Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Illustration:

Historical Context: Letters have forms, usually in the beginning and in the end.

The middle section of letters tend to have some freedom determined by:

Purpose of the letter

And content of the letter

The author introduced himself as Paul, which we looked over his life very briefly last week.

He was:

A Jew, from Tarsus, trained in Jerusalem under Gamaliel.

A Pharisees who persecuted the church, he heard Stephen’s sermon before consenting to Stephen’s death.

Had an encounter with Jesus on the road to Damascus.

An experience that totally transformed his life.

Barnabas sought Paul out to involve Paul in the ministry.

The church in Antioch commissioned Barnabas and Paul as missionaries to preach the Gospel – we have no way of estimating the impact the obedience of the church and the obedience of Barnabas and Paul had for the cause of Christ.

What could happen if we were obedience in sending and in going?

Could we measure the impact?

Proposition: Christians will disciple when they submit to God's desire, and Jesus' sending to announce grace and peace.

I. Discipleship Results by Christ’s Sending

Eph.

1:1 Paul is called an “apostle” (αποστολος).

The term causes a bit of a problem, because when Luke wrote Acts of the Holy Spirit he gave a definition for an Apostle that the Apostles used as a criteria to chose a person to take Judas’ place.

Acts 1:21-22

An apostle was with Jesus at His baptism

Followed around with them

Saw Jesus ascend to heaven.

Paul does not fit that criteria.

And yet Paul calls himself an Apostle.

So how are we supposed to understand Paul’s title?

Words have a semantic range, meaning that they have a range of meanings they can represent.

It is a exegetical fallacy to throw all the available meanings of a word to each occurence of a word.

Context limits the meaning of the words.

So how are we supposed understand “apostle”?

We must try to understand the meanings of the word.

An ancient meaning is “a.

sent, dispatched: ἀ. πλοῖον merchant ships” (GE, 272).

Ships were dispatched with a cargo.

A meaning closer to the time of Paul was of a “delegate” and also as “2. of messengers with extraordinary status, esp. of God’s messenger, envoy” (BDAG, 122).

Luke defines the word as a specific office.

Matthew 10:2 also uses the word as Apostolic office.

Luke also calls Barnabas and Paul apostles in Acts 14:4, 14.

Did Luke forget criteria of Peter in Acts 1:21-22?

Either there is a specific Apostolic office for certain people in the New Testament, and maybe even now.

Or we can understand that apostle was used of Barnabas and Paul after they were sent by the church in Antioch.

It is a title of a missionary.

Paul consideres himself as being “sent” as apostle.

But Paul’s apostleship is in construct to “Christ Jesus.”

The possessive nature of “Christ Jesus” has a qualifying or limiting effect on Paul and his being sent (Genitive: Wallace, 76).

Paul is not a free agent, nor is he someone who chooses his agenda and his message.

The Holy Spirit had the church set aside Paul and Barnabas for this ministry.

There are two things that is important to note of the sender:

Christ is the Greek for Messiah, the anointed on of God.

In the Old Testament, the high priest was anointed (Lev.

4:5) and the kings of Israel were “anointed” (1 Sam.24:6) and part of the imagery is one of Priest/Lordship.

– Paul was trying to kill all those who followed Christ, and now Paul is calling Jesus the Messiah!

The Christ is Jesus.

Christ is not really a name, many take it that way but it is a title.

Paul identifies the Christ as being Jesus.

Psa.

2:2 Jesus is the Anointed of God.

There are some who try to equate God the Father with God the Son, modalism, but the anointed one is not God the Father.

One God, but different persons.

Paul identifies Jesus as being the Messiah

And that Jesus as authority to send, and that the authority to send should be obeyed.

To whom is Paul being sent to?

Contextually, Paul was sent to believers in Ephesus.

Ephesus was a city on the western shore of present day Turkey.

“Ephesus was the third largest city in the Roman empire.

Its population is estimated to have been around 250,000 during the time of early Christianity” (Lexham Bible Dictionary).

Paul first arrived in Ephesus during his second missionary journey (Acts 18:19-21).

In Acts 19:1, Paul was on his third missionary journey and he stopped off again in Ephesus.

At this time he stayed about 2 years and 3 months (3 years in Acts 20:31) reasoning and teaching them, so that all in Asia heard about Jesus (Acts 19:10).

People got saved and turned from their idol worship of Diana.

A silversmith named Demetrius started a riot because his business was affected.

Paul on his way back to Jerusalem desired to talk to the elders of the church in Ephesus (Acts 20:17).

This section has both the word for “elder” (πρεσβυτέρους) and for “bishop/overseers” (ἐπισκόπους) and their responsibility is to “shepherd” (ποιμαίνειν) the flock.

1 Tim.

3:1 A bishop/elder/pastor should “aspire” (ὀρέγεται Pres.

Mid.

Indc.

3rd Sg.).

Elders have a list of personal qualifications that need to meet.

Being an elder/bishop/pastor is a calling by God (Acts 20:28 ) to guard the flock by teaching the “word of His grace” to build up the believer (Acts 20:32).

Paul then sent Timothy to go and minister in Ephesus (1 Tim.

1:3).

John the beloved Apostle – there is a tradition that John ministered there for some time.

Jesus – Even Jesus was involved in this ministry: Rev. 2:1-7.

They have been able to tell the difference between orthodoxy and heterodoxy.

But they had lost their first love!

Paul address the Ephesians by two qualifiers:

“Saints” (ἁγίοις) – The word can mean something pure or sacred, but it also can mean “as adj.

pert.

to being dedicated or consecrated to the service of God” (BDAG, 10).

They were set apart for God’s service.

“Believers” (πιστοῖς) The word can have two meanings.

It can mean 1. pertaining to being worthy of belief or trust, trustworthy, faithful, dependable, inspiring trust/faith or it can mean “2.

pert.

to being trusting, trusting, cherishing faith/trust act.

aspect of πιστεύω” (BDAG, 821).

The problem with understanding the πιστοις as faithful is that it sets the purpose of the letter being between the faithful and the unfaithful.

But that does not seem to be the point of the letter.

Rather the letter is addressing those who are believing or believers.