Sermon Tone Analysis

October 31, 1517 was a great day in the history of the modern church.

It was the day that sprang the Protestant Reformation.

Protestant obviously meaning to protest what the church had been doing and reformation because the intent of the young Augustinian monk was not to abolish the Catholic Church but to reform it back to what the Scriptures taught.

Being a monk he had seen how corrupted the church had become and as he himself studied the Scripture and came to Romans 1:16-17, his eyes were opened to the truth that justification comes by faith alone, not through works.

What put Marin Luther over the edge and drove him to hammer the 95 thesis on the doors at Wittenburg was in actuality a building project.

There were plans to build a bisillica in Saint Petersburg but they were not getting the funds needed so they came up with a plan.

They would go to all the churches and they would preach sermons on how their loved ones were in hell and tell them if they wanted their loved ones to be taken out of hell than all they had to do was buy an indulgence for them and then this would be added to their grace account and essentially buy them out of purgatory.

Well Martin Luther heard this and once he did he was angry at what the church was doing and he wanted to see this changed.

He wanted the church to go back to the to Christ alone, by Faith alone, through grace alone, In Scripture alone, for the glory of God alone.

The problem was he faced a heavy opposition.

These people had power and influence and they didn’t want to let it go.

Martin Luther never backed down and as he went others would follow, it wasn’t easy and many of them died for the cause of Christ as heretics but they are God’s servants who brought us back to Christ by Combating Opposition.

Why is Jesus so polarizing?

Jesus told His disciples, I did not come to bring peace but a sword.

Jesus Christ is very polarizing He can move some to realize how much they need Him, and need forgiveness and he can move others to anger and hostility.

There is no middle ground when it comes to Jesus Christ.

He has said that himself.

Bringing the gospel to the people means we are going out to war, it means we will face hostility and we need to know how to handle hostility.

We have been looking at five components to combating opposition.

We have already looked at four of the five.

The first four are actually offensive tools or components.

The last one we will look at will be defensive.

Let's go ahead and look at Acts 13:1-12 and as we read through it I will stop along the way and just remind you of our first four components as we conclude our look at Five components of Combating Opposition.

Five Components to Combating Opposition

Now there were at Antioch, in the church that was there, prophets and teachers: Barnabas and Simeon who was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manaen who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. 2 While they were ministering to the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, "Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them." 3 Then, when they had fasted and prayed and laid their hand on them, they sent them away.

Here is were we found our first component, Prayer.

Prayer

Prayer should be our first component in anything we do, it should come naturally to us and I believe prayer is one of the weakest disciplines in the Christian life and it is the weakest discipline in going out to share the gospel.

Prayer is a reliance on God and a focusing our entire being on who He is and what He wants not only in our lives but also for the world.

It is a the beginning of letting all things go in this world and embracing the will of God, it is a seeking the eternal and letting go of the temporal.

Through prayer you align yourself with the will of God and so this would lead to the next component which is Willingness.

Willingness

We see this in verses 4 through the first half of 6. "So, being sent out by the Holy Spirit, they went down to Seleucia and from there they sailed to Cyprus. 5 When they reached Salamis, they began to proclaim the word of God in the synagogues of the Jews; and they also had John as their helper.

6 When they had gone through the whole island and far as Paphos;" So we see in these verses their willing to go as God commanded them.

The Holy Spirit told them to set apart Barnabas and Saul and so they did.

We see in verse 4 they were sent out by the Holy Spirit, so they followed where the Spirit lead without putting up a fight.

They didn't just answer a call but they were willing and they knew this would not be an easy trip and they also knew they would face opposition.

These first two components are followed up by Humility.

Humility

Humility when it comes to giving the gospel and receiving the gospel are important.

We find that the proconsul, that is the governor of the island, is a man who is seeking knowledge.

This is why he has Bar-Jesus on his cabinet, just so he can soak up his knowledge.

Since he desires so much to have knowledge he hears of Barnabas and Saul in the area and we found that Sergius Paulus being a man of intelligence doesn't necessarily mean he is humble, but he will be humbled by the message Barnabas and Saul are about to give.

Those giving the message are also humble.

This is not about them it is about the gospel, they are putting themselves last for the cause of Christ.

The good news of being saved from our sin and being plucked out of hell is more important then our personal comforts and being liked.

When we understand it is not all about us and that it is all about Jesus Christ is when we truly learn to put ourselves last and allow the Holy Spirit to work in us and that is exactly what happens with Saul.

His prayerful willing humility is prime for the control of the Holy Spirit.

He is Spirit-filled.

Spirit-filled

Look at verse 9, "But Saul, who was also know as Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit, fixed his gaze on him," Now when it comes to living for Christ and when it comes to giving the gospel and even when it comes to receiving the gospel it is all the work of the Holy Spirit.

In fact this is the third time we have seen the Holy Spirit work in the passage.

The first time was in verse 2, when He said, 'Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.' Then in verse 4, "So, being set out by the Holy Spirit," and now in this verse the Holy Spirit takes control of Saul who is also called Paul.

The filling as we said last week simply means to be controlled by the Holy Spirit.

Paul was so under the control of the Holy Spirit that it is as though the words that come out of his mouth in verse 10 are not his own.

When it says here that he fixed his gaze on him, gives the impression, the Holy Spirit was seeing through Paul's eyes and looking right at Elymas.

I picture this as one of the most intense stares ever.

To the point that it was piercing, burning right through Elymas.

It is like the purity of God looking through the eyes of Paul and seeing fixing Himself on the evil and sin within Elymas.

This was one seriously intense gaze.

How many of you had a parent, mother or father, who when they looked at you with that gaze, knew you were in deep trouble.

Well multiply that by 100 and you still don't have the intensity that comes from a man who is under the control of the Holy Spirit who is staring down at a heretic who wants to turn someone away from the truth.

This guy Elymas had no idea who he was dealing with, and I don't mean Paul.

It is comforting for me anyway to know that when it comes to giving the gospel in a dark and cruel world like we live in and knowing that I will face opposition out there.

Now this opposition is not just people who won't listen but people who will work hard at trying to convince the person you are witnessing to doesn't listen to the truth.

See it's one thing when you are giving the gospel to someone and they argue with you and come up with all the reason why they don't want to listen to the truth.

Those people are just hard hearted, they are proud and until they become like a child and trust without seeing there is nothing you can do.

This isn't the opposition Paul encounters, his opposition is not from the one who wants to hear but the one who is threatened is someone else.

It has become The Holy Spirit verse satan's minion.

This is the opposition, this is what we need to prepare for.

This is why prayer, willingness, humility are important, because we need to be able at all times to yield to the Holy Spirit to fight our battles for us.

That is what happens here.

The Holy Spirit takes control, and the Holy Spirit does something to this advisory that stops him in his tracks.

He denounces him.

Denounce

Now before I read the next verse I do want to preface one thing, Paul doesn't just mouth off to this guy, he doesn't just start calling him names and beating him down verbally.

No, what he does here is he calls out the man's sin.

Verse 10 reads, 'and said, "You who are full of all deceit and fraud, you son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, will you not cease to make crooked the straight ways of the Lord?"

Here is the Holy Spirit denouncing this man's wickedness, his evil intent.

This man is so consumed with power and so stuck in his own pride that he tries to sway the Proconsul from the truth.

He is living in spiritual darkness and he wants the proconsul to live in spiritual darkness with him.

This is a matter of the heart here.

'You who are full of all deceit and fraud."

Should you listen to your heart?

This is the true source of man's desires and beliefs, it is the heart.

This is what motivates us.

The source of our motivation in life is the heart.

Now I know what you're thinking, Mike didn't you tell us not to trust our hearts because they are desperately wicked, yes and if we trust our hearts we end up like this guy here.

That is why we need to be careful of what motivates us.

Solomon writes this in his letter, Ecclesiastes;

"This is an evil in all that is done under the sun, that there is one fate for all men.

Furthermore, the hearts of the sons of men are full of evil and insanity is in their hearts throughout their lives.

Afterwards they go to the dead."

Mankind is full of evil and insanity in their hearts.

No matter what we think of ourselves our hearts are desperately wicked.

We only know one thing, selfishness, chase after what you enjoy and what makes you happy, on this earth.

Problem is we all have one fate in this world and that is to die.

So the question comes do you want to die with a motive of serving yourself or the motive of serving a Holy, Righteous and Just God.

Jesus taught His disciples a very valuable lesson on the heart and how the heart can motivate us.

I want us to get the context of what is going on so I would like to start in Matthew 15:1