If you have your Bible turned to the 16th chapter of Roman, I'm doing something that's quite unusual for me. Whenever I come on a list of names, I point out a couple of them and move on. But I decided that this time, when I came up to this list of names like in the 16th chapter, I was going to spend some time and find out about these people. I mean, they were acquaintances of mine. I wanted to make them friends. And so what I'm taking time to do, and I hope you like this as much as I do. I'm just taking some time to find out everything I can find out about these folks and to share that with you. Our text is Romans 16, 1 through 16. Before we turn to that, let's go before the throne. Father, we're thankful for all you've done for us, for your care and your kindness and your love. Father, we're thankful for another week. Remind us that we wear the royal purple. Remind us that this isn't our kingdom that you have prepared for us another city. Remind us of the time when history's over, when every book will be balanced, and when Jesus will return. But Father, until then, it's hard that here's well up in our eyes, our hearts get broken, people betray us. We listen to lies, sometimes we're confused, sometimes we're doubtful, and sometimes we're sinful, and so we're here. And we're here because we don't have any other place to go. Once one sees truth, Father, and you reveal the truth to us, it's hard to unsee it. And so, Father, we come as your people as children would come to a Father, as one would come to one who knows. We trust you, and we love you. Help us to trust you more, and to love you deeper, and to serve you better. Father, we lift before you our needs, you know everyone of them. You knew them before we were born. We ask that you would meet us at the point of the needs that we have, when we ask that you would, that you would define those needs. Father, we praise you because you're worthy of our praise. We adore you, and we worship you. We submit to you totally, and we submit to no other. Father, you are God, and we're not reminding us. And now, Father, as we study your Word, we pray for the one who teaches that you would forgive him his sins. They call him reverend, and he's not. We would see Jesus, and him only, and we pray in Jesus' name. I'm in. Guys, I don't have any idea how long we're going to take on this 16th chapter. I'm just going to take my time. I don't have any deadline. Nothing has to be done by any particular time. I'm simply going to take the time to look at all these people. I mean, there's some wonderful folks in this. You ever look at the church and think how fortunate you are to be a part of the family of God. Boy, I do sometimes, and I can close my eyes and names and pictures and faces go before my mind's eye. And I see those who have loved me when nobody else did, and who supported me when nobody else believed in me, who cared, who never kicked me out, who knew that I wasn't always a good person. But who are still my friends, and that's important to be a part of a fellowship like that, and we're looking at the fellowship of Paul's friends. Romans 16, 1 through 16 first, and then we'll drop down to some other verses. Let me read it. I commend to you, Phoebe, our sister, who is a servant of the church in Korea, and we looked at Phoebe, that you may receive her in the Lord in a manner worthy of the saints, and a sister in whatever business she has need of you. For indeed, she has been a helper of many and of myself also. Greek Priscilla and Aquila, and we looked at them, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus, who risked their own necks for my life, to whom not only I give thanks, but also all the churches of the Gentiles. Likewise, Greek the church that is in their house. Greek my beloved epinators, who is the first fruits of Achaea to Christ. Greek Mary, who labored much with us, Greek Andronicus, and Junia, my countryman and fellow prisoners, who are of note among the apostles, who also were in Christ before me. Greek Amplius, my beloved in the Lord, Greek Urbana, Sire fellow worker in Christ, and Stekas, my beloved Greek Appellis, approved in Christ, Greek Aristobulus, and those who are of the house of Aristobulus, Greek Herodian, my countryman, Greek, those who are in the household of Narcissus, who are in the Lord. Greek Trisina, and Trifosa, who have labored in the Lord. Greek the beloved purses, who labored much in the Lord. Greek Rufus, chosen in the Lord, and his mother in mind, Greek S. Cretos, Flagon, Hermus, Petrobus, Hermes, and the brethren who are with them. Greek Fologus, and Junia, near Reus, and his sister, Olympus, and all the saints who are with them, Greek one another with a holy kiss, the churches of Christ, greet you. And then we brought down to verses 21 through 23 where Paul gives the names of the people who are with them who greet the people in Rome. Timothy, my fellow worker, and Lucius, Jason, and Sasa Potter, my countryman, greet you. I, Tertias, who wrote this epistle, greet you in the Lord. Gaeus, my host, and the host of the old church, greet you. Arastus, the treasure of the city, greet you, and Cordus, of brother, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, be with you all men. Now, if you've been listening, we have gone through Priscilla and the Quilla, and we saw six things about them that are just dynamite. And now, we're going to move on with the list, and if you have your Bible open, you want to turn down to the 16th verse, the 5th verse of the 16th chapter, the second part of that verse. A great, my beloved, Efonitos, or Efonitos, who is the first fruits of the Quilla to Christ, first fruits, rivers, to the first converts to Christ. And in 1 Corinthians 16 and 15, Paul says that the household of Stephanotus was the first fruits in the Quilla. Now, it would be logical to assume that Efonitos was the first member of that household. That is everything we know about Efonitos, but it is interesting to see that he was the forefather, and that dear friend is no mean thing. It's easy to become a Christian when there's a big ground. It's hard when you're the only one, but the rewards are great. You know, it's kind of in, and some places to be a Christian now. If you want to be on the end group, if you want to know the people are really with it, become a Christian. But I'll tell you something, if you're the only one, and Jesus comes to you, and you follow him, that is no mean thing. When I was pastor of Kibis Game Presbyterian Church, there were a number of members who were there, who were there at the beginning of the church. They had started meeting at a bar on Kibis Game, and then they went to a school and finally their own building. I still love to listen to those members talk about the old days. They would tell the story about Gladys Aleword, the little missionary lady whose ministry was chronicled in the end of the sixth happen. She used to go to that church. She would come to the church, and they would tell of her telling them when Jesus had come, they came. They didn't form a committee, and the one meeting the little church was looking for a land, and they tell about how she prayed. They were at the hotel there on Kibis Game, and she stomped her foot and said, Lord, this little church is yours. These are your people, your property, and I ask in the name of Jesus Christ that they have their land so they can serve you better. You know what happened the next day they had their land. I love to listen to those who were in the beginning talk about how everyone thought they were fanatics and how they had lost friends because of their commitment to Christ. It is good to listen to the stories in the beginning. You know, we can do that when we read the book of Acts. We can hear the stories of those who were there at the beginning. We do that when we read church history, and when we do that, we need to be thankful for those who have gone on before us. Their faithfulness is the stuff of which we need to build our faithfulness, so that the next generation should the Lord dare, it will be thankful for us. I'm glad, by the way, that I became a fundamentalist evangelical orthodox Christian when it wasn't popular to be one. We have won the battle dear friend. Theological liberals have quite simply lost the battle. Our books sell, and our churches are growing, there's our dying. Mission organizations have replaced all the missionaries they called homes. Some of you have asked me about the Jesus seminar where it's the dying gasp of the dragon of liberalism, where some theological liberal tweets voted on what Jesus said and what he didn't say, and then they had a second session he voted on what he did do and what he didn't do. You will note that I haven't said much about that on key life. You know why? Because they don't matter. They're members of a dying breed. They're sort of like to fly on the cow's tail, and the fly said to the cow I'm leaving you now, and the cow responded, oh really, I didn't even know you were there. Today everybody wants to be an evangelical, but I kind of remember when our churches were the small churches. I remember when the pastor of the largest church in the town where I was serving walked on the other side of the street because he didn't want to be seen with me. I remember the way my liberal friends laughed when I told him I was becoming an orthodox evangelical. You know you'll all grow it and you're looking for an obscuredness soft place, but I'm still here, guys. I'm still here and I'm still trucking so there. One of the things I do for my students is to tell them the stories of the way it used to be when it wasn't a very good idea to be a Bible believer. These students need to be told, and I suspect that F&S did that too with the people that came along. They would sit down with him and they would say, hey, Fee, would you, that's what they called him. I know that. They would say, hey, Fee, tell us a story about the way it was before we knew him. It's very important for those who have gone on before to share the stories. See Jesus gave us stories, and then we have our own stories that we're to share with other people, and we are the platform on which others build as we have built. F&A does, greet my beloved, who is the first fruits of IKEA to Christ. It's easy to follow him when there's a bunch. It's not so easy. When you're the only one. Now let's move on to the 6-verse, greet Mary, who labored much for us. Now there are lots of Mary's in the Bible. Not the least of which was Mary, the mother of Jesus. Not the least of which was Mary, the mother of Jesus. Mary Magdalene, but there is no indication that this Mary is any of the others referred to in the other places. Mary was quite simply a common name, but Mary must have been a bearer of that name with great-grakes. There was Mary, the mother of Jesus, Mary Magdalene. I suspect that every time she met somebody new, they would say, are you that Mary and she would say no, but I'm proud to bear her name. You know I have a student at the seminary named Steve Brown and I say to him, now son, you be careful because we could hurt each other really bad. If you or I either want to decide to leave the faith, let's promise each other that we're going to change our names. My mother told me stories about Stephen in the Bible. He was, you will remember, the first vice president of the Board of Deacons. He was stoned to death. You will find that story in the book of Acts on the 7th chapter. I can remember thinking about Stephen and knowing that my name was the same name as his. I was inspired by that name and the faithfulness that he had. I'm Stephen, and that's a good name, Stephen, and you spell it right, S-D-E-P-A-G-N. When you do it with a V, that's not the way the Bible does it. And I think about Stephen. I think about bearing that name in the world and I'm glad that I'm named Stephen. Do you know the story about Alexander the Great and Alliated cowardice? Each Thursday on the battlefield he had a judgment day, and those who had proven unfaithful in battle. Those who had run away who had shown cowardice were brought before Alexander. In almost all cases, those who were charged were executed because Alexander absolutely hated cowardice. On one occasion a young man was brought before Alexander who had run and hidden in the midst of the battle. Those who were there said that Alexander's face soften when he looked at the young man. Nobody remembered when that had happened. Perhaps Alexander was thinking about the girlfriend the boy had back home. Maybe he was thinking about the family they would have when they got married. Maybe he was thinking about the boy's parents. The contribution the young man would make to the empire after the war. But for whatever reason Alexander's face soften, then nobody could remember when that had happened. And he asked, very softly, young man, what is your name? The young man was shaking in his boots and he said, I have Alexander sir, he replied. And then the features of Alexander changed radically from softness to anger. Fire came from his eyes and he walked up to the young man, picked him up and threw him in the dirt and he said, young man, either change your name or change your ways. Mary bore the name of Mary with grace and faithfulness. Listen dear friend, if you are a Christian you bear the name of Christ and that is a good thing to remember. And then if I had time and that would be too far off the subject to pursue, but if I had the time, we would talk about what they say in the book of Revelation that we are going to have a new name in heaven. And the name is going to reflect the essence of the person that we are. But we will save that for another day. Albert, there is a lot in a name and we all, every one of us who belong to Christ, bear the name of Christ. And we got to be really careful that we bear that name, very careful. Lee. All right. Now let's move on to the 7th verse. Great Adronicus and Junia, my countrymen and fellow prisoners who are of note among the apostles who were in Christ before me. Now some translations say Junicus instead of Junia, which would mean that he or she is a he. They may have been brothers, husband and wife, brothers, sister, or just two guys. I don't know. I think it's Junia, though. We would call her Jun. And you say, well, he says countrymen, he must mean they were both men. No, no. That was generic language. It was before the advocators of political and correctness got a hold of the translation. And anyway, there are two things that you need to note here about these two guys are this guy and this lady. First, they were fellow prisoners in John Jake's novel on the Revolutionary War. Philip says to his friend, I hope to have the honor to meet you in Paris one day. If not Paris, then somewhere, I have a feeling, somewhere, a battle for you, well, who can say, but comrades and arms always keep encountering one another. That's a truth old soldiers know with certainty. You know what I like to do? I've done it a while, but I used to go to West Point, and I love to go there. I was never in the service. When it was time to join up, I had this strange feeling out of going to ministry, and I went down, but I never did sign up. And that was a time when there was no war, you got a free trip on Uncle Sam. Most of my friends went 82nd airborne and they served in Germany, and they would send me these cards like, wish you were here and stuff like that, and I was slaving away. So I was never in the service, but I have to go to West Point because I like to watch those guys and those men and women in our armed services. And West Point's a fun place to go. By the way, when I speak at West Point, sometimes the chairman of our board, Harper Davidson, who's a full colonel in the reserves, goes along with me, and they say that I'm the only preacher who comes to West Point with a full colonel as an aide, because I get a chance to see the fellowship. That's great. The camaraderie of those who have been through the fire together, I love to listen to them tall. And that's what Paul was talking about when he's talking about Andronicus and Junia. I mean, they didn't just share a platform together, they shared a prison cell together. And I'll tell you something, those are the guys you'll learn to trust. I mean, when I'm in a battle with somebody, I know then that I can trust them. There's no deeper bond, that the bond that can be established when Christians go through the fire together. Listen to what Paul says of some of the suffering he went through. Second grunting is 11, 23, 23, 27. Are they ministers of Christ? I speak as a fool. I'm more. And labor's more abundant and stripes above measure and prisons more frequently and deaths often. From the Jews five times, I receive 40 stripes minus one, three times. I've been beaten with rods. Once I was stone three times, I was shipwrecked night and a day and I've been in the beat. And journeys often in perils of waters and perils of robbers and perils of my own country and perils of the Gentiles and perils of the city and perils of the wilderness and perils in the sea and perils of my faults brethren and weariness and trial and sleeplessness often and hunger and thirst and fasting goffins and cold and nakedness. Now where you get from all that stuff, I mean that's not a very good advertisement for becoming your Christian. So what's in the football? Let me tell you at first his faithfulness. There's something good about going to bed at night and knowing you did. God told you to do even if it hurt. But the second thing you get out of it is that you get friends that last a lifetime and they become meaningful, they become beat, they become real. It's worth standing in the battle for Christ just to develop the friendships that you'll get because of. Those of you guys who keep your head in a Christian stand and are in a holy huddle, you just never, you don't understand. Paul understood it and that's why he loved Andronicus and Junior. They were people who shared a prison cell. And then there's something else about Andronicus and Junior that you need to see what Paul says. He says they were Christians before Paul was converted. One of the reasons I believe in the fundamental truths of the faith and the necessity of maintaining purity in the doctrinal position of the church is because there will be other generations of believers and they they do receive what we have received assuming the Lord carries. To everything that the person you belong to Christ is because or that the reason you belong to Christ is because people who belong to Christ before you did didn't shally, shally around with the truth. Let me tell you something. God isn't looking for creative Christians. He's looking for faithful Christians. Bryce Jackson, our vice president for operations at Key Life, was telling me the other day about a man by the name of Arty who went to the corner market with an idea to rob the market. The clerk behind the counter didn't have any money except the dollar and Arty got some mad. He choked into that. And then as Arty, the thief was leaving the corner market, a man and his wife came in and Arty thought, you know, they've seen me. I have to kill them too. So he choked into that and they had a line in the paper the next day read Arty chokes three for a dollar. And the whole town went down to get the cheap Arty chokes. I'm sorry. I just didn't know but it was there. The truth is, very easy to mess up. I mean, somethings can be passed along and you ever play that game gossip and go around the circle and find out what happened when it finally got back to you. So it's very important dear friends that we'd be very, very careful to get it right. That's why on Key Life, now I make mistakes. I'm not perfect but I want you to know on Key Life you're not going to hear anything except Orthodox Christianity. I mean, I check it out on the Bible and I work very hard and so does the staff to be faithful to the eternal varieties of the Christian faith. It's important because you can't get it right to somebody else unless you got it right. Let me say that again. You can't get it right to somebody else unless you got it right. And that's why those of us who have known Christ before we, those who have known Christ before we knew Christ are so important. And that's why it's so important for those of us who know Christ now. To keep it clear and clean for those who follow. All right, we're up to the eighth verse and we're going to look at another friend of Paul by the name of Amplius. Roman 168, it says, Grete, Amplius, my beloved in the Lord, I'm going to say something interesting about Amplius, Amplius or Amplius. It was a common slave name and it appears on a tomb in the catacombs as a servant in the royal household. How about that? You know, the odds are that it's the same guy who was buried in the catacombs. Now, you say, what are the catacombs? Well, those were the caves where the early Christians worshipped. People are talking about the grand edifices that we have is true and I love beautiful church buildings. I'm not one who throws rocks in that sort of thing. I even like the crystal cathedral. I don't think I'd want to be a pastor there because I like to have baseball games in the parking lot. You can't do that if your church is made out of glass. But I'm not throwing rocks at that kind of thing. But we need to remember that the church building is not what the church is all about. The early Christians worshipped in caves and we might do better if we worshipped in caves too. But anyway, in those caves where they worshipped, you'll find a tombstone or burial stone that will refer to Amplius and he's called the servant in the royal household. Amplius was a faithful servant in the household of power, Edward Allison, who was the chaplain in the senate for a whole bunch of years just before Richard Halberton. After he retired, I had lunch with him and I begged him and he did it. So he got out his scrapbooks and we sat there in his front yard and looked through the scrapbooks. And he had been a chaplain to the senate for 100,000 years. He'd known a bunch of presidents. When I said to him something very profound and spiritual like, wow, man, well, it must have been something to know all those famous people and be a confidant of so many presidents. You know, he said to me, yes, at first it was pretty heavy stuff. And then I realized the only reason I'm here is that I represent Jesus Christ. I'm nothing. And he's everything. Every time I was at the White House, I said, I'm here for only one reason I am a representative of the King of Kings. I am a representative of Jesus Christ. I suspect that Amplias would have said something like that. You should do it. So should I. I have a friend who prays this Lord, lift me in the eyes of men and I will point to you. Pray that kind of prayer for yourself. And you will, if you mean it and you live it, you'll be very surprised at what God does in your life. What's the point? The point is that Amplias was a man who was given access into the royal household. Do you have access into some places? And if you're a teacher, have they made you the chairman of a special committee in the union? Are you a businessman and if they put you on a committee to really make a difference in the city? Are you a mother and do you head up the mother's group at your church? Are you a Bible teacher? Have you been given access because of Jesus? Just remember why you're there. You're not there to let peacock feathers fly in the breeze. You're not there to say, you know, I'm a wonderful person to ever see you, all of this. You are a representative of Jesus Christ. And I suspect that Amplias felt that way and when we get to know him, we're going to say, you know, that's a good thing you did, that you saw yourself as a representative. All right. Down to the ninth verse, note, urbanus and stacus. It's the ninth verse, Greek urbanus, our faithful worker in Christ. And stacus, my beloved, those names are common slave names too, by the way. Urbanus is a Roman slave name and stacus is a common Greek slave name. Now there are two things that you ought to remember here. First slaves were prominent in the early church and was the beginning of the abolitionist movement, by the way, that took place in Europe and eventually to America. The truth is that there's a direct line between what was written in the New Testament and will before us and the Clatman sect and England in the 18th century and Abraham Lincoln in the United States. The truth is that without the moral, an ethical basis taught in the New Testament and modeled in the early church, slavery would still be a viable and extant social institution in our culture. And I just talons anybody to refute that. In the early church, standing against an amazing cultural tide, there would often be, and I bet you didn't know this, there would often be slaves who were officers in the church. And the members, slave owners, were required to submit to the slaves of art. You know, how about that sportsman? What was happening? I'll tell you what was happening. Jesus had changed some lives. He had changed some views. He had made a difference in the cultural understanding. The next time some unbelieving twit tells you about the harm done by the Christian faith telling to take what I've just told you and put it in his pipe and smoke it. God changes lives and those changed lives affect social institutions. I'm, by the way, for some changes are social institutions. For instance, I think it's very hard to argue with those comments about Hollywood without looking like a moral pig me. I would like some kind of reference to God in our social institutions, prayers in our schools, but I take some friend. You can't change those things from the top. When we start affirming religious institutions that change lives, then those change lives will change what is happening in our society. Having to really make a difference with laws is like teaching the proverbial, dig-dressing. He can't do it anyway and it just makes him mad. And so what we see happening here is the beginning of the seed that was planted, that literally changed the world. You had a Greek and you had a Roman slave and they worshiped together and they loved each other in a church where they served and sometimes the slave owners even submitted to the slave. Then there's something else I want you to see about these guys. Note the cosmopolitan nature of the early church, Greeks and Romans, Jews and Gentiles. In church growth circles, and those of you who are into this will be just a review for you. There's a principle called the homogeneous principle. Now, that means that people who are alike will naturally gravitate together. If you're rich, you want to go to a church with rich folks, and if you're poor, you want to go to church with the poor folks. If you're a Latin, you'll want to go to church with Latins, and if you're a certain ratio, you'll want to go to church with the same race. If you're an intellectual, you want to go to church with intellectuals, and if you're a dummy like me, you want to go to church with dummies like me. Now, there are people who say that if you forget the homogeneous principle and try to mix things up, then you will not grow. Now that may be a sociological truth to your friend, but it isn't a biblical principle. In Galatians 3, 27 through 29, for as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew, nor Greek. There is neither slave, nor free. There is neither male, nor female. You are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ, then you are Abraham, Seed, and heirs according to the promise. What am I saying? I am saying this. You take the homogeneous principle and burn it, because listen, we're all one in Christ. In the early church model that, and we find that out by looking at these two friends that you're going to meet sometime when you're in heaven, two slaves, one of Greek, and one of Roman. We find them in the early church. Stakas and Erbanaus. When I was in Boston, there was a ministry of reckons. It was a reconciliation that came from Alabama to Boston to tell us what Jesus was doing in the area of reconciliation. Those who came in those days, the 50s and 60s were folks who had really paid a major price. I'm a Southern boy, and I love the South, and I believe the South is going to rise again and you ought to savor Confederate money, but we did some really bad things. I didn't mean that people in the North didn't do some bad things. They just hit it better. Those who stayed in the South and who were faithful to Christ in those days, they paid a price. People were coming from the North to the South, and then coming back home, and speaking to the ladies' aid societies on my trip to Selman, collecting their honorariums, and then going back to their nice safe homes. These people who stayed, one pastor told us about a cross being burned in his front yard and the fear of his family, his wife and children, and how he lived always with a horrible anxiety that he was going to be killed because a lot of people threatened it. At any rate, one of the men who came to Boston University where I was a student had had his trip paid for by a former member of the White Citizens Council, and this is what he told us, this man told him when the man gave in the check for the trip. Sam, there was a time when I thought that because I was white, I was better and that I needed to stand up for my race and the purity of it. But now that I found Jesus Christ, I see how silly and how superficial and how wrong I was because Jesus told me, and now there's only one color, and it's the color of Jesus. That's the way it works, folks. If you're a Christian and you haven't had your racial views, your ethnic views, your sociological views deeply affected, you need to go back to the room. It started in the first century, and it's still going on. Let me say it again. If you're a Christian and you haven't had your racial views, your ethnic views, your sociological views deeply affected, you need to go back to the room. Now we're going to move on with the list, and if you have your Bible open, you want to turn down to the 10th verse, the first part of it, where Paul says in Romans 1610, a, greet a Pellys approved in Christ. Not may not be the same man, but a Pellys was the name of a distinguished tragic actor in Rome at the time this letter was written. Now note what Paul says. He says that a Pellys is approved in Christ, and one wants to ask why Paul made this specific statement about a Pellys. Of course all Christians are approved in Christ. That's what Paul's been saying throughout the book of Romans. Why would Paul single out this one man as approved? Listen, and I'm going to tell you, because there was a tendency for the Christians in Rome just like the Christians in your church, not to approve of some folks. And the Pellys was one of those. I remember when I was a pastor, a young lady who was a professional ballet dancer, came to me, and this is what she said. She said, Steve, the gift I have to offer to the church in my worship is my dance. And I would like to offer that gift at a regular worship service, and I said something profound like your fruitcake. I need this job. If I let you dance, then I'm going to get fired, and then I've got to feed my family, I'm going to be able to feed my family, and we'll starve, and it'll all be your fault. But you know something more than I thought about it, and more I checked the script through. Do you know there's more about dance in the Bible than there is about evangelism? How about that sports, man? Well anyway, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that she had a legitimate gift. And she wanted to offer it to God and serve worship during our worship service. She worked up a magnificent dance with the music director. They had a song setting, and it was sung by the choir, and she danced to it. It wasn't improper, it wasn't erotic. It was just magnificent. It was quite moving. One of the most worshipable things I've ever seen. People were quite moved, or at least many people were quite moved, some were quite upset. Now I don't know why people get upset with me. I'm a lovable kind, non-controversial, sweet, gentle person. But for whatever reason those folks were upset about the dance of this young lady offered an answer gift of worship, they decided that she and what she did were simply not acceptable. I mean, if I'm going to get people angry, I'm as well to continue, do you have homosexuals in your church? Now I'm not talking about practicing homosexuals. I'm talking about those who are trying to live a celibate lifestyle and to be faithful to Jesus Christ. For some people, those kinds of people are simply not acceptable in the church. In the Jesus movement, and those were exciting days, that was a genuine great awakening in America. A lot of leaders in the church are standing strong because of those days in the Jesus movement when God, for reasons of His own, decided to sweep across the youth of America, and literally when Ritz of thousands of kids found Christ. Now I don't know because God doesn't check with me about hardly anything, but I kind of believe that the movement with men, promise keepers, is another example of God doing the same thing. Anywhere, way, I was serving a church in the Boston area at those times, and those kids came in droves to our church. They didn't look like us. They didn't talk like us. They didn't like the music we like, but I'll tell you something, they love Jesus a lot. As the pastor of the historic First Presbyterian church in the city of Presidents, Quincy, I had to evaluate a lot of my frequency of ideas. I find out, for instance, that one doesn't determine one's spirituality by the length of one's hair, or by the music that one listens to. Let me give you a principle, and it's important. No one is unacceptable to Jesus except those who think they are acceptable to Jesus. That's so good, I'm going to repeat it. And I believe it's true. No one is unacceptable to Jesus except those who think they are acceptable to Jesus. That's what Paul said about a Pellys. I suspect that a Pellys was an actor. The Christians, both the Jewish and the Greek and the Romans, Christians, said to themselves, he's not going to be a part of our church, he's one of those, well, you know, he's one of those. And he's just not acceptable in our church. Paul said, I believe a Pellys may not fit your cultural proclivities. He is after all an actor, and you know about actors. But no one is unacceptable to Jesus except those who think they are acceptable to Jesus. Now, let's move on to the 10th verse and the second part of the 10th verse. In verse 10b, this is what Paul says, greet those who are of the household of Aristopoulos. And not a wonderful name. When you've got a name like Steve Brown, you would like to have a name like Aristopoulos. I'd like to go into a hotel and when I signed the registry, I would sign it as Aristopoulos Brown. Wouldn't it be something? When I go to Steve Brown, sort of like John Doe. He came to me one time and said, you know, your ministry has changed my life. And he said, I want to introduce you to my friends. He called her friend over and she turned to me and turned red. And she said, I'm so embarrassed. I don't remember your name. Well, everybody forgets a name like Steve Brown. But if my name was Aristopoulos Brown, you would remember. Anyway, Aristopoulos was the grandson of Herod the Great and a friend of the Emperor Claudius. And Paul says that there were Christians who were of his household. Now, what does it mean to be in the household of someone? It means to be his or her slave. And so here, again, we see the connection of Christians to power. Not many were powerful, but a whole lot of early Christians were associated with powerful people. Now, we saw this when we looked at another friend and Plius, who was a servant in the Emperor's household. Aristopoulos was a very fortunate man. And the mass greeting to the servants in his household suggests that when his servants became Christians, they became better servants. The very fact that Paul mentions the whole household means that Aristopoulos must have encouraged his servants in their involvement in the church, or it would never have happened. Because they were slaves. Now, why did Aristopoulos do that? He wasn't a Christian, but he wasn't stupid. And he recognized that when somebody becomes a Christian, they become a better servant, or a better lawyer, a better preacher, or a better grocer, or a better teacher, or a better garbage collector. One of the most dangerous things that can happen with Christians is that they can use their faith to settle their scores. You say, I don't understand that. Oh, yes you do. Let me tell you, let me explain. Maybe you have someone in your family who drives you up a wall, and then you become a Christian and you go to that person and say, in effect, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I'm a Christian. And I'm going to heaven, and you're going to hell, and I'm glad. It happens. We're not that wonderful. This has been a particular problem with teenagers. Our teenagers by their very nature are rebellious. Now that's not good. It's just a fact. Now it's bad enough when that rebellion, establishing their own identity, apart from their parents, is just plain old human rebellion, but when a teenager becomes a Christian and decides to use her, his or her faith to focus that rebellion, something is horribly out of whack. My mother was one of the most godly women I've ever known, but when I was a teenager, I carried a Bible to school because I knew it drove her up a wall. I joined a Bible study now. I want you to know that only last year. I became an agnostic after that, so I'm not sure when I became a Christian, but now my mother was a Christian. She was godly, and she wanted me to read the Bible, but I just, I guess, in my adolescent rebellion and went as far as I carried this big old black Bible to school with me. She went to our pastor, our Methodist pastor, and she said, but you talking to my son, he's becoming a fanatic, and he's really weird. And later, when I really did come to know Christ, I looked back and I saw what I'd done and I was quite ashamed. Now, that I've confessed, let me meddle just a bit, are you using your faith as a weapon on your wife or your husband? You use such phrases as, I wish my husband could be the spiritual leader of our home, or my wife simply does not love God, the way I love God, listen, stop it. The truth is that a truth that we learn from Aristotle is too wit, when a servant becomes a Christian servant, he or she's a better servant. When a husband becomes a Christian husband, he or she becomes a better husband. When a wife becomes a Christian wife, she becomes a better wife. When a citizen becomes a Christian, he or she becomes a better citizen. That's why pagans should never fear Christians in the political arena. You ever, I don't know if I'm a part of the Christian right, I agree with those views. I guess I am a part of the Christian right. You ever get the feeling that pagans think we're monsters? The first thing we're going to do is go out and take all their books and all their movies away and we're going to fix it so unless they bow their head to Jesus that we're going to cut their heads off. We're in the world that they get those stupid ideas. I'll tell you, if I was a pagan, I'd want everybody but me to be a Christian because you can fleece Christians, but I'll take some of them. I'd want people to be Christians because if you understand what the Bible says, if you become a Christian, then you become a better citizen. Not only that, you become a better citizen who gives other citizens the freedom to worship as they want to worship. The freedom to be the person they're called to be. Listen, our freedoms in America didn't just come out of the blue because some Greeks sat around and said, wouldn't it be nice to be free? Go tell your pagan friends that. Listen, the reason we're free in America is because some Christians saw the value of freedom. So when they characterize the religious right as a bunch of nuts who are out with axes, carry nations to go into their bars and destroy their booze, and that's not what we're about. It's not a way. I'll tell you something. If you become a Christian, you become a better citizen, a more loving citizen, a more open citizen. And that's the truth that we can learn from the household of Aristotle's. You think about that? I'm in.