and he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in those places, for they all knew that his father was a Greek.

As they went on their way through the cities, they delivered to them for observance the decision that had been reached by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem.

So the churches were strengthened in faith and they increased in numbers.

So Paul and Silas start this mission on a risky note.

They travel this time by land as opposed to their first time through Cyprus because Barnabas and John Mark are going

So they go through the Taurus Mountain through

And they soon visit Lystra, a place where Paul was almost stoned to death on the first visit.

It's interesting that Paul doesn't always choose to avoid the roadblocks

that he encounters, but sometimes he bulldozes right through them.

I have found in my own experience that sometimes the door that seems the most closed is the 1 the Lord is leading me through.

Upon arriving in Lykstra and Iconium, they meet with the believers there

and receive an important reference in the person of Timothy, who was an unlikely disciple given his youth and his ethnicity.

a place where they had met with the strongest opposition, they seemed to

have developed strong allies and received a strong lead to fortify the ministry.

Even today, we know that to be true, that where there is the fiercest persecution, there are great outcomes.

Paul probably evaluated Timothy and saw a potential in him as a suitable replacement for John Mark.

It's also an opportunity to mentor a new disciple.

Mother and grandmother were Jewish converts and the father was Greek.

He was well-versed in the Bible as is written in 2nd Timothy 315.

It says he was acquainted with the sacred scriptures from a young age.

In contrast to John Mark, he will do well under pressure and will end up in jail with Paul and Philippi.

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