Turn with me in God's word this morning, for the 14th chapter of the book of Acts as we read from the 21st verse. Paul and Barnabas left for Derbe. They preached the good news in that city and won a large number of disciples. Then they returned to Listera, Iconium and Antioch, strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith. We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God, they said. Paul and Barnabas appointed elders in each church, with prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord in whom they had put their trust. After going through Pesidia, they came into Pamphilia and when they preached the word in Pergo, they went down to Attalia. From Attalia, they sailed back to Antioch where they had been committed to the grace of God for the work that they now completed. On arriving there, they gathered the church together and recorded all that God had done through them and how he had opened the door of faith to the Gentiles. And they stayed there a long time with the disciples. Amen. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, draw close, we pray you and grant that by your word you shall speak to each of our souls afresh through Jesus Christ and to His praise. Amen. One of the most striking and significant things that we see as we read of the story of this first missionary journey is the fact that Paul and Barnabas kept on going. Facing every difficulty enduring every hardship and knowing the challenges that were in front of them, they kept on going. They set their eyes upon the Lord, they knew the task that was theirs and they didn't give up on that task. From the time they set foot in Antioch, for the time they arrived at this town where they knew both encouragement as they saw the work of the gospel prosper. They saw men and women become Christians, they saw small communities of faith establish, but at the same time they saw challenges, they encountered difficulty and they felt the pain of rejection for himself being stoned and driven from the cities in which he preached the gospel. They had been driven out of each of the towns to which they had gone with the gospel of Christ and yet despite the difficulties, despite the hardships and despite the rejection they kept on going. Knowing the grace of perseverance in the face of challenges is one of the Greek trials. Sometimes one of the great temptations to the soul of every Christian for each of us who are called by God, in whom His Holy Spirit has done that work by which we have been called from this world to become citizens of heaven, which we have known the power of Christ, every one of us who has loved Christ and has been sent by Him into the darkness of this world has known the reality of opposition and we struggle with the grace of perseverance. To go forward and yet to endure, to be able to be constant with the message and the challenge that is given to us by the Lord and yet to face the reality of rejection and of hardship. We see here as Paul and Barnabas are engaged in the task of preaching the gospel that they persevered. Paul and Barnabas not only came to Derby but having been rejected there, having established a community of faith, they returned to each of the towns from which they had been driven. They went back for more pain, they returned to the places of being badly treated because they have the gospel. They preached the same message, they didn't depart from that which had been entrusted to them for it was the grace of Christ in His Word that was their only message. To us, each of us called by God, each of us set where we are, whether it's in homes, whether it's in workplaces, whether it's in schools. We are placed there as Christian men and women with a task and the task is to be God's people, to speak His Word, to live the life that His Spirit has given to us and to recognize that in being God's people set there not by accident nor by chance but given the opportunity, we are there called to be Christ's people. And it isn't easy. How then do we persevere? How do we keep going when there are challenges and difficulties, pains, problems and enemies that would seemingly overturn us? Here in these verses we are given a glimpse of what it was that called Paul and Barnabas and caused them to persevere and there isn't one of us here who doesn't need to learn afresh the lessons of what it means to persevere for Christ where He has put us. The first of the things that we see is that for Paul and Barnabas it was the message of Christ that lay at the heart of everything that they did. It wasn't simply that they were bloodends for punishment that caused them to go back to the very places that they'd endured rejection, rather it was the commitment not only to the work that they had been given but to the gospel that had entered into their soul. And the gospel, the good news, the power of Jesus Christ for precedence even over personal pain and welfare to the preached Christ for Paul and Barnabas would have been to abandon the thing that was deepest and dearest and most important to them. It was the power that had drawn them from hell and given them the hope of heaven, it was Christ and perseverance begins by recognizing the message that we have to speak is a message that has taken hold of us. It is a message that has brought life under the power of God's spirit that has drawn us from darkness to light, it is the power of Christ with in us. It isn't simply a compelling force, it isn't that we have a fine product to sell to a somewhat apathetic world, it is that we have known what it is to come to life. It is Christ and it is the vision of Christ that keeps us where we are. We recognize that there are difficulties, we recognize that there is pain in the process of what we do but that pain shouldn't discourage us and doesn't because life has quickened us. Christ who is the hope of our hearts is the vision of our eyes, the Christ who has God become flesh, who has born our sins and the consequences of our sins in his own body, in that he went to Calvary to die upon the cross in our place. By his glorious resurrection, his Holy Spirit imputes the righteousness that he is to us so that we shall be called children of God, our sins imputed to him, his sinlessness and righteousness imputed to us so that we stand as God's people. People, that's the message it gives to us new dignity, new hope, it is that which has brought us to life, it's that that caused Paul and Barnabas to persevere, it was the gospel that they had known, not simply in their head, but as the power of God overshadowed them, that gave to them a freshness of life. Some of us have been privileged to stand with our wives and witness the miracle of childbirth, but few of us who have stood there have said because of this pain we will never have another child. Though it is true that there is great pain and some of us have learned not to say the next one will be easier. But the reality of pain doesn't prevent us from commitment, and that's true for the gospel ministry, where we are as Christ's people will bring to us pain, there is challenge, there are births that doesn't mean that we do not go forward. Pain in the ministry goes with the reality of being called into Christ's presence, and each one of us is called to the ministry of God's word where we are, each of us placed there that we shall speak for him. And as a consequence, we may expect the reality that pain is a part of us, for the apostle Paul he could say, what do we if I do not preach the gospel? He was conscious of the fact that his life would not know peace if he surrendered that which was deepest to him, and so persistence became the hallmark of his life, though he was beaten, though he was rejected, though he was stoned, he kept going. Not because he was a glutton for punishment, but because the love of Christ constrained him. That's the vision that keeps us going in the face of human opposition of pain. Emerson said, the assistance is the hallmark of the hero, it's the hallmark of the chosen of God. It's the hallmark of those who know that they are called by God's mercy filled with God's goodness, and empowered with God's spirit to speak of him. David Livingston, the great missionary, hunted in Africa by those who would kill him because of his opposition to the slave trade, deserted by those who had worked with him, beset by malaria that seemed almost to consume his life, he was alone and seemingly dying on the bank of the river, and he could write in his diary, I am immortal till my work is done. I will keep going because the love of Christ possessed me. Persistence begins with the reality of the power of Christ making our hearts, the gospel, transformation. But it goes on here, as Paul and Barnabas make clear, persistence faces the future honestly. You can't keep going if you have created a dishonest picture of tomorrow. Paul and Barnabas are very clear, the message is through many tribulations we shall enter the kingdom of heaven. They face the future, they face their problems, they didn't sugarcoat what tomorrow would hold. They had no illusion about the cost of following Jesus Christ, it would be through many trials. Paul knew that the life for the Christian was going to be unfair and unjust. Many of us tell our children, when they complain and say it isn't fair, I didn't get what my brother got, and we say life isn't fair. Live with it. The Christian not only knows that life is not fair, it is doubly unfair. For the Christian not only is going to experience the pain of being human, but will know the unjust life triumph. They will know the reality of unfairness, one little ditty sums it up. The reason is this, the reign it reigneth every day upon the just and unjust fella, but mainly on the just for the unjust stole the just umbrella.
Paul knew that Christians would suffer for the very name of Christ, that the love of Christ would bring them odium in this world. He knew from experience that he would have to deal with pain, and so he says through many tribulations, we will enter the kingdom of heaven. The vision is clear, but so also is the way forward honestly faced. He didn't pretend that his would be an easy road, though he had a message that every man and woman needed. He had a message of life that would bring joy, forgiveness, hope, yet he knew that the world would hate Christ and would reject it. There would be many tribulations that he went on. There are discouragements, there are going to be discouragements in life, but that doesn't stop us. It doesn't set us back. There are stories that would fill volumes, no doubt, from the experiences of Christians in this congregation, of the discouragements that come from the unjust and just treatment of this world, and sometimes God forgives us from the injustice in the church. That doesn't stop us. Keeping on. Methodist candidates committee in England listened to this testimony in the sense of call of one young man who offered himself for Christian service ministry. And they said to him, we sense no call in you and your gifts are inadequate for the task of ministry. And so they rejected G. Campbell Morgan, who became one of the greatest preachers of his generation. Emissions board heard the tale of a young woman who said, I am called of God to go to China. And they said, you are not educated, you are not equipped and glad is there would date her own way. Preach the gospel to work for him because they will call. They face the reality that there will be tribulations. The fact is, when we are honest about the future, we are not disappointed and shattered when the future unfolds itself as having trials. Because we love Christ and the world does not, we will know pain. But honesty prepares us for that. There is a third thing that we see here. As we seek to persevere, we see also that we are instructed to prepare for the future we aren't people simply of the moment. Paul and Barnabas went from church to church and as they saw the work of God, we are told they appointed elders in every church with prayer and with fasting. They didn't believe that they were indispensable to what God was doing. They knew themselves to beat tools in the hands of the Lord and they were content to bear that with their eyes set upon the future they prepared for the next generation. They said about elders, wasn't easy for them because these were young converts but they were nonetheless people who had maturity to leave the body of Christ into tomorrow. Paul and Barnabas, as they said, their eye upon the future, they trusted the Lord. Most of us talk about that and rarely do it in the reality of pain and of difficulty and of challenge. They were forced to. They saw the future and they said, it is God's future. We will set our best seal. We will do our best. We will appoint Godly people to lead the family of faith but ultimately they had to trust the Lord. For each of us to persevere without knowing what the future holds without being able to shape the future, we have to trust God. To trust Him with what we can't see and what we can't control, many of us find our hardest of all. To be able to say it is His future and to be able to hand it to Him with having done the best that with frail hands and tools we can do, we are able to trust Him. We see finally that they were able to rejoice in God's goodness. When they returned to the very church that had commissioned them and sent them out and supported them, we are told they declared all that God had done with them. And it took a while. They parried there in the church at Antioch and they spoke of the Lord and they rejoiced in the work of God. The report wasn't. We were stoned. We were rejected. Nobody wanted us. The church is under persecution. There are terrible dark clouds building ill for the future. Instead they said this is what God has done. He has opened up a new way to reach Gentiles. There is a church established on these roots that lead into the heart of the empire. God is still at work building His kingdom. It reminds us, whenever we see the storm clouds and the darkness and the challenges, we declare in the midst of them the good hand of God in blessing. Because in the place of challenge oftentimes our hearts begin to fail. He knew what it was to confront reality and to find it a dismal place to be. And He said, why are thou cussed down within me, O my soul? Why? Because the world was all wrong because the future seemed dark and dismal and painful. Hope thou in God. And suddenly He spoke to Himself and He spoke to those around Him of the grace of God, of the goodness and the freshness of the messes of God. To persevere we have to remind ourselves that God still is sovereign, He is Lord and through there are challenges. Through there is darkness, difficulties, there is rejection. God is still the Lord, His work continues to prosper. The door of faith was open to those who had not heard previously. The Gentiles who had been excluded have been drawn in the church and growing. And God is still good. Remind yourself, speak to yourself of the mercy of God and thus you can persevere. This story is a story of excitement and expansion that goes hand in hand with pain and opposition. They go together. You deal with the pain, the opposition as you rejoice in all that the Lord is doing, not blindly assuming that there is no pain, trusting your path to Him whose grace you have known. A grace that has lifted you from earth and given you the hope of heaven, all yours. It was the reason that even amidst discouragement He could be encouraged in Christ and He could go on. For you and for me, that same challenge, that same grace, that same call, go on for I am the Lord, persevere in that grace that is set in free for it is from God and He is your rock. Let's pray. I'll have only Father draw close to us.